School accused of tolerating a “hotbed of anti-Jewish animosity and intimidation”
The University of California, Berkeley, which has long been accused of tolerating a “hotbed of anti-Jewish animosity and abuse,” was added to the congressional committee’s research on Tuesday.
According to data provided by the council and a version of a letter obtained by the Washington Free Beacon, the House Committee on Education and the Workforce announced that it is asking Berkeley to turn over domestic records regarding “numerous anti-Semitic situations on campus and its government’s failure to protect Jewish students and faculty.” We are concerned about how inadequately UC Berkeley’s racism on its campus is.
The House committee’s investigation comes less than two weeks after the class opened up a hate crime probe in relation to a , aggressive protest , that erupted on school around a scheduled statement by an Israeli attorney, Ran Bar- Yoshafat. During that event, which was canceled due to the violence, mobs of anti- Israel students reportedly” choked a female student attendee, spit in another’s face, and shouted’ Jew, Jew, Jew,'” the , Free Beacon reported.
The committee, led by Rep. Virginia Foxx ( R., N. C. ), cited this incident in its letter to the university, saying that lawmakers were disturbed by the “violent riot in which anti- Israel activists assaulted Jewish students and shattered glass windows, forcing the cancellation of an Israeli speaker’s lecture”. Foxx’s committee is investigating a handful of other schools over similar incidents, including Harvard University, MIT, and the University of Pennsylvania, among others.
In recent weeks, “anti- Israel students have occupied and blocked UC Berkeley’s landmark Sather Gate, a key entrance to the center of campus, and harassed Jewish passersby”, according to the letter.
The committee wrote in its letter to the school, highlighting numerous instances of anti-Semitic harassment, bullying, and violence, that “UC Berkeley’s failure to address this activity breaches a specific and longstanding university commitment to keep the gate open as part of a legal settlement.”
In the wake of Hamas’s terror attack on Israel on October 7th, Berkeley has seen a sharp rise in anti-Israel and anti-Semitic incidents.
A civil rights group sued U. C. Berkeley in November, shortly after Hamas’s attack, for allegedly permitting the “longstanding, unchecked spread of anti- Semitism”, the Free Beacon reported.
According to the lawsuit,” Anti-Semitism has persisted at the school,” citing a number of recent incidents, including a violent attack on a” Jewish undergraduate draped in an Israeli flag” and a number of other instances of pro-Palestinian students yelling “hatre and threats against Jews.”
The school must comply with the House committee’s request to provide all information about anti-Semitic incidents on campus, details about how the school responded, and other details that might indicate that U. C. Berkeley’s administration is failing to combat Jew hatred on campus.
