LDB President Kenneth L. Marcus will be a featured speaker at the “Real Talk Conference 2016: Difficult Questions About Race, Sex, and Religion” at the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College. The conference will be held at the Olin Humanities Building at Bard College, October 20-21. For those driving (GPS): Franklin W. Olin Humanities Building, 35 Henderson Cir Dr Annandale-On-Hudson, NY 12504.
A new Ithaca book club will examine “The Other Racism” — anti-Semitism — in Ithaca and beyond, with a reading of the new Kenneth Marcus book, The Definition of Anti-Semitism. Marcus will speak at the club’s first meeting on Oct. 21 at 5:30 pm at Buffalo Street Books. He is former director of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and is the founder and president of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law. The book club will meet on the third Wednesday of the month at Buffalo Street Books at 5:30 pm. Participants are asked to purchase their copies of The Definition of Anti-Semitism through Buffalo Street Books. The club’s discussions will be facilitated by members of the Ithaca Coalition for Unity and Cooperation in the Middle East (ICUC-ME). ICUC-ME is a grass-roots anti-racist community organization working to preserve the plurality and diversity of the Middle East, advocating for peace and security for all. The group embraces fact-based, respectful dialogue, mutual recognition and cooperation to promote justice in the Middle East. For more information, see the ICUC-ME Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/IthacaCoalition. Video Call Link Here
Download PDF Washington, D.C: This week, Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law (LDB) President Kenneth L. Marcus will be a featured speaker at the “Real Talk Conference 2016: Difficult Questions About Race, Sex, and Religion” at the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities at Bard College. LDB is a national non-profit civil rights legal advocacy organization committed to combating anti-Semitism in higher education. LDB’s President Marcus commented, “I am honored to be joined by such a diverse and impressive group of scholars to address some of the most pressing issues on college campuses today.” The Center’s ninth annual international conference asks questions such as: How can colleges bring racial and social justice into the heart of higher education? Should colleges and universities limit speech in the name of civility? Should trigger warnings be incorporated into college curricula? Can we balance the right to practice one’s religion with the desire for inclusiveness? Are “microaggressions” the kinds of speech that should be disciplined? Does civility limit free speech? The conference will be held at the Olin Humanities Building at Bard College, on Thursday, October 20- Friday, October 21. For a full conference schedule, registration links, and bios of featured speakers, please visit hac.bard.edu/con2016
Download PDF Washington D.C, The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law (LDB) is pleased to welcome two new Civil Rights Legal Fellows to the staff, Hana Ma and Rachel Leach. LDB is a national non-profit civil rights legal advocacy organization committed to combating anti-Semitism in higher education. LDB’s President & General Counsel Kenneth L. Marcus commented, “We are pleased to welcome our new team members, who join at a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise on a national scale and their skills will be put to good use. We are confident they will add to our growing list of legal accomplishments.” Hana majored in law and English as an undergraduate student and became very interested in a variety of legal topics such as cross-border insolvency law, U.S. constitutional law and international humanitarian law. She was awarded China Oxford Scholar at Oxford and F.Y. Chang Scholar at Harvard, and is committed to inter-cultural exchanges and learning.
October 18-19, 2016 University of St. Thomas and University of Minnesota LDB Senior Staff Attorney Jennie Gross will address the LDB Law Student Chapter at the University of St. Thomas on Tuesday, Oct. 18, and at the University of Minnesota on Wednesday, October 19. Ms. Gross will speak about anti-Semitism, civil rights, and the Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) Movement. Jennie joined LDB earlier this year with ten years of experience litigating in federal courts on behalf of plaintiffs in class actions, mass torts, including the Vioxx litigation, antitrust litigation against Microsoft, and complex litigation against the tobacco industry. Jennie also has strong background in policy analysis, and is the co-author of the textbook Class Actions Dilemmas: Pursuing Public Goals for Private Gain, which has been used to teach complex litigation to law students. More recently, Jennie completed a fellowship in Tobacco Regulatory Science at FDA. Jennie graduated from Emory University (BA, Economics) and the University of Southern California Law Center (JD). She is also a former Doctoral Fellow in public policy at the RAND Corporation.
Dale Hurd CBN News October 7, 2016 Activists in the BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) movement will tell you they are only defending the rights of Palestinians, but when they chant “from the river to the sea,” they’re calling for the complete destruction of Israel. The BDS movement is growing and has become has become a force on more and more college campuses. It is aimed at only one nation, the only democracy in the Middle East. Who Started BDS? “No other country, just Israel,” says Richard Millet, who tracks the BDS movement through his website. “You won’t see this against any other country in the world that they don’t agree with. They won’t be calling for a boycott of America, which they don’t agree with, or the British government, which they don’t agree with, before we get into China, Russia, Syria, Saudi Arabia. You name it. All the other countries, there is no boycott, so you answer, ‘Why?'” The answer to that question can be found in the answer to another important question: Who started the BDS movement? BDS groups say the movement was launched in 2005 by the Palestinian Civil Society. But the evidence shows that is not true. A video of BDS leaders discussing the origin of the movement at a conference at the University of Westminster on May 25 this year shows Ilan Pappe, director of the European Centre for Palestinian Studies at the University of Exeter in England, considered a leading intellectual in the BDS movement, quietly disagreeing with the statement that the Palestinians created the BDS movement. Dr. Ruba Salih, with the University of London, told Pappe, “The Palestinians launched the BDS in 2005 and 2004.” Pappe responds, “Yes, yes, not really, but yes. For historical records, yes.” Salih presses him: “That’s important.” Pappe responds: “That’s not true [that Palestinians started the BDS movement], but it’s important.” It is important because, if the Palestinians did not begin the BDS movement, then the question, of course, is who did? BDS expert and president of NGO Monitor, professor Gerald Steinberg, says BDS is a creation of European socialists and Muslim nations who oppose Israel, led by the 57 nation Organization of the Islamic Conference, the largest voting bloc at the United Nations. “So they get together with the radical Left, it started with the Soviet Union, certainly filters over to the Trotskyites and the British Labor Party in the UK and many other radical allies,” Stenberg explained. “The fact that this is in many ways a European radical political movement makes it even less legitimate.” Who Funds BDS? There have been Arab boycotts of Israel since 1945, before the creation of the State of Israel. Some even trace the boycotts back to Nazi Germany in 1933. But the modern BDS movement took shape at the 2001 U.N. Conference against Racism in Durban, South Africa; an event so rife with blatant anti-Semitism that the U.S. and Israeli delegations walked out. “People were selling or distributing copies of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. There were people there urging a return to Nazi anti-Semitism,” Kenneth Marcus, president of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, said. He added, “from that movement, the new BDS campaign emerged.” Another key question is who funds BDS? Steinberg says the movement gets hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Some of the funding is difficult to track. But if you live in a Western nation, there’s a good chance you help fund it through your tax dollars and also through your tithe. The BDS movement gets most of its funding from the European Union, European national governments, and even the U.S. government. The money goes to NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that claim to fight for human rights but that also oppose the State of Israel. “Amnesty International, Ken Roth and Human Rights watch,” Steinberg said. “These organizations are funded by governments under the label of international aid promoting human rights, promoting peace and development, the Swiss, the Swedes, the Norwegians, the British, Germans, up and down. The money there is huge.” Some Christian charities also give money to BDS. The website for Christian Aid makes it look like it only fights poverty, but drill down on their website and you’ll find they also support BDS, as does the Presbyterian Church, USA. Brainwashing Students While the BDS movement has been in one respect a failure–it has accomplished very little in the policy arena–it is has succeeded in another area, by spreading anti-Semitism across college campuses. “What we’re seeing increasingly is that BDS activists are intimidating student governments at colleges and universities to pay for their activities and if they don’t, there may be repercussions,” Marcus said. Jewish students and professors find themselves increasingly persecuted on campus. The Muslim Student Association and the Students for Justice in Palestine have hundreds of campus chapters, aggressively confronting and sometimes assaulting Jewish students and faculty at pro-Israel events. Ronnie Fraser, founding director of the Academic Friends of Israel, warns that the next generation of leaders is being brainwashed that Israel is the worst nation on earth. “Students are being fed a diet of Israel is a racist state. Israel is a Zionist state. Israel equals the Nazis,” he said. With massive funding behind it, BDS is turning people against Israel and creating a generation of leaders who may someday try to carry out what some have said is the real goal of the BDS movement: the elimination of the State of Israel. Original Article
LDB President Kenneth L. Marcus, University of Virginia On Thursday, September 29, LDB President & General Counsel Kenneth L. Marcus will address the LDB Law Student Chapter at the University of Virginia (UVA) on the topic of, “Making Dollars or Making Change: Big Law, Human Rights, and Becoming a Purposeful Lawyer.” Marcus will describe his career path and discuss his current work in the area of civil rights law. Marcus is the author of The Definition of Anti-Semitism (Oxford University Press: 2015) and Jewish Identity and Civil Rights in America (Cambridge University Press: 2010). Marcus founded the Brandeis Center in 2011 to combat the resurgence of anti-Semitism in American higher education. The following year, Marcus was named to the Forward 50, the Jewish Daily Forward’s listing of the “American Jews who made the most significant impact on the news in the past year.” The Forward described its 50 honorees as “the new faces of Jewish power,” predicting that “if Marcus has any say in it, we may witness a new era of Jewish advocacy.” During his public service career, Marcus served as Staff Director at the United States Commission on Civil Rights and was delegated the authority of Assistant Secretary of Education for Civil Rights and Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity. Shortly before his departure from the Civil Rights Commission, the Wall Street Journal observed that “the Commission has rarely been better managed,” and that it “deserves a medal for good governance.” Marcus also serves as Associate Editor of the Journal for the Study of Antisemitism. Marcus previously held the Lillie and Nathan Ackerman Chair in Equality and Justice in America at the City University of New York’s Bernard M. Baruch College School of Public Affairs (2008-2011). Before entering public service, Mr. Marcus was a litigation partner in two major law firms, where he conducted complex commercial and constitutional litigation. He has published widely in academic journals as well as in more popular venues such as The Jerusalem Post, Commentary, The Weekly Standard, and The Christian Science Monitor. Mr. Marcus is a graduate of Williams College, magna cum laude, and the University of California at Berkeley School of Law.
UC Berkeley School of Law On Thursday, September 29, LDB Senior Staff Attorney Jennie Gross will address the LDB Law Student Chapter at the University of California at Berkeley on anti-Semitism, civil rights, and the Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) Movement. Jennie joined LDB earlier this year with ten years of experience litigating in federal courts on behalf of plaintiffs in class actions, mass torts, including the Vioxx litigation, antitrust litigation against Microsoft, and complex litigation against the tobacco industry. Jennie also has strong background in policy analysis, and is the co-author of the textbook Class Actions Dilemmas: Pursuing Public Goals for Private Gain, which has been used to teach complex litigation to law students. More recently, Jennie completed a fellowship in Tobacco Regulatory Science at FDA. Jennie graduated from Emory University (BA, Economics) and the University of Southern California Law Center (JD). She is also a former Doctoral Fellow in public policy at the RAND Corporation.
Download PDF Washington, D.C.,Today, following recent reports of anti-Semitic, racist, and hateful social media postings at the University of Tennessee – Knoxville, the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law (LDB) called on the Tennessee State Legislature to address whether the series of anti-Semitic incidents violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. LDB a national non-profit civil rights organization dedicated to combating anti-Semitism in higher education joins the call of Proclaiming Justice to the Nations (PJTN). LDB President Kenneth L. Marcus commented, “We join the call of PJTN and PJTN’s President Laurie Cardoza-Moore, and urge the Tennessee State Legislature to conduct hearings into whether these reports of anti-Semitism on Tennessee’s public campuses are in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. We call on Governor Bill Haslam to establish a task force to monitor and protect Jewish and Christian-Zionist students.” Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin in programs that receive federal funds. In 2004 The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced that Title VI applies to discrimination on the basis of Jewish ethnicity or ancestry. Therefore, a university administration has the obligation to address incidents of anti-Semitism by creating a safe environment for all students, condemning and prohibiting anti-Semitism, and holding accountable those who have engaged in anti-Semitic incidents. Jewish and Christian-Zionist students deserve the same protections as all other students on campus. In August, LDB wrote to the University of Tennessee – Knoxville (UTK), urging Chancellor Cheek to address reports of numerous anti-Semitic and threatening posts that were found on the social media accounts of current UTK students and recent graduates. The postings include a variety of messages advocating violence against Jews and Israelis; displaying anti-Semitic, homophobic, and racist sentiments; and endorsements of terrorist organizations. The Twitter messages reportedly included statements such as, “Hitler had alot [sic] of great ideas. We need a guy like that in the White House”; “…I already hate you. You dirty filthy Jew. All your people do is f***ed s*** up. Wish hitler [sic] was still around to show you guys”; and “’@PalAnonymous Today marks the 26th anniversary of the First #Intifada #Palestine.’ About time for another one…” In the letter, LDB wrote, “Allowing such incidents, without strong condemnation from the University administration, will signal that UTK takes a disparaging view of Jewish students and students of Israeli national origin. Such messages are incompatible with UTK’s values – and federal civil rights law.” The letter continued, “[s]peech that invokes anti-Semitic stereotypes against Israelis and Jews, such as the social media messages at issue, can create a hostile environment for Israeli and Jewish students on campus in violation of Title VI.” LDB stands in support of Ms. Cardoza-Moore’s call. Current attempts to address the incidents include reviewing the social media posts for violations of the student code of conduct, alerting the campus police to explore other potential threats, and facilitating an opportunity for the student organizations involved to meet and discuss the incidents that have taken place. Despite Chancellor Cheek’s and the UTK administration’s attempts to recompense the Jewish and Christian Zionist students who were targeted by these offensive posts, it is clear that more work must be done to address issues of anti-Semitism on campus. Therefore, the Tennessee State Legislature needs to investigate these troubling anti-Semitic, racist, and bigoted incidents in order to protect students’ civil rights, provide a safe learning environment, and to hold the offenders accountable.
On Wednesday, September 28, LDB Attorney Aviva Vogelstein will return to her law school alma mater and address the LDB Chapter at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law on “Fighting the New Anti-Semitism.” Vogelstein, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania (BA ’10) and Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law (JD ’13) has worked with the Brandeis Center for two years. Her work focuses on combating the resurgence of anti-Semitism on American university campuses through legal and public policy approaches, as well as growing LDB’s Law Student Chapter Initiative, to train the next generation of lawyers to use their legal tools to fight anti-Semitism.