President Lefton released a statement Thursday responding to an offensive outburst by Julio Pino, associate professor in history, during a guest lecturer’s presentation Tuesday.

Ishmael Khaldi, a former deputy counsel general at the Israeli consulate in San Francisco, spoke about his experiences as a Bedouin in Israel and on other Middle Eastern topics. Pino posed a provocative question to Khaldi, then shouted “Death to Israel!” before leaving the auditorium.

Lefton said that although it was Pino’s right to speak his mind, he found his words “reprehensible and an embarrassment to our university.”

“We hope that our faculty will always model how best to combine passion for one’s position with respect for those with whom we disagree,” Lefton said in a press release. “Calling for the destruction of the state from which our guest comes (as do some of our students, faculty and community members) is a grotesque failure to model these values.”

Contact Leighann McGivern at [email protected].