Antisemitism on College Campuses

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Dear Reader,

Thank you for your ongoing support for J. The Jewish News of Northern California. We literally would not be able to do the work we do without you.

The stories in this digital magazine are not pleasant to read. In a perfect world, antisemitism wouldn’t exist. I wish! What struck most of us by surprise this year was not the old, old antisemitism of neo-Nazis, but a new strain of antisemitism on campuses, especially after October 7. U.C. Berkeley was not the only northern California campus to experience this hate–J. reported on antisemitic incidents at Stanford, San Jose State, U.C. Davis, UCSF, Sacramento State and San Francisco State. But the impact of these protests was felt especially hard at U.C. Berkeley.

J.’s reporting on U.C. Berkeley professor Ron Hassner led to national attention on how pro-Palestinian protests were negatively impacting Jewish students. J.’s reporting on U.C. Berkeley antisemitism was so powerful that nine of these stories were cited by a letter from the House Committee on Education and the Workforce to the leadership of U.C. Berkeley, questioning the university’s inaction in confronting hate speech.

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This digital collection will show you the power of J.’s reporting. Persistent, hard-hitting, but always accurate and fair, J. tells what is actually happening out in the community. Thanks to all of you who gave us tips, who sent in letters to the editor, who liked or commented on our Facebook and Instagram posts and shared our newsletters. Thanks for your dollars too–that support truly makes J.’s journalism possible.

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Jo Ellen Green Kaiser

This digital collection will show you the power of J.’s reporting. Persistent, hard-hitting, but always accurate and fair, J. tells what is actually happening out in the community.

Creating a Legacy

As founder of a firm that focuses on estate planning and elder law, Gene Osofsky is frequently asked by clients to include legacy gifts in their planning.

So when he and his wife, Hilary, a retired attorney, started planning for their own retirement, they realized that it was their turn to become their own best clients.

Legacy giving can be the best part of estate planning. As you look back on all you have accomplished, legacy planning gives you a chance to ensure that what you care about most will continue into the future. These gifts help charities plan ahead, knowing that there will be resources to sustain their work. And legacy giving has the added benefit of providing tax benefits not only to your heirs, but, when appreciated assets are being sold, to you as well.

When creating their own estate plan, the Osofskys had several of these goals in mind. “We wanted to find a way to minimize taxes on the sale of appreciated assets,” says Hilary, “while allowing us to divert our gains to charitable purposes instead.”

Legacy planning need not be complex. If you are giving some or all of your assets to one or more charities, you can do so as a bequest through your will or trust by simply specifying that you want to give your named charity a particular dollar amount or percentage of your estate.

Sometimes, it can be easier to leave “extras” in your estate to charity without a will or trust, as in the case of 401(k)s, IRAs, brokerage and bank accounts, and life insurance policies. These assets usually have built-in beneficiary designations

HOW TO GIVE A LEGACY GIFT

in the account documents themselves that require nothing more to take effect.

With his expertise, Gene knows that there are many ways to leave a legacy gift to charity. The Osofskys wanted to be able to realize a benefit from their assets, reduce the tax on their gain, and thereby leave a larger gift to their favorite charities. For them, the solution was a Charitable Remainder Unitrust, an irrevocable trust that lets you realize significant tax benefits that come from donating appreciated assets to charity while enabling you to draw an annual income for life.

The Osofskys wanted to honor their strong Jewish and Bay Area identity, so they chose J. The Jewish News of Northern California as one of the recipients of their new Unitrust. As the Osofskys noted, “Supporting J. is a high priority for us because it is an integral part of the infrastructure of the Jewish community.”

The Osofskys’ legacy will become one of the keystone gifts in J. ‘s new endowment fund. With this bequest, the Osofskys have helped ensure that the tradition of Jewish journalism will continue long into the future.

• Name the charity in your will or estate plan as a recipient of a set percentage or dollar amount of your residual estate

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• Make sure to let the charity know you have included them in your estate!

The Osofskys with their grandchildren

As the 2024-2025 school year begins, News Editor Gabe Stutman reviews the protests of 2023-2024 and looks forward to what students can expect on campus in the fall. This article provides context for the articles that follow, which begin with initial campus reaction after October 7, 2023 and continue through May 2024.

Does ‘back to school’ mean back to Gaza protests?

GABE STUTMAN | J. STAFF

As students return to college campuses this fall, many Jewish community leaders and students are asking whether the tone and tenor of campus activism on Israel and Gaza will be any different this year, despite assurances from university leadership that it will.

“Last year was so exhausting,” said Aaron Schimmel, a Stanford Ph.D. student. “We just want normalcy.”

On Aug. 19, the president of the University of California, Michael Drake, announced updates to UC’s policies surrounding free speech and protests. During the upcoming school year, Drake said, the 10-school university system would be “reinforcing” policies that prohibit camping and the wearing of identityconcealing masks during protests. The updates, he said, follow a summer spent “reflecting with students, faculty, staff, Regents, and others on the events of the past year.”

Whether the announcement will help reduce the temperature of the debate surrounding Israel and Gaza, or head off tent encampment protests that proliferated in public university spaces at dozens of California campuses, remains an open question.

Last school year, Cal, UC Irvine, UCLA, UC Davis and others had rules in place that prohibited overnight camping. Even so, student encampments were allowed to stay because university leadership wished to avoid ugly police confrontations. It was only after violent incidents that schools like UCLA called in police to dismantle the

protest camps. (The UCLA chancellor later told Congress he wished he had done so sooner).

In mid-August, Columbia University’s president, Nemat Shafik, resigned in the wake of national scrutiny over her handling of campus protests. Her departure followed the January resignations of the Penn and Harvard presidents after a heated congressional hearing about campus antisemitism, and the retirement in May of the Cornell president after months of turmoil over the war.

In a series of conversations with J. as the fall term approached, Jewish and pro-Israel students and leaders voiced uncertainty about what to expect next, expressing a mix of emotions: reserved optimism, anxiety, and despair over what many viewed as the inevitable return of coarse debate and a hostile atmosphere on campus.

(AARON

The front of UC Berkeley’s Sproul Hall was covered in tents and signs on May 7.

LEVY-WOLINS/ J. STAFF)

A June protest targeted the interim Stanford president, Richard Saller.

(PHOTO/ANDREW ESENSTEN/J. STAFF)

“Things can spiral out of control so quickly. That’s why it’s important for campus administrators to get out ahead and to anticipate some of these challenges.”

State Senator Scott Wiener

The turmoil began soon after the Oct. 7 rampage by Hamas, in which some 1,200 people in southern Israel were murdered and 250 were taken hostage, starting the war that has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza as Hamas militants embed in densely packed urban areas.

Rabbi Gil Leeds, who directs the Chabad Jewish center at UC Berkeley, told J. he has fielded calls from Jewish parents concerned about sending their children to the university.

“They’re like, should we really be sending our daughter there?” he said.

Some students requested housing close to the Chabad center, Leeds said, so they wouldn’t have to walk long distances at night, especially on Jewish holidays when they will be wearing kippot or dressing up for services, making them more easily identifiable as Jews.

Leeds said he expected protests against Israel to return with gusto this semester, which starts on Aug. 28, in part because of the way UC Berkeley handled the activism last year.

“It wasn’t really resolved in a way that we would have liked it to be resolved, which would be the enforcement of time, place and manner” rules, he said, referring to Cal’s policies surrounding student protests, which say protesters may not “camp or lodge on University property.”

“You know, a law-and-order-type of

enforcement,” Leeds said. “It was more like an appeasement and concession. That kind of emboldens them, and I think they’re going to, unfortunately, snap right back, unless something more is done.”

Pro-Palestinian activists have signaled that they intend to continue on-campus protests. The Young Democratic Socialists of America, with more than 100 university chapters, is planning a “national student strike,” according to the news outlet the Free Press. The Escalate Network, an influential online group that encourages radical protests against Israel on college campuses and elsewhere, published an updated 2024 “do-it-yourself occupation guide” for taking over property, with stepby-step advice on how to enter locked buildings, barricade doors and avoid getting caught.

“The new school year is coming. The genocide continues,” the group tweeted on Aug. 13. “We must move from permanent war to permanent revolution. Students: LAY PLANS!”

Meanwhile, state lawmakers are trying to impact the campus climate from their perch in Sacramento. Members of the Legislature are leaning on UC leadership to take a more hands-on approach. Over the summer, lawmakers said they would condition $25 million in state funding to the UC system on whether it develops a “systemwide framework” for campus protests, free speech and enforcement policies. State Sen. Steve Glazer, a member of the California Legislative Jewish Caucus, authored a new bill that aims to force university leadership to prohibit “violent, harassing, intimidating, or discriminatory conduct” that creates “a hostile environment on campus.” The measure is getting intense pushback from pro-Palestinian organizations and freespeech groups like the ACLU.

Scott Wiener, a progressive state senator representing San Francisco and a backer of Glazer’s bill, told J. that he strongly supports students’ right to protest.

“That’s a fundamental constitutional right,” he said. “But the campuses need to be able

to function, and we want to make sure that students are not being subjected to bullying, harassment and intimidation.”

Things can “spiral out of control so quickly,” Wiener added. “That’s why it’s important for campus administrators to get out ahead and to anticipate some of these challenges.”

The protests on college campuses in California were intensely polarizing, impacting not only the 10 universities in the UC system but also the vast Cal State system, as well as private universities like Stanford and USF. Many within the protest movement saw themselves as an essential voice against a brutal war conducted with American backing, while opponents pointed to the hostile rhetoric used by the protesters, which included support for Palestinian militancy, vitriolic pronouncements against “Zionists” or people who support Israel, and scant regard for the civilian hostages held in Gaza or for the innocents killed by Hamas on Oct. 7.

Rabbi Jessica Kirschner, director of Hillel at Stanford, where classes start on Aug. 26, recalled the challenges associated with the encampment last school year — its duration and location and the sometimes troubling sentiments expressed by protesters.

“There was really, to some extent, no way to avoid them,” Kirschner said. “Even if you rerouted yourself so you just never went through White Plaza, which is a very central location on campus, they remain sort of physically present,” she said.

“I’m sure that’s part of the intention of the protesters,” she added. “But it really did impact the atmosphere for students, faculty and staff.”

The tent encampment at Stanford, one of scores like it at universities across the country, was one of the most long-lasting, launching relatively early in the war, just weeks after the Oct. 7 attack. Administrators negotiated with campers in the ensuing months, and the encampment was dismantled in February. Then in April a new encampment popped up and lasted until the end of the semester. The university removed the second one after some of the protesters

were arrested for breaking into the university president’s office and vandalizing it.

One photo that circulated widely on social media and in news reports showed a protester wearing a Hamas headband. Stanford officials called the photo “deeply disturbing” and submitted it to the FBI.

At the same time, a number of Jewish anti-Zionist activists have been visibly involved in the encampment protests and supported them wholeheartedly. At Cal, Jewish demonstrators helped lead Passover seder in April, setting out matzah, grape juice and other foods on a blue tarp on Sproul Plaza. A photo of the seder published by an Al Jazeera journalist shows an attendee wearing a kippah decorated as a watermelon, a symbol of Palestinian nationalism, next to another wearing a kaffiyeh.

Jewish Berkeley student Jonah Gottlieb, who attended the seder, wrote on social media that attendees “prayed, sang, and ate,” calling the gathering a “sacred space” within the encampment.

Multiple people who spoke with J. in recent weeks for this story said that in their view, protesters who were openly antisemitic or supported violence against civilians represented a minority in the tent encampments at Stanford, Berkeley and elsewhere. Most simply wanted Israel to cease the war in Gaza.

Yet the minority was a vocal one, imbuing campus protests with a tone that was often intimidating, or morally repugnant, to Jewish students and others who support Israel.

“Starting as early as maybe Oct. 7, but certainly by Oct. 8, there was language on campus that seemed supportive of Hamas and what it had done that seemed to justify those attacks,” Kirschner said. “And this was before there was any [military] response from Israel at all.”

UC Berkeley’s encampment sprang up in April and was dismantled in May after a few concessions by leadership, including a pledge to examine the university’s investment policy. Much of the activity at the encampment was peaceful; when a J.

“Starting as early as maybe Oct. 7, but certainly by Oct. 8, there was language on campus that seemed supportive of Hamas and what it had done that seemed to justify those attacks. And this was before there was any [military] response from Israel at all.”

Rabbi Jessica Kirschner, director of Hillel at Stanford

“This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith.”

From judge’s decision on UCLA handling of campus protests

reporter visited in its early days, students were sitting in their tents, chatting, sipping coffee and doing homework.

But over time, an unsparing and hostile attitude toward Israel and Zionists became evident, including the use of violent language. The protesters hung a banner above the tents on Sproul Plaza describing their action as a “student intifada.” Another sign was emblazoned with inverted red triangles, a symbol Hamas has used in propaganda videos to indicate Israeli military targets. “Glory to the martyrs! Victory to the resistance!” the sign said.

A number of Jewish Berkeley students said they avoided walking by the encampment, which wasn’t always easy because of its central location on campus. For several weeks, protesters blocked a portion of the arch of Sather Gate with antiIsrael banners and played a recording with sounds of bombs and screaming.

“It’s not a peaceful encampment. It’s not like they’re handing out roses,” Rabbi Leeds said. Of the rhetoric there, “people are taking your identity and using it, you know, to call you the pariah and the root of all evil,” he said. “It makes it a tough pill to swallow every morning when you walk by campus.”

The new chancellor of UC Berkeley, Rich Lyons, released a 2½-minute video statement on Aug. 19 that made reference to the enforcement of campus policies surrounding protests, and that affirmed the university would take direction from the UC system. But the statement did not say whether students who erected encampments would be subject to censure or punishment.

“Adherence to our ‘time, place and manner’ rules will continue to ensure that expressive activities do not interfere with the rights of others, or with the operations of our university,” Lyons said. “We can and will continue to address violations of these rules in a carefully considered way.”

For its part, the UC Office of the President told J. that the university system stands firmly against antisemitism and “acts of anti-Jewish bigotry,” calling them “alarming and antithetical to core UC values.”

Jewish, pro-Israel students may be buoyed by a recent ruling in federal court in Southern California, where a judge ordered leadership of UCLA to change course in its handling of campus protests in order to protect Jewish students. The ruling came after evidence was presented showing that pro-Palestinian demonstrators blocked Israel-supporting students from traversing parts of campus, a violation of their rights, the judge wrote.

“In the year 2024, in the United States of America, in the State of California, in the City of Los Angeles, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith,” the judge wrote in a blistering decision blaming UCLA for contributing to the problem. “This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith.”

Lawyers for UCLA have said they plan to appeal the decision.

Schimmel, the Ph.D. student at Stanford who is studying Jewish history, said the question of whether pro-Israel Jews will feel safe this year is frequently discussed at Jewish community minyans, or prayer sessions, in group chats and on social media.

One of the major problems with the protests, Schimmel said, has been the masks that demonstrators have worn to conceal their identity. That has contributed to an atmosphere of distrust among students, he said.

“We didn’t know if our classmates, or neighbors, or the person sitting next to us was out there threatening violence against us, and our people,” Schimmel said. “The fact that they were in the middle of campus, and the fact that you didn’t know who was participating in this, were the two biggest things that bothered me,” he said.

“Myself and my Jewish friends, we just want to be students, and focus on our work and getting our degrees,” he said. “We just want things to be quiet on campus.” n

A tense Berkeley campus reacts to Hamas massacre and war

EMMA GOSS | J. STAFF

Like many of his Jewish peers on campus, Noah Rothman, a UC Berkeley senior and president of the Berkeley Hillel student board, is struggling under the emotional weight of the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack and its war with Israel.

“It’s really hard to actually focus on homework and set aside time to just take care of things like cooking, going to the gym, showering, doing laundry,” Rothman said. “It’s hard.”

Rothman, 25, is a Los Angeles native who lived in Israel for five years after high school. He served in the Israel Defense Forces before starting at UC Berkeley, and his older brother has been called up as a reservist since the war began.

Rothman joined about 30 fellow pro-Israel students and faculty outside Berkeley’s Sather Gate at the edge of Sproul Plaza on Oct. 16 as a counterprotest to a pro-Palestinian rally.

Rothman described the scene of more than 100 pro-Palestinian students, many of them holding Palestinian flags and signs decrying Israeli “genocide,” chanting rally cries like “viva, viva la intifada” (long live the intifada) and “Israel, Israel, what do you say? How many children have you killed today?”

“It’s really hard to hear that stuff,” said Ethan Katz, director of UC Berkeley’s Center for Jewish Studies, who also attended the counterprotest. “It was deeply painful for a lot of students to hear.”

Pro-Israel students, including Rothman, formed a line and held Israeli flags. They remained silent for 23 minutes and 30 seconds — 1,410 seconds in memory of the number of victims of the Hamas massacre.

Rothman said he was relieved that the protest didn’t “feel hostile.” Overall, he added, “it was not as bad as I thought it would be.”

Since Oct. 7, Berkeley’s campus has been rife with tension between students

with opposing views on the Hamas terrorist attack, Israel’s declaration of war and its bombing campaign.

The campus, known as a stronghold of Palestinian support among American universities, has been more strained than usual over the past week and a half. That has surfaced in the form of protests and political events among students and a series of open letters from faculty expressing their indignation over the campus climate and the university’s official positions toward the massacre, the war and student responses.

“I would say for Jewish students, there’s this combination of grieving and anger and sorrow that is being manifested in many ways,” said Rabbi Adam Naftalin-Kelman, executive director of Berkeley Hillel.

Berkeley Law Students for Justice in Palestine, for example, hosted a panel of Palestinian speakers on Oct. 12, attended by an estimated 200 people in person and close to 100 people on Zoom, according to Charlotte Aaron, a Jewish and Zionist student in the UC Berkeley School of Law who listened to 45 minutes of the meeting on Zoom before she’d heard enough.

“It’s providing an extremely one-sided narrative of the conflict, which is dangerous

Pro-Israel students rally at UC Berkeley, Oct. 10, 2023.

(PHOTO/BEN WEISS-ISHAI)

“I would say for Jewish students, there’s this combination of grieving and anger and sorrow that is being manifested in many ways.”

Rabbi Adam Naftalin-Kelman, executive director of Berkeley Hillel

“The student conduct at Berkeley is part of the broader attitude against Jews on university campuses that made last week’s massacre possible. It is shameful and has been tolerated for too long.”

Berkeley professor Steven Davidoff Solomon

and counterproductive to resolution,” said Aaron, who is 28 and in her final year in law school while working on a joint master’s degree in public policy. She said the Berkeley LSJP event was similar in content to an event she attended by the group last year called “Palestine 101,” characterizing both events as “demonizing” Israel.

On Sunday, Berkeley corporate law professor Steven Davidoff Solomon wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal with the headline, “Don’t Hire My Anti-Semitic Law Students” that also referenced Berkeley LSJP’s controversial decision last year to ban Zionist speakers from participating in its events and encourage other student groups to adopt the same bylaw.

“The student conduct at Berkeley is part of the broader attitude against Jews on university campuses that made last week’s massacre possible. It is shameful and has been tolerated for too long,” Solomon wrote in the WSJ.

Ahead of a Hamas leader’s call for a “day of jihad” on Oct. 13, UC Berkeley professor Ron Hassner, faculty director of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, was deeply concerned about the potential for students to turn violent that day.

He’d already heard of heated arguments between students that were interrupted before turning physical. He contacted his colleague, Hatem Bazian, who is a Palestinian lecturer on Middle Eastern languages and cultures, founder of Students for Justice in Palestine and an anti-Zionst who “has never said a kind word about Israel,” Hassner said.

Hassner proposed that two of them write a joint statement calling for students to remain peaceful toward one another. Hassner posted the statement on his Facebook profile on Oct. 12. UC Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ shared it later that day in a campuswide email. Hassner and Bazian’s five-sentence statement read:

“To our students: We are two professors on this campus who disagree, vehemently. But we have always treated one another with respect and dignity. We love this campus with its diverse communities and

all of our students and are heartbroken to hear of incidents of near violence between students in recent days. We will not tolerate our students harming one another. Disagreement and differing points of view are an essential part of campus life, and we expect that you treat one another with the same respect and dignity that we are modeling here.”

Hassner praised Bazian for his willingness to work with him on the letter.

“I know that it took courage on his part, and I admire that,” Hassner said. “Any identity I might carry as a Jewish person or as an Israeli person is the identity I carry as a teacher. And as a teacher the idea that my students would do one another harm is just unbearable to me.”

The university administration has contributed to the problems on campus, Jewish students and faculty said.

A letter from two university vice chancellors, Dania Matos and Stephen Sutton, on Oct. 8 sent to all registered student organization leaders that addressed the violence in the “Middle East” didn’t land well with Jews on campus because it didn’t condemn Hamas or the antisemitism pervading Cal.

The words “Israel,” “Gaza” and “Hamas” were not used in the statement, which read:

“We are writing to offer our heartfelt sympathy and support to members of our campus community with ties to the Middle East, whether they be familial, religious, ethnic, national, academic, or ideological. We mourn the loss of life and recognize that this conflict is causing a great deal of fear and anxiety among members of our Cal community. We deeply regret the pain and trauma that is caused by this ongoing conflict.”

The statement concluded with links to campus mental health resources and reaffirmed the university’s policy on free speech.

Katz called the message “very upsetting” and “very weak,” adding that many Jewish students were outraged and voiced those feelings to administrators.

“The administrators heard them, and they

realized they had made a mistake and that they had not gotten it right,” Katz said. After “trying to figure out how to address the pain of Jewish students while acknowledging other people’s different perspectives,” according to Katz, Chancellor Christ sent her own statement campuswide on Oct. 11.

“I am heartbroken by the terrible violence and suffering in Israel and Gaza,” Christ wrote. “The brutal attack by Hamas on Israel, the killing of so many innocent people — including children and the elderly — and the taking of hostages, fill me with grief and dismay. Israel’s subsequent blockade and bombing of the Gaza Strip is causing the loss of yet more innocent lives. This tragedy has a long and complex history, one leading to an appalling result. I know many members of our community have deep ties to Israel and to Palestine and are experiencing tremendous sorrow and trauma at this time. Your suffering must be particularly acute; we feel compassion for all that you are experiencing.”

Separately, more than 300 UC Berkeley faculty members signed a letter, released Monday, that denounces the Hamas attack on Israel and stands in support of Jewish students on campus. Those signing the letter included Berkeley Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, Ben Hermalin — who signed it not as provost but as “Distinguished Professor of Economics & Business” — and Christ, who signed it as “Emeritus Professor of English.” The letter remains open for more signatures.

The 527-word letter states in part, “We condemn this violence for what it is, and we extend our deepest sympathies to Israelis and to Jews worldwide in this hour of terror and brutal devastation. It is possible to do this and simultaneously evince deep sympathy and concern for the people of Gaza as they face a major military onslaught whose impact will indeed be brutal. It is possible simultaneously to condemn unequivocally what occurred this weekend for the barbarism it was and to advocate for justice for Palestinians. We mourn all loss of life and security in the Israeli-Palestinian

conflict and we pray for a swift resolution to the current violence and the return of the hostages.”

Danielle Sobkin, UC Berkeley class of 2024, said the official reactions came too late.

“It’s been over a week,” Sobkin said. “It shouldn’t be Jewish students begging administrators to take a stance and for them to finally hear that after so much has happened.”

Hannah Schlacter, a student in the class of 2024 at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, echoed that sentiment and added, “It’s one thing for faculty to sign that letter. It’s another thing for the chancellor to refuse to condemn Hamas terrorism.”

Schlacter and Sobkin co-authored an op-ed in the Jerusalem Post on Monday about their frustration with the university administration’s response.

Katz, who helped write the faculty letter, said in an email to J. that the letter came out of a need to denounce the Oct. 7 terrorism and the loss of lives on both sides and to “show support for our many Jewish students who are facing a very difficult environment from many of their peers and some of their professors on campus. We also did so because we believe it is important for Berkeley faculty to make a statement that draws clear lines on these horrific events.”

While the campus continues to feel the weight of grief and anger, there have been glimmers of hope, too.

In a separate letter sent to students on Monday, Asad Ahmed, a Berkeley professor and director of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, said the Center for Middle Eastern Studies “prays for peace and healing in the darkest of times. We dream of a safe and thriving Israel and Palestine.”

Rothman was grateful to read those words.

“It was a really beautiful statement to see from someone who you wouldn’t necessarily believe to be your ally,” Rothman said. “I think we have a lot more allies than we think we do.” n

“It’s been over a week. It shouldn’t be Jewish students begging administrators to take a stance and for them to finally hear that after so much has happened.”

Danielle Sobkin, UC Berkeley class of 2024

Hundreds rally at UC Berkeley to demand action on Gaza

SUE FISHKOFF | CORRESPONDENT

A rally the afternoon of Oct. 27 on the UC Berkeley campus drew about 250 Jewish students and their supporters to Sproul Plaza, with one clear message: Bring the hostages home.

in shouting and some shoving between protesters. Since then, the two sides have held events on different dates or in separate locations.

Friday’s “Bring Them Home” rally followed a large pro-Palestinian rally two days earlier that featured chants of “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” That slogan is widely understood as a call for the elimination of Israel.

At Wednesday’s rally, two pro-Palestinian protesters tried to steal an Israeli flag from a pro-Israel student, an incident that ended with a pro-Palestinian protester hitting the pro-Israel student over the head with a metal water bottle, according to campus police.

“…there are many innocent residents of Gaza. At the same time, I want to point to the vitriol on this and other campuses that will not acknowledge the atrocities of Hamas.”

Steve Tadelis, professor in the Haas School of Business

“Bring them home! Bring them home!” shouted the mostly student crowd leading chants from the plaza steps, as supporters looked on.

Several campus groups were represented, including Tikvah: Students for Israel, Berkeley Hillel and the Jewish fraternity AEPi. Other students told J. they weren’t part of any group. They were “just Jewish” and wanted to be part of the rally. Flyers with the photos and biographies of each of the estimated 220 hostages that Hamas took into Gaza on Oct. 7 were strung banner-like across the plaza. Students handed out more of the flyers for attendees to hold aloft.

Then the chanting began, led by student organizers with megaphones.

“Release! Release! We stand for peace!” was one oft-repeated chant, along with “Bring them home!”

Friday’s event, which kicked off at 1:30 p.m., was the latest in a series of pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian rallies held since Oct. 7 on the Cal campus.

Competing rallies on Oct. 16 erupted

By contrast, Friday’s rally was intense but calm.

The only counter-protesters were a white-bearded man holding a Palestinian flag and an individual who rambled loudly about American and Israeli evils.

Big-picture politics were at a minimum. A few people held anti-Hamas posters, but the focus was kept clearly on the need to free all the hostages immediately. Demonstrators sang “Am Yisrael Chai” and “Hatikvah.”

Speakers addressed the crowd. Offir Gutelzon, co-founder of UnXeptable, a pro-democracy group started by Israeli expatriates in the Bay Area, implored the students to share images of the hostages on social media and to write letters to their elected officials, urging U.S. action.

“And let’s thank President Biden for all he’s doing,” Gutelzon added, which elicited a cheer.

A louder cheer erupted when the students caught sight of a plane circling the campus, trailing a banner that read “Berkeley stands with Israel.”

Rabbi Gil Leeds of the Chabad Jewish Student Center at Berkeley took the

A rally at UC Berkeley’s Sproul Plaza on October 27, 2023.

(PHOTO/SUE FISHKOFF)

microphone to read psalms before launching into a rousing rendition of “Oseh Shalom.” Students quickly joined in.

At one point, a student organizer called for a moment of silence to remember the hostages. He then read dozens of names of hostages, adding where they were kidnapped from. When he said that one of the hostages “was 36 when she was kidnapped from her home,” another student shouted back, “She is 36 — is, not was.” He quickly corrected himself.

A small crowd of Muslim graduate students stood nearby, watching the rally silently. Several wore the floor-length caftans and head coverings of the devout, while others had draped keffiyehs around their shoulders.

Asked whether they felt afraid or unsafe watching the pro-Israel rally, they said no.

“The first rally did,” one said, saying he had been spit on by Jewish students.

None of them had heard of the joint statement posted Oct. 12 by Ron Hassner, a professor and faculty director of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, and Hatem Bazian, a Palestinian lecturer on Middle Eastern languages and cultures and the founder of Students for Justice in Palestine. The statement asked

students to refrain from violence. But the Muslim students all said that tempers had cooled in the past two weeks, and they did not expect this or upcoming rallies to be interrupted.

“It’s media fatigue,” one of them offered.

Steve Tadelis, a professor in the Haas School of Business, addressed the crowd, saying that he had never before spoken at a rally but felt compelled now because of what he described as “blatant antisemitism” on the rise at his campus and nationwide.

“I want to acknowledge that emotions are high for everyone,” he said. “Everyone has the right to their opinion. But it is important not to confuse opinion with truth. I want to acknowledge there are many innocent residents of Gaza. At the same time, I want to point to the vitriol on this and other campuses that will not acknowledge the atrocities of Hamas.”

Decrying Wednesday’s pro-Palestinian rally for its anti-Israel tone, he pointed out that calling for the destruction of Israel means calling for the killing of Jews — millions of Jews.

“And that’s antisemitism,” he said. “Antisemitism must be confronted no matter what. By standing here together today, we voice our opposition to that.” n

“Antisemitism must be confronted no matter what.”

Steve Tadelis, professor in the Haas School of Business

‘I’m screaming for help’: Jewish students face violence at Cal

EMMA GOSS, MAYA MIRSKY & GABE STUTMAN | J. STAFF FIRST PUBLISHED

Bears for Palestine called for protesters to show up at Wheeler Hall to protest the Israeli guest speaker..

(PHOTO/INSTAGRAM-@ BEARSFORPALESTINE)

Jewish students at UC Berkeley evacuated from a campus theater on Feb. 26 after a mass of protesters, chanting “Intifada! Intifada!” and other slogans, shattered a glass door at the venue and shut down a scheduled lecture that night by an Israeli attorney and IDF reservist.

Several students who were attending or working the event at Zellerbach Playhouse were injured, including two young women, one of whom sprained a thumb when she wrestled to keep a door shut as protesters muscled it open. Another female student reportedly was handled around her neck, leaving marks. A third student was spit on, he told J.

The lecture was scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. Ran Bar-Yoshafat, who is a reserve combat officer in the Israel Defense Forces and was deployed in Gaza, planned to discuss international law as it pertains to Israel. “He’ll explore whether Israel violates international law, the rules of wartime conduct, and how the IDF can better protect civilians,” a social media post publicizing the event said.

The talk was conceived of as a small lecture in a classroom at Wheeler Hall, but organizers moved it at the direction of campus police for safety reasons after the anti-Zionist group Bears for Palestine, the Cal affiliate of Students for Justice in Palestine, called for a protest to “shut it down,” according to Joseph Karlan, a student leader of campus pro-Israel group Tikvah and one of the event organizers.

“Shut it down: Genocidal murderers out of Berkeley,” the Bears for Palestine announcement said. It showed a picture of Bar-Yoshafat with glowing red eyes and a stamp under his face saying “murderer.”

“This individual is dangerous. Ran Bar-Yoshafat has Palestinian blood on his hands,” said the Instagram post, which got more than 2,200 likes and dozens of supportive comments. Bears for Palestine did not respond to an Instagram message from J. seeking comment.

J. interviewed a number of Berkeley students who said the incident was deeply discouraging and frightening.

Videos circulated widely on social media, showing protesters outside wearing keffiyehs and masks, yelling “You can’t run! You can’t hide! We charge you with genocide!” and other anti-Israel chants and banging on the glass door until it shattered. Videos also showed the students who were trying to attend the event being led down hallways — what one described to J. as an “underground tunnel of the building” — in order to safely evacuate the premises.

The incident shines a harsh spotlight on UC Berkeley amid concern that the university is not doing enough to protect Jewish students.

Even prior to the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre and the ongoing Israel-Hamas war — which has led to recurring pro-Palestinian protests that some say use intimidation tactics with violent slogans — the university was under scrutiny after a number of student groups at the law school banned speakers who support Israel. In December 2022, the U.S. Department of Education said it had opened a civil rights investigation into the university over the law school controversy.

A spokesperson for the university lambasted the conduct of the protesters in an interview with J. Tuesday.

“What happened last night was despicable,” spokesperson Dan Mogulof said.

He said property damage to the theater was still under evaluation, but he confirmed that there were broken windows and at least one broken door, which was damaged after being forced.

Mogulof pushed back on the idea that UC Berkeley was scanty with its police protection. There were 19 officers present, the university said, including the chief of campus police.

“The size of the crowd, the size of what was a mob, and the willingness and readiness of that mob to engage in violent behavior” were shocking, Mogulof said. “We are deeply disturbed by what happened. It was a terrible experience for the audience.”

Jewish students related their experiences in interviews Tuesday.

Senior Vida Keyvanfar, a co-president of Tikvah, was responsible for checking student IDs against a list and stood outside the entrance to Zellerbach.

Keyvanfar said Tikvah worked with police for hours prior to the event to make a plan for student safety.

“We had a ton of protocols,” she said, including allowing in only those students who had RSVP’d.

Members of Tikvah and Students Supporting Israel, among several organizers of the event, arrived at Zellerbach with the speaker around 5:30 p.m., according to Karlan. He said the protesters convened around 5:15 p.m. elsewhere on campus because they didn’t know the event had been moved from Wheeler Hall.

“Around 6:15 protesters heard of the location change, and it was blasted on social media. They came to the new location and started shouting,” he said.

“They found us,” said Keyvanfar. “I was the first to notify our security team: ‘OK, they’re coming. I can see them.’ It was a gigantic mob of people stomping, marching and screaming,” she said.

UC Berkeley estimated there were about 200 protesters who “began to surround the building.”

“I was getting calls left and right from

students who had RSVP’d,” Keyvanfar said. “They were saying ‘I can’t get through the crowd. How do we get let in?’ I was trying to identify ways for students to get through this crowd safely, which isn’t my job. It should be the job of the school and the police to make sure students are able to get where they want to go safely.”

She said protesters told her they were on the list, but weren’t. They demanded to be let in.

“They were surrounding the table that I was standing at, yelling and screaming. There was spit flying left and right,” said Keyvanfar, who described herself as a “small girl.” “I was pretty nervous, surrounded by this crowd, but I was going to keep doing my job.”

She said a university administrator advised her to shut her laptop, worried that the protesters would take a photo of the RSVP list. “They’re looking at the names,” the administrator said, according to Keyvanfar.

At that point it was determined that it was “too unsafe to stand out there,” she said. “There were protesters to the front of me, to the side of me and behind me. I was getting kind of swallowed.” The whole time, Keyvanfar worried about her younger sister, a freshman, who was inside.

As Keyvanfar moved inside for her safety, she got a message that said the protesters had made it inside the building. The students had “gained unauthorized entry into the building,” Chancellor Carol Christ said in a statement Tuesday.

“I’m running to go see if my sister is OK,” Keyvanfar said. The protesters were “banging on the windows and the doors. Eventually, glass broke.”

Keyvanfar saw another door being opened. She ran to try to pull the door shut, but it was too late. “I see that the protesters from outside had recognized that there’s an access point.”

As she held onto the door, a protester stuck out his foot to prop it open. “I’m trying to shut the door, but his foot is there. It’s just me trying to pull the door shut” against a group of protesters pulling it from the outside, she said.

“The size of the crowd, the size of what was a mob, and the willingness and readiness of that mob to engage in violent behavior [were shocking]. We are deeply disturbed by what happened. It was a terrible experience for the audience.”

University spokesperson Dan Mogulof

“I personally was verbally attacked, being called a Jew and dirty Jew, with a very nasty connotation. I was also called a Nazi and spit at. All in my face.”

Alijah Feldman, UC Berkeley junior

“And I’m screaming for help from the police. And I’m screaming for someone to come help me.”

She said the police were barricading another door and didn’t come right away. Eventually the protesters “were able to rip me out of the door,” she said. “They ripped the door out of my hand.”

She fell out into the crowd, she said, and injured her hand. The next day she said she was told she suffered a thumb sprain and began wearing a brace.

Elijah Feldman, a junior who belongs to AEPi, the Jewish fraternity, was also there to help with the event.

“There weren’t many cops, but everyone was trying to keep them out,” he said of the protesters. “They got into doors that were locked from the outside by trying to push through.”

He said he was called slurs and spit at.

“I personally was verbally attacked, being called a Jew and dirty Jew, with a very nasty connotation,” he said. I was also called a Nazi and spit at. All in my face.”

He said that the whole experience left him “in shock and with adrenaline pumping.”

One photo published on social media showed a young woman with several red marks around her neck.

“One of the rioters grabbed her neck,” Tikvah’s Karlan said. Keyvanfar and Rabbi Gil Leeds of UC Berkeley’s Chabad said she had been “choked,” though J. could not independently verify that claim.

Keyvanfar said the experience was disturbing in part because the demonstrators had their faces covered and it seemed like they could do whatever they wanted.

“When I was standing out there, when they were surrounding me, and they were yelling in my face to let them in, I realized that there were no repercussions for what they were doing. Because there’s no way to identify these people,” she said. “Something clicked in my brain. I was like, wow, they really could do anything to anyone here — and get away with it.”

Danielle Sobkin, co-president of the pro-Israel campus group Bears for Israel

and one of the organizers who helped bring Bar-Yoshafat to campus, told J. she was walking toward Zellerbach on Monday evening to attend the lecture when friends began frantically messaging and calling her, telling her to turn back for her own safety.

“All I see is dozens of messages flooding in and all of these group chats, phone calls, texts,” Sobkin said. “We were expecting a situation of protests to arise, but none of us imagined it would escalate this fast, this quickly,” she added.

Though campus police officers were present at the event, they appeared to be overwhelmed by the size of the demonstration.

Audio of the campus police scanner uploaded to YouTube revealed a chaotic situation. Officers first report around 100 to 125 protesters outside Wheeler Hall, the original venue, then some 150 going inside Wheeler to block the room.

After finding out about the venue change, protesters walked to the plaza outside Zellerbach.

“We have a crowd at the door on the west side,” an officer says. “I’m trying to clear them away from the door.”

“I don’t see how we’re going to clear this,” another says.

At one point an officer describes a door that’s been opened and protesters inside.

“I need more people at this gate,” an officer says, sounding alarmed. “We’re going to lose this.”

“We need cover!” another yells.

Later, police officers confirm that the attendees have been safely moved out of Zellerbach but that protesters have reached the stage and lobby. Officers report vandalism and windows broken.

“We approach events like this with two priorities: to do what we can so that the event can go forward, and to do what we can to safeguard student safety and wellbeing,” Christ said in her statement. “Last night, despite our efforts and the ample number of police officers, it was not possible to do both given the size of the crowd and the threat of violence.” n

In wake of chaos, UC Berkeley Jewish students say they feel demoralized and angry

LEA LOEB | J. STAFF

A week after anti-Israel demonstrators nearly incited a riot outside a UC Berkeley theater, some Jewish students on the school’s campus are feeling depressed, ostracized and confused.

“I’m too anxious and sad to go into my departmental building,” said “David,” a firstyear student who, like others J. interviewed, would only speak on the condition he be identified using a pseudonym, fearing for his safety and possible academic repercussions. “I have anxiety every time I walk past Sather Gate. I feel I’m too anxious and sad to be in class.”

David described his experience at the university as a “trainwreck.” He said he’s been subjected to antisemitic rhetoric from a professor and other students on campus and on social media. He does not identify as a Zionist and now feels he does not fit in anywhere on campus, so much so that he is considering leaving the school.

“I feel harrowingly lonely, because it really feels like there’s no one to speak to about this, especially because I don’t feel super comfortable hacking through conversations with Jews who are much more right-wing than me,” David said. “It’s so depressing.”

On March 4, a week after protesters shut down a talk at Zellerbach Playhouse by an Israeli reservist and lawyer, forcing their way into the building and injuring some Jewish students, J. met with a small group of students who described similar feelings of anxiety on a campus now under federal discrimination investigation for its handling of antisemitism. While their sentiments do not represent the totality of Jewish experience on campus, they nevertheless reflect a growing sense among some students that the university feels less comfortable for Jews than it once did.

The students shared their stories on the first day of “apartheid week,” with scheduled

events “surrounding the history of Palestinian struggle,” according to the Bears for Palestine.

Daniel Solomon, a Ph.D. history student who has been vocal about the climate for Jews on Berkeley’s campus, said every time he has raised concerns to colleagues and administrators in his department about antisemitism, anti-Israel comments or calls to action, he becomes more ostracized.

“Each time I point out communications that are offensive, I’m accused of being uncivil,” said Solomon. “And I said to a department administrator, ‘This is, like, Orwellian. You’re telling me that I have to be civil as they promote barbarity.’”

Hannah Schlacter, a second-year MBA student from Chicago and a member of Jewish Americans for Fairness in Education, believes the failure of the university’s administration to effectively condemn violence against Jewish students in the past led to the incident at Zellerbach Playhouse. Schlacter submitted a 33-page testimony to Congress for a Feb. 29 hearing about campus antisemitism. “Before Feb. 26, I did not feel safe outwardly expressing my Jewish identity at Berkeley,” she told J. “After Feb. 26, the underlying root cause of that sentiment continues. By and large, the reason the riot happened is because when you don’t call out hate against Jews, it continues to happen.”

“Rachel,” who is 18 and a freshman, says the school has reached a “tipping point.”

“[Protesters are] saying, ‘globalize the intifada,’ which Jews understand as a call for violence,” she said. “And that’s not how it was

A Jewish student at Berkeley Hillel wears a “Bring Them Home Now!” tag in support of hostages taken by Hamas. (PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

Signs posted near Sproul Plaza at UC Berkeley.

(PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

“How serious of an injury do they need to see before they’re going to acknowledge that this is a problem?”

Rachel, UC Berkeley freshman

treated by the administration. And now it’s crossed the line into violence where people were assaulted, and that’s a crime.”

Rachel was born in Israel but grew up in Southern California. She did a gap year volunteering in Jerusalem before starting at Berkeley in the fall. She lives in one of the on-campus dorms and says students on her floor are vocally anti-Israel. She often chooses not to be visibly Jewish or display items that identify her as Israeli.

“It’s not like I feel like on campus I’m going to be attacked or harassed, but it is kind of always in the back of my mind,” she said. “In conversations with people, it’s like, ‘Do I mention that I’m Israeli? Do I bring my gap year up at all? Is that going to make the conversation go in a direction I don’t want it to go?’”

Rachel said statements from the university and its pursuit of a criminal investigation are a good response to the Feb. 26 incident, as long as they are followed up by action.

“How bad does it have to get before something is done?” she said. “How serious of an injury do they need to see before

they’re going to acknowledge that this is a problem?”

Signs of the heightened tensions on campus aren’t hard to find. Sather Gate is an iconic landmark that many students pass through to attend class. For at least three weeks, anti-Israel activists have been demonstrating there daily, displaying Palestinian flags and posters and playing a 10-minute, amplified audio recording on repeat. The audio features a continuous drone sound, the voices of several people purporting to be besieged Gazans and a mock Israeli announcing that bombs will be dropped, followed by the sound of an explosion and screaming.

Demonstrators said that the audio was sourced from “many places,” including Red Crescent, the humanitarian organization that services hospitals and provides emergency medicine and ambulance services in Palestinian areas. The recording, they said, was edited together by Cal students.

When this J. reporter began to film the action at Sather Gate, demonstrators wearing masks blocked the camera with a kaffiyeh.

David, the first-year student, reported being harassed in a similar way on the same day. According to a statement he made to a professor and shared with J., as he walked toward the gate, a demonstrator began to film him. When he asked why, she refused to answer and was soon joined by five or six others who surrounded him, circling and recording him.

“This is when antisemitism gets physical,” David said. “I am now too scared for my safety to walk through Sather Gate to get to Dwinelle.” Dwinelle Hall is the secondlargest building on campus.

Despite the fear and unease among Jewish students, Rachel said she is glad so many are continuing to show up and not backing down.

“It’s really important that there is that strong Jewish community on campus, and not to let [aggressive actors] push us out,” said Rachel. “To say, like, ‘No. You can be hateful, but we’re still going to be here.’” n

‘Shiva-worthy’: Berkeley prof starts sit-in to force action against campus antisemitism

EMMA GOSS | J. STAFF

UC Berkeley professor Ron Hassner hauled a suitcase, pillow and sleeping bag into his campus office the evening of March 7 and began converting the small room into his temporary home.

Hassner, faculty director of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, began an open-ended “sit-in protest” over what he and many others in Cal’s Jewish community see as the failure of university administrators to protect Jewish students. A wave of anti-Zionist activity — and antisemitic intimidation — began on campus after the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre in Israel, including mob violence on Feb. 26 at Zellerbach Playhouse, where an Israeli speaker was slated to appear.

Hassner intends to eat, sleep and teach from his office until the university administration addresses a series of requests he issued in a letter Thursday to UC Chancellor Carol Christ and Provost Benjamin Hermalin.

“If my students feel that they cannot walk safely across campus without being bullied, then I will not cross campus either,” he wrote.

In the meantime, Hassner will leave a lamp illuminated in the window of his 7th-floor office, an announcement to students walking down Bancroft Avenue that his door is always open to them and that a faculty member is “sleeping as bad at night as they are.”

“I’m thinking that maybe by doing this — giving the students some hope, showing them that someone cares, the door’s open, there’s a light in the window, please come by, let’s talk — I can avert the next disaster,” said Hassner, who has worked at Cal for 20 years.

The next disaster, he fears, could come as soon as Monday morning when an ad-hoc group of Jewish students has planned a “Liberate the Gate” march from Zellerbach Playhouse to Sather Gate, where anti-Zionist

protesters have been stationed for nearly a month and have blocked the gate’s main entryway.

“I’m so sorely afraid,” Hassner said of what might happen Monday. “It makes me want to cry.”

Asked to comment on Hassner’s sit-in, a Berkeley spokesperson emailed a statement to J. on Friday, noting that Cal “remains committed to fostering an environment conducive to robust free speech and in which all members of its community feel that they may engage in campus life without fear of harassment. The administration is committed to confronting antisemitism and holds Professor Hassner in great esteem and it is in conversation with him about his concerns.”

Ron Hassner has been living and sleeping in his jammed UC Berkeley office since March 7, waiting for the university to address growing antisemitism.

(PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

Hassner also took a public stance in the days following the Oct. 7 massacre when Hamas called for a global “day of jihad” on Oct. 13. Hassner released a joint-statement on Oct. 12 with Hatem Bazian, a UC Berkeley lecturer on Middle Eastern languages and cultures and the founder of the anti-Zionist group Students for Justice in Palestine, calling on all students to remain peaceful.

By midday Friday, Hassner said he’d heard from eight colleagues who have decided to support his sit-in so far by moving their courses out of the classroom and onto Zoom.

In a way, Hassner said, it’s as if he’s sitting shiva — mourning the loss of Jewish student safety on campus. Like a mourner, he anticipates that his family, students and other supporters will bring him meals while he remains in his office. And like those in mourning, he won’t bathe. He’s using a hall

“If my students feel that they cannot walk safely across campus without being bullied, then I will not cross campus either.”

Ron Hassner, UC Berkeley professor

“If the university can’t get its grip around this, we are doomed. Jewish students will stop coming to this campus.”

UC Berkeley professor Ron Hassner

bathroom with a sink and toilet but does not have access to a shower.

The situation at Berkeley, he said, is “shiva-worthy.”

“If the university can’t get its grip around this, we are doomed,” he said. “Jewish students will stop coming to this campus.”

Hassner remains hopeful that his protest will elicit a response from administrators. Among his requests to Christ and Hermalin is unblocking the primary entryway of Sather Gate, the main entrance to campus, which has been cordoned off by anti-Zionist protesters in recent weeks.

His second request comes in response to the mob violence at Zellerbach, which forced speaker Ran Bar-Yoshafat, an Israeli lawyer and reservist who served in Gaza after Oct. 7, to cancel his talk on campus and deliver it at UC Berkeley’s Chabad instead.

Hassner has also requested that administrators apologize and invite Bar-Yoshafat back to campus — and to follow such protocol if any future speakers are interrupted by hecklers or violence.

Finally, Hassner has called for antisemitism and Islamophobia training for incoming faculty, resident advisers and leaders of registered student organizations.

“My ask is quite modest,” he said. “Nonetheless, I expect to be in this office for a while.”

On Thursday evening, Hassner’s wife and 15-year-old daughter stopped by to check on him. His 18-year-old son was on the way with a “cheapo” mattress, Hassner said.

Several of Hassner’s students also dropped by. Before deciding on where to order takeout for dinner, one student produced a box of glazed donuts to tide everyone over.

Hassner informed his War in the Middle East class, an upper-level political science course, on Thursday afternoon about the sit-in. He plans to teach that class, which has more than 100 students, over Zoom. A smaller seminar will meet in his office.

Eli Glickman, a junior studying political science, was among those visiting Hassner’s office.

“I think it’s nice to see people like Ron

sticking their necks out for students and showing that they care and they’re listening, even if the administration — which I have a great amount of respect for — is not always the best at showing everybody that they’re listening,” Glickman said.

“This strikes me as one of those times where they should be clearly delineating their position,” he added. “And they’re not.”

Until they do, Hassner plans to stay in his office, with one light always on.

By midday Friday, Hassner said he’d heard from eight colleagues who have decided to support his sit-in so far by moving their courses out of the classroom and onto Zoom.

The situation at Berkeley, he said, is “shiva-worthy.”

“If the university can’t get its grip around this, we are doomed,” he said. “Jewish students will stop coming to this campus.” n

Marching in silence, UC Berkeley students and faculty demand safety for Jews in ‘unbearable’ environment

SUE FISHKOFF | CORRESPONDENT

It was an unusual protest on a campus known for the unusual.

On the morning of March 11, some 250 Jewish students, faculty and allies gathered at Zellerbach Playhouse at UC Berkeley, most of them dressed in white, and then marched — in total silence, as organizers had asked — to demand safety for Jews on campus.

Two weeks earlier, on Feb. 26, an angry mob had stormed the same building, broken glass at the entrance, prevented a visiting Israeli attorney from speaking and assaulted Jewish students who had to be escorted to safety via an underground tunnel. It was a turning point for Jewish students, many of whom have felt unwelcome and unheard on campus since the Hamas attack on Oct. 7 in Israel that launched the ongoing war and a global spike in antisemitism.

University police have begun investigating the mob violence on Feb. 26, and the administration has released statement after statement, but none that promised enough action to satisfy the Jewish students who showed up for Monday’s march. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Education has announced a federal investigation into how UC Berkeley is handling antisemitism on campus.

Some of the same Jews who were present on Feb. 26 joined the march on March 11 to demand that Cal’s administration ensure student safety, which they say is under constant threat. An antiIsrael demonstration has lasted for weeks at Sather Gate, with a wide pro-Palestinian banner blocking the iconic arch.

“Before Oct. 7 I was cautious, but now I’m scared to walk around campus,” said sophomore Leah Cohen, 20. “I got yelled at by someone who saw my ‘Bring Them Home’

necklace,” she said, referring to chains with dog tags that reference the hostages still held in Gaza.

MBA student Hannah Schlacter, 28, one of the organizers of the March 11 march, testified recently before a congressional roundtable on campus antisemitism.

“We are protesting the Berkeley administration, demanding that it enforce its policies,” she told J. “That’s why we are marching to Sather Gate. Students are violating campus policy by blocking the gate, yet the administration is aggressively choosing not to enforce its policy consistently. That sends a message to student groups that the rules don’t apply to them.”

Charlotte Aaron, who is 28 and pursuing dual master’s degrees in public policy and law, agreed.

Noting that the last time she marched in a protest was in eighth grade, Aaron told J. that she has spent two years working with Cal’s administration to articulate the problems faced by Jewish students, even serving on the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Jewish Life and Campus Climate.

Jewish students, faculty and allies march toward Sather Gate, avoiding anti-Israel demonstrators, and call on UC Berkeley’s administration to take antisemitism seriously.

(PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

“I’ve been through a lot of Berkeley experiences, but this is the first time I’m coming out to walk. It’s that important.”

Retired history professor Paula Fass

“I can honestly say we’ve tried everything,” she said. “Their inaction is saying it’s OK. They understand that Jewish students generally follow the rules. What we get for that is being run over. We’re here today to say: You need to enforce your policies.”

As the march got underway, Jewish history professor Ethan Katzreminded the crowd why they were there.

“For the past four weeks, Jews have been unable to cross freely through the university’s most iconic site, Sather Gate, where the Free Speech Movement began,” he said, referring to the weeks-long barrier at Sather set up by anti-Israel activists, some of whom harass or photograph Jewish and Israeli students passing by, according to students who have been so accosted.

Quoting from Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who famously marched with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s to demand freedom and safety for Black Americans, Katz suggested that Heschel “could hardly imagine that 60 years later it would be hard for Jewish students to cross their campus. Battles my generation believed were won must sadly be fought again.”

Jewish students and supporters walked in three lines, arms linked, without speaking, to Sather Gate.

As the marchers approached the blocked gate, they turned left, clambered down a small hill and crossed ankle-deep Strawberry Creek, one by one, before finally regrouping on the far side and continuing on their way to a rally in front of California Hall.

No slogans were shouted. No songs were sung. Both the marchers and those protecting the anti-Israel banner at Sather Gate maintained their silence. The only sound was the constant whirring of a helicopter circling overhead.

“I’ve been through a lot of Berkeley experiences, but this is the first time I’m coming out to walk,” retired history professor Paula Fass told J. “It’s that important.”

At the rally after the march, speakers addressed the quieted crowd. Clapping was permitted, but a handful of rabbis circulating among the marchers quickly shut down adults from outside the campus community

who came with their own agendas.

“We are here because it’s become unbearable to learn in an atmosphere so hostile to Jews,” Schlacter said to loud applause. ”Bears for Palestine continue to do business as usual,” she continued, referring to the Cal affiliate of the anti-Zionist group Students for Justice in Palestine. “Last week they held events on campus, while Jewish students were forced to hold theirs off campus.”

Sophie Hahn, a member of the Berkeley City Council, told the crowd that Berkeley “cares about your safety and well-being and your right to walk freely in this city” and called on the university administration to work with the city council to keep students safe.

“We can have differences of opinion,” said Hahn, who is Jewish, “but when we see the kind of despicable violence we saw on this campus two weeks ago, we are appalled.”

Senior Danielle Sobkin, 20 and president of the pro-Israel student group Bears for Israel, told the crowd that her parents emigrated from the former Soviet Union so they could express their Jewishness openly.

“Why is it that I can’t walk to class without facing intimidation at a blocked-off Sather Gate? Why do I get threats just for being Jewish?” she said.

“I refuse to hide who I am. My Jewishness is not a costume to be worn when it’s deemed acceptable and shed when it’s not. That’s not what my parents came here for. Just as we stand firm in our identity, we call on our universities to stand firm in their commitment to inclusivity and respect for all.”

The day’s loudest applause was saved for professor Ron Hassner, faculty director of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, who called in to the rally from his office, where he is maintaining a roundthe-clock vigil to demand safety for Jewish students. Monday was day four.

“He wants to say how proud he is of all of you,” said the student who listened to Hassner’s call and repeated his words through a microphone. “And he invites you all to his office for hot tea and cookies after the march.” n

Does Cal have an antisemitism problem? J. sits down with UC Berkeley’s chancellor

GABE STUTMAN | J. STAFF

Two weeks after a violent protest shut down a UC Berkeley event hosted by pro-Israel Jewish students and forced them to flee for safety, J. received a request from the university for a sit-down interview with Chancellor Carol Christ.

Christ, who assumed office in 2017, was initially criticized by some in the Jewish community for her response to the Feb. 26 riot. In a statement published the next day, co-signed by Executive Vice Chancellor Benjamin Hermalin, Christ strongly criticized the protest for violating campus rules, but did not mention antisemitism or Jewish students. A week later, she and Hermalin published a second statement noting that Jewish students reported being subjected “to overtly antisemitic expression.”

Since Oct. 7, the campus has become an ideological battleground more intense than at any time in recent memory, centered on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The protests began soon after the Hamas terrorist attack in southern Israel. By Oct. 16, more than 100 pro-Palestinian students were protesting outside UC Berkeley’s iconic Sather Gate accusing Israel of genocide.

In November, a progressive Oakland city councilor, who is Jewish, was disinvited from speaking because he supports Israel. Meanwhile, UC Berkeley is still dealing with reputational fallout from 2022 after student groups at its prestigious law school pledged not to host speakers who support Zionism.

Some of the protests have turned ugly. Most recently, on Feb. 26, demonstrators stormed the theater where an Israeli attorney and reserve military officer was scheduled to speak. The protesters overtook police and caused minor injuries to Jewish students. The demonstration forced the event to shut down and required attendees to flee through an underground hallway.

In an hourlong interview on March

13, Christ addressed a number of topics, including what went wrong on Feb. 26, whether hate speech is permitted at UC Berkeley, whether shouting “intifada” at Jewish students is permissible and whether antisemitism is a problem on campus.

(Note: Dan Mogulof, assistant vice chancellor for communications and a board member of UC Berkeley Hillel, was also present for the interview and participated throughout.)

The interview has been edited for clarity.

J.: You have stated publicly that something went wrong on Feb. 26, and I’m curious what you think that was?

CC: You know, it’s really hard for me to put myself in other people’s heads. Because obviously, I don’t know.

I think one of the things that went wrong is — we have a major events policy that takes unusual measures and precautions. The organization sponsoring the event has to ask and has to present a security plan. But this particular event didn’t fall under that policy because they anticipated having fewer than 50 people there. They can just go in the classroom reservation system and reserve a classroom.

So we didn’t know about the event until 24 hours beforehand. That’s on us. We really have to change our policies and procedures. So when there is an event that doesn’t fall under our major events policy, where I think you anticipate an audience of over 200, that we are alerted to it and can make the appropriate preparations.

So if you had known about it in advance, or it fell under the major events category, would there have been additional police presence?

CC: Two things would have happened. First of all, we would have had it in a different venue. We changed the venue of the event

“The law for public institutions in the United States is very permissive of speech that we may find abhorrent.”

Cal Chancellor Carol Christ

block UC Berkeley’s Sather Gate on March 11 with a sign accusing Israel and the U.S. of committing genocide in Gaza.

(PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

just a few hours before the event. And it turned out, in retrospect, not to have been the best venue. It was better than the original one. But it wasn’t the best one, in terms of ability to protect it.

And we would have had time to hire additional security before the event. But you need lead time, and quite a bit of lead time, to do that.

they’re students and whether there’s a violation of our student conduct policies.

But those two processes are always sequential. And they’re also confidential.

The Anti-Defamation League and others are calling on the university to take measures against students, after, I suppose, the criminal investigation is complete. To take some kind of disciplinary action, either against students or against Bears for Palestine, the campus group that organized the protest.

CC: The organizations are not under criminal investigation.

That investigation and deliberation about the organizations, and whether any sanction is called for against them, is going on right now.

Broadly speaking, does hate speech violate campus policy in any way?

CC: It’s actually a complicated question. I’m going to sound like those ladies in front of Congress.

“If my speech creates a harmful atmosphere that detracts from the educational benefits that a student might receive — that would not be protected.”

Carol Christ, Cal Chancellor

I know that police are investigating some of the activity from that evening. But were there violations of university policy in addition to potential crimes? And if so, what violations are you looking at?

CC: Well, let me explain that, first of all, a lot of people don’t understand that these two investigations have to be sequential. First, the criminal investigation takes place. I have no idea whether the people that allegedly committed criminal violations were students or not. And if they weren’t students, this student conduct process is irrelevant to them.

Also, we never do a student conduct investigation until the police have completed the criminal investigation, because we don’t in any way want to interfere with the criminal investigation.

Then, when the police finish their investigation, we look at both who the individuals are who are involved, whether

So hate speech in an abstract context is protected by free speech. I could say something like, you know, in the context of a dinner party at my house, I could say, ‘I hate the Chinese.’ And that would be protected if there weren’t individual Chinese people there that were threatened by that speech.

If my speech creates a harmful atmosphere that detracts from the educational benefits that a student might receive — if I said that very same thing, ‘I hate the Chinese,’ in a classroom in which they were Chinese students — that would not be protected. And I would be subject to discipline.

The thing that determines what is not protected is if it is understood as a threat to the people hearing the speech.

So it would have to be understood as a threat? Let’s say, for example, someone posts on Snapchat something overtly Islamophobic, calling Muslim people terrorists, and 300 people see it. Would that violate campus policy?

CC: No, it would be protected free speech.

Demonstrators

We’ve actually had instances of that. And the only thing we can do is if a person makes a comment like that, on a website, for example, that attaches itself to the University of California, they can’t do that. But if they’re using some sort of vehicle in the marketplace like Snapchat, they can say an alarming range of really abhorrent things.

There were groups of protesters at the Feb. 26 protest chanting, “intifada, intifada,” essentially at Jewish students who were attending the event. Would that violate school policy?

CC: I don’t think so.

Despite “intifada” referring to “uprising” and associated with a series of terrorist attacks and suicide bombings and so forth?

DM: I’ve asked the question myself. And I’ve asked it from none other than [Law School Dean] Erwin Chemerinsky, who knows a thing or two about the Constitution. In order for there to be incitement—

Sorry, you wouldn’t think that chanting “intifada” outside of an event would interfere with the education of—

DM: Let me finish.

OK.

DM: In order to cross the line to incitement, it has to create an imminent threat of mob level violence. That chant has been heard around the campus quite often since Oct. 7. And it hasn’t.

As we’ve said before, we’ve had dozens of events without any violence, without any outbreak. We couldn’t go to a court. We would be sued, and we would lose. And I think the last thing we want is for something like that to happen. We don’t want to make martyrs and heroes of people who would sue the university.

We’ve told students, if you believe that was harassment or discrimination, you report that to the Office for the Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination, and it will be investigated, we promise, and it will be responded to.

What about the actions of that group on

Feb. 26 violated campus policy?

CC: Well, damage to property.

OK, so is it just the damage to the window?

CC: No, they also damaged the door and pushed through the door. The speaker and the audience both had to be evacuated for their own safety. So that violates campus policy, not allowing a speaker to speak. There were claims of physical assaults, as well as directed hate speech at individuals. And so those things all violate campus policy, as well as the law.

Chancellor, a more general question, do you think discussion of antisemitism belongs in the same general category as discussions around anti-Black racism, anti-Asian racism, transphobia, homophobia and other forms of bigotry? Does it occupy that same space at Berkeley?

CC: Absolutely. But one of the things that I’ve learned is each of these forms of bigotry is somewhat different, given the context, the historical context of the bigotry. But they absolutely belong, all in the same category.

Berkeley has a division of equity and inclusion, as most universities do. You have Centers for Educational Justice and Community Engagement. The website describes it as a “collaborative of offices and centers that advocate for, build capacity with and dialogue among and across diverse communities.” There’s an office for African Americans, Asian Pacific Americans, Chicanx students, an office for gender equity, Native American equity, and something called the multicultural community center. Do you think an office for Jewish students, who make up a pretty sizable chunk of Berkeley students, should exist in that matrix?

CC: Yeah, that’s a really interesting question. And certainly the office of equity and inclusion, the Division of Equity and Inclusion, understands both Jewish students and Muslim students as part of their charge. They are frequently present at events, frequently talk with those communities. So it’s not

“The speaker and the audience both had to be evacuated for their own safety. So that violates campus policy, not allowing a speaker to speak. There were claims of physical assaults, as well as directed hate speech at individuals. And so those things all violate campus policy, as well as the law.”

Carol Christ, Cal Chancellor

“I don’t think antisemitism is unique in the kind of bigotry that students suffer. What is different about it is this national narrative that’s gotten attached to it.”

Carol Christ, Cal Chancellor

as if they don’t think of Jewish students as a distinct ethnic group whose sense of belonging isn’t part of the mission of their office. That’s certainly true. But they don’t have a particular office that’s connected to the Jewish community.

However, there are resources that the Jewish community has. There’s a center for Israel studies, the Center for Jewish Studies. There’s Hillel. So some of the communitybuilding work that these particular programs in equity and inclusion do is carried out by other kinds of units on the Berkeley campus.

Do you think that there’s a problem with antisemitism on campus at Berkeley?

CC: Yeah, that’s a hard question to answer. I think that there are problems with lots of different kinds of prejudices. On the Berkeley campus, I hear from Black students that they feel that they’re victims of prejudice. I hear from Muslim students that they feel they’re victims of prejudice. We live in a world in which there is a lot of prejudice and bigotry. Asian students often talk to me about the prejudice that they feel. So I don’t think antisemitism is unique in the kind of bigotry that students suffer. What is different about it is this national narrative that’s gotten attached to it. That really complicates the situation in a way that’s quite different from some of our other groups.

So you don’t think there’s a specific problem with antisemitism at Cal that’s unique?

DAN MOGULOF: There’s no doubt we’re receiving a lot of reports from students — of just sort of passing in the hallways, things being said to them. I mean, things that we see in society as a whole, yes, we are also seeing on the campus. The campus doesn’t have a wall up between it and society.

Perhaps I should have phrased the question differently. Chancellor, I wasn’t saying, is the university responding inadequately to antisemitism. I’m asking, is there a problem originating from students or perhaps faculty as well that contributes to a special atmosphere of

antisemitism at the university? Or is it simply one form of prejudice among many that has been blown out of proportion in the media?

CC: I don’t think either of your two alternatives is right. I think it’s a form of prejudice that has taken a particularly anguished and painful form because of the current conflict in the Middle East.

I think it’s unique, or different from the other kinds of prejudice that I see at Berkeley in that there’s a kind of … what should I say … a political and historical story that those supporting the Palestinian cause often embrace. I think it’s a wrong story.

But I think not putting it in its current historical and world context leads you to think of it as simply and merely bigotry. And I don’t think it’s simply and merely bigotry. It’s gotten attached and complicated by very strong political opinions and a very strong political narrative, which you can agree with or not agree with.

I don’t think it’s a kind of clear issue that is just about antisemitism. I don’t think you can separate it from people’s extraordinarily strong views about what’s going on in the Middle East.

Understood. Even though many students do describe it, experience it, as antisemitism.

CC: Yeah, no. I mean, it’s incredibly, incredibly sad to me. But yes, I agree.

OK. This might be a very easy question, chancellor.

DM: Oh, no, that would be a change!

I keep seeing activists saying that “Zionists are not welcome at Berkeley.” And I’m wondering: Are Zionists welcome at Berkeley?

CC: Of course Zionists are welcome at Berkeley.

DM: I was just in the chancellor’s office yesterday, and she didn’t throw me out! n

Read the full interview at tinyurl.com/christ-transcript.

UC Berkeley chancellor to post ‘observers’ at Sather Gate

EMMA GOSS | J. STAFF

More than a month after anti-Israel protesters began blocking the main arch of UC Berkeley’s Sather Gate and eight days after 250 Jewish students, faculty and allies marched in silence to “liberate the gate,” the university’s chancellor said she will take steps to address the situation.

“The current protest at Sather Gate has been unusual in the length of time that it has gone on, the disruption it has imposed, and the conflict it has engendered,” UC Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ said Tuesday in a campuswide email. “Political protest is a protected — indeed a valued — activity on the Berkeley campus, it is also subject to time, place, and manner regulations.”

Christ said that the “variety of complaints” have led her to a decision to “post observers who can monitor and report on the situation” at the iconic gate. Meanwhile, her office will continue to “try to connect” with both protest organizers and those objecting to it, she said, “so that we can find a path forward and reduce conflict.”

The chancellor added that she’s “convening a small group to re-examine the policies and procedures” around the “time, place and manner” restrictions on freedom of speech on campus. Christ said she is uncertain that the current approach is “serving us well.”

It appears the university is finally taking action.

Although students could still walk through the side arches of Sather Gate, Jewish students have reported incidents of harassment and intimidation. Protesters blocking the main arch have shouted at or filmed Jewish students whom they recognize or identify by their jewelry, such as a Star of David necklace.

Professor Ethan Katz, who is director of UC Berkeley’s Center for Jewish Studies, said he applauds Christ’s statement and the actions she outlined.

“I think the reason we are where we are is [administrators] feel hamstrung by the policies and their ability to respond,” said Katz, who chairs the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Jewish Student Life and Campus Climate.

Professor Ron Hassner, who is two weeks into his open-ended sit-in to protest the administration’s response to Jewish student safety, including at Sather Gate, said Christ’s announcement shows that “there’s clearly progress, there’s clearly a plan” to resolve the issues at the gate. However, he noted that the letter left him with a lot of questions.

“What is the timeline? Who are the people [monitoring] going to be? Who is on this committee?” asked Hassner, who is faculty director of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies. He said he would pose these questions to the chancellor’s office.

J. contacted the chancellor’s office for comment but did not hear back.

“I think the fact that there is a stance is encouraging,” Hassner said. “After a month and a half of crying out, it appears the university is finally taking action, and I think that’s great.” n

“The current protest at Sather Gate has been unusual in the length of time that it has gone on, the disruption it has imposed, and the conflict it has engendered.”

Carol Christ, Cal Chancellor

It’s over: UC Berkeley professor ends his sit-in protest

J. STAFF

UC Berkeley professor Ron Hassner on March 8, 2024, the day after he started his protest.

(PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

UC Berkeley professor Ron Hassner has left the building.

Two weeks after starting a round-theclock vigil in his office, Hassner announced on March 21 that he was ending his sit-in protest and getting ready to head home. His intent was to call attention to antisemitism on campus and pressure the university to address it forcefully, and on both counts he said he achieved his goals.

Hassner had taught, ate and slept in his cramped office since March 7. He said it was important to support demoralized Jewish students and push the university to quell the wave of anti-Zionist activity and antisemitism on campus since Oct. 7.

What is the first thing he plans to do when he gets home?

“Hug my kids and shower,” he told J. in an email. “Maybe not in that order :).”

Following is the letter that Hassner emailed to Jewish students at Cal on March 21 with the subject line: “Free at Last.”

Dear students,

Yesterday evening, towards the end of my 13th day in the office, I received an unexpected phone call from Chancellor [Carol] Christ. Several minutes later, I received another phone call from Provost [Benjamin] Hermalin. They called to accept all the requests I had made in my letter to them two weeks earlier, without exception, and to answer any questions I might have about how my requests would be implemented. After consulting with student leaders and colleagues, and sleeping on it for one more night, I have started packing my bags so that I can go back home to my family.

I made three requests in my March 7 letter to Christ and Hermalin. First, I asked that “all students, even the ones wearing Stars of David, should be free to pass through [Sather Gate] unobstructed. The right of protestors to express their views must be defended. It does not extend to blocking or threatening fellow students.”

To that end, the school has now posted observers from the Division of Student Affairs to monitor bullying at the gate. These are not the passive yellow-vested security personnel who have stood around Sproul in prior weeks. The Student Affairs representatives are there to actively document bullying, abuse, blocking, or intrusion on personal space. They are wearing blue lanyards around their neck with a blue badge that says “Observer.” They will be at the gate whenever protestors are there (which happens less and less these days).

The protestors who are haranguing students at the gate are hiding behind masks because they are afraid that campus will hold them accountable for their actions. The goal of the observers is to do just that. If you experience any incident of harassment, please approach Student Affairs staff and draw their attention to the incident. If necessary, they will call the police.

My second request was that Chancellor Christ reaffirm her proud stance to “uphold this university’s venerable free speech tradition” by inviting back any speaker whose talk has been interrupted or canceled. The chancellor did so gladly and confidently. The speaker who was attacked by a violent mob three weeks ago spoke to an even larger crowd this Monday. After students invited him to return to Berkeley, the university invested heavily in protecting his person, the venue for the talk, the audience attending, and the talk itself. This came at significant cost and effort, but the university will not hesitate doing so, again and again, whenever necessary, for any future speaker, be they Palestinian or Israeli, Jew or Muslim, Republican or Democrat, etc.

Only those who lack good arguments fear speech. Mobs cannot be permitted to muzzle ideas by threats and heckling, let alone by violence against students and university property, as happened three weeks ago.

The third reason for my sleep-in was the absence of mandatory Islamophobia and anti-Semitism training on campus. Chancellor Christ has committed to funding and instituting such training.

It is my belief that campus leaders would have fulfilled all these requests of their own accord even in the absence of my sleep-in. Everyone at our university knows that antiSemitism, sometimes cowering behind a thin mask of “anti-Zionism,” is a real concern, on this and on all U.S. campuses. Our leadership is as annoyed by the nuisance of the blockade at Sather Gate as are all students by now (especially students with disabilities). At best, our sleep-in reinforced the university’s determination to act and accelerated the process somewhat.

I say “our” sleep-in, because this protest would have been easy to ignore had it not been for the combined effort of the entire campus Jewish community. Some 80-100 guests came to my office every day to eat, drink, chat, meet friends, and discuss anti-Semitism and free speech. Students, parents, alumni, community members, rabbis, administrators, and colleagues dropped by with food and encouragement. Jewish and non-Jewish students, pro-Israel and even

some anti-Israel students spent hours around my coffee table, late into the night, to talk about their identity and their politics. Many hundreds sent messages of encouragement and gifts for students from around the U.S. and the world. The light in my window gets no credit for that accomplishment. You do.

In good Berkeley tradition, our effort also shines a light for other California campuses. On Tuesday, 33 of my colleagues across California spent the night in their offices in solidarity with Berkeley students and in protest of anti-Semitism. They posted images of their sleep-ins on social media. Many of these sleep-ins took place on campuses where Jewish faculty had been reluctant to stand up for their rights and their safety. You showed them how to rally, celebrate their Judaism, and hold their heads high. The sleep-in movement against anti-Semitism is now spreading eastward across the U.S.

What happens next here? First of all, tomorrow Chabad has invited all students who are still on campus for a celebratory Shabbat. If you’d like to join me, I’ll be walking to Chabad from my office at 7:30 p.m. It will be nice to walk together, if you like.

Second: My mattress, blanket and pillows stay at the office. Should the climate on campus deteriorate, and anti-Semitism escalate again, I will not hesitate to lock myself back up. I will look to you, the students, to tell me whether I need to resume my protest.

Third: My office remains a home for all students, regardless of identity and politics. In addition to office hours, I will open my doors every Thursday at 6 p.m. to eat and drink with all who come seeking good company and good debate. I will do so as long as students wish.

I’ll end with some fantastic news, worthy of celebration. For the last two years, faculty and staff of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies have worked tirelessly to create an opportunity for students to signal their competency in Israel Studies. Yesterday, [UC Berkeley] announced that all colleges on this campus will offer a minor in Israel Studies, starting this fall!

I view this as one of our biggest and most

“Only those who lack good arguments fear speech. Mobs cannot be permitted to muzzle ideas by threats and heckling, let alone by violence against students and university property, as happened three weeks ago.”

Ron Hassner, UC Berkeley professor

lasting accomplishments in making Berkeley a destination for students interested in Israel, and in changing the campus experience for students once they arrive here. The minor reflects the rich and multidisciplinary nature of the academic field of Israel Studies, drawing on the social sciences and humanities as well as law, business, science and technology. It will offer students an opportunity, not available on many campuses, to integrate rigorous engagement with Israel explicitly into their core studies, and recognize and signal

the importance of that work with a Berkeley degree.

Attacks and intimidation of students on U.S. campuses are designed to drive some students away. The new minor in Israel Studies will do the opposite. It will attract students from all backgrounds to our campus precisely because we are the greatest campus in the country for studying the complexities of Judaism and Israel in an inclusive and rigorous manner.

Yashar Koach! — Ron n

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Anti-Israel protester disrupts Berkeley law dean’s backyard dinner, refuses to leave, scuffle ensues

MAYA MIRSKY | J. STAFF

What was meant to be a congratulatory spring dinner for graduating students at the home of UC Berkeley’s law school dean turned confrontational on April 9 when a pro-Palestinian protester stood up with a microphone and began making a speech.

Erwin Chemerinsky and his wife, law school professor Catherine Fisk, were hosting the event for third-year law students in their backyard and asked the protester, who was a student and one of the registered guests, to leave.

According to a statement released by Chemerinsky, around 60 students signed up to attend and were eating dinner when the disruption occurred.

“While guests were eating, a woman stood up with a microphone, stood on the top step in the yard, and began a speech, including about the plight of the Palestinians,” Chemerinsky said in the statement. “My wife and I immediately approached her and asked her to stop and leave. The woman continued. When she continued, there was an attempt to take away her microphone. Repeatedly, we said to her that you are a guest in our home, please stop and leave. About 10 students were clearly with her and ultimately left as a group.”

Video has circulated on social media that shows a woman identified as Malak Afaneh, who is a Berkeley law student and co-president of Berkeley Law Students for Justice in Palestine. She is also a law clerkat the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

The student group had called for a boycott of Chemerinsky’s dinner with a disturbing cartoon that showed the law school dean holding a fork and knife covered in blood.

“No dinner with Zionist Chem while Gaza starves,” it read.

In the video clip, which shows 20 seconds of the incident, Afaneh is standing with a microphone and reading from her phone. Fisk approaches and grabs at her phone and the mic while putting her arm around her shoulder in what appears to be an attempt to move her aside.

“Leave,” Fisk says. “This is not your house. This is my house.”

Chemerinsky also intervenes. “Please leave our house,” he says loudly. “You are guests in our house.”

According to one student present at the event, the video doesn’t paint the whole picture. A Jewish third-year law student who was at the dinner said that the protesters, including Afaneh, were speaking and disrupting the event for quite a while before things escalated. They were at first politely asked to leave by Chemerinsky and Fisk, the student said. The video shows only the end of the incident, after the protesters had been speaking there for three or four minutes, he said.

“They did not leave when they were

UC Berkeley law professor Catherine Fisk attempts to get law student Malak Afaneh to leave the home Fisk shares with her husband, Berkeley law dean Erwin Chemerinsky, on April 9, 2024.

(SCREENSHOT VIA INSTAGRAM)

“I am enormously sad that we have students who are so rude as to come into my home, in my backyard, and use this social occasion for their political agenda.”

Erwin Chemerinsky

asked the first 20 or 30 times,” he said. The student added that they finally left after Fisk said that while she was reluctant to call the police, she would do so if needed.

He said students at the dinner were already on edge, as they expected some kind of protest — but outside, on the public sidewalk. Instead, it was in front of them.

“We mostly stared in a combination of awkwardness and disbelief,” he said. “I think people weren’t quite sure how they should respond.”

Another student who was present said she was not entirely surprised that something like this happened, considering that one of the tables had students she knew to be part of Berkeley Law Students for Justice in Palestine. She told J. that she felt bad for Chemerinsky and Fisk.

“They’re just such good people and kind people, and don’t deserve this,” she said.

Both students requested anonymity over concerns about potential repercussions for them.

The Instagram posts calling for a boycott of the event and depicting Chemerinsky included a caption that read, “This dinner is the prime example of a normalization PR event that hopes to distract students from Dean Chem’s complicity and support for the genocide of the Palestinian peoples.”

“I never thought I would see such blatant antisemitism,” Chemerinsky said in his statement, “with an image that invokes the horrible antisemitic trope of blood libel and that attacks me for no apparent reason other than I am Jewish.”

Chemerinsky lamented the disruption of what was meant to be a welcoming, positive evening.

“I am enormously sad that we have students who are so rude as to come into my home, in my backyard, and use this social occasion for their political agenda,” he said.

UC Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ also weighed in on the disruption.

“I am appalled and deeply disturbed by what occurred at Dean Chemerinsky’s home last night,” Christ said in a statement sent to J. “I have been in touch with him to

offer my support and sympathy. While our support for Free Speech is unwavering, we cannot condone using a social occasion at a person’s private residence as a platform for protest.”

Chemerinsky has largely been supportive of the rights of his students to voice their criticisms of Israel.

He spoke out against trucks sent by the right-leaning Jewish organization Accuracy in Media that drove around UC Berkeley in February displaying the names and photos of people that the organization accused of holding antisemitic views.

Chemerinsky has also defended the right of law school clubs to bar Zionist speakers, although he disagreed with the policy.

In a 2022 op-ed in J., Chemerinsky wrote about the student groups at Berkeley’s law school that had changed their bylaws to condemn Israel. “It is crucial that I stress that students have the right to take a position on this, like all issues, even if I disagree with them or find their views offensive,” he wrote at the time.

In that op-ed, however, he expressed concerns that the updated bylaws also included a pledge to ban Zionist speakers.

“It is very troubling to broadly exclude a particular viewpoint from being expressed,” he said. “Indeed, taken literally, this would mean that I could not be invited to speak because I support the existence of Israel, though I condemn many of its policies.”

His views on free speech were broad enough to include the posters targeting his Tuesday night dinner.

“I felt that though deeply offensive, they were speech protected by the First Amendment,” he said in his statement. However, he drew the line at protests at his home.

“The dinners will go forward on Wednesday and Thursday,” he wrote. “I hope that there will be no disruptions; my home is not a forum for free speech. But we will have security present. Any student who disrupts will be reported to student conduct and a violation of the student conduct code is reported to the Bar.” n

UC Berkeley’s pro-Palestinian tent camp joins others across nation

MAYA MIRSKY | J. STAFF

Pro-Palestinian activists at UC Berkeley erected a handful of tents April 25 on the steps of UC Berkeley’s Sproul Hall. By Wednesday afternoon, the “Free Palestine Camp” had mushroomed to 70 tents.

“It’s been a rapid expansion,” an organizer from the UC Berkeley Divest Coalition, which is running the encampment, told J. The student did not disclose his name.

Inside Cal’s tent camp — organized in a response to the recent arrests at Columbia University of pro-Palestinian students living in tents there — students chatted, drank coffee and did homework on laptops. But the campground atmosphere was at odds with the words of a young woman giving a talk on what to do if confronted by police: keep your student ID on hand, make sure your phone has a passcode and don’t volunteer information. “They can lie to you,” she said.

Similar encampments have rapidly sprung up across the country, including at Yale, Harvard, New York University, Northwestern University, University of Michigan and University of Southern California.

The Cal organization running the roundthe-clock encampment is calling not only for “boycott, divestment and sanctions” against Israel but also for an end to Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza

They also have university-specific demands, such as an “academic boycott,” which would prohibit UC Berkeley from signing research or scholarship agreements with Israeli universities. And they want the establishment of a Palestinian studies program at Cal.

One of the tents at the camp had a Jewish Voice for Peace sign adhered to it. The anti-Zionist organization has helped organize multiple protests across the Bay Area since Oct. 7.

The Free Palestine Camp is running daily programming on topics ranging from “Poetry as Resistance” to “Judaism and Anti-Zionism.”

Interspersed with that, a speaker system plays the sound of aircraft under other clips, such as a woman stating the camp’s demands.

The camp is taking donations and has posted a list of requests online, from

One tent among many that have been set up as part of a pro-Palestine protest encampment in UC Berkeley’s Sproul Plaza, April 24, 2024. (PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

The

Free Palestine Camp is running daily programming on topics ranging from “Poetry as Resistance” to “Judaism and Anti-Zionism.”

“We had our firstnight seder at the encampment, which was amazing. It was beautiful.”

Jewish student who asked to remain anonymous

hot coffee to batteries to money, warning potential donors to “make sure you are bringing BDS-friendly items!”

The student organizer with the UC Berkeley Divest Coalition said protesters had received “tons of food” so far, enabling community meals.

They are also asking for matzah donations. A Jewish student involved in the protest, who said he didn’t want to give his name because he worried about being doxxed, noted that Jewish protesters celebrated Passover together at a JVP-sponsored seder.

“We had our first-night seder at the encampment, which was amazing,” he said. “It was beautiful.”

recognizes “explicitly the historic role of civil disobedience as a protest tactic” but also states that “civil disobedience will generally have consequences for those engaging in it because of the impact it can have on the rest of the campus community.”

“With three weeks left in the semester, we are prioritizing students’ academic interests and have committed to taking the steps necessary to ensure the protest does not disrupt the university’s operations,” Mogulof said in an email to J. “The protest at Berkeley is not blocking doorways, thoroughfares, and there has, so far, been no disruption of teaching, learning, or research.”

Students walk through Sather Gate, which is blocked temporarily by pro-Palestinian protesters, at UC Berkeley on April 24, 2024. (PHOTO/AARON LEVY-WOLINS)

He said that his Jewish identity has inspired his activism and his decision to join the tent encampment, mentioning the “righteous gentiles” during the Holocaust who risked themselves to save vulnerable Jews.

“Many JVP people are just trying to embody that spirit,” he said.

University spokesperson Dan Mogulof said Wednesday the school will continue to follow the UC policy for nonviolent protests during the current situation. UC policy

On April 18, pro-Palestinian students also organized a rally outside Berkeley’s law school. It followed an April 9 altercation at UC Berkeley law school dean Erwin Chemerinsky’s home where law student Malak Afaneh began giving a speech about Palestine during a dinner party for students. Catherine Fisk, a law professor and Chemerinsky’s wife, pulled at Afaneh’s microphone, phone and shoulders while repeatedly asking her to leave. The April 18 rally was a call for the “removal” of Fisk and Chemerinsky, who Afaneh described as a “self-identifying Zionist.” n

Despite two physical attacks on Jewish students, UC Berkeley doesn’t plan to dismantle tent city

GABE STUTMAN | J. STAFF

UC Berkeley administrators are standing by their decision to take a hands-off approach to the tent encampment at Sproul Plaza despite two attacks that have rattled pro-Israel Jewish students and left a pro-Israel activist injured.

Dan Mogulof, a spokesperson for the university, told J. on May 3 that while “we are ready to change our stance at any time,” the university does not plan to take any drastic steps — such as dismantling the camp — in response to the violent incidents.

The response from Cal highlights the university’s reluctance to get in the middle of anti-Israel protests and its wish to avoid the harsh media spotlight shone on campuses like UCLA, Columbia, University of Texas at Austin and others that have sent in police in riot gear to use force and break up tent encampments in recent weeks.

Such a scene would be deeply discordant with Cal’s identity as a bastion of free speech and a university welcoming of protests of all sorts. The campus felt that friction in 2011 when officers arrested demonstrators camping amid the Occupy Wall Street protests.

“We don’t believe we’ve come to the point where we need to take the sort of actions that have led to utter chaos and calamity for the entire community — actions that we’ve seen at other universities,” Mogulof said.

Mogulof has repeatedly told J. that the university is focusing on two top priorities. The first is to avoid what he called the “disruption of campus operations, which include teaching, learning and research,” and the second is ensuring the “physical safety of the campus community” and responding to “isolated or individual acts of

violence, harassment or discrimination.”

Yet two violent outbursts against Jews at or near Sproul Plaza, have increased scrutiny on the university even as the semester nears its end. Finals begin Monday.

The first incident occurred on April 26, when a Jewish law student, Noah Cohen, was blocked by a protester from recording the Sproul Plaza scene on his cell phone, was followed as he sought out an administrator or police officer and then was punched in the face as he attempted to walk back into the protest area. The incident is partially captured in a chaotic cell phone video obtained by J. and posted online.

In an interview with J., Cohen described the protest as “dystopian,” saying Sproul Plaza had become a place where dissenting viewpoints are not allowed and can invite violence.

“There’s not freedom of movement if your message doesn’t comply to what they want it to be,” he said.

According to another video recorded on May 1, a man in a T-shirt and green pants punched Ilan Sinelnikov, a pro-Israel activist, in the head multiple times during a scuffle

A student guards tents at Sproul Plaza at UC Berkeley on April 24, the first day of the encampment. (PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

“We don’t believe we’ve come to the point where we need to take the sort of actions that have led to utter chaos and calamity for the entire community — actions that we’ve seen at other universities.”

Dan Mogulof, university spokesperson

“Have they seized a building?

No. But are Jewish students comfortable walking through that part of campus?”

Noah Cohen, Jewish law student

over an Israeli flag. The alleged assailant wasn’t wearing a medical mask, unlike most of the protesters who wear masks or garments over their faces.

Sinelnikov, who was visiting from Florida, is president of the pro-Israel group Students Supporting Israel (SSI).

A group of about 10 students affiliated with SSI’s Berkeley chapterwalked to Sproul Plaza that evening, Sinelnikov said, with three Israeli flags to “show that we are here — that there are Zionist students on this campus, and they’re not going anywhere.”

He said they sang Hatikvah, the Israeli national anthem, and chanted “Bring them home!” in reference to the 133 hostages who are still held by Hamas in Gaza.

A cell phone video recorded by a Cal undergraduate named Atara, who asked J. not to publish her last name to maintain her privacy, shows someone shouting “Go back to Europe!” before a man grabs her Israeli flag.

The video shows Sinelnikov attempting to wrestle the flag back. At that point, the man in the green pants comes from Sinelnikov’s left and delivers three hard punches at his head and face. One of the punches split his lip; another connected with his head. He was treated and given a concussion test by paramedics at the campus police station.

“I felt that if we gave them the flag, they might go and burn it,” said Sinelnikov, whose parents emigrated in 1989 from the Soviet

Union to Israel, where he was born.

Both Sinelnikov and Atara said they encountered antisemitism during the incident — that someone in the crowd shouted “Talmudic devils!” Atara said she also heard people shout “Death to Zionists!” “Intifada!” and some say “failed experiments, failed experiments.”

“I had never seen anything like this before,” Sinelnikov said.

“It was very much hate speech, and hostile to begin with,” Atara said. “We literally were standing there. We said, ‘This is our right. This is free speech.’”

Cohen said that the encampment, which is on a main campus thoroughfare, has raised questions among the Berkeley Jewish community about whether it creates a hostile environment, particularly for those who support Israel. He described the rhetoric coming from the tent camp as “hateful.”

“Have they seized a building? No,” he said. “But are Jewish students comfortable walking through that part of campus?”

UC Berkeley is offering escorts to students who feel uncomfortable traversing the plaza, and the university said it is increasing faculty monitors in the protest area.

Mogulof said both attacks are under investigation by university police. The University of California Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday. n

UC Berkeley adds Israel studies minor for the fall

RYAN TOROK | CORRESPONDENT

UC Berkeley will begin offering a minor in Israel studies this fall, coming at a time of acute tension on campus around Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.

The minor, announced in late May and created through Cal’s Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, is open to all undergraduates.

“It’s become clear Israel is a very important topic, and it’s also become clear people are very ignorant about it,” institute faculty co-director Ron Hassner told J. “I believe, and I think we all do at the institute, that teaching Israel studies is a source of moderation, as opposed to extremism.”

While many universities offer Jewish studies degree programs that include Israel courses, among them UC Berkeley, San Francisco State University and Stanford University, standalone Israel minors are rare.

The minor is designed “for students who want to pursue something deeper and more robust with a formal degree attached to it,” institute executive director Rebecca Golbert told J.

Its four core courses are “Israel: Politics and Society,” “History of Modern Israel: From the Emergence of Zionism to our Time,” “Comparative Constitutional Law: The Case of Israel” and “War in the Middle East.”

Electives include Jerusalem architectural design, Israeli literature, anthropology, legal principles and religion and spirituality in education.

Hebrew and Arabic courses also count toward the minor. The institute hopes that both Jewish and non-Jewish students choose the new minor, leaders said.

Hassner, who is the Helen Diller Family Chair in Israel Studies and the Chancellor’s Professor of Political Science, teaches two courses that will count toward the minor. One is the junior seminar “Israel: Politics and Society.”

“So, unexpectedly and contrary to all assumptions, UC Berkeley is a very good place to study about Israel and study Jewish

things, Jewish history, but also Israeli law, Israeli politics, Israeli history,” said Hassner, the professor who staged a two-week sit-in vigil in his campus office in March to call attention to antisemitism on campus and pressure the university to address it.

Students with the minor can “walk out of here with a real qualification to advise people about Israel, to engage in leadership around Israel and to make policy around Israel,” he added.

UC Berkeley sophomore Shaya Soleil Keyvanfar, who is part of the institute’s undergraduate fellows program, plans to pursue the new minor this fall.

Keyvanfar, 18, told J. that being Jewish on her embattled campus has — whether she wants it or not — turned her into a kind of Israel spokesperson.

“Unfortunately, as a Jew on a campus, I’ve become an ambassador for Israel, needing to know every fact to defend its existence, which is unfair but it’s the reality of the situation,” she said. “I wanted to equip myself with as many facts as possible.”

The institute, which is self-funded from outside sources, was founded as part of Berkeley’s law school in 2011. It has sponsored more than 100 courses, coordinated learning programs in Israel and brought visiting professors from Israel to teach at Cal during their sabbatical years.

Permanent faculty, including Hassner and Ethan Katz, an associate professor of history and Jewish studies and faculty director of Cal’s Center for Jewish Studies, will teach the minor’s courses, as will visiting professors from Israel.

The announcement follows ongoing unrest on campus by pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel activists following the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre in Israel that sparked the ongoing war and a spike in antisemitism worldwide.

“Our institute has been mentioned numerous times in rallies on campus,” Golbert said, “specifically because we view Israel studies as essential.” n

Ron Hassner, faculty director of the Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, will teach courses in the minor. (PHOTO/AARON LEVYWOLINS)

“Unfortunately, as a Jew on a campus, I’ve become an ambassador for Israel, needing to know every fact to defend its existence, which is unfair but it’s the reality of the situation.”

UC Berkeley sophomore Shaya Soleil Keyvanfar

Outgoing chancellor: Cal won’t divest from Israel, will invest in antisemitism education

EMMA GOSS | J. STAFF

Carol Christ retired as UC Berkeley chancellor at the end of June.

During her final week as UC Berkeley’s chancellor before retirement, Carol Christ sought to set the record straight about the agreement she reached in May with the organizers of a pro-Palestinian tent encampment. She also took the opportunity to announce university funding of expanded antisemitism education.

In a 2½-page letter sent June 24 to members of the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Jewish Student Life and Campus Climate, Christ stated that the deal over the encampment, which led to its dismantling on Sproul Plaza by mutual agreement, did not “in any way open the door to, or have anything to do with, divestment from entities based on the fact that they do business with or in Israel, or are situated in Israel.”

also agreed in May that the university would review all complaints about its international programs to make sure they are in line with anti-discrimination policies. Student protesters had demanded Cal cut all ties with Israel, but Christ had said the university would not do that.

By contrast, Christ used the June 24 letter to announce that the university will require antisemitism education for all new students during orientation week, beginning in August. She also said that in the longer term, Cal will fund an existing program, the Antisemitism Education Initiative, that to date has been self-funded and supported by donors.

“We will, for the first time, invest significant university funding in support of antisemitism education.”

Carol

Christ,

outgoing UC Berkeley chancellor

She also noted that the campus will not undertake a program-level review of any relationship between UC Berkeley and institutions in Israel.

“The understanding that the campus reached with the coalition reiterates and confirms existing campus policy concerning protected-class discrimination,” she wrote in the letter, which was shared with J.

The May agreement had included Christ’s reference to the “horrific killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians” in the ongoing war in Gaza and a declaration of support for a cease-fire and the release of hostages held by Hamas. She also promised to create a “task force” of students, faculty and staff to create recommendations for an ethical investment strategy to submit to decision-makers. Divestment from Israel is “not permissible,” she added at the time, but recommendations could target weapons manufacturers, as well as companies that contribute to “mass incarceration” and the “surveillance” industries.

Christ, who retired after seven years as chancellor and a lifetime career in academia,

“We will, for the first time, invest significant university funding in support of antisemitism education,” Christ wrote in her letter, noting that the funding will be available for at least five years.

The new funding will create more robust and widespread antisemitism education, said Ethan Katz, faculty director of Cal’s Center for Jewish Studies.

While Katz does not yet know the precise figures, he told J. that it’s “not a small amount in terms of what it represents for the initiative. And it’s very significant that the university has made the decision to put public dollars behind this.”

Katz will work with Gregg Drinkwater, head of the Antisemitism Education Initiative, to help develop the antisemitism awareness training for orientation. Incoming student housing advisers and leaders of official student groups will receive a more in-depth version of the training.

“Golden Bear Orientation” traditionally consists of several days of information-packed sessions.

Katz said it’s always difficult to “squeeze” more programming into an already jam-packed orientation, which is why in recent years, the university has focused on

a general training on equity, inclusion and belonging that has included brief examples of discrimination without focusing on any single marginalized group.

The presence of antisemitism education in the orientation has been meager. Since 2022, students have been provided with a list of resources for further education on forms of group-based hatred or exclusion, including an 11-minute video about antisemitism, produced by the Antisemitism Education Initiative.

Political science professor Ron Hassner, Berkeley’s faculty director of the Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies, applauded Christ’s letter.

Hassner gained national attention this spring when he stayed in his office round the clock for two weeks to protest the administration’s tepid response to antisemitism after Oct. 7.

Hassner and Katz, who co-chair the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Jewish Student Life and Campus Climate, had requested that Christ issue a clarifying statement before her final day on June 28, addressing questions about the mid-May agreement.

“The committee asked the chancellor to please clarify those things in writing, because as far as the media was concerned, the anti-Israel protesters were claiming all sorts of outrageous success,” Hassner told J. “And the reality on the ground is quite different.”

Hassner said requiring antisemitism education for student group leaders and resident advisers was one of the three requests he made of administrators when he began his office sit-in. The new funding is a bonus, he said.

“It’s a big relief,” Hassner said.

Hassner said the university has now followed through with all his requests, which also included university oversight and support to ensure Jewish student safety, and the assurance that speakers who come to campus will not be interrupted or removed — something that happened at a February event with Israeli attorney and IDF reservist Ran Bar-Yoshafat when anti-Israel protesters

violently stormed Zellerbach Playhouse ahead of his speech.

“What this entire experience has taught me is that you can accomplish a lot more with protests that are reasonable and dignified and constructive than you can with protests that are obnoxious,” Hassner said.

“Two weeks of quietly sitting in my office, welcoming people for conversations, engaging with people from both sides of the debate, making reasonable requests of the university, rather than trying to, you know, dictate Middle East foreign policy accomplished a good deal in terms of anti-racism and antisemitism education,” he added.

The chancellor’s letter did not satisfy all critics of Cal’s handling of antisemitism on campus this past school year.

Steven Davidoff Solomon, a Cal law professor who co-authored a petition in late May demanding that Christ reverse her agreement with the encampment, considers the letter meaningless.

“It’s just words,” Solomon told J. “The university is not taking the hard steps to structurally reform itself.”

Solomon said he wished that the letter had been released widely to the public and had been addressed specifically to the encampment protesters.

“Saying nice things about Jewish students in a private letter does not walk back what she said” to the protesters, said Solomon, former head of the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Jewish Student Life and Campus Climate and the co-founder of the Antisemitism Education Initiative.

Solomon added that the protests are likely to return to campus when classes resume in late August. He believes the climate for Jewish students won’t improve until the university makes more meaningful changes.

Katz acknowledged Solomon’s concerns, but said the letter is a good start to a much longer and deeper process that’s still needed to support Cal’s Jewish students.

“I don’t want to give the impression that I’m painting a rosy picture because there are challenges that are not addressed there,” Katz told J. “There’s a lot of work to do. There’s a lot that remains to be done.” n

“What this entire experience has taught me is that you can accomplish a lot more with protests that are reasonable and dignified and constructive than you can with protests that are obnoxious.”

Ron Hassner, UC Berkeley professor

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