Shani Shahmoon: Resolution important in deconstructing anti-Semitic rhetoric

While many students on this campus pride themselves on their ethnicity and religion, I find myself stigmatized for my background.

This Tuesday, “A Resolution Condemning Anti-Semitism” was presented to the Undergraduate Students Association Council to help bring an end to the discrimination of the Jewish community at UCLA. It’s no surprise, though, that this resolution quickly became politicized and questioned for its clauses regarding criticism of Israel and its government.

Let’s be clear: This resolution is not aimed at denying the right of UCLA students to criticize the Israeli government. Almost an entire page of the five-page resolution is devoted to that right, by aiming to create a structure for respectful disagreement on the topic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the most important part of the resolution aims to reconstruct an environment in which the identities of Jews are no longer politicized because of this international conflict.

I am a first-generation Iraqi-Israeli-American Jew. Both my parents are children of pogrom or Holocaust survivors who found themselves finally free of genocide in the Jewish state of Israel. I was raised in southern Nevada, where none of my background seemed to follow me, as my community was neither political nor religious.

Matters changed as soon as I started my first year at UCLA.

First year, when I tried to get involved in non-Jewish organizations on campus, my mother insisted I leave my Jewish Star of David necklace at home. She told me it would limit my opportunities. But I never once considered my faith a deterrent to my success until last February, when the issue of divestment came up.

Last year, USAC and hundreds of UCLA students sat in Ackerman Grand Ballroom for nearly 12 hours as emotional and offensive public comments were spewed on either side of the issue regarding divesting from companies that do business with Israel. The resolution did not pass.

Despite it not passing, I found myself extremely uncomfortable walking to Shabbat dinners at Hillel, the center for Jewish life on campus. I was hesitant to apply to the Daily Bruin, fearing my ethnicity would lower my chances of getting accepted. I nearly questioned my entire future of pursuing journalism, fearing my Jewish last name would label me as incapable of being unbiased.

None of this is true, but divestment put me, along with several other Jewish students, in this place of discomfort, regardless of our political affiliations. Divestment began to put Jewish students in a pro-Israel box, mixing up religion with politics, and leading to the growth of anti-Semitism at UCLA.

Following the passing of a divestment resolution at UCLA, contentions grew between the majority of the Jewish population and the pro-divestment population. Jewish students were stigmatized for their assumed political perspectives. A particular example is the case of second-year economics student Rachel Beyda and the concerns raised against her appointment to the USAC Judicial Board, given her religious affiliation.

This resolution passed by council Tuesday aims to deconstruct the anti-Semitic rhetoric formed around the majority of the Jewish community because of their perceived political beliefs. It aims to protect qualified students, like Beyda, from being denied positions in student organizations because of their religious beliefs. It aims to denounce the vandalism of a Jewish fraternity house with graffiti of large swastikas the day after the passing of a divestment resolution at UC Davis. It aims to re-establish the security of being Jewish and a Bruin.

Published by Shani Shahmoon

Shani Shahmoon is an opinion columnist and a member of the Daily Bruin Editorial Board. She writes about student activism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mental health issues.

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6 Comments

  1. Shani Shahmoon,

    Though I appreciate what you’re trying to say, giving any credence to the idea that Israel is the source of anti-semitism is just misguided and you shouldn’t accept it as an excuse. Those who insist on “five pages” to ensure they have a way to critisize Israel really needs to answer only one question:

    What does Israel have to do with antisemitism in UCLA?

    Consider the racist video against African-Americans at OU. Now consider the terrible genocide and murders taking place in Durfur, Somilia, Libya and Nigeria. Does anyone blame the racism in OU on the policies in Africa? Of course not.

    Then why does this double standard only apply to the Jews and Israel?

    You wouldn’t be surprised if some African-Americans in OU belonged to groups and organizations that had positions on African conflicts – BUT NO ONE WOULD EVER suggest that the racism against African-Americans in Ohio University has ANYTHING to do with Boko-Haram, Durfar or Libya.

    To make such a claim would be outrageous and dishonest. It’s a way of blaming the victim.

    Are Israel’s policies really worse than the genocide in Darfur? More people have died and been displaced in Darfur in a single month than the entire 70 year history of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Are Israel’s policies worse than Boka Haram in Nigeria, where they kidnapped and raped hundreds of high school girls. Where just last week – in just one week – they murdered more people than the entire recent conflict between Israel and Gaza?

    And before Israel was even established in 1948, what excuse did the Nazis use through the 1930’s? What excuse did KKK use through the early 20th century? What excuse did the Russians use for their pogroms through the late 1800’s? When they didn’t have Israel to blame, what excuse did they invent?

    Nearly every generation, Jews are mass murdered some place on earth and there’s ALWAYS someone telling us, “You kind of deserve it.”

    Well, don’t fall for it. You’re obviously a fair minded, empathetic person. You’re surrounded by opinions in UCLA and many of those opinions are biased.

    But the truth is, Israel is on the other side of the world, just like Africa. The conflict in Israel is conflated way out of proposition – and that’s the way antisemities like it. By any measure, the Israel-Palestine conflict certainly isn’t the worst, most unjust or most violent conflict on earth – not even close.

    And the Jews in UCLA have EXACTLY as much to do with Israeli policies as the African-Americans in Ohio University have to do with policies in African countries – but the antisemitic culture in UCLA has to find some excuse to continue their discrimination against Jews.

    And wasn’t it the antisemitic canard about Jews having “dual-loyalties” that got UCLA into this mess in the first place?

    Good luck in UCLA. Keep up the fight against antisemitism and don’t let anyone convince you Israel is the problem. Bigotry is the problem – and it has been long before Israel ever came along.

  2. First, israheili intel is running a worldwide propaganda op with its agents
    running stories about “rising tide of anti semitism”. but
    it is all a lie, just propaganda designed to get sympathy for the “poor
    jews, i.e. zionist thugs” who are committing mass murder in gaza. Just google: rising
    tide of anti semitism…………you can see the operation for yourself.

    Second, see the link below for an example of the zio mafia trying to turn
    legitimate criticism of israheil into a crime. under their definition saying
    “that sure was horrible of israheil to mass kill all those kids last
    summer” or “israheil killing all those kids in gaza reminded me of the
    warsaw ghetto” would be hate speech and therefore a crime.

    http://www.amchainitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/CNES-Report.pdf

    see pages 16 to 18 for the conspiracy.

  3. I’d be more comfortable with the entire UCLA student government being impeached…still hypocritical if such a resolution is passed with no proper punishment….

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