Florida tells universities to disband pro-Palestinian group SJP over Hamas support

TALLAHASSEE, Forida — Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s administration is taking the extraordinary step of ordering state universities to ban a pro-Palestinian student organization from campuses, saying it illegally backs Hamas terrorists who attacked Israel earlier this month and massacred over 1,400 people.

As Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, aimed at destroying Hamas, has intensified, some college students have expressed solidarity with Palestinians, resulting in swift censure from some Jewish academics and even some prospective employers. But Florida has gone further, saying Students for Justice in Palestine is supporting a “terrorist organization.”

State university system Chancellor Ray Rodrigues wrote to university presidents Tuesday at Gov. Ron DeSantis’ urging, directing them to disband chapters of SJP. He quoted the national group’s declaration that “Palestinian students in exile are PART of this movement, not in solidarity with this movement.”

“It is a felony under Florida law to ‘knowingly provide material support … to a designated foreign terrorist organization,'” Rodrigues said in the letter.

War erupted after Hamas’s October 7 massacre, which saw some 2,500 terrorists burst across the border into Israel from the Gaza Strip by land, air and sea, killing some 1,400 people and seizing over 220 hostages of all ages under the cover of a deluge of thousands of rockets fired at Israeli towns and cities. The vast majority of those killed as gunmen seized border communities were civilians — including babies, children and the elderly. Entire families were executed in their homes, and over 260 were slaughtered at an outdoor festival, many amid horrific acts of brutality by the terrorists.

Israel says its Gaza campaign is aimed at destroying Hamas’s infrastructure, and has vowed to eliminate the entire terror group, which rules the Strip. It says it is targeting all areas where Hamas operates, while seeking to minimize civilian casualties.

Last week dozens of US national Jewish groups, campus organizations and state legislators signed a letter demanding universities withdraw their schools’ recognition of and funding for SJP.

SJP’s activities, according to the letter and a report by the Anti-Defamation League, included lauding the Hamas onslaught as a “historic win”; distributing materials with images of paragliders, which were used by Hamas members during the assault; endorsing violence, and making incendiary social media statements.

The US State Department designated Hamas a terrorist group in 1997. The European Union and other Western countries also consider it a terrorist organization.

Hamas won parliamentary elections in 2006 and a year later violently seized control of the Gaza Strip from the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority, dominated by rival Fatah movement, administers semi-autonomous areas of the West Bank which is under broader Israeli control.

DeSantis, who is running for president, has ramped up his pro-Israel stance since the October 7 Hamas massacres in southern Israel, which led to pro- and anti-Israel demonstrations around the world. The governor has sent planes to Israel to provide supplies and return Floridians there who want to come back.

He also is supporting a special legislative session to impose new sanctions on Iran, which supports Hamas, and to express support for Israel. So far, no government has presented evidence that Iran was directly involved in carrying out the attacks.

Students for Justice in Palestine has been on US campuses for decades, with frequent protests calling for the “liberation” of Palestine and boycotts against Israel. The loosely connected network says it has more than 200 chapters across the United States.

It has also played a central role in a campus movement known as BDS, calling for the boycott, divestment and sanction of Israel over its treatment of Palestinians. The national group didn’t immediately reply to an email seeking comment.

Palestine Legal, a group that provides legal support for pro-Palestinian groups, said the ban on SJP is part of a broader effort by DeSantis to suppress freedom of speech on campuses.

“Florida, particularly under the leadership of Governor Ron DeSantis, has been actively undermining education, freedom of speech and social justice movements, including by banning anti-racist courses and trying to criminalize protests. It is not surprising that this egregious move to silence the student movement for Palestinian rights is being pursued under DeSantis,” it said Wednesday in a statement.

Under DeSantis, Florida has limited how race can be discussed in schools, prohibited state universities from spending money on diversity, equality and inclusion programs and taken other actions that critics say limit free speech on campus.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a free speech group, called Florida’s directive unconstitutional and dangerous and said the government does not have the legal authority to force colleges to ban SJP chapters.

“If it goes unchallenged, no one’s political beliefs will be safe from government suppression,” the group said in a statement.

The ban came after the only Jewish Republican in the state Legislature switched his support in the presidential election from DeSantis to former president Donald Trump, saying DeSantis doesn’t back up his pro-Israel words with action.

Rep. Randy Fine, who has advised DeSantis on Israel and Jewish policy, said he had called on the administration to take action against the student group but there was none until he released a strongly worded op-ed explaining his decision to switch his endorsement.

“It shouldn’t have taken me endorsing Trump to make it happen. I was begging them for two weeks and was just getting the Heisman at every turn,” Fine said, referring to the college football trophy depicting a player holding his arm out to fend off opponents.

The governor’s office said the ban was in the works for more than a week, however.

“The action, taken by the administration had nothing to do with Representative Fine. Any implication otherwise is nothing more than political grandstanding. Randy Fine is not the center of our universe,” DeSantis spokesman Jeremy Redfern said via email.

Students for Justice in Palestine and several other groups called for a national student walkout on college campuses Wednesday to demand an end to Israeli attacks on Gaza and to US financial backing for Israel. Walkouts were planned on campuses from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, to the University of California, Los Angeles.

Israel says its military campaign is aimed at destroying Hamas and that it is targeting terrorist infrastructure while making efforts to avoid civilian casualties.

Thousands are believed to have been killed, but the figures issued by the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry cannot be independently verified. They are believed to include its own terrorists and gunmen killed in Israel and in Gaza as well as the victims of a blast at a Gaza City hospital on October 17 caused by a misfired Islamic Jihad missile.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad have continued to barrage southern and central Israel with rockets, as have terror groups in southern Lebanon, displacing over 200,000 Israelis.