Attending UC Intifada

Parents generally assume that college is the kind of
safe haven where their sons and daughters can study
without fearing that they will become exposed to
hateful and volatile rhetoric. No one would like to
think that their child might be subjected to verbal
and physical assault due to their race, religion, or
political orientation.


Unfortunately, on many college campuses, Jewish
students deal with the growing trends of racism and
hate crimes every day.
In California alone, statistics demonstrate the
shocking trend of hate crimes on college campuses, a
place where people should be more open-minded and
less prone to racism. According to Barbara Perry’s
Hate Crimes and Bias, in 2001 there was a reported
23 percent increase in the number of incidents of a
racist nature reported toward Jewish students on
college campuses in California.


CBS News also reported that California currently has
the fourth-highest rate of anti-Semitic activity within
the United States.
UC Irvine, a relatively quiet suburban university, has
become a focal point for the Arab-Israeli
conflict. “Israel Awareness Week,” for example,
sponsored by the Muslim Student Union almost every
quarter, introduces extremists who do absolutely
nothing for the sake of dialogue between Jewish and
Muslim students, but instead promote hate on
campus.


In these presentations speakers like Amir Abdel Malik
Ali and Imam Muhammed Al-Asi consider all “Zionist
Jews” to be evil because they “control” everything.
Jews, they claim, are the “real terrorists.” Ali and Al-
Asi have gone as far as to target Jewish and pro-
Israel protesters, and have suggested that Israel
needs to be wiped from the earth.
“They think they are superman, but we, the Muslims,
are kryptonite. They know that their days are
numbered,” said Imam Ali on October 5 to a crowd of
roughly 200 students. Ali’s remarks drew applause
and cheers from members of the Muslim Student
Union.


The perpetual hateful speakers sponsored by the
Muslim Student Union are nothing short of obnoxious
and ridiculous they only create a tenser environment
and have already caused several cases which Jewish
and pro-Israel students have been verbally and
physically harassed.


As an Israeli student, I have been exposed to absurd
levels of hatred and have been personally sought out
because I am an active member in the community.
Racism has become a reality for many students that
are just like me, and we have had to learn to deal
with the occasional swastikas being drawn on our
dorms and apartment complexes. We do,
nevertheless, have the obligation to set the record
straight and educate the UCI community, to make
people aware of what is going on and that being
Israeli is not associated with hating Muslims.
Thankfully the Hillel Foundation of Orange County and
the Anteaters for Israel (AFI) has been one avenue
for students to become more involved in Israel
advocacy, to encourage Jewry and, most
importantly, to support fellow pro-Israel students.
AFI has allowed me to explore political avenues
while doing UC Irvine a great service. In particular,
being an active student on campus, by doing jobs
such as holding a board position with AFI and working
as secretary, has allowed me to find some semblance
of acceptance on a campus that has become both
largely anti-Israel and anti-Semitic.


While I wholeheartedly support free speech, it is
incumbent upon local governments and the
administrations of the University of California to
exercise moral leadership, to disassociate from and
condemn poisonous rhetoric and conduct that
threatens the safety of students. Administrators
need to be cognizant of negative behavior in order to
ensure the safety of the campus as a whole.



Reut Cohen is an undergraduate student at the
University of California, Irvine. This article originally appeared in The Stand With Us OC newsletter.