Comments made at a Sept. 3 rally in Washington D.C. that were recorded then aired by the Christian Broadcasting Network are coming back to haunt Lincoln University professor Kaukab Siddique along with old emails dug by CBN investigative journalists.
At the rally, Siddique, who teaches English, literature and journalism, said “We must stand united to defeat, to destroy, to dismantle Israel, if possible by peaceful means. Perhaps, like Saladin, we will give them enough food and water to travel back to the lands from where they came to occupy other people.”
In the email exchanges Siddique was found to have said “The Holocaust is a hoax. Get over it.” and that there is “not one document to prove it happened.”
CBN says the record of Siddique’s hatred for Jews goes back at least a dozen years.
Lincoln in Oxford, Chester County, is the nation’s first degree-granting black college. Alumni include Thurgood Marshall, Langston Hughes and Cab Calloway. It is part of Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth System of Higher Education along with Penn State, Temple and the University of Pittsburgh. These schools are independent of state management but still receive public money, which in Lincoln’s case is about $14 million per year.
Two state senators who represent parts of Delaware County, Daylin Leach of the 17th District and Anthony H. Williams of the 8th District , both Democrats, have written a letter to Lincoln University President Ivory V. Nelson expressing concern about the bizarre, hate-filled statements and noting that while “you are entitled to your own opinions, but you are not entitled to your own facts.”
They pointed out that the state has a no-tolerance policy regarding hate speech for state-supported institutions and demanded to know the level of awareness held by Lincoln’s administration regarding Siddique’s comments and what steps the school was taking to keep Siddique from teaching false claims to his students.
Lincoln answered that Siddique has not made such claims to his students and that tenure keeps him from being fired.
The strange and sad thing is that one suspects that most Jews in Siddique’s home state of Maryland on Tuesday voted for the same candidates as Siddique did.
“Lincoln answered that Siddique has not made such claims to his students and that tenure keeps him from being fired.”
The issue now is that Jewish and, above all, Israeli students are now aware of his claims and attitudes and are likely to avoid programs which might involve being taught by him for fear of bias. By keeping him in place, Lincoln is thus itself discriminating against these classes of students.