Shame on Campus

Brooklyn College President Karen Gould botches handling of an anti-Israel conference 

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS 

Saturday, February 9, 2013

So much for academic freedom at Brooklyn College.

There was no place at an anti-Israel, anti-Semitic campus program for four students who attempted to attend with the goal of expressing contrary views.

At the order of a representative of Students for Justice in Palestine, and while a school administrator stood by, campus security forced the four members of Hillel, a Jewish student society, out of the event.

The expulsions are a severe blot on the record of college President Karen Gould, as well as on the standing of Paisley Currah, chair of the political science department, which co-sponsored lectures devoted to the so-called BDS movement.

Gould and Currah had defended the department’s co-sponsorship as an exercise in academic freedom. Gould, for one, urged people with differing views to attend and speak their minds.

“I encourage those who do attend with opposing views to participate in the discussion, ask tough questions and challenge any ideas with which they disagree,” she wrote.

That’s not what happened for student Melanie Goldberg and three companions. She said she brought opposing fact sheets to distribute at the end of the program.

When a member of the sponsoring group saw her taking notes on the papers, she said, he demanded that she surrender them or be expelled.

Goldberg refused. Security was called. Goldberg said she complained to college Vice President Milga Morales, only to be told, “It’s their event and they are calling the shots.”

Continue reading.

Serving in the Israeli Army without being in the Israeli Army

By Moshe Pollock

I removed my army uniform, grabbed my towel and trudged off to the shower room. The four other men in my barracks had already headed for the mess hall. It was the conclusion of another rewarding day of serving the Israeli army.

Every year, individuals from more than 60 countries come to Israel to volunteer for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) under the auspices of Sar-El (the Hebrew acronym for "Service to Israel"). They are not given weapons. They do not serve in tanks. But they do wear uniforms and live on army bases. They work in warehouses, hospitals, kitchens, garages and other places, relieving the load on soldiers. They take over functions that enable the military personnel to focus on the essential duties of defending Israel.

My Sar-El group was atypical in that it served for only week because of the holidays. Sar-El service generally extends for three weeks to a maximum of three months. But our group was illustrative of the persons who volunteer. There were 25 of us representing 13 nations including Israel. Evenly divided between men and women, we ranged in age from 18 to about 70. Approximately 40% of us were not Jewish. There was a babel of English accents and a variety of backgrounds. For example, there were a taxi driver from Belgrade, a Zurich policeman and a nurse from Finland.

We were assigned to the IDF medical supply base. I worked with about a half dozen others of our team in packing thousands of individual medical kits. We counted out the burn dressings, IV catheters, gauze rolls, tourniquets and pressure dressings. We laughed and exchanged stories of our personal histories while we filled the kits. But it was sobering to recognize just what our work product would be utilized for. Repeatedly it was said, "May none of these kits ever be used."

Our group performed another task. We worked on emergency packs to be distributed to victims of earthquakes, tsunamis and other disasters around the world. What we had to do was unwrap the previously sealed packs and remove the alcohol prep pads. Why? The pads had been manufactured in Israel and this fact was printed on the wrapper. If Israel attempted to donate, through a third country or an international relief organization, tens of thousands of these emergency medical kits to a nation experiencing a crisis, they might be rejected.

Certain Arab, Islamic or other countries might not accept the critically-needed kits if they came from "The Little Satan," Israel. To ensure that they will be accepted, the IDF ensures that its medical emergency kits contain no indication that they emanate from Israel. We replaced the mistakenly inserted alcohol pads imprinted with "Made in Israel" with those saying "Manufactured in the U.K."

Continue reading.

UC Davis protesters abused Jewish students, pro-Israel group claims

January 29, 2013

The pro-Israel group AMCHA Initiative claimed that Jewish students at the University of California, Davis were abused and threatened at a pro-Palestinian protest on campus.

In a letter sent Monday to UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi, AMCHA Initiative co-founders Leila Beckwith and Tammi Rossman-Benjamin alleged that demonstrators carrying "death to Zionism" placards occupied a public building on Nov. 19 and harassed pro-Israel students. The letter also was CCed to University of California President Mark Yudof and others.

AMCHA Initiative released a video showing protesters comparing Zionism with Nazism and telling supporters of Israel to leave.

"We are deeply concerned about the virulent and hate-filled actions taking place on the UC Davis campus as a result of students' religion and beliefs," Beckwith and Rossman-Benjamin, faculty members at the University of California, Los Angeles and University of California, Santa Cruz, wrote to Katehi.

According to the two, several UC Davis faculty members were present at the event but did not intervene.

The university said Monday it was investigating the claims.

In recent years, several universities in the University of California system have become a battleground between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups.

Last year, 10 pro-Palestinian students at the University of California, Irvine were found guilty of disrupting a lecture by Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren on campus and sentenced to community service.

American Jewish University: Not Just American Jews

From an outsider’s perspective, the undergraduate college at American Jewish University in Los Angeles may not seem diverse. After all, the college, while not a religious institution, is predominately Jewish. However, AJU students – much like American Jewry as a whole – are differentiated by homeland, customs, beliefs, and individual personality traits, despite being generally unified by a common culture.

In order to research how the undergrads view their school’s diversity, I asked roughly 70 percent of the school’s 125 students to complete an anonymous survey. The survey included demographic questions such as age, birthplace and major, as well as questions about students’ personal observance of Judaism and their perception of the AJU community.

According to the survey, the student body is 95 percent Jewish and 88 percent Caucasian. When you delve deeper, however, you will find that considerable diversity exists within the mostly Jewish population. Thirty percent of students were born outside of California, and an additional 12 percent were born outside the United States. AJU students come from seven other countries: Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, Czechoslovakia, Israel and Ukraine.

While AJU exhibits a remarkable diversity of nationalities for a university of its size, the distribution of Jewish ethnicities closely parallels that of the global Jewish population. The survey revealed that Ashkenazim constitute 74 percent of Jewish students at AJU, compared to roughly 80 percent of Jews worldwide, according to an article published by the Jerusalem Center of Public Affairs.

One part of the survey asked students to state whether they “strongly agree,” “agree,” “disagree” or “strongly disagree” with the statement “AJU has a diverse student body.” The student body was evenly split: 50 percent selected “strongly agree” or “agree,” and 50 percent selected “disagree” or “strongly disagree.”

Continue reading.

African-American Student Starts Pro-Israel Group in New Orleans

The research she did for her paper alarmed her, and Valdary resolved to do what she could to fight Jew-hatred.

There hasn't been a lot of good news recently for pro-Israel watchers of campus culture, but in the unlikeliest of places, by the unlikeliest of Zionists, there is finally good news to share.

The University of New Orleans has nearly 13,000 undergraduate students, fewer than 100 of whom are Jewish. There are no Jewish studies courses, there are no Jewish services available and there is no kosher food available on campus. But what UNO does have is Chloe’ Simone Valdary.

Valdary, a sophomore, majors in international relations. Her particular interests are history, religion, philosophy, politics and current events. Although she is Christian, Valdary decided to write a major paper her freshman year on the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The research she did for her paper alarmed her, and Valdary resolved to do what she could to fight Jew-hatred. She created an organization on Campus, “Allies of Israel.” There are currently only nine members of the group, but the membership is likely to soar soon. Their first major event will be held on January 28.

For their kickoff event Valdary chose to aim high. She contacted Dr. Daniel Pipes, the executive director of the Middle East Forum, and one of the best known and respected authorities on the Middle East and radical Islam. To the delight of the Allies, Pipes agreed to be the keynote speaker at their upcoming Declare Your Freedom event, which she describes as a “pro-Israel, pro-America event.”

The goal of this project, Valdary told The Jewish Press, is to publicly express a pro-Israel position, but also to talk about how to combat anti-Semitism in innovative ways. She has a number of ideas she is already working on which she believes will have a real impact on the widespread hatred of which she only recently became aware.

In an announcement for the January 28 event, Chloe wrote:

Continue reading.

Gun Violence: A Jewish Issue, a Student Issue

New Voices Editorial, Opinion by New Voices Editorial Board

At least one member of the New Voices editorial board sat in a meeting of their Hillel board this week at which a discussion of security spontaneously took its place on top of the agenda. We assure you it was not the first such discussion in a Jewish organization this week, nor the first on a college campus, nor the first in a Hillel board meeting – nor will it be the last. In light of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. last Friday, a new discourse about security, mental health policy and gun control grips the nation.

We limit these editorials to subjects that matter to Jews and to college students. We believe that an editorial about the tragedy in Newtown is not out of place here because we believe the issues of mental health and gun violence raised by these killings are Jewish issues as well as student issues.

The tragedy of Newtown is a Jewish issue.

It’s not a Jewish issue just because we Jews know what it’s like to live in fear of random acts of mass violence. It’s not a Jewish issue because the youngest child murdered in Newtown, 6-year-old Noah Pozner, was a Jew. And it’s not a Jewish issue because Rabbi Saul Praver of Newtown has been visibly active in his efforts to support the grieving families of Newtown.

It’s a Jewish issue because taking the life of another is our most basic sin. Our tradition tells us that God’s creation of humanity began with the creation of one single human being to teach us that taking the life of one person is like destroying an entire world. Last Friday, 27 worlds were destroyed. As the Jewish community of America, preventing more destruction is incumbent upon us. (And if you turned up your nose as you read this paragraph because you think it an oversimplification of Judaism, consider that some elements of Judaism may be just that simple.)

The tragedy of Newtown is a student issue.

Continue reading.

2012′s Jewish Headlines and Their Ramifications for Jews on Campus

It’s the most wonderful time of the year. School is off, joy is in the air, and the NFL playoffs are about to start. Christmas and Chanukah? Well…they’re done, and with them the holiday season is now reduced to the solar New Year.

But we all know what that means. It’s the time of year where every website, magazine, and newspaper bands together to create the traditional late-December tradition we like to call the Year-In-Review. Looking for this year’s biggest celebrity feuds? No need to fear…that list exists. Searching for a review with an especially corny name? Feel free to check out PBS’s The Year of You. Feeling selfish? Just log into Facebook and there’s an application to create your own personalized year-in-review that will cover the most interesting development in the world: Your life.

Because I’m a shameless conformist, and because these years-in-review make me giddy, I’ve decided that New Voices needs a similar year in review. It has been an eventful year for Jewish college students, and a few storylines have the potential to drastically affect the landscape of Jewish life on campus as we head into 2013 and beyond. Here are five stories from 2012 that might be worth remembering as we look to the future.

1. Rick Jacobs commences his term as President of the Union for Reform Judaism.

For two organizations, this year was a year of profound change. At the Union of Reform Judaism, Rabbi Rick Jacobs of Westchester, New York started as President, promising profound changes from the leadership style of Eric Yoffe, whose administration Jacobs had criticized harshly while serving as a congregational Rabbi. Officially taking the helm in July, in Jacobs’s first few months, he demonstrated an interest in campus Jewish life, spending his High Holy Days on a college campus (Brown University) and attending Hillel Institute, Hillel’s annual leadership-training conference in St. Louis, which served almost 1,000 Hillel staff and student leaders.

2. Wayne Firestone steps down as CEO of Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life

Continue reading.