The Iranian regime has threatened to target American and Israeli academic institutions in the region.
They are “legitimate targets” after recent airstrikes against Isfahan University of Technology and Tehran’s Iran University of Science and Technology, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said. Other Iranian research centers had also been hit, he said.
In a statement titled “Warning to the Criminal Rulers of the US,” the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps accused “the invading American-Zionist forces” of targeting Iranian universities, Kurdistan Region-based news channel Rudaw Media Network reported.
The Iranians said “the unwise rulers of the White House should know that, from now on, all universities of the occupier [Israeli] regime and American universities in the West Asia region will be legitimate targets for us,” the report said.
The statement advised “all employees, professors, and students of American universities in the region, as well as residents in surrounding areas, to stay at least 1 kilometer away from these universities to protect their lives,” Rudaw reported.
Institutions of higher learning in the Middle East are taking Iran’s threats seriously. The American University of Beirut, for example, has moved classes online.
Founded in the 19th century and named the American University of Beirut in 1920, the AUB, as it is also known, has played a key role in the region for more than a century. It has trained key leaders and officials.
AUB played an influential role in inspiring Arab nationalists and others. It also has roots linked to the missionaries of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and the Syrian Protestant College.
Daniel Bliss was its first president. He was from Vermont and attended Amherst and later Andover Theological Seminary. He taught Bible and ethics at AUB and was its president.
As such, this institution was a key part of Lebanon for generations. Many Palestinian intellectuals and activists attended AUB.
US Embassy in Baghdad warns universities, US citizens
Meanwhile, the US Embassy and Consulate in Iraq warned on Sunday that Iran “and its aligned terrorist militias may intend to target the American universities in Baghdad, Sulaymaniyah, and Dohuk, along with other universities perceived to be associated with the United States.”
The threat specifically threatens “American universities across the Middle East,” it said. “Iran and Iran-aligned terrorist militias have conducted widespread attacks on US citizens, targets associated with the United States throughout Iraq, including the Iraqi Kurdistan Region, and Iraqi institutions and civilian targets. The Iraqi government has not prevented terrorist attacks against the United States and regional countries from Iraqi territory. US citizens should leave Iraq now.”
The American University of Iraq-Baghdad was founded in 2018. The university said it began as “a dream of influential individuals in Iraq and United States business, industry, and government who want to see a world-class institution of higher learning established in Baghdad, reminiscent of the days when the city was an educational and cultural mecca and the flourishing capital of the Muslim world.”
In the autonomous Kurdistan Region of northern Iraq, there are two American Universities.
The American University of Kurdistan in Duhok, Iraq, was founded in 2014 by Masrour Barzani, who is now the prime minister.
The American University of Iraq, Sulaimani in Sulaymaniyah was founded in 2006. It was inspired by the American universities that had been founded in Beirut and Cairo. Dr. Barham Salih led the university before becoming president of Iraq in 2018 and then head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
There are many other US-linked institutions in the region, such as the American University of Cairo, which was founded in 1919.
There are numerous US-linked institutions in the Gulf, such as the American University of Bahrain, the American University of Sharjah, New York University Abu Dhabi, Zayed University, Georgetown University in Qatar, Northwestern University in Qatar, and Texas A&M University at Qatar.
In Israel, there are also many academic institutions that could be threatened. Iran likely would justify these types of threats by arguing that these institutions could be linked to Israel’s military-industrial complex.
This is also the reason used for targeting Iranian universities. As such, Tehran would claim it is appropriate retaliation.
Israel has many universities, including prominent ones such as the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the University of Haifa, Tel Aviv University, and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.