The UN Human Rights Council Has No Shame ~ Diane B. Kunz ~ June 1, 2021 A government pledges in its founding document to exterminate the citizens of its neighboring country through a holy war. The leaders proclaim that they will never stop fighting until they have eliminated the “most despicable and contemptible nation to crawl up on the face of the earth.” In furtherance of these goals it has launched tens of thousands of rockets against civilians located deep within the neighboring state, far away from any military installations. Surely the United Nations, a world body dedicated to furthering peace and suppressing “acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace” would condemn that government, either in the General Assembly or in its Human Rights Council. Indeed, the UNHRC did pass a resolution and it did lay the blame in an unequivocal manner on the government. But the UNHRC resolution passed on May 29 was aimed not at the Hamas government of Gaza, whose national charter I quoted above, but against Israel, whose citizens, children, men, and women alike withstood 4,300 rockets attacking every part of its country in less than a two-week period. (UNHRC Resolution A/HRC/S-30/L.1) There is no legal, factual, or moral justification for what the UNHRC did. The Resolution’s ostensible aim is to assess Israel’s actions “ in accordance with applicable national procedures and international obligations and standards, that there is a clear risk that they could be used to commit or facilitate serious crimes. violations or abuses of international human rights law or serious violations of international humanitarian law.” The irony is that if the UNHRC members or anyone else objectively judged Israel according to these precepts, Israel would be found not guilty of the charges. Let’s look at the evidence. Article 51 of the UN Charter recognizes the “inherent right of individual or collective self-defense” of every member nation. Israel’s actions during last month’s eleven-day conflict fit squarely within this article. Constantly quoted during the UNHRC and other debates was the principle embodied in Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions that it is a war crime to risk civilian casualties that would be ”excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.” (Add. Prot. I, Art.51, §4) But according to Matthias Schmale, the head of the Palestinian refugee organization (UNRWA), clearly an unbiased source, the Israeli attacks on Gazan military targets were “precise” and “sophisticated” with minimal civilian loss of life, not excessive casualties. Moreover, Additional Protocol I, which neither the United States nor Israel has ratified, forbids the use of civilians to “render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations.” (Add. Prot. I, Art.51, §7) Yet this is precisely what Hamas has done in Gaza, planting its rocket launchers, military equipment and installations in schools, hospitals and in the same building as the AP news headquarters in Gaza. In a just world, Hamas’ egregious violations of the provision against using civilian locations as shields would be sufficient to put it, not Israel, in the dock. But the UN is concerned neither with peace nor with justice. The UNHRC resolution is only the latest action that discredits multilateralism in general, and the UN in particular. The UNHRC itself is only fifteen years old. Its predecessor, the United Nations Human Rights Commission, was disbanded because of its disproportionate obsession with Israel and its failure to deal with genuine human rights abuses committed by countries around the world. For its part, the UN General Assembly during its truncated 2020 session passed 17 resolutions condemning Israel, out of a grand total of 23 resolutions. It failed to rebuke egregious human rights violations by China, Russia, Venezuela, Cuba, Ethiopia, Yemen, Sudan, among others. In November 1975 Israeli diplomat and Foreign Minister Abba Eban writing about “Zionism and Racism at the UN” (NYTimes, 11/03/1975) said that the UN was “on the way to becoming the world center of Anti-Semitism.” Last week it took a giant step closer toward that perfidious goal.
In case you missed EMET’s August 27th webinar featuring Brandeis Center’s Founder and Chairman, Kenneth L. Marcus, you can watch here. Thursday, August 27th at 12 pm EDT via Zoom Join LDB’s Founder and Chairman, Kenneth L. Marcus, presented by EMET (Endowment for Middle East Truth) via Zoom, to discuss the the state of civil rights for Jews and other minorities in our nation’s educational institutions. Don’t miss this conversation! Watch the webinar here. Presented by EMET
Thursday, August 20th at 3 pm via Zoom Edwin Black Show Flier Join LDB’s President, Alyza D. Lewin, via Zoom on the Edwin Black Show, to discuss the explosion of openly anti-Semitic speech and campus hate against Jews. Just how bad is the threat to the Jewish community? Watch Edwin Black’s show featuring Alyza Lewin, President of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, Rabbi Abraham Cooper, Associate Dean at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and Malcolm Hoenlein, Executive Vice-Chair of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, as they explore the current rise of Jew-hatred in America. Don’t miss this discussion! For Zoom link and password click here. Sponsored by JNS
Washington, D.C., August 12, 2020: LDB Commends FSU President ~ Press Release The Louis D. Brandeis Center commends Florida State University President John Thrasher for adopting the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. In his letter to the FSU community this afternoon, Thrasher wrote, “The United States, the State of Florida, and Florida State University recognize the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of Anti-Semitism and its contemporary examples. I encourage everyone to educate themselves on the IHRA definition and examples of Anti-Semitism, as I have done myself.” Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus commented, “We are delighted that President Thrasher is assuming leadership by recognizing, studying, and endorsing this important tool. It is really the most important single thing he could have done – and it should be an example to other university leaders. We are hopeful that FSU will build upon this critical first step by taking additional actions to support Jewish students and ensure a safe and healthy atmosphere for everyone at his university.” Brandeis Center President Alyza D. Lewin added, “FSU and the State of Florida are now leading the way by demonstrating an understanding of anti-Semitism that many have failed to grasp. Recognizing that contemporary anti-Semitism often manifests itself as the demonization not only of Jews, but also of the Jewish collective, the Jewish state of Israel, is an essential first step in combatting this scourge. We are delighted to have worked with groups that pressed for the Florida anti-Semitism legislation and are pleased to be working with FSU students, alumni and administrators as they seek to improve the climate on FSU’s campus for Jewish students. Kudos to President Thrasher on taking this bold first step.”
President Thrasher’s Statement on Antisemitism and Religious Discrimination Dear FSU community, I am writing today to update you on our efforts to address concerns expressed by our Jewish community and others and to reaffirm that Antisemitism and religious discrimination have no home at Florida State University. As a minority group, the Jewish people have faced bias and discrimination and have been marginalized for centuries. It is one of the oldest forms of bigotry and is as intolerable as all forms of hate. The United States, the State of Florida, and Florida State University recognize the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of Antisemitism and its contemporary examples. I encourage everyone to educate themselves on the IHRA definition and examples of Antisemitism, as I have done myself. You can read it here . In June, I publicly pledged to our Jewish students, families, faculty, staff, alumni and friends that FSU will continue to embrace them and stand behind our stated vision of fully valuing and respecting every member of our community. In support of that promise, there have since been a number of significant developments on campus to combat Antisemitism. In July, the FSU Student Body Executive Cabinet adopted the IHRA definition of Antisemitism, and the Student Senate passed Resolution 59, which adopts the IHRA definition of Antisemitism, in line with the Florida Statutes 1000.05(7). The students are to be commended, but we know it is only a first step in addressing needed changes in campus culture. Therefore, FSU administrators, led by Vice President for Student Affairs Amy Hecht, have been working closely throughout the summer with Jewish student leaders, Hillel at FSU leadership, Jewish alumni and local Jewish organizations. Together, we have created a task force to review Jewish student life on campus and develop recommendations for Vice President Hecht to consider by Sept. 7, 2020. We will conduct a student campus survey on Jewish student life at FSU and Antisemitism. The task force will use a questionnaire developed by Hillel at FSU as a basis for initial discussions. The Division of Student Affairs also will institute annual training for its staff surrounding Antisemitism, religious discrimination and ways in which to foster a more inclusive campus for our Jewish students and employees. We have updated the university calendar to capture all significant religious holidays and we will work to increase understanding of these holidays across our campus. FSU also has reestablished its Jewish Student Union and is creating a Jewish Alumni Network to provide enhanced support and educational resources for all our students. In the coming months, the university will hire a new Student Equity and Inclusion Director with consultation from various members of the university community including the Jewish community. I want to reaffirm that this is a top priority. My university leadership team and I will continue to work determinedly to combat Antisemitism and unlawful behavior. While freedom of speech is of paramount importance on a college campus, so is creating a climate of acceptance and appreciation for the value and richness of the many cultures and ideas that make Florida State University such an excellent academic experience. Sincerely, John Thrasher President
By Melissa White ~ August 7, 2020 Jewish Insider The student government vice president at the University of Southern California resigned this week, alleging she was the subject of antisemitic harassment over her support for Israel. In response, the university administration said it is launching a new educational initiative to counter on-campus hate. “As you may know, our Vice President of Undergraduate Student Government, Rose Ritch, resigned yesterday from her position in student government,” wrote USC President Carol Folt in a letter sent Thursday evening. “In her heartbreaking resignation letter, Rose described the intense pressure and toxic conditions that led to her decision — specifically the anti-Semitic attacks on her character and the online harassment she endured because of her Jewish and Zionist identities.” In the statement, Folt announced the launch of a new initiative by the USC Shoah Foundation to provide educational programs and antiracist and anti-hate for-credit courses. A letter sent to university administrators last month by the Louis D. Brandeis Center detailed the online harassment faced by Ritch, a rising senior, and other students. LDB Letter to President Fol… by Jacob Kornbluh on Scribd Ritch told JI in an interview that she first faced blowback from other students due to her support for Israel during her campaign for student government vice president earlier this year. She said the online harassment began in late June after several other members of the student government came under fire over past inappropriate comments. “From there, it just kind of greenlighted a lot of students to say some pretty horrific things on social media messages, text messages,” Ritch told JI. “Most of it was entirely isolated onto Instagram, a little bit on Twitter as well.” “It’s a very different time we’re living in — with everything, really, our entire social interaction being constricted to being online,” she continued. “People in general feel safer behind a screen. It’s different interacting with a person face-to-face versus just digitally online. You can’t have a conversation retweeting or in the Instagram comments.” In a series of messages in one Instagram screenshot included in the Brandeis Center’s complaint to the university, a resident assistant on USC’s campus, Shaden Awad, wrote: “Even if all the orgs on campus that r Jewish r also Zionist That’s not an excuse For you to join That’s still blood on ur hands.” Awad did not respond to a request for comment. In her statement of resignation Wednesday night, Ritch listed “cancel culture” and a campus environment that made it inhospitable for a pro-Israel student leader to hold office. In the memo, Ritch alleged that she was the subject of a social media campaign led by students seeking her impeachment from USC’s student government. “Because I also openly identify as a Zionist, a supporter of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, I have been accused by a group of students of being unsuitable as a student leader,” the statement read. “I have been told that my support for Israel has made me complicit in racism, and that, by association, I am racist.” During the campaign, Ritch was asked during a debate how her affiliation with Trojans for Israel, an activist group on campus, would affect her ability to govern. The question was, she said, “essentially asking, ‘how can I be an effective leader and representative for all students with my not hidden, my very blatant support of Israel with this growing BDS and the discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.’ So that was something I was also asked about, which was very interesting to be the only candidate on that stage getting asked about how their identities may affect their ability to govern.” The situation mirrors a 2015 incident at the University of California, Los Angeles, when student Rachel Beyda was asked by a student council member how Beyda, then a candidate for the school’s judicial board, would be “able to maintain an unbiased view” given her activity in the Jewish community. Beyda’s nomination was first voted down before a faculty member intervened; she was then unanimously voted onto the board. Ritch said the events differed slightly — Beyda, she noted, was asked explicitly how her Judaism would impact her votes. In Ritch’s case, she said, “There never was an explicit like, ‘dirty Jew,’ like anyone ever invoking even the word ‘Jew.’ It was all under that kind of cloak of anti-Zionism.” Ritch acknowledged that her situation was not unique. In her statement, she wrote: “The sad reality is that my story is not uncommon on college campuses. Across the country, Zionist students are being asked to disavow their identities or beliefs to enter many spaces on their campuses.” The university’s statement also addressed growing antisemitism on college campuses. “Despite the significant progress we have made in cultivating and supporting a vibrant Jewish community on campus, we still wrestle with a history of anti-Semitism at USC,” the statement read. “Over the last several years, incidents of anti-Semitism in American higher education have dramatically increased, and anti-Semitic attacks remain the most common religiously motivated hate crime in the United States.” In November, a bathroom at the university was defaced with antisemitic graffiti that included a swastika and the message, “Holocaust is a lie says the liar with a nose bigger than any Jews.” In March 2016, USC printers were hacked with Daily Stormer flyers featuring swastikas and antisemitic language. Ritch told JI that until recently, the campus had been relatively quiet. “It’s just been people expressing their views and us expressing our views and that’s what it’s been. It’s been very civil and that’s what it’s been quite frankly my entire time here at USC,” she said. “You know, I never thought my belief in the existence of the State of Israel would ever put me in this position.” Ritch Resignation Letter by Jacob Kornbluh on Scribd
JNS.org Why doesn’t the world recognize this anti-Semitism? In a world that opposes bigotry, why is there no resounding chorus condemning this discrimination? JNS – The following are adapted remarks delivered by Alyza Lewin, president and general counsel of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, at a townhall hosted by the Tikvah Fund on July 23, 2020. The Future of College: A Jewish Townhall with Alyza D. Lewin Thank you, Alan and Eric and the Tikvah Fund for inviting me to participate this evening in this important and timely program. As president of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, I hear nearly every day from students who are experiencing the anti-Semitic pressure you describe. Students are being told—sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly—that if they want to be accepted on campus, if they want to be included and join progressive clubs, social-justice demonstrations or even engage in dialogue, they must first shed their Zionism. Demonizing and excluding Jews in this fashion is anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination. So why is it permitted? Why doesn’t the world recognize this anti-Semitism? In a world that opposes bigotry, why is there no resounding chorus condemning this discrimination? I believe that one of the answers is that our society has been blinded by the Holocaust. What do I mean by that? I mean that the only anti-Semitism that most people today recognize as anti-Semitism is hatred that “looks” like the anti-Semitism of the Holocaust. When people see a swastika, they know it is anti-Semitic. When they hear a Nazi or white supremacist, they recognize that, too, as anti-Semitic. The public today, however, does not realize that anti-Semitism existed for centuries before the Holocaust. People don’t understand that in each generation, anti-Semitism looks a little different. Anti-Semitism morphs. The constant, however, is that anti-Semitism always seeks to demonize and exclude the Jew. Throughout history, the Jew has been blamed for whatever is society’s greatest evil. The Jew has been maligned as the Christ killer, the capitalist, the race polluter. Each generation finds a different excuse to demonize, blame and ostracize the Jew. According to anti-Semites, the Jew is dangerous. Today, we are told the “greatest evil” is colonialism and apartheid. And lo and behold (as Yossi Klein Halevi once noted), who is demonized and falsely alleged to be the world’s most egregious colonialist and apartheid offender? The Jew. Today, however, after the Holocaust, the Jews have a nation-state. So it is not only individual Jews who are demonized. It is also the Jewish collective—the Jewish State of Israel—that is maligned. Irwin Cotler, the former Canadian Minister of Justice and a world-renowned human-rights activist, once explained that traditional anti-Semitism sought to deny the Jew his place in society. Today, the “new” anti-Semitism seeks to deny the Jewish collective—the Jewish State of Israel—its place in the society of nations. Judaism is unique in that it is both a faith and an ethnicity. Jews share not only religious belief, but also a common ancestry and sense of Jewish peoplehood. Our history, theology and culture are deeply intertwined with the Land of Israel. In fact, over half of the 613 commandments in the Pentateuch are connected to the Land of Israel and can only be fulfilled in the Land of Israel. For centuries, Jews have not only prayed facing Jerusalem. They have prayed to return to Jerusalem. Zionism as the political movement of the Jewish people may have originated in the 19th-century, but the desire and determination of Jews to return to their ancestral homeland in Israel is thousands of years old, as old as Abraham and the Bible. Zionism is as integral to Judaism as observing the Jewish Sabbath or maintaining a kosher diet. Not all Jews observe Shabbat or kashrut, but those who do, do so as an expression of their Jewish identity. Similarly, not all Jews are Zionists. But for many Jews identifying with and expressing support for the Jewish homeland is also an expression of their Jewish religious and ethnic identity. Harassing, marginalizing, demonizing and excluding these Jews on the basis of the Zionist part of their identity is just as unlawful and discriminatory as attacking a person for observing Shabbat or keeping kosher. Yet this exclusion is happening on campuses with increasing frequency. Last year, for example, at Williams College, a group of students sought to create a pro-Israel club. The club was intended as a cultural, not political, club. Its leaders refused to take a position on the Palestinian‒Israeli conflict. The organizers satisfied all the requirements necessary to become a formally registered student organization (an “RSO”). However, when they applied to the student College Council (“CC”) for formal RSO status, the CC denied the application. It was the first time in more than a decade that the College Council had voted against having a club that met all the criteria set out in the bylaws. During the debate on the club’s application, one College Council representative asked the Jewish students, “Why do you feel the need to ally yourself with the State of Israel, as opposed to taking a human-rights-oriented approach?” Another CC rep expressed concern about having a club “that is built on the assumption that Israel has a right to exist.” The message to the Jewish students at Williams College was clear. A club that identifies with or supports the Jewish homeland is not welcome. It was only after tremendous public outcry and a complaint to the Office of Civil Rights in the Department of Education, that the president of Williams College identified an alternate procedure and granted the pro-Israel group formal RSO status. Similarly, two years ago, at New York University, 53 student organizations signed an agreement to boycott not only the State of Israel, but to boycott all pro-Israel student groups on campus. The 53 student organizations, representing a broad swath of the campus community, resolved that they would not co-sponsor events or engage in dialogue with any pro-Israel organizations. What message does this send to pro-Israel students on campus? It says to them, “If you want to join our campus community, if you want to be included as a full-fledged member and demonstrate with us on climate change, immigration, women’s rights, or LGBT rights (if you even just want to dialogue with us), we’ll accept you on one condition. Check your support for Israel at the door. Shed that part of your Jewish identity and you can join us.” As I suggested earlier, that is no different than demanding that a student stop observing Shabbat or stop keeping kosher in order to gain admission. It’s comparable to demanding that a Catholic student disavow the Vatican or that a Muslim student shed his/her connection to Mecca. Excluding an individual in this manner on the basis of his/her identity is discrimination. There is one more point that students and the general public should understand before we turn to the “legal remedies” and explain how the law can be utilized to protect Jewish students. That is: Denying Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state is qualitatively different than criticizing the policies of the government of Israel. Denying the right of Jewish self-determination is anti-Semitic not only because those who deny this right apply a double standard to the Jews. They support self-determination for all other groups (including the Palestinians and the Kurds), but deny it only to the Jews. It is also anti-Semitic because (as we have been discussing) it demands that Jews shed a key component of their identity as Jews—namely, the historic Jewish yearning and determination to return to Zion. I once heard Israel’s Ambassador [to the United States] Ron Dermer give the following analogy. He said, if a couple has a conversation about whether or not they should have children—whether they can afford children, whether they have the disposition to be good parents—that conversation is legitimate before the couple has any kids. After the children are born, that discussion becomes immoral. Similarly, 75 years ago before the modern State of Israel was born, it was legitimate to have conversations (as many did) about whether or not a Jewish state should be established, particularly if that state would have to “live by the sword” and engage in the “dirty business” of statehood. Today, however, to suggest that the Jewish State of Israel has no right to exist is immoral and anti-Semitic. It is immoral because supporting the destruction of the world’s only Jewish nation-state is akin to supporting the destruction of Jews. Denying the right of Jewish self-determination means supporting the destruction of the safety net for Jews who are and have historically been persecuted around the globe. In 1998, the noted columnist Charles Krauthammer (who passed away just two years ago) penned a piece called “At Last, Zion.” The article, which was written over 20 years ago, describes how essential Israel is to Jewish continuity. Krauthammer said: The return to Zion is now the principal drama of Jewish history. What began as an experiment has become the very heart of the Jewish people—its cultural, spiritual, and psychological center, soon to become its demographic center as well. Israel is the hinge. Upon it rest the hopes—the only hope—for Jewish continuity and survival. Krauthammer explained that as the demographics shift, “The Jewish people will be centered—not just spiritually but physically—in their ancient homeland.” And indeed, today approximately half of world Jewry lives in Israel. Over 80 percent of the Jews around the world live in either Israel or the United States. Krauthammer pointed out that “to destroy the Jewish people, Hitler needed to conquer the world. All that is needed today is to conquer a territory smaller than Vermont.” “The Jews,” he noted “have … put all their eggs in one basket, a small basket hard by the waters of the Mediterranean. And on its fate hinges everything Jewish.” When people on campus and beyond say that they are merely “criticizing the policies of the government of Israel,” we have to know where they stand on Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. Criticism of Israel by those who deny Jews the right of self-determination and who say Jews do not have a right to a Jewish homeland in any borders in the Land of Israel is anti-Semitic, even if it is cloaked in human-rights terminology. If you do not believe the Jewish state of Israel has a right to exist, your criticism of Israel is not intended to reform the policies of the government of Israel. It is not intended to be constructive. Rather, it is intended to be destructive and destroy the Jewish state. So now, a quick word on legal remedies which we can discuss more in depth during the question and answer period. What we are witnessing on campus (and beyond) is not a “free speech” issue. It is the result of an organized, well-funded strategy to harass and marginalize pro-Israel Zionists and deny them a place in society. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 requires universities to protect students from harassment and discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin. Although Title VI does not mention religion, both Republican and Democratic administrations have formally recognized that religious groups such as Jews, Sikhs and Muslims who have shared ancestral and ethnic characteristics are also protected under Title VI. If students feel they are being discriminated against, marginalized and excluded on the basis of their shared ancestry or ethnicity, they can file a complaint with the Office of Civil Rights (“OCR”) in the Department of Education. OCR will then conduct an investigation. If OCR finds that the university was aware of the discrimination and did not take adequate steps to address it, OCR could withhold Federal funds from the university. In practice, that rarely happens. Usually, OCR negotiates a resolution with the university where the university agrees to take steps to address the discrimination. Not every unsettling incident on campus is grounds for a Title VI complaint. In our country, the First Amendment protects even hate speech. Marginalizing and excluding students on the basis of their identity, however, is not a “speech” issue. It is unlawful harassment and discrimination. We have to learn to articulate the difference. Condemn the anti-Semitic speech, punish the discriminatory conduct. Document, document, document. Documentation is key. Students have to learn to document both the anti-Semitic speech and the discriminatory conduct. Make the university aware of the anti-Semitic speech so that the university can condemn it the same way it would condemn racist or bigoted speech. But don’t stop there. Explain how you are being marginalized and excluded. Are you being shut out of a student group or campus event? Is your program being disrupted? Are you being told you are not welcome? Are you afraid to wear a yarmulke, Star of David or a T-shirt with Hebrew lettering because you are afraid that if you do, you will be targeted and maligned? That documentation is crucial to proving the harassment and discrimination that is currently taking place on campus. In addition, feel free to contact us at the Brandeis Center for help. We have attorneys and a trained a group of law-school students: our JIGSAW Fellows. They are available to work with you, to help you prepare talking points for meetings with administrators or to help you draft university bias complaints when appropriate. If you are experiencing anti-Semitic harassment on campus, send us an email (info@brandeiscenter.com), and we will put you in touch with someone who can help you. And finally, always remember that the best response to unlawful discrimination is self-confidence and pride. Don’t let anyone take that away from you. Jews have a deep, rich, profound heritage. Study it, embrace it and be proud of it. The Jewish people and our tiny relatively young nation-state have changed the world. We have made enormous contributions in the areas of science, technology, agriculture, medicine, mathematics, philosophy, art and more. We have so much of which to be proud. Imagine if Israel had no enemies committed to its destruction. Imagine if Jews were no longer demonized. Israel would not have to spend any time or resources on security and defense. It could devote 100 percent of its resources to improving the world in which we live. So let’s unite and push back together against those who pressure Jews to abandon the Zionist component of our identity. No one has the right to demand that we give up our sense of Jewish peoplehood or our historic yearning for Zion. Whether you are Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Mizrahi, Conservative, Orthodox, Reform or Reconstructionist, haredi or Chiloni, we are all Jews, and Israel is our homeland. Alyza Lewin is president and general counsel of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law.
Tikvah is pleased to announce a multi-part “townhall series” on the future of college assessed, analyzed, and debated from a Jewish perspective. We will be joined by some of America’s leading educators and experts—such as Jonathan Haidt, Alyza Lewin, and Ruth Wisse. The series is open to college-bound and college-enrolled students, to parents and grandparents concerned about the education of the rising generation, and to everyone who cares about how to strengthen Jewish liberal education in America in the years ahead. Watch the Tikvah Townhall presentation here. This townhall series is generously sponsored by Liz Lange. For more information or to ask a question, please contact us at abondar@tikvahfund.org. Register Here How to Avoid the Anti-Zionist Trap with Alyza Lewin, Brandeis Center and Tamara Berens, Krauthammer Fellow at Mosaic Magazine Tuesday, June 23rd, 2020 | 7:30 PM EDT On college campuses, BDS petitions, Apartheid Weeks, and organized animus against Jews and Zionists abound. How can we understand the anti-Zionist playbook? How should Jewish and Zionist students respond? And what is at stake in the nationwide campus wars over Israel? To explore these issues, we will be joined by two courageous voices: Alyza Lewin, president and general counsel of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, who has been at the forefront of public debate over illegal discrimination against Jewish students at the hands of anti-Israel activists; and Tamara Berens, a Krauthammer Fellow at Mosaic Magazine, who recently published an important investigative piece on the history of anti-Israel activism at Columbia University.
By Melissa White – September 20, 2019 Jewish Insider The U.S. Department of Education blasted a joint Middle Eastern studies program between the University of North Carolina and Duke University for providing a biased curriculum to students. The department ordered UNC’s vice chancellor for research to provide an updated curriculum for the Duke-UNC Consortium for Middle East Studies (CEMS) in order for the program to retain its federal funding. Written warning: The letter, sent by Department of Education Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education Robert King, warned that the school was potentially in violation of Title VI of the Higher Education Act of 1965. “Congress authorizes grants to protect the security, stability, and economic vitality of the United States by teaching American students the foreign languages and cultural competencies required to develop a pool of experts to meet our national needs,” he wrote. Uneven emphasis: The letter flagged several areas of concern about the consortium, noting that the Duke-UNC CEMS curriculum “lack[s] balance as it offers very few, if any, programs focused on the historic discrimination faced by, and current circumstances of, religious minorities in the Middle East.” King flags the “considerable emphasis placed on the understanding the positive aspects of Islam, while there is an absolute absence of any similar focus on the positive aspects of Christianity, Judaism, or any other religion or belief system in the Middle East.” Weighing in: Alyza Lewin, president of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, tells Jewish Insider: “Title VI of the Higher Education Act (HEA) was enacted in 1965 to fund academic programs that would benefit national security by teaching students a foreign language, instructing them on international affairs, providing them with a comprehensive understanding of foreign countries, and training students for future roles in government or national security. For years, however, many university area studies programs [called National Resource Centers or NRCs] have misused these funds; as Middle Eastern Studies Centers, in particular, have become havens of biased, anti-American and anti-Israel propaganda.” Lewin said that the DOE’s letter “suggests that the Department is at long last seriously reviewing the NRCs that receive Title VI funding and working to ensure that these federally funded programs advance the HEA’s national security goals.” The DOE demand “sends a loud and clear message to other federally funded NRCs that before they re-apply for Title VI funding, they had better be certain their programs are balanced and promote national security interests as the Higher Education Act requires.” Background: The Duke-UNC program came under fire in the spring for a conference titled “Conflict Over Gaza: People, Politics, and Possibilities.” Reports indicate that both participants and speakers made antisemitic and anti-Israel remarks — with some of those remarks captured on film. During a performance by Palestinian rapper Tamer Nafar, the artist told the crowd, “I can’t be antisemitic alone, try it with me together” and “Think of Mel Gibson. Go that antisemitic.” While King’s letter makes no mention of the conference, the inquiry began after Rep. George Holding (R-NC) sent a letter to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos in April calling for a federal investigation into the program. What’s next? The Department of Education has given UNC until Sunday to respond with a plan and timeline for bringing the program into compliance with existing laws.
National borders have been a fundamental issue in the Middle East for a century. The year marks the hundredth anniversary of the secret British-French Sykes-Picot agreement which carved up Middle Eastern parts of Ottoman Empire in anticipation of a Turkish defeat in World War I.[i] As with most Asian and African territories, twentieth century Middle Eastern borders were fixed on a basis of settlement, great power politics and war. (more…)