“She parrots racist rhetoric.” The dean defended the criticized academic

In the lesson, she “parrots racist Zionist rhetoric”, the group accused Academician against apartheid Irena Kalhousová – an employee of the Faculty of Social Sciences of Charles University and an expert on the Middle East. Members of the group are demanding that her tenure at the university be resolved.

“Charles University must reconsider the employment of people like Dr. Irena Kalhousová, who, although they claim to be impartial experts, parrot racist Zionist rhetoric in their classes,” they write in a statement published on the group’s Instagram profile.

It is not clear who the members are, they publish posts anonymously. They don’t even specifically state what Irena Kalhousová’s statements bother them. They have not yet answered the questions sent.

On the part of the faculty where he works, however, support came on Monday.

“This is not a criticism, but a meaningless and factually unfounded accusation. Dr. Kalhousová appears in the public space exclusively from the position of an academic expert, and her statements can serve as a model of impartial reflection on a very complicated problem,” wrote Seznam Zprávám, dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Tomáš Karásek.

He resolutely rejected the activists’ demand to reevaluate Kalhousová’s tenure at the faculty. “For Dr. I stand by Kalhousová absolutely unequivocally. Among other things, this year I nominated her for the prestigious Miloslav Petruska University Award for 2023, precisely for her public speaking on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” he said, adding that this was not the first attack on an academic.

“The intensity of personal attacks on Dr. Kalhousová is extremely tall. “Unfortunately, other colleagues also encounter similar reactions, e.g. those who comment on the Russian war against Ukraine,” added the dean.

Irena Kalhousová did not want to comment on the criticism before the university’s statement. Now, Seznam Zprávám has not been able to contact her yet. On Tuesday, he will be a guest of the program Ptám se já.

Even before the dean, Kalhousová was supported by, for example, her colleague from the faculty, Denisa Hejlová, or an expert on extremism from Brno’s Masaryk University, Miroslav Mareš.

According to him, he is in an extreme case it’s possible to fire someone if their views clearly affect the teaching, but they don’t see that with Kalhousová. “According to the law, it is possible, but I do not consider those arguments to be correct. I consider the pressure on Mrs. Kalhousová to be unjustified,” he told Seznam Zprávy.

He immediately added that the university should stand up for the academician. “Although he can seem sharp, he is an internationally recognized expert, and these things must be presented with a certain professional background of an academic. If she allows discussion, if she is understood as a media expert, then the university should stand up for her,” says Mareš.

Irena Kalhousová

Controversies regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have been appearing in the Czech public space for a long time, and now they are increasingly leaking into the academic environment. This opens the debate to what extent politics can be a topic on campus. According to Mareš, these two spheres are inseparable.

“Politics and academia cannot be separated, we would have to reject, for example, the Velvet Revolution. I’m open to having politically oriented debates on campus, but the space shouldn’t have just one political direction, it should be pluralistic. It is permissible to express a political opinion on campus, but professors should not be prevented from operating in universities because of their opinions,” the expert concluded.

“Political disputes do not avoid academia either. Even TG Masaryk knew about it, and a section of the anti-Semitic public wanted to expel him from the university after the Hilsneriad. I believe that universities can keep such disputes within civilized limits, academic freedom is inviolable,” added Minister of Education Mikuláš Bek.

Two recent incidents have also fueled this debate. On Thursday last week, for example, a demonstration in support of Palestine erupted in front of the building of the Faculty of Humanities at Charles University, during which one person was injured.

“As much as I respect the right to express a free opinion, the role of the academic land and the academic community is different. Academic land is and should be a space of mutual respect and dialogue. I didn’t see that at the demonstration yesterday. One of the demonstrators physically attacked a student from the dormitory, who was showing that he did not agree with the protesters, and wounded him in the face,” said the dean of the faculty, Věra Sokolová, about the event.

There was also a report in the media recently about the hanging of the Palestinian flag at the University of Applied Arts in Prague. This was subsequently withdrawn by the management, stating that the school did not approve this event.

“From the negotiations with the academic community, there is a split of opinion within the school, which is also visible in the studios, on the windows of which the flags were placed. The use of the facade of the school building, which does not differentiate between the attitudes of individuals and the entire institution, also remains problematic. The significant engagement of graduates who are no longer part of the academic community of UMPRUM, and yet speak on its behalf, is also questionable,” reads the statement, which was mediated by the university’s spokeswoman Kamila Stehlíková.

Controversies regarding the situation in the Gaza Strip occur in universities and in other countries. The most prominent are the pro-Palestinian student protests in the United States, but they have already appeared in France and Australia, for example.

We have updated with the opinion of the Minister of Education Mikuláš Bek.