The head of a pro-Israel Jewish-American group is urging Gov. Cuomo to block an invitation to have Muslim civil rights activist Linda Sarsour speak at a CUNY commencement ceremony.
In a letter to Cuomo, Zionist Organization of America president Morton Klein called Sarsour, the keynote speaker at the CUNY Grad School for Public Health graduation ceremony on June 1, “a bigot and divider” and “extremist” who supports the “anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.”
“Sarsour claims to care about bigotry — except when it is directed against Jews,” Klein told Cuomo.
Klein also cited Sarsour/s tweets, including one where she says “nothing is creepier than Zionism.”
Sarsour was a co-organizer of the January Women’s March in Washington.
In a statement, CUNY School of Public Health Dean Ayman El-Mohandes defended Sarsour’s selection and said the keynote speaker opposes all discrimination, including anti-Semitism.
“Ms. Sarsour supported an effort by a Muslim group to raise funds to repair a Jewish cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri vandalized in February, 2017, in an apparent anti-Semitic attack,” El-Mohandes said.
But Cuomo, who has visited Israel and opposes the boycott of the Jewish state, declined to second-guess the CUNY school’s speaking invitation to Sarsour.
“Commencement speakers at CUNY are selected independently by the individual campuses, and the Board [of Trustees]does not approve the process or have any say in the matter,” said Cuomo spokeswoman Abbey Fashouer.