Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) rehired Maher Bitar, a former White House staffer who used to be a leader of Students for Justice in Palestine, a group that advocates for the destruction of Israel, the Breitbart news site reported on Saturday.
Bitar was listed this month as working for Schiff, a moderate Democrat who is Jewish, on LegiStorm, an organization with a website that lists congressional aides and other staff.
Bitar, who had worked for Schiff in the past, left the staff of the former member of the U.S. House of Representatives to serve in the Biden administration as the White House coordinator for intelligence and defense policy at the U.S. National Security Council
Bitar has also worked for UNRWA, the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, which Israel last year said was deeply infiltrated by Hamas.
Before that, he studied at the University of Oxford’s Refugee Studies Centre, writing papers on the nakba or “catastrophe"—referring to the Arabs’ defeat in Israel’s War of Independence in 1948-49—and on Palestinian activism, according to Breitbart. He appeared to describe Israel’s Judea and Samaria security barrier as a “segregation wall.”
Students for Justice in Palestine members have been involved in many cases of glorifying terrorism and harassing Jewish students, both before and after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel.
At Tufts University in Massachusetts, the Students for Justice in Palestine chapter praised the “creativity” of the Hamas massacre, drawing a rebuke from the university administration.
Students for Justice in Palestine internal materials exposed by Israel on Campus Coalition speak of how the “total return and liberation to Palestine is near … , armed struggle … is legitimate, and all of it is necessary.”
