Into the Impossible With Brian Keating - Keating Goes to Congress: Combating Antisemitism in Universities

Episode Date: July 11, 2024

Join my mailing list https://briankeating.com/list to win a real 4 billion year old meteorite! All .edu emails in the USA 🇺🇸 will WIN! I was proud and humbled to share the harrowing experiences of Jewish students and faculty at the University of California since October 7. With help from Congress, we can continue to be a beacon in the darkness. Let there be light! — Additional resources: 📝 Get one month of Snipd Premium for free with this link: https://get.snipd.com/Cx7S/brianSnipd Snipd lets you take Smart Notes 🧠 with AI 💡 — it’s my favorite podcast player 😀 ! ➡️ Follow me on your fav platforms: ✖️ Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrBrianKeating  🔔 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/DrBrianKeating?sub_confirmation=1  📝 Join my mailing list: https://briankeating.com/list  ✍️ Check out my blog: https://briankeating.com/cosmic-musings/  🎙️ Follow my podcast: https://briankeating.com/podcast Into the Impossible with Brian Keating is a podcast dedicated to all those who want to explore the universe within and beyond the known. Make sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Open the pod bay doors, hell. Professor Brian Keating will testify today about how this encampment was anything but peaceful and how it aimed to foment hate against the Jewish people. He will share testimonials from other university employees, one who said she doesn't know, quote, how much longer I can do this. I can't work at UCSD. I can barely live here.

and I have learned brutally and painfully where my life ranks for the people I'm surrounded by every day. Chairman Kylie and esteemed members of the committee, my name is Brian Keating, and I stand before you today as a Jew and an astrophysicist. My childhood dream was to study the universe and all of its wonders. This dream led me to the University of California, where our motto is taken from the Hebrew Bible, let there be light. I was dedicated to the pursuit of the luminous thrill of scholarship, and I always wondered, who would pay me to do this job? In fact, I'd do it for free, but please don't tell Gavin Newsom or the Regents. My concern is not for me.

I'm fully tenured and working on well-funded research with a brilliant team of scientists around the world. No, today I speak for scholars, like a young, untenured professor from Israel, her homeland demonized since October 7th and even long before. I speak for an undergraduate teaching assistant who studies and whose employment requires him to, navigate the complex thoroughfare of campus that sometimes includes encampments, which are no-go zones for him. All educators are familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It provides a framework for creating an educational environment conducive to learning. At the base of the pyramid is safety, physical safety, and emotional safety. And safety means more than just meeting your needs, your basic needs. It also has to involve an environment free of discrimination, harassment, and

intimidation. As an educator, I know you cannot learn in a place of hatred. You cannot teach from a place of hatred. However, for decades, UC has not been a safe space for Jewish and Israeli students, staff, and employees. Faculty members call them their colleagues effing colonizers. During a tour of a lab and workspace environment where Israelis and Jews are working and pursuing their studies, They are confronted by calls for elimination of the one Jewish homeland. These faculty call themselves scholars and yet engage in a dishonest and anti-intellectual

boycott of the one Jewish state, forbidding members to come to our campus to learn, work, and study based on their religion and national origin. An Israeli undergraduate student, dedicated premed who wants to save lives, faces very challenging classes, but also from, he is ostracist, is ostracized from the very union that's meant to protect him, the United Auto Workers Union,

who seems more interested in demonizing his homeland and calling for strikes against the campus. When he attempts to have his voice heard at an academic Senate meeting, he sees the ISIS flag, waved proudly outside by protesters. A young woman pursuing her doctoral degree, receives a letter from her professor, her employer, filled with hateful anti-Israel rhetoric. This letter intimidates her and makes her question her safety within her department. When she seeks refuge over a campus, over a coffee at the campus student union, she's blocked by an illegal encampment,

which is a no-go zone for her as a Jew. Following one of the five daily prayer services in the camp, she's confronted by chance for the elimination of Israel as a sovereign Jewish state. She hears calls for Intifada, reminding her of the awful times decades ago which she thought were over. These flyers also include calls for death to America.

A professor tries to bypass the encampment. He hears the familiar chance, long condoned on our campus. There is only one solution, Intifada Revolution, which is a veiled reference to the Holocaust. Protesters at the encampment scream at him. May Allah humiliate and crush all the Zionists. Enter them in fire. A graduate student employee sees students passing out pamphlets

with the Star of David compared to the Nazi swastika and she decides the life of the mind may not be for her and we would be all the more poorer for it. In an environment where academic freedom should flourish, professors try to hire scholars from Middle Eastern studies and find them banned because of their national origin. Let me quickly relate a story of the reprehensible anti-black racist Compton Cookout which took place in our campus in 2010.

There was immediate steps in remediation, many of them sponsored by the Black Student Union. However, in May 2023, over a year ago, a swastika made of human feces, was found in a dorm and learning facility on our campus. No such activity to combat anti-Semitism has taken place in our campus. When swords were found and flammable materials were found

at an illegal encampment, nothing of the sort is tolerable, our encampment only lasted five days, thanks to the quick action of our Chancellor Perdid Kosla. Other campuses weren't so lucky, and there was tremendous violence at our sister campus, as you heard, at University of California, L.A. I have very many recommendations in my written testimony,

but I think the most important one is to develop a comprehensive conversation between students for justice in Palestine, which unfortunately explicitly forbids conversation with Zionists. I hope that we can return our campus with your leadership help back to being a beacon of light. Let there be light. Professor Keating, your written testimony, notes that every May at UCSD for many years, students for justice in Palestine have led a week

of anti-Israel activities called Justice in Palestine Week, which is informally known as Israel Aparthite Week. How many years has this annual event taken place and what kinds of activities does it entail? Thank you, Dr. Box. The annual event, which informally by students at least is called Israel Hate Week is takes place during Israel Independence Day and the Holocaust Remember and stay it's time to do that and typically what's found there are huge billboards taking over the entire common area leading up to the student library forced sometimes they includes checkpoints where there'll be mock Israeli defense uniforms being worn by some of the students for justice in Palestine and

other and other folks people wearing full head coverings masks etc. chanting slogans depicting the state of Israel completely eliminated from the map of the Middle East replaced by a Palestinian flag There are oftentimes events co-held on campus at the exact same time Bringing in outside speakers that are then timed to act as sort of a Bullwark against students or faculty members that wish to counter the examples That are presented extremely a biased narrative of the events of the Middle East and And it becomes a very intimidating, intolerable location at the center of our campus student union for most students to walk by for an entire week on campus. Professor Keating, I understand that UCSD had its own anti-Semitic encampment on campus for five days before it was dispersed by the police.

It is reported that 64 individuals were arrested, 40 of whom were students. Could you describe this encampment and the anti-Semitic statements made by protesters there? Yes, thank you, Congresswoman. The encampment sprung up over a course of a period of five days. It tripled in size in just a few days. The protesters were allowed to have their freedom of speech, their First Amendment rights, recognized. In fact, there have been 2,500 attendees

to pro-Palestinian-anthi-Israel protests on our campus alone, which have been majority peaceful. But this one was different. This one resulted in continued refusal to allow inspections by campus firemen marshals. There were weapons found there, including a three-foot-long ninja sword that I displayed during my testimony. There were flammable materials found there. They would not let in inspectors. They would also not let in Jews or anybody identifying as a Jew wearing, for example, a Star of David,

or a high symbol, anything of that nature. And it was incredibly intimidating. There were chants there of globalizing the Intifada. There were leaflets passed out by the revolutionary socialist of America that said that freedom for Palestine means death to America, as I displayed in my oral testimony as well. So this was an incredibly hostile environment, not just for Jews, but for Americans and students who wanted to just have a peaceful day to go about their lives on campus and study or their employment.

I also want to ask you about policy changes that would address the rise of anti-Semitism on campuses across the country. Would banning the wearing of masks so that individuals at encampments can be identified, help in this regard, and what other policy changes would help protect Jewish faculty and students? I think so. I think abetting masks is one step to doing so. I think it's appropriate to wear religious garb, of course,

but to completely cover your face, there's absolutely no need to do that unless you're involved in some activity that you're either ashamed of or do not want to participate in. And so wearing masks and wearing full head gear and covering up your entire human personhood is demeaning and it creates a barrier. Also, I should note that in the Students for Justice in Palestine Constitution, they adopt a strict policy of not negotiating with anyone who supports the state of Israel as a sovereign

nation. They refuse to negotiate or dialogue with quote-unquote Zionist. This organization currently is operating under a cease and desist order on campus. It didn't prevent them from organizing a complicity walking tour where they targeted individual professors by name due to their national origin or the fact that they were Jewish and doing research on studying, say, the biblical flood story. It had nothing to do with politics just because they happen to be Jewish and or conducting research in Israel. And the most reprehensible thing to me as a faculty member, it's fine for students to exercise their rights.

We all should do that. It's part of our constitutionally granted rights. But for faculty to take a paycheck from a university that they claim is committing acts of genocide, is complicit in genocide, and to continue working there, and encourage students to get arrested and call their other, and call students themselves complicit in the genocide themselves, and when students expressed their fear to the Academic Senate chair, John Hildebrand, he ignored them, the Jewish students, and other people on an open call compare Jewish students fearing for their safety. He compared them to students during the segregation period who supported the KKK. This is unacceptable in a place of learning, in my opinion.

How many discounts does USAA auto insurance offer? Too many to say here. Multi-vehicle discount. Safe driver discount. New vehicle discount. Storage discount. How many discounts will you stack up? Tap the banner or visit usa.com slash auto discounts. Restrictions apply. Thank you for your bravery being here today.

Thank you for standing up what is morally right, standing up for Jewish students, Jewish faculty, Jews around the world. And with that, I yield back. Professor Keating, I understand that the local United Auto Workers, chapter of the UAW 4811 voted to strike in protest that your university and the police removed the anti-Semitic anti-Israel protesters and their encampment. The UAW alleged that workers' rights were violated in their handling of the anti-Israel protests, and the individuals were, even though these individuals were violating policies. the union is demanding amnesty for the employees

and students to basically fight for the right to be anti-Semitic, I guess. Professor Keating, are you aware of the UAW's strike on the campus? Yes, sir, I am aware of it. In fact, our teaching assistance in my classes, and I teach, I've taught thousands of students of the years, they are effectively forced to be members

of the United Auto Workers Union as part of their contract and their collective bargaining agreement. So even though it's, it's, They even though it's a university, they're forced. Is it a public university? Yes, it's a public university. So is this a government system, and yet people are being compelled to be a member? I believe that I can't speak if they're literally forced to do it.

I know that you have to resign. And in fact, many of the graduate student teaching assistants submitted their testimonials to me. In fact, had to meet with their unit representative in order to resign from the union actively based on their partisan advocacy for the in support of the anti-Israel demonstrators receiving full rights. Again, why they want to receive full rights to a diploma from a university that they claim is genocidal, complicit, et cetera, et cetera, and hold constant boycotts against is beyond me. However, I should point out that none of the students that I teach, which I remind you, are physics students, astronomy students, et cetera, including devout Muslims who work with me

and for me, and I've always had a proud tradition of educating people from around the world. They refused to strike and they in fact they told me we stand with Israel and for them to be sort of have to proactively tell me that because otherwise I might have had to take over all their responsibilities and there's a faculty organization which is not officially sanctioned by the university they called themselves the San Diego Faculty Association that again was encouraging protest encouraging walkouts encouraging the graduate students who are employees and in fact one employee of the union a teaching assistant broadcast to his undergraduate students that they have a right, a moral obligation

to protest the university's complicit nature with the activities of Israel in Gaza and beyond. So he was using an intimidation tactic on the students whose grades he's partially responsible for to advocate for political speech. That's appalling. So what were the policies of the university that they were violating on campus? Because because, because, I would you know if pro-Israeli students were were protesting and violating these policies one might expect there to be equal treatment what were the policies that were being violated so so these were encouragement to to not great to cease work they were operating the graduate students did go on strike two years ago to advocate for higher wages

and then and as you know living in la hoyas is not an inexpensive endeavor so i i support you know their right to advocate for fraud. So this was an unauthorized strike in the sense that they weren't authorized by their own union rules to go on strike for political purposes. They can go on strike for whatever reason. So did they violate it a labor practice? That was the consent. I have to defer to legal experts, but I believe that was the decision. In fact, California state courts ruled that that strike was no longer supported. It was in violation of the union's contract. So they did go back to work eventually. Do you think most members of the UAW understand that there's a there's a segment of their of their labor union that is that is actively making sure that people have a right to be anti-Semitic?

I think in they claim to represent 58,000 members of the University of California, as Congressman Kiley said, it's an enormous employer in the state of California. That's not an insignificant fraction of the employment of the state of California. And yet I don't believe they represent more than a few percent. Well, and what I find striking is that, you know, they're supposed to represent all workers' rights, and yet did you see any activity that they were expressing that indicated that they cared about the Jewish students and workers?

No, in fact, one graduate student teaching employee, she stated that she met with the union organizing unit chair, and they said that we sometimes advocate for political reasons. Professor Keating, thank you for sharing your, story as well, also so disturbing. And I want to ask you the same question. Were you ever told about the option or your ability to file an EEOC complaint on the basis of religious discrimination? No, ma'am, I was not. And were you aware of the differences between filing with the Office of Civil Rights and filing with the EEOC?

I was not. I have since familiarized myself with that policy. I'm a little bit surprised here to say that apparently the local UAW union decided to weigh in when California San Diego students were asked to disperse. Could you elaborate on that? I'd just a little surprise that the union would try to put all their prestige on the line here. Yeah, it wasn't only the University of California, San Diego, Congressman. It was all the university campuses within our university system. So multiple campuses, they organized rolling, strives. They call them Day of Action or complicity tours,

where they would organize shutdowns of campus or attempt to shut down campus. But the students, again, are the lifeblood of the university, and every educator has to recognize that. So they're not only our students, but their employees of the University of California as well. We pay their salaries through research grants, some of them federal grants that come from the National Science Foundation,

Department of Energy, et cetera, and their representative union that they have been under representation by is known, is the United Auto Workers Union. Could any of you comment on what effect it has in general in a campus, where it appears like they must almost be actively discouraging people who are outside the left wing to be employed at a campus? On my campus, some of the most unifying moments I've had between my liberal, Democrat,

and conservative Republican friends in the sciences, as you probably noted, there are more Republicans. but the notion has never been we've never been closer and that said there are great many professors that are identified themselves as liberal and Jewish and they actually compared my chancellor to the biblical genocidal maniac known as Pharaoh when he decided to disperse the campus violence that took place in early May of 2024 okay but you don't you don't see a correlation between the apparent really dislike of Republicans the pre-presearchs

seated this anti-Semitism and the intolerance you're seeing now? I mean, there's not an ideological litmus test that's applied. I think people feel more comfortable speaking out. I have colleagues in literature. I've co-taught classes in literature, as you noted, very, very much unified politically on the Democratic side. You know, people of intellectual stature can get along. That's one of the hallmarks of academia should be tolerance.

Unfortunately, it's not so common these days. Professor Keating, one of the sort of perverse- ironies that we have seen in this rise of anti-Semitism on campus is that many of the universities that have been the worst offenders in terms of suppressing free speech and violating the First Amendment on campus are now suddenly claiming the mantle of the First Amendment as a reason to allow what is actually anti-Semitic conduct that is not indeed protected under the First Amendment. Would you be, could you give us a little a sense of how that double standard or sort of backward state of affairs has played out on your

campus? Yeah, it seems to me that freedom of speech has never applied so liberally as it is when it comes to demonizing Jews and anti-Semitic voices on campuses. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition for citizens' backing. Fortunately, this is probably within the purview. We asked and we heard from the other witnesses today about policies, the EOC, and so forth that could be used.

But all campuses currently already have principles of community that forbid harassment, discrimination based on any other identifying trait, whether it's religion, national origin, gender status, et cetera, et cetera. These would be forbidden, and they are. And in fact, as I testified, when there was long before October 7th, this Justice in Palestine Week has been taking place,

it becomes a terrifying place for a young Israeli-American student who's just trying to become a pre-med so she can treat people and help save lives. There is an environment on campus, which is almost orgiastic of violence, of hatred towards Jewish people and towards a state of Israel, that she has to endure, that others have to endure. And it's well within the purview, in my opinion, I'm not a lawyer, but the opinion that I

hold is that it's our principles of community that are continually being violated, including wearing complete head coverings, head-to-toe, masks, and chance for the destruction and violence against people based on their national origin. Professor Keating, I have a letter here from the president of the University of California system, Michael Drake. I had written him about my concerns about some of the things going on in campuses within the system, and he wrote me a letter back, which I appreciate. But this is the chief executive of the entire UC system, which includes your campus and 10 others.

It's an organization that includes 200,000-some employees as well as all the students. And one of the things he says in the letter is that the University of California has consistently opposed calls for boycott against and divestment from Israel. While the university affirms the right of our community members to express diverse viewpoints, a boycott of this sort impinges on the academic freedom of our students and faculty and the unfettered exchange of ideas on our campuses, which is good. I'm glad he said that. It's the right policy. Of course, it's actually, you know, the law in California. But how has the BDS movement, how active has it been on your campus and what role has the faculty played or some faculty members in supporting it?

Yeah, unfortunately, it's been incredibly active. and they do tend to exercise, as I said, every year at the coincidence with Israel's Independence Day and with Holocaust Remembrance Day, this Justice in Palestine Week, which many students have told me, they call Israel Aparthite Week or Hate Israel Week. It's an event that just last year, May 23, six months, seven months before the October 7th terrorist attacks, found on a campus dorm, a swastika made of human feces, where Jews live and work. It's a combined use facility.

At that time, you know, there were also events at our sister campus University of California, Santa Cruz, which are both anti-Semitic and homophobic. Again, we hear words from Dr. Drake about how we take this seriously, and there will be panels in power. This is over a year, to my knowledge, no substance of changes have taken place.

Is it a coincidence that it takes place? Coincident with this event that's held annually? I can't say for sure. but it certainly predates October 7th. And so after October 7th, he did commission a panel, which apparently has a budget of over $7 million, which had a combined mission to combat anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. So we haven't seen, at least in my campus,

my personal eyewitness, I have not seen any repercussions from it. And in fact, as I mentioned, dialogue is often discouraged by people that support the academic and cultural boycott of the one single Jewish state. Extremely troubling. You also mentioned earlier that the dean of the faculty refused to meet with Jewish students even as he readily met with representatives of other groups. Can you tell us a little more about that? Yes, sir. That was the chair of the academic senate, John Hildebrand, who is the responsibility for effectively running meetings and having panels brought in, but not

to advocate political causes or things of that nature. He did knowingly meet with students for justice in Palestine before they were issued a cease and desist order for violation of campus policies. And he refused at five separate occasions that I've documented in my written testimony to meet with any Jewish students citing lack of time. And he blew them off, in my opinion, referring them to, you know, Lester campus procedural violations, even though they're expressing their heartfelt pain and suffering emotionally, sometimes feeling physically threatened. And he is responsible, you know, for faculty governance. We have a shared. governance model in our campus, and he did refuse to meet with very many stakeholders,

including Jewish professors such as myself and others, outside of, you know, very limited circumstances. And this gentleman is still the chair of the Academic Senate? He will be replaced in the upcoming academic year. I want to ask a final question, and anyone on one of the witnesses can weigh in on this if you'd like, which is that let's imagine that, you know, when school resumes in most places in the fall, you see these unlawful encampments, which are still actually operating in some places, but on your campuses or in any particular campus, they come back in full force along the lines that we saw at UCLA, we saw at UC San Diego, or at least they start to form. What would you, what action would you recommend that the leaders of those university takes?

We've seen a menu of options for how these things have been handled. Some have allowed them to grow and grow and grow until they become unmanageable. Some have given in to the demands of those leading the encampments. Others have simply enforced the law and campus policies in an even-handed manner and dealt with the issue in short order. So which of these options might you recommend to a university leader? Yeah, I ask the committee to consider, you know, the following thought experiment, as we physicists are likely to do, which is, you know, to imagine that on our campus we have access to reproductive rights for young women on campus. Imagine if there was an organization diametrically opposed to that, believe in strict right to life.

And they set up an encampment, a no-go zone where young women felt intimidated, to exercise their privileges and rights on this campus, I think their ID cards would be taken away and shut down later that afternoon. I don't think there's ever kind of the tolerance of these things. They allowed themselves to fester, as Mr. Enzi said. And I think enforcing existing laws, we were asked about do we need more funding for committees

and do you guys need to do, you men and women, need to do more funding-wise. That may be true. But every university has principles of community. They are entitled to enforce those principles of community, and they have an obligation to do so. equally, liberally, and equitably for their students to feel safe and to their employees to operate effectively in the workforce.