On Oct. 10-12, the Third Annual Student Conference of the Palestinian Solidarity Movement will convene on the Rutgers campus at Douglass College. "New Jersey Solidarity – Activists for the Liberation of Palestine" is a registered student organization and has applied for and received permission to hold the conference at Rutgers University. As with other registered student organizations they were allocated a portion of the student fees paid by all students attending the University.
 
It is clear that the University seeks to allow the conference to go on as planned. A Rutgers University press release announcing the decision to permit the conference states, "Intrinsic to Rutgers' own mission is its commitment to academic freedom, including the free exchange of ideas including those that are controversial."
 
We are dismayed that this conference will be taking place in New Jersey, at the State University. However, the central concern of the NJ Jewish community is not the location of the conference, but the conference mission and the nature and goals of the sponsoring organizations. The commitment of NJ Solidarity is to the elimination of the State of Israel and the glorification of suicide bombers who have killed hundreds of innocent civilians over the past 30 months. Their hope is to intensify the anti-Israel environment on campus and delegitimize Israel.

It is the intention of MetroWest to work with the entire "Rutgers Community"— the students, faculty, and administration of the University, as well as alumni[us], parents of Rutgers students, and community members to publicize the hate-filled motivation of NJ Solidarity and their allies.
 
It is imperative that all of New Jersey understands and the university acknowledges the extremist nature of the sponsors of this gathering, as well as their hope of using this conference, ostensibly under university auspices, to further their radical goal of the destruction of a democratic state. 

We believe that while the university may view its role solely as the venue for the conference, we view Rutgers' responsibility to be more significantly to insure that the true nature of the conference and its organizers is understood by the campus community and beyond.