Oberlin’s Notorious Pro-Jihad Professor
Suspended for Sex-for-Grades Arrangement
The notorious Professor Mohammad Jafar Mahallati has been suspended from Oberlin for his involvement in a sex-for-grades arrangement at Columbia has just been made public, and now there is the distinct possibility of his facing charges of rape by a student at Oberlin:
US professor who called for ‘global Jihad’ on Israel,
supported Hamas, suspended
by Benjamin Weinthal, Jerusalem Post, January 14, 2024:
The investigative journalist Ben Baird, who uncovered the sexual harassment case against Mahallati, told the Post that “Mahallati isn’t just involved in human rights abuses and possible antisemitic teachings – he was also the defendant in a lawsuit alleging a predatory sex-for-grades relationship with a graduate student at Columbia University, where Mahallati taught courses in the 1990s.”
Baird, who is also Director of the Middle East Forum’s Action program, where this author is a Writing Fellow, added “Columbia settled the case with the plaintiff for an undisclosed amount. “
He added, “However, the case files detailing the sordid nature of the affair, including Mahallati’s alleged attempts to blackmail” the plaintiff “if she told anyone about the quid pro quo, sat buried in government storage for decades, obstructing access to evidence of Mahallati’s potential academic malpractice.”…
But now the files have apparently been made available to researchers such as Baird himself, and the sex-for-grades arrangement has been revealed. The only thing we do not know is how much Mahallati’s unseemly practice cost Columbia University in settling the claim of the student he had taken such advantage of. And of course, when Mahallati applied for a job at Oberlin, he made no mention of that sex-for-grades business at Columbia. Why should he? He was secure in the knowledge that all documents related to it, including the settlement, were locked up in government storage.
According to the Iran International TV segment, a journalist for the outlet said, “I have reliable information that at least one Oberlin College student was directly sexually assaulted by Mahallati in 2008, who has not dared to speak up publicly until now. I hope this New York Post article will encourage her to come forward.”…
It is not easy for female victims of sexual assault to come forward. Some are embarrassed, or afraid of possible retaliation from powerful men, or worried about the possibility of defense lawyers shredding their reputations by, for example, going into their sexual history. But this information about the sex-for-grades arrangement at Columbia having just been made public has given the unnamed former Oberlin student — the putative victim of a sexual assault by Mahallati — the courage to come forward. And there may be other victims who will be similarly emboldened.
Mahallati refused to respond to numerous Post press queries. Mahallati’s supporters, the Oberlin city councilman Ray English and Oberlin College’s controversial academic Matthew Berkman, who teaches in the college’s allegedly anti-Israel Jewish Studies program, declined to comment.
According to the website Canary Mission, “Matthew Berkman has glorified violent protesters, demonized Jewish organizations and Israel and is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.”
Canary Mission noted that “As of April 2022, Berkman was listed as a Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) member on JVP’s website. In 2017 Berkman was reportedly a JVP Steering Committee member and an ‘organizer with JVP’ since 2013. Berkman was a member of JVP Philadelphia (JVP Philly) in 2014, 2017 and 2018.”
In October, the New York Post reported that JVP is one of the groups rallying for Hamas in its war against the Jewish state.
Matthew Berkman is a pro-Palestinian member of the virulently anti-Israel “Jewish Voices For Peace,” a member of BDS, and a defender of violent protesters, as long as those protesters are against Israel. His support for Mahallati no doubt reflects that diseased sympathy. He is not repelled by Mahallati’s record of defending the theocratic totalitarian state of Iran and denying the murders of 5,000 political prisoners. He is apparently unmoved by Mahallati’s calling for a “global jihad” against Israel. But even he is now reluctant to defend Mohammad Jafar Mahallati from the most reason stories about his sex-for-grades arrangement at Columbia, and the accusation of his raping a student at Oberlin. Berkman, asked if he had anything to say about these charges, “declined to comment.”
In my not-so-humble opinion, the only thing worse than an unbelieving Jew is a believing Muslim.
Mahallati is now without a job, without his previous defenders who — from Oberlin’s President to Professor Andrew Berkman — have now abandoned him, and with a charge of rape now being brought against him. As Iran’s ambassador at the UN, he defended those guilty of a crime against humanity by lying. He called for a “global jihad” against Israel. At Oberlin, he spread his antisemitic venom in his courses, creating a distinctly unpleasant atmosphere for Jewish students with all his talk about the “colonial settler state of Israel,” and expressing his admiration for Hamas. He settled a sex-for-grades scandal at Columbia with an out-of-court settlement, paid by the university. It appears that he is now accused of raping a student at Oberlin. There may be more students who will come forward. Unless he manages to flee to Iran, Mohammad Jafar Mahallati will live out the rest of his days in a world of woe.
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