"What a mealy-mouthed statement. Why not say that while they value academic freedom, his views are so beyond the pale that they cannot be accepted at USF. Advocating death and destruction of Jews, and racist anti-Semitism, are not acceptable views of a university professor. Simple as that."
As far as I can tell, the professor hasn't been caught saying "death to the Jews," only "death to Israel." In my opinion, the latter would lead massively to the former. However, a large number of American university faculty members do favor the non-existence of Israel, and it would be a tremendous violation of academic freedom to purge them all. In this present case, to the professor's credit, there does not seem to be any evidence of classroom indoctrination. The man, who teaches computer science, espouses his hate on his own time. The real reason that this case has caused a firing isn't the professor's views, or the professor's perfectly legal involvement with anti-Israel hate groups, but the pressure donors and others from outside the university community put on the institution. Personally, I wouldn't contribute to my alma mater due to affirmative action, but it would be despicable of them to change their policy based on such considerations.
Check out Univeersity of South Florida President Judy Genshaft on a good web search engine. The last big controversy she jumped into also involved a firing, and the reason for the firing, since reversed by a court or mediator, was that students complained their white girls basketball coach was a racist for not recruiting hard enough from black high schools, etc. The commonality in both firing cases is unprincipled surrender to pressure.
This single isolated case is going to be used over and over by America-haters to show that America discriminates against Muslims. If the University of South Florida was right in the matter, that wouldn't be worth mentioning. But the spineless and liberal University of South Florida administration is wrong, and America's reputation abroad will suffer from it.