[News] Trump official wants students prosecuted for Israel protests

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://electronicintifada.net/content/trump-official-wants-students-prosecuted-israel-protests/25526 



  Trump official wants students prosecuted for Israel protests

Ali Abunimah <https://electronicintifada.net/people/ali-abunimah> - 19 
September 2018

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Trump administration’s top civil rights enforcer at the US 
Department of Education wanted students who did nothing but hold a noisy 
protest in support of Palestinian rights to be criminally prosecuted.

Kenneth Marcus <https://electronicintifada.net/tags/kenneth-marcus> was 
captured on camera during a September 2016 meeting with an undercover 
reporter working on Al Jazeera’s explosive documentary 
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/lobby-usa> about the US Israel lobby.

The documentary has never been broadcast due to censorship by Qatar 
<https://electronicintifada.net/content/national-security-cited-reason-al-jazeera-nixed-israel-lobby-film/24566>, 
which funds Al Jazeera, following pressure from pro-Israel organizations.

The above video obtained by The Electronic Intifada is the latest 
excerpt to leak <https://electronicintifada.net/tags/lobby-usa> from the 
documentary. It shows Marcus speaking to the undercover reporter.

At the time, Marcus was director of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for 
Human Rights Under Law, an Israel lobby group unaffiliated with Brandeis 
University. The Brandeis Center specializes in lawfare – the use of 
legal proceedings to harass and silence Israel’s critics.

In that role, Marcus spearheaded the Israel lobby strategy of filing 
complaints to the Department of Education under Title VI of the 1964 
Civil Rights Act 
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/title-vi-civil-rights-act>, 
claiming that universities fail to protect Jewish students by not 
cracking down on Palestine solidarity activism.

In June, Marcus was confirmed 
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/nora-barrows-friedman/trumps-civil-rights-enforcer-could-use-law-silence-students> 
as the director of the Office for Civil Rights at the US Department of 
Education. This means he is now in charge of investigating alleged 
violations of the civil rights law.

He has quickly fulfilled the worst fears of civil liberties defenders by 
reopening a bogus complaint 
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/nora-barrows-friedman/trump-administration-moves-curb-campus-criticism-israel> 
against Rutgers University made by the Zionist Organization of America.

That complaint was thrown out by the Office for Civil Rights in 2014 for 
lack of evidence.

Marcus also informed the ZOA by letter that he has decided to enforce an 
official definition of anti-Semitism that conflates criticism of Israel 
and Zionism with anti-Jewish bigotry.

The move, made without public discussion or congressional notice, could 
have a profoundly chilling effect on academic freedom and free speech.


    Demonizing campus activists

In the leaked video that can be watched at the top of this page, Marcus 
explains his lobby group’s strategy, which he is now using his 
government position to implement.

“Right now, the challenge is that there are people who say, ‘you know 
what, anti-Israel politics have nothing to do with anti-Semitism,’” 
Marcus states. “What you gotta show that they’re not the same, but 
they’re not entirely different either.”

“The goal is to have the federal government establish a definition of 
anti-Semitism that is parallel to the State Department definition,” 
Marcus adds.

The full documentary shows how Marcus’ organization aims to demonize 
campus groups like Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) that support 
BDS – boycott, divestment and sanctions – to hold Israel accountable.

“You have to show that they are racist hate groups, and that they are 
using intimidation to get funded, and to consistently portray them that 
way,” Marcus states.

The so-called State Department definition of anti-Semitism was 
originally adopted in 2010 
<https://www.state.gov/s/rga/resources/267538.htm> and updated in early 
2018.

It is substantially the same 
<https://static1.squarespace.com/static/548748b1e4b083fc03ebf70e/t/5ad7b4d470a6ad81ab1bb20c/1524085976920/FAQ+on+Definition+of+Antisemitism+4.18.18+.pdf> 
as the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism 
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/ihra-definition-anti-semitism> that 
Israel lobby groups pressured the UK’s Labour Party to adopt 
<https://electronicintifada.net/content/how-israels-bogus-definition-anti-semitism-shuts-down-free-speech/25471> 
as part of their campaign to oust leader Jeremy Corbyn and curtail 
expressions of support for Palestinian rights.

The definition has been widely opposed for conflating criticism of 
Israel and Zionism, Israel’s state ideology, with anti-Jewish bigotry.

Even the definition’s lead author 
<http://jkrfoundation.org/about/kenneth-s-stern/>, former American 
Jewish Committee executive Kenneth Stern, strongly opposes 
<http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/should_a_major_university_system_have_a_particular_definition_of_anti_semit> 
efforts to enshrine the definition in legislation or university rule 
books, or to use it for enforcement, arguing that this would 
unconstitutionally 
<http://jkrfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Stern-Letter-links-corrected.pdf> 
infringe on free speech.


    Criminal prosecution

Not all the footage of Marcus obtained by Al Jazeera’s undercover 
reporter has been included in the censored documentary.

A transcript of the full meeting seen by The Electronic Intifada shows 
that Marcus also spoke about a May 2016 protest 
<https://electronicintifada.net/content/why-are-university-heads-racing-slander-protesters/17061> 
at the University of California, Irvine.

The UC Irvine protest sparked accusations that students from groups 
including Students for Justice in Palestine had harassed, threatened and 
intimidated attendees at a campus film screening and discussion 
featuring a panel of Israeli soldiers.

The screening was co-sponsored by Students Supporting Israel 
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/students-supporting-israel>, a 
chapter of a campus organization funded 
<https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/students-supporting-israel-a-milstein-family-foundation-partner-shares-its-story/> 
by anti-Palestinian financier Adam Milstein 
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/adam-milstein>.

Earlier leaked footage from the censored Al Jazeera documentary 
published by The Electronic Intifada 
<https://electronicintifada.net/content/censored-film-names-adam-milstein-canary-mission-funder/25356> 
names Milstein as the secret funder of Canary Mission 
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/canary-mission>, the anonymous 
website that smears and harasses student activists, especially from 
Students for Justice in Palestine.

But after a three-month investigation 
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/charlotte-silver/uc-irvine-clears-students-pro-israel-groups-accusations>, 
UC Irvine issued a 58-page report 
<https://static1.squarespace.com/static/548748b1e4b083fc03ebf70e/t/57bcc2b3579fb3227fe1b030/1471988465936/SJP_August_18_2016_1.pdf> 
concluding that the most troubling allegations against the Palestine 
solidarity activists were untrue.


    False accusations

Pro-Israel groups had claimed falsely that the protesters had blocked 
the exits to the screening room and denied people entry.

The investigation found that the doors were held shut from the inside, 
keeping out Students for Justice in Palestine members and at least one 
pro-Israel student.

As The Electronic Intifada reported 
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/charlotte-silver/uc-irvine-clears-students-pro-israel-groups-accusations> 
at the time, the university investigation refuted claims made by 
Students Supporting Israel, the Orange County Hillel chapter, the 
Zionist Organization of America and Marcus’ Brandeis Center which tried 
to paint the protesters as threats to Jewish students on campus.

One of the most serious allegations Marcus repeats in the Al Jazeera 
transcript is that “a Jewish pro-Israel student was chased across campus 
when they saw that she was one of the pro-Israel students, and had to 
hide in a kitchen until security could come.”

But this lurid claim was also refuted by the university’s investigation. 
By her own account, that student had been denied access to the screening 
room because the door was being held shut from inside.

The students who allegedly “chased” her were simply trying to find 
another way into the screening room, the investigation concluded. In 
their effort to do so they entered an adjacent room several minutes 
after the pro-Israel student did and “were not chasing” her, the report 
states.

The only charge that the university substantiated was that the student 
protest had “more likely than not” generated so much noise as to disrupt 
the viewing of the film, a documentary about Israeli soldiers.

Making noise is inherent to speech and protest. But administrators found 
the protesters in violation of one policy on student conduct: 
“Obstruction or disruption of teaching, research, administration, 
disciplinary procedures, or other university activities.”

As a sanction, the university gave Students for Justice in Palestine a 
warning and an assignment to host an educational event.

Marcus told the undercover reporter that this sanction was “not enough.”

“I’d like to see the students prosecuted, but the DA [district attorney] 
has not been amenable,” Marcus said.

“But we’ll keep pushing them so that if we don’t get these students 
prosecuted this time, we’ll get the DA at least sensitized to the issue 
and [they] should know that there will be pressure on them next time.”

During the investigation, the Brandeis Center, the Zionist Organization 
of America and other pro-Israel groups wrote to UC Irvine administrators 
to find the protesters in violation of codes of conduct and to urge them 
to refer the incident to the Orange County District Attorney’s office 
for criminal prosecution.

The Zionist Organization of America cited as precedent the 2011 
convictions 
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/nora-barrows-friedman/irvine-11-sentenced-community-service-no-jailtime-attorneys-prepare> 
of the Irvine 11 students for protesting a speech by Michael Oren when 
he was Israel’s ambassador in the United States. While the students 
could have faced prison time for disruption of a public meeting, they 
were sentenced to community service.

But as noted, Marcus spoke to Al Jazeera’s undercover reporter in 
September 2016 – more than a month after the UC Irvine investigation 
debunked the serious accusations against Students for Justice in 
Palestine members over the film screening protest.

Yet Marcus continued to advance false accusations and insist that 
students who did nothing more than hold a campus protest in support of 
Palestinian rights should face the full weight of the American criminal 
legal system.

Students across the United States now face the perverse and dangerous 
situation where the most senior federal official entrusted with 
protecting their civil rights may use his position – in the interests of 
a foreign state – to press for their criminal prosecution merely for 
exercising their First Amendment rights.

/Asa Winstanley contributed research./


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