Brooklyn College Poli-Sci Supporting Academic Boycotts of Israel
Latest update: April 16th, 2013
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BC Pol. Sci. Asst. Professor Corey Robin
Idler sent her concerns in an email to the chair of the political science department, Paisley Currah, in which she noted also that “hate is never the way to bring about change.” Currah has not respond to Idler’s email.
Most of the students with whom The Jewish Press spoke have a very narrowly focused concern. Every one of them was adamant that they were not looking to have the event cancelled. Their issue was that the political science department was a co-sponsor of the BDS event, and, as a secondary matter, that the administration was not open to taking their views into consideration about why that sponsorship was a serious problem.
Here’s what the students who were willing to go on the record think.
David Rosenberg is a Brooklyn College junior. He is the Speaker of the BC Student Government Assembly. Rosenberg speaks forcefully, in rapid-fire full sentences.
Rosenberg explained that he was “not concerned at all when I saw the Students for Justice in Palestine was having this BDS event. It is a core value of this university to encourage the full and free exchange of ideas, even if some do not agree with those ideas.”
However, when he later saw that the political science department was a co-sponsor of the event, he immediately began researching the contours of that concept. Rosenberg explained that “there was no way this event could be covered by ‘academic freedom.’ This event is to promote the end of ‘Israeli Apartheid’ and the ‘illegal occupation of the Palestinians’ – that’s purely political, not academic.”
According to Rosenberg, the event reveals the political science department’s endorsement of “the partisan political agenda of an idea” that is hateful and hurtful to a large segment of the Brooklyn College community.
An email that was sent by an assistant professor in the BC political science department and obtained by The Jewish Press – but not by any student named in this article – reveals the extent to which that department considers the event highly significant.
From Professor Corey Robin: URGENT: Hi everyone. I need you all to stop what you’re doing and make a phone call or write an email to the administration of Brooklyn College. A few weeks ago, my department (political science) voted to co-sponsor a panel discussion, featuring Judith Butler and Omar Barghouti, on the Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions movement against Israel. In the last week, we’ve gotten a lot of pressure and pushback from the media, students, alumni, and now Alan Dershowitz (who’s been trying to track down our chair to “talk” to him). So far, the administration has held firm, but the pressure is only building and they are starting to ask us whether we endorse these views or are merely seeking to air them (to which we responded: “Was the Brooklyn College administration endorsing the pro-torture and pro-Israel views of Alan Dershowitz when it decided to award him an honorary degree?”) Anyway, I need you guys now to send an email or make a phone call encouraging the administration to stand by the department and to stand for the principle that a university should be a place for the airing of views, ESPECIALLY views that are heterodox and that challenge the dominant assumptions of society. Please contact: President Karen Gould (718.951.5671; klgould@brooklyn.cuny.edu); Provost William Tramontano (718.951.5864; tramontano@brooklyn.cuny.edu); and Director of Communications and Public Relations Jeremy Thompson (718.951.5882; JeremyThompson@brooklyn.cuny.edu. Please be polite and respectful, but please be firm on the principle. Right now, they’re only hearing from one side, so it’s imperative they hear from many others.
Abraham Esses, a BC senior and the president of the undergraduate student government, agreed with Rosenberg that the problem was not the event, but the “academic department’s endorsement of one side on a very divisive topic.”
Both Esses and Rosenberg, who are in touch with many students on campus, were particularly disturbed that the administration issued its decision before speaking with student groups who had been expressing concern.
Monday, January 28, was the first day of the second semester. The announcement of the BDS event took place during the long winter break. When everyone returned to school on Monday, according to one of the students, “the first thing they saw was an email from Karen Gould, BC president, unilaterally announcing there would be no reconsideration of the event or of the political science department’s sponsorship.”
tell a friendAbout the Author: Lori Lowenthal Marcus is the US correspondent for The Jewish Press. She is a recovered lawyer who previously practiced First Amendment law and taught in Philadelphia-area graduate and law schools.
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The headline is misleading: Brooklyn College as an institution is not sponsoring the conference; one department is. Not that that is excusable!
It's just painful that such idiots are employed at the university level.
Headline's been changed.
This is worse than last year's infamous anti-Israel conference at Harvard because that one had no official university connection and didn't even appear on the unversity calendar. To have a political science department sponsor something like this???
This is worse than last year's infamous anti-Israel conference at Harvard because that one had no official university connection and didn't even appear on the unversity calendar. To have a political science department sponsor something like this???
As an alumni of Brooklyn College I just sent the following e-mail to the three e-mails listed on page two: "Hi,
I just heard about the political science department supporting an academic boycott of Israel. As an alumni of Brooklyn College I was absolutely flabbergasted. I was born in the ashes of the holocaust. Many of my co-students in the late sixties were just like me. While the world has gone back to the antisemitism of the thirties, I never expected Brooklyn College to join the chorus of hate mongers. And please, do not send me one of those disingenuous e-mails about academic freedom. That is the logic of Goebbels. Come on Karen. Why would you stealthily announce this in the dead of the winter break, without any opposition input and declare it is final, without knowing that you are doing something wrong? Can't wait till you visit us here in Florida so that we can let you know what we think.
This story needs to be spread to other avenues before Feb. 7 e.g. Arutz Sheva Jpost etc. Does anybody know how to get this info to them?
I AM CALLING FOR A NATIONAL BOYCOTT BY JEWS OF ANY INTERFAITH HOLOCAUST PROGRAM WHERE HATIKAVAH IS INTENTIONALLY EXLUDED DUE TO MUSLIM PRESSURE OR CLERGY WHO SUPPORT THE PALESTINIAN CAUSE. PLEASE GET THE WORD OUT. RABBI DR. BERNHARD ROSENBERG
what is the world coming to!
Looking forward to attending this conference.
Look forward to your mother, look fwd to that!
Looking forward to attending this conference.
These people are basically Nazis. No other word for this.
Gabor, upon reading your post, I was not sure to whom you were referring. I viewed your profile and was relieved to see that you are truly pro-Israel. I urge you to clarify your message and also to refrain from using the term "Nazis" to describe people not involved in the Holocaust or in activity rooted in Nazism (Islamofascism, for example). Those supporting the event at Brooklyn College are ignorant and/or evil in their promotion of hate-filled propaganda and incitement to violence. Am Yisrael Chai! Buddy
OK, but just cast your glance a few inches below to brenrod's 3rd comment and you will see that what I say is largely corrrect in light of those facts detailed in the comment…
The joke is that EVERY area of the former Palestine mandate territory, which is currently under arab control(Jordan, west bank PA and gaza), is JEW FREE. You cant have apartheid agianst jews when they don't let jews in at all. Facts are an inconvenience to the ignorant and the ignorant are "useful idiots" for the disingenuous.
one should look into the individuals in the political science dept who rammed this through in typical fashion. The ramming through BDS while no one is looking has become the modus operandi of the disingenuous BDS movement. Academic freedom is their red herring. To see the truth look into the individuals.
"readers may recall Professor Corey Robin from his most famous student: terrorist Syed Hashmi. Robin and Brooklyn College Professor Jeanne Theoharis have led a movement to support Hashmi, who admits to having assisted al Qaeda. Hashmi is serving 15 years in prison. According to Phil Orenstein in Frontpagemag, Hashmi became radicalized while he was Robin’s student." gooogle them!
I AM CALLING FOR A NATIONAL BOYCOTT BY JEWS OF ANY INTERFAITH HOLOCAUST PROGRAM WHERE HATIKAVAH IS INTENTIONALLY EXLUDED DUE TO MUSLIM PRESSURE OR CLERGY WHO SUPPORT THE PALESTINIAN CAUSE. PLEASE GET THE WORD OUT. RABBI DR. BERNHARD ROSENBERG. I have bowed out of the local interfaith Holocaust service, because it was a custom to include Hatikvah at the end, but now some Christian groups object as they support the Palestinians and the Muslim Imams would either sit or leave during the Hatikvah. Perhaps interfaith Holocaust programs no longer make sense, at least to me. I do not need the stress of seeing disrespect being afforded to Israel and nor do I wish to compromise by leaving Hatikvah out. This is a personal choice and I DO NOT ADVOCATE ANYONE NOT PARTICIPATING IN ANY INTERFAITH HOLOCAUST SERVICE. I INTRODUCED INTERFAITH HOLOCAUST SERVICES IN 1974 AND WAS ONE OF THE FIRST IF NOT THE FIRST TO DO SO. This was a difficult decision for me based on personal principle. The interfaith Holocaust memorials started as well intentioned way for the Jewish people and other groups to pause and reflect on man's capacity to perpetuate unbelievable cruelty against his fellow and to commiserate as a group and oHolocaust survivors and athers, with the Jews and hopefully prevent this nightmare from reoccurring. Over the years it was understandably modified to include other victims of genocidal mass killings, though these mass killings were not really analogous, as the Nazis were obsessed at not just killing Jews as a competing group, but Hitler desired to eliminate our creed and it's pervasive influence on humanity, particularly Christian doxy. As a result of Muslim participation and twisted liberalism, this is morphing into a twisted canard where Israel is being blamed for perpetuating ethnic killings against the Palestinians as the Jews were slaughtered by the Nazis. One can understand the Islamo-Nazis belief system with a quote from the Talmud. We do not see things as they are. We see them as we are. RABBI DR. BERNHARD ROSENBERG, CHILD OF refugee born in a D.P. camp.
I would assume that those in the political science department have brilliant minds. However, for them to have no fear of God who said He would curse those who curse Israel, to have no fear of the repercussions of not believing God, sounds oxymoronic. They are not thinking this through. For those at the school who say they don't endorse, but allow this….you are complicit. 483years.blogspot.com
I'm definitely reducing or eliminating any future contributions to the BC Alumni Association if the Poli Sci Dept. or scholl doesn't endorse a pro-Israel event.