Zionist hoodlums and Columbia University: I am most distressed over the nasty campaign by Zionist hoodlums directed at my dear friend Joseph Massad of Columbia University. Joseph is a man of great integrity, honesty, and scholarship. He is free of any prejudice. Now, a demagogic member of Congress (who doubles as a Zionist fanatic and is (most likely) running for Mayor of New York City next year) is asking for Joseph's dismissal from Columbia. If there is anything worse than this blatant and vulgar political interference in academic affairs I have not seen it. For those who do not know him, Joseph has written courageously in Arabic and English against anti-Semitism and anti-Semites. The propaganda lies spread about him have no basis in reality. I shall initiate a petition in his support, and will post information here. You may in the meanwhile feel free to write to the president of Columbia University, Lee Bollinger (his email:lcb50@columbia.edu), to protest this thuggish intimidation of a courageous academic. (His address: Office of the President, Columbia University, Mail Code 4309, New York, NY 10027).