Palestinian Students – Islamic Research and Information Center (IRIC)

Fear and intimidation on both sides. UW releases report on Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia

IRIC — Tue, 15 Oct 2024 10:36:52 +0000

The University of Washington has released a report on the tense “campus climate” over the past academic year, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

The report is the result of two task forces charged with looking into the perceptions and feelings of Jewish, Israeli, Arab, and Palestinian students.

“The differences in perceptions of comfort and safety are rather stark depending on one’s own identities,” the report states in its findings. “Members of all affected communities perceived less openness to diversity of opinions compared to members of the broader campus community and expressed greater perceptions of discomfort and unsafety for those who share their identities compared to those who do not.”

The report states that students reported both Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia on campus, including anti-Israel bias and a “perceived alienation and lack of support for Palestinian and Muslim communities.” Insults, intimidation, and a desire to hide their identities were reported all around.

University of Washington students created UW Palestine Encampment on Monday, April 29, 2024, on the University of Washington Quad in Seattle. The students are demanding that the University cut ties with Boeing.

“The intent of this joint submission is not to equate antisemitism and Islamophobia, but to acknowledge that this particular moment puts into sharp relief the need to examine both in a shared context, as the present conflicts shine light on issues that impact members of our campus community who have experienced pain, isolation, fear, and discrimination,” the report states.

According to UW’s report, during the 2023-24 academic year:

About two-thirds of Palestinian students said they had experienced insults and intimidation over the previous year. About half to one-third of Muslim and Arab/Middle Eastern/North African (MENA) students reported the same.
One-third of Jewish students and 70% of Israeli students said they experienced insults and intimidation.
72% of Arab or MENA, 80% of Muslim students, and 78% of Palestinian students in the focus groups said they were unwelcome because of their identities.
60% of Jewish students and 92% of Israeli students in the focus groups said they were unwelcome because of their identities.
69% of Arab/MENA students, 74% of Muslim students, and 77% of Palestinian students reported a desire to hide their identity at least once (38% of Arab/MENA students, 40% of Muslim students, and 50% of Palestinian students said this happened frequently).
65% of Jewish students and 95% is Israeli students said they needed to hide their identities at least once (42% of Jewish students, 81% of Israeli students said this happened frequently).

Read the full 143-page report here.

Following a talk by Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, supporters clashed with University of Washington students and protesters who barricaded the east entrance to the encampment for Palestine on the Quad on Tuesday, May 7, 2024, in Seattle.

In March 2024, UW President Ana Mari Cauce ordered the formation of the two task forces — one for gauging Islamophobia on campus, and the other for Anti-Semitism. Those task forces conducted a series of surveys with focus groups in May 2024 to develop the report released Tuesday. During that time, there were multiple protests and a pro-Palestine encampment on the UW campus.

“We recognize the importance of preserving public free speech; however, the encampment and campus protests, at times, were perceived to go beyond these lines of argument and advocacy to call, implicitly or even explicitly, for violence,” the report states.

“Many survey or focus group participants were distressed by the perceived alienation and lack of support provided for Palestinian and Muslim members of our community. In voicing concerns related to the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East, they sought visibility for their cause and for the UW to provide a place where these local and global concerns could be focused on, feeling at times that their message and concerns were not adequately heard nor addressed.”

No information from these focus groups was looked into or confirmed for accuracy. UW says that the purpose of the task forces was more for “gathering feedback and gaining an understanding of the campus climate.”

Source: KUOW

Berkeley Unified hit with new civil rights complaint over anti-Palestinian and Arab racism

IRIC — Thu, 06 Jun 2024 09:05:06 +0000

The district now faces allegations of antisemitism and “severe and pervasive racism” against Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students and staff.

Berkeley Unified is in hot water again over its handling of discrimination — this time, toward Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students and staff.

A school board meeting in Berkeley, Calif. Public school board meetings have turned heated and sometimes ugly.

The school district has been under scrutiny for months since a federal civil rights complaint filed in February described widespread antisemitism on campuses. On Wednesday, the superintendent testified before Congress on her handling of antisemitism in schools.

Now, the district is facing allegations that it failed to protect its Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students.

The complaint, filed Wednesday by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee and the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, alleges “severe and pervasive racism” against these students and staff.

A person holds a poster calling for a cease-fire at a Berkeley school board meeting in March.

It describes incidents based on input from roughly 20 students, parents and staff, ranging from Arab and Muslim students being taunted as terrorists to a student’s hijab being ripped off. It also claims that the school district is suppressing expressions of support for Palestine and allowing harassment of those who hold these views.

According to the complaint, a Muslim fourth-grader was told she could not give a presentation about Palestinians to her class; students who started a Watermelon Club for Palestine faced complaints before holding their first meeting; parents have harassed students participating in walkouts and protests by filming them.

Berkeley High students painted a mural on Allston Way on Wednesday to call for a cease-fire in the Gaza war.

The complaint by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee and CAIR counters what the Brandeis Center characterized as an insufficient response to antisemitism. This complaint argues that there is a suppression of support for Palestinians and discrimination against those expressing a pro-Palestinian viewpoint.

The dueling narratives reflect the division in Berkeley schools over the Israel-Palestine conflict, borne out in online petitions and legal challenges. The new complaint illustrates the heated debates over this issue that have long hashed out at school board meetings and private forums.

Continue reading on: Berkeleyside

Emory University investigated over alleged anti-Muslim discrimination

IRIC — Thu, 02 May 2024 12:56:42 +0000

College under federal investigation after students with Palestinian and Muslim ancestry allege ‘hostile environment’, Guardian learns

The US government has opened an investigation into Emory University’s alleged discrimination against students with Palestinian, Muslim or Arab ancestry since 7 October, the Guardian has exclusively learned.

The US education department notified the Council on American Islamic Relations, Georgia, or Cair-GA, and Palestine Legal, a national organization, on Tuesday that it would be investigating claims made in an 18-page complaint filed on 5 April on behalf of students at the university in Atlanta, Georgia, under title VI of the Civil Rights Act.

The complaint is one of at least six title VI claims made in recent weeks regarding discriminatory treatment of Palestinian, Muslim and Arab students on US campuses; others include Columbia, Rutgers, University of Massachusetts-Amherst and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

Students gather in a dining hall at Emory as they protest in support of Palestinians. Photograph: Elijah Nouvelage

The students named in Emory’s complaint belong to the school’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a group that has seen its share of controversy on campuses in recent months. Brandeis and Columbia suspended SJP chapters in December, after the national group called events of 7 October “a historic win for the Palestinian resistance”. PEN America, a freedom of expression group, called such language “deeply objectionable, and even incendiary … [but] typically protected by the first amendment and by many university policies”.

Claims of discrimination have also been made on behalf of students at Columbia and Rutgers; these complaints were filed in the last 10 days. Since 1 October, the education department’s office of civil rights has received 343 complaints containing what the agency calls “shared ancestry” allegations, compared with 42 in fiscal year 2022 and 62 in fiscal year 2023, a department spokesperson wrote in an email. The category includes antisemitic and Islamophobic claims.

The federal investigation of Emory is noteworthy in the context of the Atlanta university’s decision last week to call two police departments on to campus within three hours of protesters setting up a camp in favor of divestment from Israel and against a local police training facility colloquially known as “Cop City”. At the time, the response appeared to be the quickest use of police against the recent campus protests nationwide, and probably the first to involve police using Tasers.

A pro-Palestinian protest at Emory in Atlanta.

Emory spokesperson Laura Diamond shared by email the university’s statement about the title VI complaint, which reads in part: “Emory does not tolerate behavior or actions that threaten, harm or target individuals because of their identities or backgrounds.”

Several Emory students who experienced incidents described in the complaint spoke to the Guardian using their first names. They and other students filed dozens of reports directly to the university over the last seven months regarding incidents on campus, only to be notified that their reports “had been received”.

Other incidents described in the complaint include: “an Emory parent verbally accosted a visibly Black Muslim student, accusing them of supporting Hamas” at an 11 November “bake sale … to fundraise for the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund, a humanitarian organization that provides medical assistance”.

Similar patterns are playing out on other campuses, according to organizations behind other complaints.

Continue reading at: The Guardian