In a rare rebuke of a campus event, UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk on Friday distanced the university from a law school symposium about the 9\/11 terrorist attacks that has faced criticism for including a lawyer for 9\/11 \u201cmastermind\u201d Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, along with speakers whom critics accuse of sympathizing with extremism or being antisemitic.<\/p>\n
The symposium, \u201c25 Years After 9\/11,\u201d was sponsored by five law school centers and ran Thursday and Friday, highlighting legal issues raised by the U.S. response to the attacks. Topics included torture, rendition, detention, immigration enforcement and government surveillance. The program said America\u2019s response ushered in \u201csweeping expansions of state power.\u201d <\/p>\n
In his Friday afternoon statement, Frenk said:<\/a> \u201cUCLA\u2019s values are clear. We reject antisemitism and terrorism in all their forms, and we believe our campus must be a place where the dignity of every member of our community is respected. Nothing about this event at the UCLA School of Law, which we do not endorse, changes or qualifies those commitments.\u201d<\/p>\n Melanie T. Partow, an attorney who has represented Mohammed at Guantanamo Bay, was listed as a speaker on a Friday morning panel titled, \u201cTorture, Rendition, and Detention: The Erosion of the Rights Regime Post-9\/11.\u201d The 9\/11 Commission report described Mohammed as the \u201cprincipal architect\u201d of the attacks. The Washington Free Beacon first reported on the event. <\/p>\n Some members of the Jewish campus community also objected to the program\u2019s description of Israel\u2019s war in Gaza, launched after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack, as \u201cgenocide.\u201d A United Nations commission<\/a> said in September 2025 that Israeli authorities had genocidal intent in Gaza. Amnesty International<\/a> and Human Rights Watch reached similar conclusions. Israel has rejected the finding, and major American Jewish leaders have called the charge antisemitic. <\/p>\n This month, more than 5,000 Jewish public figures and allies \u2014 including several UC professors \u2014 signed an open letter<\/a> opposing the accusation. The letter said \u201cthe massacre of October 7 has been systematically downplayed, while Israeli actions have been distorted and amplified.\u201d<\/p>\n Frenk also said that \u201cacademic freedom does not require us to be neutral about antisemitism or terrorism. Speaking at UCLA should never be mistaken for the university\u2019s approval, endorsement, or acceptance of an individual\u2019s viewpoints, or our institution\u2019s indifference to the pain their presence may cause members of our community.\u201d<\/p>\n The symposium was organized by five official institutes, centers or programs housed within the law school: the Critical Race Studies Program, the International and Comparative Law Program; the Institute for Technology, Law and Policy; the Mi\u00f1ana Family Center for Immigration Law and Policy, and the Promise Institute for Human Rights. Leaders and spokespeople for the groups did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the chancellor\u2019s statement. <\/p>\n It was unclear whether Partow spoke. The posted program said the event was \u201can in-person event and will not be streamed live or recorded.\u201d Partow did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n Mohammed also confessed to killing<\/a> Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, who was beheaded in Pakistan in 2002. Mohammed identified Pearl by his religion when he said he was behind the killing during a 2007 Guantanamo Bay military hearing, according to a Defense Department transcript.<\/p>\n