UPDATE: 150+ student groups condemn anti-Israel bylaws passed by law students
'More than 95% of Jewish Americans support the state of Israel” making the bylaws an “unconscionable act of discrimination,' according to the letter.
Campus Reform previously reported on the original bylaws at the heart of the Instagram post.
Over 150 student groups signed a demand letter on October 4th condemning pro-Boycott Divestments and Sanction (BDS) bylaws passed by several law student organizations at the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley).
Associated Students of the University of California Senator Shay Cohen posted the letter on Instagram with the caption, “Today we stand united to condemn the organizations that have made Jewish students nationwide feel unwelcome and discriminated against.”
“In August of 2022, you adopted bylaws silencing and excluding speakers who have expressed support for Israel…[a]s members of the global Jewish Community, we recognize these bylaws as a deliberate attempt to exclude Jewish students from the UC Berkeley campus community,” the letter reads.
“More than 95% of Jewish Americans support the state of Israel,” according to the letter, making the bylaws an “unconscionable act of discrimination.”
The long record of Jewish discrimination was also referenced, “[h]istory teaches well what follows when people are forced to pass litmus tests based on ethnic identity before they are granted their right to be treated as queal members of their community.”
The statement concluded, “If you maintain your posture of unqualified exclusion towards thousands of UC Berkeley students and faculty, the Jewish community will not stand idly by as discrimination is perpetrated against us.”
Campus Reform previously reported on the original bylaws addressed by the group’s Instagram post.
Nine student groups at UC Berkeley Law passed pro-Palestine bylaws boycotting and divesting from “institutions, organizations, and companies” that are pro-Israel as well as prohibiting hosting speakers that support Israel, calling the Jewish nation “an apartheid state.”
[RELATED: CUNY union President blames ‘white Christian nationalism’ for anti-Semitism on campus]
In an email to students, UC Berkeley School of Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky said the bylaws were “troubling” and if “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.”
“Singling out the state of Israel for special condemnation, or questioning the very legitimacy of its existence, is considered by many Jewish students to be a form of Antisemitism,” Chemerinsky wrote.
Campus Reform contacted everyone mentioned and will update this article accordingly.
Follow @kliseanderson on Twitter.
