When Law Students for Justice in Palestine (LSJP) at Berkeley’s law school promoted a bylaw that would create what critics have characterized as “no-go zones for Jews,” they may not have anticipated the thunderous and widespread denunciation they have since experienced for their toxic and radical tactic to marginalize and alienate Zionists and Jews on campus.
“LSJP is so excited to announce that multiple student affinity groups and clubs at Berkeley Law have adopted a pro-Palestine bylaw divesting all funds from institutions and companies complicit in the occupation of Palestine, and banning future use of funds towards such companies!” the group wrote in an August Instagram post. “LSJP is calling ALL student organizations at Berkeley Law to take an anti-racist and anti-settler colonial stand and adopt the bylaw into their constitutions ASAP!”
In addition to urging the student groups to commit to supporting the ongoing boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, the bylaw also included very troubling language that seeks to expunge any speech by individuals who might be considered pro-Israel or pro-Zionist, especially speech meant to correct the many factual and historical inaccuracies in the pro-Palestinian narrative inherent in this insidious bylaw.
“[I]n the interest of protecting the safety and welfare of Palestinian students on campus,” the suggested language read, groups who adopt this bylaw “will not invite speakers that have expressed and continued to hold views or host/sponsor/promote events in support of Zionism, the apartheid state of Israel, and the occupation of Palestine.” [Emphasis added]
And in language which is Orwellian in its attempt to paint bigotry as virtue, cooperating student groups, the bylaw read, will proclaim that they are “publicly stipulating the organization’s position of anti-racism and anti-settler colonialism to speakers, ensuring that proposals for speakers emphasize the organization’s desire for equality and inclusion,” all of this for the purpose, of course, of creating “a safe and inclusive space for Palestinian students and students that are in the support of the liberation of Palestine . . . .”
The implementation of what amounts to a litmus test of ideological allegiance—only targeted at Jews who support Israel—is grotesque but part of a decades-old campaign to malign Israel and transform it into a pariah state, while excluding its supporters from progressive groups because Israel, it is falsely alleged, is an apartheid, racist regime of white supremacy that continues to oppress innocent brown Arabs who were the actual indigenous residents of the land now called Israel.
For all the talk of a Palestinian state and Jewish state, “two states living side by side in peace,” the actual intent of the anti-Israel campaign is to weaken and destroy Israel completely and to silence the Jewish state’s supporters on university campuses. The Berkeley situation is just the latest of a continuing pattern of demonizing and maligning Zionism, Israel, and Jews in the name of Palestinian self-determination. Thus, the frequent calls for the “liberation of Palestine” or chants of “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” articulate a fantasy in which present-day Israel is subsumed by returning millions of Arabs, purging all of its Jews and creating a 23rd Arab state in its place.
In the case of the Israeli/Palestinian debate, which forecloses on any speech that defends Israel and answers back to the lies, distortions, and slanders apparent in the language of the LSJP bylaw, the suppression of pro-Israel speech is even more serious. Pro-Palestinian activists would prefer that their rancid ideology is never challenged, of course, particularly since so much of their anti-Israel narrative is based on the oft-repeated but counter-factual references to the “occupation of Palestine,” Israeli “apartheid,” “colonialism,” “genocide,” and the oppression of an Arab people at the hands of Jews. But emboldened by their success in promoting this false narrative, activists began attacking Zionism—Jewish self-determination—itself and other organizations, and programs associated with Judaism itself.
At the University of Toronto, for instance, the school’s Graduate Students’ Union (UTGSU) has the dubious distinction of being the only student union in Canada with a committee dedicated solely to promoting the anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. More outrageously, in 2019 the union members rejected Hillel’s request to recognize the “Kosher Forward” campaign to have kosher food offered on campus since, as the Union decided in their grotesquely anti-Semitic way, Hillel is pro-Israel and therefore kosher food should not be allowed.
What is next for the purge of anyone who might be considered pro-Israel? No Jews allowed in cafeterias that use Soda Stream products? The removal of Jewish names from endowed professorships or campus buildings if those benefactors supported Israel? Will “Open Hillel” centers—those renegade Hillels which allow pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel dialogue and events to take place in their spaces—be allowed to remain on campuses but conventional, pro-Israel Hillels not?
Will professors who teach Jewish studies courses, or within Middle East studies departments, have to confess their opposition to Israel and Zionism in order to remain on the faculty? Will pro-Israel students be allowed to run for student government positions at all, given that they have admitted their support for and allegiance to what is alleged to be a racist, militaristic, colonial, apartheid regime?
Imagine if a student government yanked accommodations for halal food on campus because Islam can be linked to terrorism, the same spurious linkage these social justice cretins have created for “apartheid” Israel, Zionism, and Kosher foods from pro-Israel companies. The campus-wide howling about Islamophobia and bigotry would be deafening. And since when are Jewish students—who may not support or even care about Israel—responsible for the political behavior of a foreign country thousands of miles away from campus and made to suffer for it?
The Berkeley and University of Toronto situations, of course, are part of a broader effort to marginalize Jewish students, malign Israel and Zionism without debate or counter-argument, contort history and facts to elevate the Palestinian cause and denigrate the Jewish state, and promote hatred and hostility to any supporter of Israel.
At CUNY, law students introduced a 2021 resolution condemning Birthright trips to Israel, as well as Stand With Us, Hillel, and other Jewish, pro-Israel groups on their campus as dangerous and destructive and wanted them purged from campus, along with any Zionist ideology or support for the Jewish state.
A 2016 report requested by CUNY’s own administration to investigate incidents of anti-Israelism, anti-Zionism, and anti-Semitism, “Report to Chancellor Milliken on Allegations of Anti-Semitism,” noted that “Several pro-Israel students attended the [anti-Israel] rally. When a pro-Israel student asked what Zionism had to do with tuition, someone in the crowd responded that ‘Jews control the government and the banks’ . . . There is evidence that some members of the crowd shouted ‘Jews Out of CUNY’ and ‘Death to Jews’ . . . One student told us that a protestor shouted ‘Go back home, and get the fuck out of my country. . . .’”
And if there was any doubt that this demonstration was only about the politics of Israel and not about Jew-hatred, the chants such as “Jews out of CUNY!” and “Jews are racist sons of bitches!” should dispel that fantasy once and for all.
At McGill, based on their spurious charges that Israel is a colonial, apartheid, racist regime engaged in ethnic cleansing, land theft, and an ongoing genocide of an indigenous people, anti-Israel groups and individuals outrageously petitioned the administration that, in light of these accusations, any pro-Israel ideology or expression on campus should henceforth be considered to be hate speech, or as they defined it, “violent, hateful, and harmful speech.”
“[Zionist] ideologies are dangerous, colonial, discriminatory, and violent, and should not have a place on our campus,” the petition read, “especially given that McGill University is dedicated to upholding the tenets of equality and safety . . . It would go against McGill’s supposed commitment to justice, safety, and anti-racism to continue allowing Zionists on campus to mobilize discourse, speeches, programs, and events that support and maintain this harmful ideology [emphasis added].”
The desire to effect the complete and comprehensive purging of pro-Israel students and organizations is not, as it is often disingenuously positioned, mere “criticism of Israel.” It is much more repellent and insidious than that and can be seen now as a targeted attack not only on Israel but on Zionism, Judaism, and Jewish life itself.
The real intention of pro-Palestinian radicals, now encompassing a large swathe of academia, is, clearly, to exclude Israel and Zionism as reasonable topics of discussion and to prevent supporters of the Jewish state from even defending it or offering counterarguments to the falsehoods and lies that comprise so much of anti-Israel rhetoric and expression.
This campaign, of course, is part of a broader effort to marginalize Jewish students, malign Israel and Zionism without debate, contort history and facts to elevate the Palestinian cause and denigrate the Jewish state, and promote hatred and hostility to any supporter of Israel.
Israel-haters have made moves to reject the IHRA working definition of anti-Semitism, as well, claiming it suppresses Palestinian solidarity; decide who are “bad” Jews and who are “good” Jews based on their support or opposition to Israel; proclaim, mistakenly, that anti-Zionism never amounts to anti-Semitism, although the IRHA definition designates the denial of Jewish self-determination as actually being anti-Semitic; claim they speak for Jews in deciding that Zionism has nothing at all to do with Judaism; or announce that Zionism itself is anti-Semitic; seek to disqualify Jewish students from serving in student governments because they are accused of not being impartial; in other words, that these toxic, bigoted activists want to continue to be anti-Semitic and reject any steps taken by others to reveal and sanction that hatred.
Only the supporters of one country on earth are prevented from speaking on certain campuses. Only the supporters of one country are accused of being racist oppressors of an indigenous people and who maintain a system of apartheid to deprive its victims of human and civil rights. Only communal and faith-based organizations of one religion are attacked, denounced, and said to be complicit in the predations of a country thousands of miles away from American campuses.
That country, of course, is Israel and the victims of this bigotry are Jews—even though this inherent anti-Semitism is masked with the good intentions of social justice for the long-aggrieved Palestinians.
Decrying every aspect of Israel’s existence and simultaneously denying its supporters the ability to express their defense of the Jewish state not only is unjust but defies the very tenets of what the university represents: a place where open and vigorous debate takes place to eventually uncover the truth. The efforts of radical anti-Israel activists are in the end a betrayal of what the university has, and should, stand for—the free exchange of ideas, even bad ones.
“Education should not be intended to make people comfortable,” University of Chicago President Hanna Holborn Gray once remarked, “it is meant to make them think. Universities should be expected to provide the conditions within which hard thought, and therefore strong disagreement, independent judgment, and the questioning of stubborn assumptions, can flourish in an environment of the greatest freedom.”
Jewish students should also enjoy that greatest freedom.
In regards to the title of the author’s upcoming book on the state of the university, it should be called the “Death of the University: How Radicalism, Israel Hatred, and Race Obsession has Destroyed Academia.” It is a fait accompli – already done.
American universities, including one I attended – Harvard, have completely lost their credibility as institutions of higher learning. They are institutions of wokeness – that posit that wokeness is the only worldview truth that exists. The search for truth is over because the universities found it in wokeness.
Anyone paying thousands of dollars in tuition for their children to attend universities of wokeness in America are throwing good money after bad – along with destroying their children’s intellectual curiosity and viewpoint tolerance.
Yehuda,
Please explain why Jewish people sheepishly vote for democrats every election when democrats hate you and openly wish for your demise?
Talk about self destruction. Why?
Why do blacks or whites or anyone vote Democrat when we all suffer so horribly from their dirty deeds?
It’s because we have all forgotten God and followed our own way.
“The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.” The road to destruction is broad and many people go there . . .
hmm, I was kicked off Mr. Horowitz’s Times of Israel comment page because I dared to write that Islam tells its adherents to lie to infidels. Yet his comment page asked for out opinions. So I find a bit of hypocrisy associated with his news sites. Will I now be kicked off of this site as well? While I agree with what you said, why is my statement worthy of being banned?
You know that Horowitz of the Times isnt the Horowitz of FPM, right?
Adolf Hitler and his pro-Nazi Arab cohort, Amin al-Husseini, would be proud of them. Perhaps we’ll soon be witnessing a burning of books by Jewish authors on those campuses.
These young PUNKS are insane today.
‘Jews control the government and the banks’
IMO… FPM isn’t doing enough to change these opinions…
Yeah… having articles that expose the persecution of Jews is a step…
But it never addresses the root causes of why Jews are being persecuted…
I think God’s wrath is soon to be visited upon America for spurning HIm and replacing Him with hate and racism. God will protect Israel even if it means the destruction of the country that once believed in “liberty and justice for all.”
God’s Wrath will not occur until after the Tribulati0n…
Any war or anything until then is not from God… but from satan…
Make note: The Holy Bible tells us that at the Mid-Point of the Tribulation… the Abomination of Desolation will occur…
At that point… those Jews and Christians living in Israel will be persecuted and killed like no other time in history… even worse than the Holocaust…
First, this growing ant-Jewish sprite spirit a Berkeley law school is a strong reflection of the insidious stealth jihadist Muslim infiltration and influence of this institute of higher education.
Second,, this is also a reminder of the wisdom of the statement of the former US President , William Howard Taft, who in a speech declared ” Anti-semitism is a noxious weed that should be cut out. It has no place in America.”
Walter – TWO excellent comments
It is also a reflecton (and demonstration) of the “unholy alliance,” so to speak, between the Left and Islam.
History doesn’t repeat, but it does rhyme. This kind of antiSemitism originally found fertile ground in the German universities in the 1920s, before the Nazis were installed as the head of Government. The came the Nuremburg Laws. It wasn’t long before Jews were barred from various professions, were not allowed to marry out side of the faith etc. The rest is history.
Unless American Jews wake up this not going to end well for them.
And gun control in early 30s Germany did not work out well for Jews.
Gun control is always the prelude to dictatorships, whether you call it socialism, communism, Marxism, Nazism or a leftist progressive movement. Removing the instruments available to combat them insures victory.
No it is not. But Judaism did prepare the ground for Christianity and both prepared the ground for Islam and Marxism. Christianity is much more heavily responsible for the mysticism of Marxism and Nazism than Judaism is.
But even before there was Judaism there was mysticism, religion, supernaturalism, magical thinking, superstition, mythology, tribalism, and collectivism. There was the religious, mystical, supernatural, moral code of sacrifice and self-sacrifice of the individual to the God or gods. Of the sacrifice of the individual to the tribe, the God or gods, and the earthly representatives of the God or gods, the priesthood.
Even if Judaism had never existed there were other religions all dedicated to the altruistic sacrifice and self-sacrifice of the individual to the mystical and supernatural. The religions of the Aztecs and the Incas, the religion of the Hindus, were and is, such religions.
The mysticism of Marxism simply jettisons God out of the mystical equation and replaces him with Almighty Society as a the supernatural organism the individual must be sacrificed to.
Actually, as Israeli historian Sever pollock made clear – the Soviet Communists were, in fact, largely Jewish..
Castro Trudeau just instituted a ban on all handgun sales and transfers in Canada. However two of the western provinces just told Trudeau to back off.
If that had happened in Germany 80 years ago there might not have been the Holocaust and maybe WWII in Europe as well.
Remember the “Liberty”! Boycott Israel.
The Liberty was a spy ship that was intercepting Israeli communications and sending them to Egypt. The Liberty should’ve been sent straight to the bottom of the ocean and America should learn to stop interfering in each and every conflict in the world–including creating and implementing the Color Revolutions in Ukraine.
Loser!! At least we know who and what you are.
The Jews are a successful people who arouse envy and hatred. Being also the unique possession of the LORD, there is always a Satanic energy behind any hatred directed towards them. History should teach us that Jewish persecution and hatred inevitably work to destroy the people who participate in it. Those who bless Israel will be blessed. Conversely, those who hate and curse Israel will be cursed. Gen. 12: 1-3
These Jews are not the chosen people.. All the chosen people are dead, they’re family lines wiped out by the wrath of God. That’s why the Bible stopped following their lineage. Jews aren’t even mentioned in the Bible.
Hope you are not thinking you are Christian – you have no understanding of Jesus. God is Faithful and loyal to his people even if Jews are seldom loyal to him – because He is righteous.. The Covenant He made with Jews is HIS Covenant, not the Jews’ covenant. Jesus came for the Jews first and will not abandon them en masse.
That ant- Jewish spite is a result of the Muslim infiltration and likewise influence at Berkeley Law school as well as in other U universities in the United States is what is known as the Stealth jihad otherwise called the Muslim method of Islamic Gradualism. In contrast to the way of the violent jihad or also called the militant jihad .This non-violent form of the jihad for Islam is a very sly, insidious, subtle and deceptive way of working for the advancement of Islam.
This Muslim scheme for achieving the goal of the Islamic agenda is as, many times, as subtly effective as it is demonically clever. Furthermore, this Islamic gradualism, in some ways, is very similar to the instruction printed in the book entitled THE ART OF WAR by Sun Tzu. Which reads “At first, then, exhibit the coyness of a maiden, until the enemy gives you an opening; afterwards emulate the rapidity of a running hare, and it will be too late for the enemy to opposes you”
Why don’t you keep your NON-arguments to yourself? You offer no rational arguments for your claims just empty trolling.
We own so much more than the media and Hollywood studios. It’s not known widely but Israeli scientists have actually developed technology to control the Sun!. In fact, they can direct a laser like beam of solar energy directly to fry your already f**ked up brain! FOAD please.
But I think you would have to admit that without the Left-Muslim alliance, the Islamist program would be nowhere in the United States and other parts of the West. It is the Left that propagates Islamist viewpoints into our culture and conceals its actual program and beliefs from our gullible and incurious public.
History repeats itself because evil stems from the heart of sinful man, as described in Matthew 15: 18-20.
What we believe about others are our own choices, depending on the state of our hearts and who we follow – God or Satan.
My goodness, I’m a Christian who has Jew in him. I guess I should stay out of the whole State. Huh?
Learning lesson for Jews –
1) ISLAM wants to exterminate you. This is Quranic/Islamic doctrine. Keep voting Democrat and they will succeed.
2) Stop hating Christians and get your focus on the REAL haters.
Learning lesson for Americans –
1) Islam hates you if you are not MOSLEM. Islam wants to exterminate you also, just after Jews.
2) Obama, the gay Moslem, brought his Moslem nation here in great numbers. The DC area is inundated with these domestic terrorists / genocidal civilization killers.
This has been going on since the New Left (which Horowitz had a major hand in fostering) started pulling this crap on campus in the late 60’s. The GUPS, and other Muslim Brotherhood sponsored organizations, got in on the act in the wake of Israels Lebanon adventure, when confronting Israel directly ceased to be an option. Now it’s this leftist-Islamist alliance is not only deeply embedded on campus, but the second generation of naive young Americans is already being brainwashed.
I suggest a. a moratorium on all immigration for 50 years and, b. fighting the hard left–including its Jewish members–to the death.
U.C. Berkeley is just another place when the youth is Brainwashed to serve Big Brother this is 1984 a few dozen years later