GoLocalProv | News | 5 Big Stories in Rhode Island This Week – December 2, 2023

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EXCLUSIVE: Brown University Has Received Over $11M in Funding From Palestine

Brown University has received millions in funding from sources in “Palestinian Territories,” according to a review of federal data by GoLocal. 

The United States Department of Education “requires institutions of higher education that receive Federal financial assistance to disclose semiannually to the U.S. Department of Education any gifts received from and contracts with a foreign source that, alone or combined, are valued at $250,000 or more in a calendar year.”

According to the “College Foreign Gift and Contract Report” — Brown University has received $11,692,251 from sources in “Palestinian Territories” over an indeterminate amount of time. 

Federal records show that the biggest gifts include separate $2,000,000 donations — including one to “support an assistant professorship at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, with preference for Security Studies.”

In addition, records show two entries from “Palestinian Territories” of $643,000 which state “the purpose of the Fund is to provide support for a Professorship in Palestinian Studies within Middle East Studies.”

The professor who those gifts supported is Beshara B Doumani, the Mahmoud Darwish Professor of Palestinian Studies at Brown. He also simultaneously has served as the President of Birzeit University from 2021 to 2023, located in the Palestinian West Bank territory. His Brown University bio does not mention his role heading the Palestinian University, but his Birzeit bio features his role at Brown.

When Doumani was named to the Presidency at Birzeit, the American conservation publication the American Spectator wrote, “Palestine’s ‘Terrorist University’ Picks Ivy League Prof as New President.”

The Birzeit University was raided in September of 2023, and eight students were arrested by Israeli Defense Forces for suspected ties to a terror plot.

The Times of Israel reported in September, “The students, from Birzeit University near Ramallah, were nabbed following an investigation into Hamas cells in Palestinian educational institutions, the Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet said. They were allegedly recruited by Hamas operatives in Gaza, receiving weaponry intended for the attack.”

Doumani was the featured speaker at the Brown University vigil on Tuesday — an event closed to the press.

According to the federal database, Brown reported gifts and contracts from countries including England, Spain, Thailand, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and more. 

It did not report any donations from Israel to Brown. 

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