Gov. Jeb Bush yesterday backed University of South Florida’s controversial decision to fire a Palestinian professor with suspected links to terrorists, while critics called the ouster a political lynching.
University president Judy Genshat complained that computer-science instructor Sami Al-Arian’s views and presence has caused a “continuing threat to our students.”
Al-Arian once ran the university-affiliated – but now defunct – World and Islam Studies Enterprises, which federal investigators suspected funneled money to Middle East terrorists. A former top official of the organization was Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, who later became the head of the terrorist group Islamic Jihad.
Neither the FBI nor Florida authorities turned up evidence against Al-Arian, however.