Photo Credit:
Brooklyn College BDS Forum, Feb. 7, 2013

THE YEAR+-LATE APOLOGY

Included in the statement issued to all Brooklyn College students, Gould wrote: “I wish to publicly apologize on behalf of Brooklyn College to [the students]”. She also refers to the study conducted under the auspices of Brooklyn College’s parent body, the City University of New York (CUNY) system, that that investigation concluded that “there was no justification for the removal of the four students.”

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But Gould failed to acknowledge in how many different ways she, as the head of Brooklyn College, violated the rights of those four students, what a poor role model she provided throughout the debacle, and how she allowed members of her faculty and administration to harm those students with impunity. There have been no real consequences for the many, repeated and egregious harms committed against them in the name of Brooklyn College.

DEFENDERS OF THE FOUR EXPELLED PRO-ISRAEL JEWISH STUDENTS

The legal non-profit organization representing three of the four pro-Israel Jewish students who were expelled from the Brooklyn College BDS event on Feb. 7, 2013, is the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, located in Washington, D.C., and run by Kenneth L. Marcus. The Brandeis Center is the only public interest advocacy organization devoted to protecting the rights of Jewish students and faculty who have been subjected to anti-Semitic discrimination, harassment or a hostile environment, on North American campuses.

Gould referred to the statement as a public one, but other than by email distribution to the college students, and a posting in a wordpress blog, “bklynevents,” which covers events and news from Brooklyn College and surrounding environs, it was not shared with the public.

However, in a press release, the Brandeis Center welcomed and re-printed Gould’s apology. The statement from Marcus made the connection which the official Brooklyn College statement failed to do, that is, that the apology “reflects that the university violated the constitutional and civil rights” of the JPI Students.

The Brandeis Center statement also makes clear that the late apology by BC president Gould is not a sufficient response to the wrongs suffered by the JPI Students. Marcus, in his statement, wrote that the Brandeis Center looks forward “to working with the school to ensure that other Brooklyn College students will not have to endure what happened to our clients.”

Gould, however, wrote as if all the hard work has been done. She wrote that the school and student leaders worked to “develop and internalize new policies and guidelines for the management of public events hosted by student clubs, in order to ensure that such a situation does not occur again.”

The Jewish Press, which covered the Brooklyn College BDS event and its aftermath extensively, spoke by telephone with Marcus on Monday, March 10.

We asked Marcus whether the Brandeis Center is satisfied with Gould’s statement.

“This is definitely not over, Brooklyn College still has considerable work to do. Our clients have not settled their claims and we hope Brooklyn College will be cooperative.”

In particular, it is the view of the Brandeis Center that the new policies and procedures heralded by Gould as if they solved the problem is not a view shared by the plaintiffs.

“What they’ve done is a nice start, but there have to be other policies and procedures, and perhaps training for staff and administrators put in place.” According to Marcus, “Brooklyn College has not done enough in order to prevent other students from experiencing the same kinds of wrongs our clients experienced at Brooklyn College.

“There needs to be far more clarity about how the rights of dissenting students in public assemblies will be protected, and that those students will not be expelled or punished for controversial opinions,” Marcus explained.

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Lori Lowenthal Marcus is a contributor to the JewishPress.com. A graduate of Harvard Law School, she previously practiced First Amendment law and taught in Philadelphia-area graduate and law schools. You can reach her by email: [email protected]