Posted on 02/14/2013 4:09:09 PM PST by SJackson
College probes ejection of Jewish students
Brooklyn college launches investigation after students claim security removed them from pro-Palestinian BDS event.
NEW YORK -Brooklyn College launched a probe into allegations that Jewish students were wrongly ejected from an event hosted by the school in support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
Karen Gould, the college's president, on Wednesday ordered officials to conduct a "thorough independent review" of allegations that four members of the Jewish student group Hillel were told to leave the gathering organized by a pro-Palestinian group on campus last week. The college's political science faculty was an official co-sponsor of the event.
The students claim they were escorted by security out of the room where a lecture by pro-Palestinian speakers was set to take place for no apparent reason other than being supporters of Israel.
The Hillel students had pro-Israel leaflets with them in the lecture hall. They told the New York Daily News that they were asked by an event organizer to give up the leaflets, and when they refused they were told to leave.
"If we learn that these students were denied that opportunity without cause, as they allege, the decision to have them removed will have been inappropriate and the college will issue a formal apology," Gould wrote in a statement.
The primary host of the event was the Brooklyn College Students for Justice in Palestine, a group that says it is aimed at “helping end Israeli apartheid and the illegal occupation of Palestine.” Some objected that a BDS event was being held on a college campus with the college's imprimatur.
================================
Algemeiner Audio Prompts Threat of Justice Dept. Investigation Against Brooklyn College
Former Special War Crimes Prosecutor for the US Dept. of Justice Neal Sher and CUNY trustee Jeffrey Wiesenfeld are holding a press conference today calling on Brooklyn College to adopt new policy changes in light of recent events surrounding a BDS (Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment) event aimed at Israel in which four Jewish students complained of being unfairly singled out and then removed from the audience.
Recent audio released by The Algemeiner appears to contradict original claims by Brooklyn College officials that the students were being disruptive throughout the first speaker’s address. The incident is especially egregious taking into account that the school’s Political Science Department co-sponsored the event.
Sher said he plans on calling on the Justice Department to open an investigation into the school’s conduct if it is unwilling to take responsibility and address the issues that led to the students’ eviction.
“It seems rather clear that school officials simply didn’t tell the truth about what happened,” says Sher.”It seems to me the students were unfairly removed from the event and when a stink was raised they just made up a story,” he added.
“Federal civil rights law, under Title VI, gives Jewish students the right to be free of a hostile environment and here you have a case where a university’s actions created a hostile environment. If there’s student harassment of Jews you have to take action.”
A Brooklyn College spokesman told The Algemeiner Wednesday that the audio file had been given to investigators and would be used as part of an inquiry the school has launched. The spokesperson declined to comment further.
Wiesenfeld insists that institutional change needs to be made, and went beyond the incident of the students being evicted, making the assertion that laws were broken just by having the Political Science Department co-sponsor the event.
“This was not an academic pursuit–it’s propaganda–which is actually prohibited in universities. The American Association of University Professors has standards that have been in force since 1916 that say professors may not proselytize, they must give two sides of an issue, and they are to spur academic discussion and research–that’s being violated,” he said.
Wiesenfeld believes there are two major changes that need to be addressed. “Look at groups who are not poised to engage in debate, conversation, reason, and true discussion, but are looking to proselytize by force, and have a record of doing so and have exclusionary tactics should not be invited on campus. And secondly amend the bylaws of the state university by the legislature and signed by the governor where the department chairs will be chosen by the president of the college” instead of by the professors.
Wiesenfeld says that part of the problem is pro-Israel academics feel threatened in liberal arts environments and top-down governance would provide a more balanced faculty. “What you have now is the inmates running the prison,” he says.
Alan Dershowitz was at the center of the battle against the BDS event and says that the school has its work cut out for it. “There will be a lot of tests coming up. One test will be whether the Political Science Department will be willing to sponsor the right wing of opinion relating to Israel. For example: would they sponsor Naftali Bennett or the Zionist Organization of America? There’s going to be tests to prove whether they’re really neutral, to see if they pass the “shoe on the other foot” test. And I think there’s going to be blisters,” he said.
If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
..................
Needless to say the "threat" of a Justice Dept investigation isn't coming from the Holder Justice Dept, and is as like as prosecuting New Black Panthers for voter intimidation, or deporting illegals, Union Leader: ‘ICE Crumbling from Within’ Because Obama Won't Let Agents Arrest Illegals
Are they going to tell muslims they can't come in?
BDS = Bush Derangement Syndrome?
What kind of Jews are they? Don’t they know that ALL JEWS in the United States are supposed to support Israel, but, at the same time, make sure that Israel’s enemies can ANNIHILATE them.
Drone strike.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.