A Shift in U.S. Policy toward Campus Protests

If Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei himself refers to student protests in support of Palestine and opposition to the United States as a form of “social and moral jihad,” then we too must acknowledge the reality and call it by its name: “Jihad on Campus.”

The October 7, 2023, massacre and the ensuing “Swords of Iron War” triggered the rise of protest movements in U.S. academic institutions. Identifying the true nature of these protests requires examination as to whether groups such as National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) and its allies are conducting legitimate human rights advocacy or, rather, coordinated subversive activity.

Since President Donald Trump took office, there has been a significant shift in federal policy toward student protests – and particularly toward pro-Palestinian activity on higher education campuses. It’s not just a change in tone – it’s also a shift in practical measures: visa revocations, in-depth investigations, and budget cuts.

In light of this trend, the opportunity arises to examine not only the nature of the protests – but also the organizational and financial structures behind them.

Reports point to these organizations’ possible links to extremist groups, use of encrypted platforms to coordinate violent activities, and dissemination of advice on disturbing the peace and physically attacking law-enforcement personnel, alongside anti-American messages. A key question concerns how such activities are funded.

Encrypted Platforms: Telegram as a Key Tool for Coordinating the Tent Encampments in the United States

Telegram, an instant messaging application launched in 2013 and developed by Telegram Messenger LLP, headquartered in Dubai, uses the MTProto protocol for encryption – regular chats are encrypted but not end-to-end, while Secret Chats are fully end-to-end encrypted (E2E). The platform allows groups of up to 200,000 members, channels for unlimited message broadcasting, and bots for content management.

Reports from the Counter Extremism Project (CEP) and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) indicate that Telegram has been used by extremist groups and conspiracy networks for propaganda dissemination, recruitment, and coordination, taking advantage of the platform’s encryption and relative anonymity.

Past publications of Radio Free Europe and Wired magazine discussed the application’s possible links to the Russian government. According to published data, 50 percent of people in Russia use Telegram, while in the United States approximately only 2 percent do.¹ Yet, in the United States, the university and college tent encampments are coordinated primarily via Telegram, which serves as a key tool to convey information, instructions, and logistical coordination between different groups. Among the organizations most heavily using the platform are NSJP and Within Our Lifetime (WOL).

Popular University 4 Gaza: The Hub for Coordinating the Tent Encampments

The main channel for organizing and coordinating the tent-encampment activities is Popular University 4 Gaza (PU4G), which was created on April 23, 2024. In less than two weeks it gained more than 7,300 subscribers.²

PU4G is managed by a user named Popular University News, and the channel’s first announcements, issued within 10 minutes of its establishment, concerned main venues of protest: New York University (NYU), Columbia University, and the University of Southern California (USC). Apparently, the tent-encampment organizers view these institutions as strategic foci.

According to NSJP’s official X account, it was they who established the channel in cooperation with the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) and Writers Against the War on Gaza (WAWOA).³

In addition to the nationwide channel, several tent encampments have created their own dedicated Telegram channels, including those at Columbia, MIT, UCLA, NYU, and Northwestern.

PU4G acts as a platform to coordinate the spread of information. It offers instructions to demonstrators as well as advice on funding methods, logistical planning, and even on bail for detainees.

Subversive Activity: Disrupting Public Order and Anti-American Messages – Instructions for Illegal Activity and Incitement

The tent encampments’ Telegram channels are used to circulate materials that include instructions for disrupting law enforcement.

One of the key documents spread by these channels is the “De-Arrest Primer.” Its 10 pages offer direct advice on how to interfere with arrests and thwart police operations.⁴

Among the methods it counsels are:

Physically pushing police officers to free detainees from their hands.
Deliberately escalating violence against police forces. The primer points to the advantages of creating chaos and ramping up clashes.
Opening police-car doors to enable detainees to escape.
Carrying handcuff keys and wire cutters to remove other restraints.
Bearing in mind that most of the arrests are “catch and release” so that demonstrators need not fear arrest.

The University of Chicago tent encampment’s channel sent out instructions to remain silent in interrogations, avoid identifying oneself as a student, and refuse to show ID cards. The aim is to make the work of the police more difficult

Likewise, the Tufts University encampment’s channel issued an “arrest support form” on which students had to declare their degree of willingness to be arrested.⁵

Spreading Anti-American Themes and Inflammatory Materials

The Telegram channels also disseminate inflammatory materials and a radical anti-American and anti–law enforcement discourse.

Among the contents circulated on the different channels:

Calling police officers “pigs” while noting that this epithet is considered haram (forbidden by Islam), and/or publishing the names of police officers to embarrass them.⁶
Encouraging use of the term “intifada” in direct reference to a violent uprising.
Praising activists who have taken down the American flag, while dubbing it “the flag of the racist, imperialist, and violent entity” alongside the inscription: “Long live the intifada!” ⁷
Offering a quote on “the fall of America” from Black Panthers member Mumia Abu-Jamal, who was sentenced to death.
Using the epithet Turtle Island for the United States, which connotes that it is a colonial entity built on indigenous lands.
Calling for “decolonization” and for attacks “from Gaza to the Americas.”

The Possible Link to Terror and its Funding

It is not hard to show that these organizations support terror. After the October 7, 2023, attack, they all lauded the atrocities perpetrated by the terror organization Hamas. They organize demonstrations and attacks on police officers, issue radical manifestos, and work to delegitimize the United States.

In the past, WOL and SJP expressed their support for radical organizations including the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), which the United States designates as a terror organization.

The website of WAWOG links to the Palestinian campaign for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel (PACBI),⁸ and the leaders of PACBI include members of U.S.-designated terror organizations. The U.S. Congress has called to investigate PACBI for its possible links to terror.⁹

The main question is whether, beyond support for terror, a link or apparent link to terror can be found that would require an investigation centering on terror and terror funding.

We can begin with a detailed report on NSJP published by the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP). The report notes that NSJP was founded in 2010 as part of the Palestine program of the United States Social Forum, which is supported by the National Committee of BDS – a coalition that includes U.S.-designated terror organizations such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the PFLP. ¹⁰

A 2017 study by the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs (JCFA) showed that SJP is not an independent student organization but, rather, a network linked to Hamas and operating on U.S. campuses to promote its goals.

When the funding sources are investigated, connections emerge. The study found that the organization American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) provides financial and logistical support to SJP. Likewise, the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP) was dismantled after it was found guilty of funding Hamas. According to testimonies obtained, AMP and its leaders apparently have links to actors involved in funding Hamas. Charity organizations are used to hide the money trail.

Jonathan Schanzer, who was an investigator of terror funding in the U.S. Treasury Department, testified to Congress in 2016 that AMP, whose leaders worked for organizations linked to Hamas, was “arguably the most important sponsor and organizer for Students for Justice in Palestine.”¹¹ Schanzer explained that “at least seven individuals who work for or on behalf of AMP have worked for or on behalf of organizations previously shut down or held civilly liable in the United States for providing financial support to Hamas.”¹² Those included the Holy Land Foundation (HLF), which provided $12 million to Hamas, and IAP, which, as noted, was convicted of funding Hamas.

The connections between funding for Hamas, SJP, and AMP were also evident in the case of David Boim, an American student murdered at age 17 in a Hamas shooting attack in Israel. His family sued organizations in the United States that had provided direct support to Hamas. Among these, IAP had transferred funds directly to Hamas accounts, including checks that were marked “for the Palestinian martyrs only.”¹³

In 2004, the American court ruled that IAP had to pay compensation to the Boim family totaling $156 million. Instead of paying, however, IAP was dismantled. It was reestablished, however, as AMP, with the same personnel and methods. Court testimonies show that Rafiq Jaber, formerly president of IAP, was directly involved in registering AMP, and Osama Abu Irshaid, former editor of IAP’s newspaper, is now AMP’s executive director. In addition, Hatem Bazian, who was a key figure in IAP events, not only established AMP but also SJP, which promotes pro-Hamas messages on U.S. campuses.

In 2017, the Boim family filed a new lawsuit claiming that AMP was not a new organization but a direct continuation of IAP, and hence must bear legal responsibility and pay the sum awarded to them.

In May 2024, victims of the October 7 attack and their family members filed a precedential suit in the United States against NJSP and AMP. The suit includes grave allegations that the two organizations operated as a front for funding and propaganda on behalf of Hamas. It states that on the day after the massacre, AMP and NSJP justified the atrocities that Hamas perpetrated and took part in the terrorist propaganda to justify its appalling brutality. It contends further that AMP and NJSP complied with Hamas’s call to mobilize large numbers of people and spread messages calling “to sow chaos, violence, and terror in the United States.”¹⁴

The suit also points to the Westchester Peace Action Committee (WESPAC) Foundation as a key actor in transferring funds to NSJP and AMP while concealing the sources of the funding. It states: “As a financial sponsor, WESPAC receives and manages contributions for NSJP and AMP, and retains a percentage of contributions for itself before transferring them. This arrangement has enabled the organization to collect and transfer funds without being exposed to full financial transparency.”¹⁵

WESPAC also expressed indirect support for Hamas’s October 7 attack, claiming that it “has a certain context” and had “root causes.”¹⁶ It was also reported that WESPAC supported the pro-Palestinian demonstrations and posted videos with demonstrators carrying signs portraying President Biden as “Genocide Joe.”¹⁷

Conclusions

The findings raise concerns that the activity of NSJP, WOL, WESPAC, and AMP goes beyond legitimate democratic protest and constitutes coordinated subversive activity aimed at disrupting public order, subverting law enforcement, and exploiting funding structures for radical purposes.

According to American law, these organizations could face criminal indictments that include material support for terror (U.S. Code § 2339B 18), conspiring to promote disorderly conduct (U.S. Code § 371 18), sedition (U.S. Code § 2383 18), tax fraud and money laundering (U.S. Code § 7206, 18; U.S. Code § 1956 26), and using encrypted means to coordinate illegal activity (U.S. Code § 1030—CFAA 18).

In addition, the use of Telegram as an unregulated communication channel to coordinate physical activities in the field, distribute instructions to attack the security forces, trespass on public institutions, and take down state symbols may constitute incitement to violence (U.S. Code § 2101 18), violating hate-crime laws (U.S. Code § 249 18), and damaging public property (U.S. Code § 1361 18).

If it is proved that the organizations engage not just in protest but in subversive activity that undermines the state and violates American law, they may face cancellation of their tax-exempt status, significant economic sanctions, and criminal charges against their leadership.

In line with the findings and the concerns about the activity of NSJP, WOL, and WESPAC, the following measures are recommended:

A thorough investigation of WESPAC and AMP: An in-depth legal and economic inquiry should be made into the exploitation of the 501(c)(3) tax exemption to fund subversive activity or support for terror. If infringements are found, the next steps are to cancel the tax exemption, impose economic sanctions, and restrict access to public resources.
Strict supervision of the use of Telegram and encrypted platforms: A regulation should be advanced to prevent the use of Telegram to coordinate disturbances, plan violence, and disseminate information for purposes of anti-American activity. Measures to be considered include requiring the identification of managers of large public groups, monitoring groups that are in contact with radical organizations, and restricting the dissemination of messages that encourage violence.
Monitoring and enforcement regarding incitement to disturbances and violence: Calls to clash with the police, obstruct security forces, take down state symbols, and disrupt public order must be systematically monitored. In cases where solid evidence is found, criminal proceedings should be launched against organizers and message carriers who encourage violence or subversive activity.
Restricting the activity of off-campus organizations: PYM, WOL, and NSJP should be prevented from exploiting university facilities and resources to promote radical goals. It is recommended that these organizations be prohibited from holding official events in academic institutions and that access to public budgets to finance their activities be blocked.
Tightening economic supervision of the funding of radical political organizations: Funding sources of organizations involved in subversive activity should be thoroughly investigated, with close scrutiny of the contributors’ identity and the purpose of the funds. It is recommended that transparency be required for significant contributions, thereby preventing the use of foreign funds to promote radical political goals and blocking transfers of funds from hostile actors.
Monitoring and restricting the influence of foreign bodies on protests in the United States: Possible external involvement in the funding and directing of protests should be investigated, and measures to restrict foreign influence on organizations acting within the United States should be considered. It is recommended that control mechanisms be established for organizations that receive foreign contributions, and that proper disclosure of funding sources that enable subversive activity be required.
Cooperating with academic institutions to prevent their use for illegal activity: Supervision of the on-campus activity of students and organizations should be tightened so that university resources are not used for subversive purposes. It is recommended that university administrations be required to set regulations restricting use of public resources for radical propaganda and to bolster enforcement of the laws against indirect support for radical activity.

The findings suggest the potential existence of a well-coordinated infrastructure leveraging encrypted technologies, concealing financial channels, and disseminating inflammatory messages aimed at disrupting public order in the United States. A thorough investigation, enhanced regulatory oversight, and stringent legal enforcement are essential to prevent the exploitation of American democratic institutions for subversive and extremist political agendas.

If it is determined that these organizations’ activities go beyond legitimate democratic protest and constitute orchestrated subversive action, the United States should consider responding decisively, both legally and economically, to safeguard itself against those who seek to undermine it while exploiting the very freedoms designed to protect them.

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