On Monday, June 22, a third-party arbitrator determined that Sang Hea Kil, a tenured professor of Justice Studies at San Jose State University would get reinstated, after she had been previously terminated for her involvement in pro-Palestinian activism.
In May of 2024, Sang Hea Kil was suspended from the university for participating in and encouraging students to attend pro-Palestine demonstrations. The university administration said that she had violated the campus’s “Freedom of Expression and Time, Place and Manner” policies which are supposedly established to regulate how people can exercise free speech on campus. As on most university campuses, Kil pointed out the hypocrisy of how such policies were selectively enforced.
After initially being put on administrative leave, she was terminated from her position in November 2025, making her the first tenured professor at a public university in the United States to be fired from her position in connection with pro-Palestine protests. It was clear that those who were hostile to Palestinian activism, and Zionists in general, wanted to make an example out of Kil.
Kil, alongside her union, the California Faculty Association challenged this decision and escalated to a fact-finding binding arbitration. The third-party arbitrator ultimately came to the conclusion that the university’s disciplinary response was “excessive and disproportionate.” Sang Hea Kil has won her job back as well as full back pay for the nearly two years that she has been out of work.
The national Middle East Studies Association, Council on American-Islamic Relations California, Jewish Voice for Peace and the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression all argued for Kil’s reinstatement. The attack on her was part of a national and international attempt to brand all opposition to the Israeli state’s policy of genocide against Palestinians as antisemitic.
Kil’s reinstatement is an important victory for Pro-Palestinian activism, for academic freedom, for free speech and for all of our movements against exploitation and oppression!
