BUZZ
ANALYSIS: Stands by remark … then retweets claim there’s ‘no evidence’ Hamas raped Israeli prisoners after Oct. 2023 attack
The Rutgers alumnus whose speech at the School of Engineering convocation recently was canceled due to his anti-Israel social media comments is speaking out.
Rami Elghandour, CEO of the biotech company Arcellx (recently purchased for almost $8 billion), posted on X last month that Israel is “running dungeons where they train dogs to sexually assault prisoners” and has “committed genocide.”
He also retweeted a post referring to Israel as “the WORST ‘state’ currently on planet earth.”
School of Engineering Dean Alberto Cuitiño had noted “some graduating students would not attend their graduation ceremony due to concerns” over Elghandour’s remarks. A university spokesperson added the school wanted to make sure “no graduate feels forced to choose between their personal convictions and a convocation ceremony.”
A week ago on X, Elghandour wrote “the feelings of a handful of students […] were more important than the experience of the entire graduating class, the reputation of the school, the dignity and belonging of Arab and Muslim students, and the First Amendment.”
In recent comments made to the Rutgers student paper The Daily Targum, Elghandour said “the core details of the [Israel] post were widely reported and proven” and that it “was a reply to a different user’s post providing resources.”
The reply, however, was to a tweet by California Democratic U.S. Representative Ro Khanna who merely wrote “The free ride is over. Israel has a $45 billion defense budget. I am Team America”:
While Elghandour sticks by the claims about Israel, dogs and sexual assault, he retweeted an X post dated May 12 which denies Hamas raped Israeli civilians during its initial attack against the country three years ago:
Elghandour told the Targum “It is just absolute cowardice and dishonesty, after catching a lot of heat and seeing that the whole world is upset with them, to now selectively, out of my 50,000 tweets, pull out one […] If I (were) a neutral person and I saw that, number one, I would be more disturbed by the accusation … than by a (post).”
Elghandour said that the cancellation of his speech has changed the way he views Rutgers. He said that throughout his career, his foundational education at Rutgers consistently served him professionally and personally. Beyond academics, he credited Rutgers’ diversity for introducing him to different people and perspectives.
After the speech cancellation, he is disappointed with Rutgers’ leaders. Elghandour said he will not be reaching out to the University to mend their current state of contention.
“I have no relationship with the leadership of Rutgers at this point — the ball is in their court,” Elghandour said. “They made this mistake. If they are principled and honorable people, they’ll apologize both for what they did, as well as their lame and pathetic defamation attempt by misquoting by introducing something they never talked to me about, implying that they did and selecting a tweet on the topic that obviously doesn’t link to the evidence.”
On Monday, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof published an article (labeled “opinion”) which allegedly supports what Elghandour stated in his controversial tweet.
Various journalists have since ripped Kristof’s piece; the New York Post’s Andrea Peyser notes the “deranged” article “relies heavily on a recent report by Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor,” whose founder and chairman Ramy Abdu “has publicly declared his support for Hamas.”
Abdu had posted on social media that the attackers who murdered over 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023 were “heroic knights who created for us pure glory,” and said people should “remember their names well and teach the stories of their eternal heroism to . . . children and grandchildren.”
I cannot believe we have to do this.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) May 11, 2026
The New York Times, the paper of record, just published an op-ed accusing the State of Israel of systematic sexual violence against Palestinian detainees, including the claim that Israel is training dogs to rape prisoners.
One of their… pic.twitter.com/moQmxhDunq
This New York Times “article” about Israel is such a journalistic atrocity that I actually feel stupid reading it out loud.
— Scott Jennings (@ScottJenningsKY) May 12, 2026
If everyone at the NYT who is responsible for this is not fired, then the publication will lose whatever shred of credibility it has left. pic.twitter.com/nhXSl5AW1D
TheTargum report notes the Middle East Studies Association of North America sent a letter to Rutgers stating the cancellation of Elghandour’s speech “compromises the integrity of Rutgers as an Institution of higher education” and “flies in the face of the university’s First Amendment obligations.”
Last week, the Rutgers American Association of University Professors claimed the university’s decision was “politically motivated suppression of expression” and an example of the “Palestinian exception” to free speech.
MORE: Rutgers administration buckles to anti-Israel activists’ demands
