Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz is calling on his alma mater, Princeton University, to take action and dismiss a once high-level Iranian regime official due to allegations of making students on campus feel unsafe due to recent incidents of antisemitism that have exploded on the grounds of the ivy league school.
Seyed Hossein Mousavian, a former official for the Islamic Republic of Iran, who serves as a Middle East security and nuclear policy specialist at the school, is now facing mounting pressure on several different fronts from congressional representatives, students, and experts on the issue of antisemitism.
“Mousavian is closely linked to the Iranian regime and to the regime’s campaigns of terrorism and murder. His presence at Princeton makes students feel justifiably afraid for their safety. Princeton’s decision to keep employing him shows they care less about their students, and more about providing a platform for pro-regime and anti-American propaganda. That kind of reckless institutional ideological bias is exactly why the Trump administration is reassessing federal funding for Princeton,” Cruz went on to say in a Fox News Digital exclusive statement.
Fox News also reported, “Fox News Digital previously reported that Mousavian expressed support for the U.S.-designated terrorist movements, Hamas and Hezbollah, and appeared to pay tribute to the global Iranian terrorist Qassem Soleimani in 2020 when he attended his funeral.”
President Donald Trump ordered a drone strike to take out Soleimani in January 2020 during his first term, over the murders of 600 American military personnel, and for planning future terrorist attacks. Mousavian is refusing to renounce his support for the terrorist groups, Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian fatwa to kill Salman Rushdie, a British-American writer.
During a protest that took place in 2024, a Hezbollah flag was displayed on Princeton’s campus as students protested against the Jewish State. Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, is most well-known for a bombing in 1983 that killed 241 members of the U.S. military in Beirut.
Maximillian Meyer, president of Princeton Tigers for Israel, and an undergraduate at the university, told Fox News Digital, “I commend Sen. Cruz for raising urgent concerns about Princeton’s employment of Mousavian, whose career has been defined by shilling for the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. Credible reports linking Mousavian to the oversight of Iranian dissident assassinations in Europe – alongside his endorsement of the fatwa on Salman Rushdie – are deeply alarming.”
Fox News Digital first reported in November 2023 that the House Committee on Education and the Workforce launched an investigation into Mousavian’s role in advancing the interests of the clerical regime in Tehran. During Mousavian’s tenure as Iran’s ambassador to Germany, he was in charge of the embassy that a German court found “served as the ‘headquarters’ for the planning of the 1992 assassination of four Iranian dissidents at the Greek restaurant Mykonos in Berlin.”
The former Iranian ambassador had previously told the media outlet that “This accusation is a big lie” and “The 398-page verdict is published, and everyone can have access to it. The Berlin court verdict does not contain any direct or indirect allegations against me. German authorities never forced me to leave the country.… I have been a frequent visitor to Germany.”
Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber, who recently said he would defy Trump’s efforts to stop antisemitism via federal funding cuts to the wealthy university, did not respond to Fox News Digital email press queries and telephone calls about Mousavian.
A recent talk at Princeton given by former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was interrupted by a group of pro-Palestinian agitators, which led to heavy criticism from Jewish students who attend the university.
In a statement to Fox News Digital over the incident, Eisgruber said he was “appalled” at reports of antisemitic language used during Bennett’s visit. He added, “Such behavior is reprehensible and intolerable. The University is investigating and will pursue disciplinary measures as appropriate, to the extent any members of the Princeton University community are implicated.”
It’s not clear if Eisgruber took any action against the students who interrupted the event.
Mousavian has been under heavy criticism for causing antisemtism ever since the horrific terrorist attack on Israeli soil by Hamas in 2023, which led to 1,200 people being killed, including 40 Americans.
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