Professor suspended after harassing Muslim woman

Muslim Affairs

Zionist ASU professor Jonathan Yudelman harasses a Muslim woman

A well-connected academic has been suspended from his university post after he was filmed aggressively harassing and abusing a Muslim woman in what appears to be a hate crime linked to his support for Israel. Jonathan Yudelman, a Zionist and Jewish political theory professor at Arizona State University, was suspended after he was filmed as a well-known Israeli reservist mocked and hurled personal and religious insults at a Muslim woman.

A widely shared one Online clip from Arizona portrayed Yudelman, who held positions at the prestigious universities of Princeton and Harvard and most recently worked at the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University, in an altogether less savory light. Accompanied by Sammy Ben, an Israeli soldier who took part in Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza filmed his mockery Among the prisoners, Yudelman can be seen, with his chest out and his arms raised threateningly, approaching a Muslim girl in a hijab who is clearly trying to get away from him and is defending himself against his insults.

Physical and verbal attacks

Continue to support MuslimMatters for the sake of Allah

Alhamdulillah, we have over 850 supporters. Help us reach 900 supporters this month. All you need is a small gift from a reader like you to keep us going, for just $2/month.

The Prophet (SAW) taught us that the best deeds are those that are done consistently, even if they are small.
Click here to support MuslimMatters with a monthly donation of $2 per month. Put it up and collect blessings from Allah (swt) for the khayr you support without thinking about it.

Jonathan Yudelman advanced on the Muslimah and threatened them.

While much of Yudelman’s speech is drowned out by Ben’s louder offers – including “Go back to Iran” and “Go back to jihad” – the professor can clearly be heard mocking the woman’s objections as she raises her hands to hold him back. As she begins, “You’re literally…” he interrupts, “I’m literally right in your face, that’s right!” and continues to make fun of her accent. As the woman protests, “You don’t respect my religious boundaries,” Yudelman grins with another chest-push, “You respect my sense of humanity, bitch.”

When bystanders – apparently the people who filmed the interaction – repeatedly shout “Hate crime!” Ben and Yudelman swagger over to confront her. The reservist asks them if they are glorifying the Palestinian attack in October 2023, which has become Israel’s pretext for genocide, while both ask them to take off their masks.

When another passerby shouts: “Liberate Palestine!” Ben replies: “From what? Of what? By a group of terrorists?” It is unclear whether this last sentence refers to Palestinians, who are routinely and regularly insulted in such terms by Zionists, or to the Israeli military, in which Ben himself recently served, and which the Palestinians in one terrorized a genocidal attack that killed dozens of people out of thousands and unleashed shocking misery that worsened generations of occupation.

ASU suspends Yudelman

Whatever the case, Yudelman’s behavior clearly raises questions about his ethics, his professionalism, his basic decency and the wisdom of keeping him around students. His employer responded by suspending him pending an investigation. In addition to his academic career, he holds a position at the Tikvah Fund, a Zionist “institution of ideas dedicated to supporting the intellectual, religious and political leaders of the Jewish people and the Jewish state.” Before deleting his social media account, Yudelman also sharedin apparent agreement, an anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian post by far-right British provocateur Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who performs under the pseudonym Tommy Robinson.

The viral clip of the abuse was shared on social media by the Gaza Notifications account with the introduction: “His identity must be discovered and revealed!” It didn’t take long for the replies to emerge, giving a well-connected academic a larger outlet than he expected when he harassed an outnumbered Muslim woman on the street.

Related:

Heavy-handed campus crackdown on pro-Palestinian protesters is sweeping the United States

6 Koranic reflections on the current situation in Palestine