Jewish Studies Faculty’s Support

UC Faculty: Jewish Studies Faculty at the University of California Ask D.A. to Drop Charges

“As faculty affiliated with Jewish Studies at the University of California, we are deeply distressed by the decision of the District Attorney in Orange County, California, to file criminal charges against Muslim students who disrupted Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren’s speech on the UC Irvine campus last year.   While we disagree with the students’ decision to disrupt the speech, we do not believe such peaceful protest should give rise to criminal liability.  The individual students and the Muslim Student Union were disciplined for this conduct by the University, including suspending the MSU from functioning as a student organization for a quarter.  This is sufficient punishment.  There is no need for further punitive measures, let alone criminal prosecution and criminal sanctions.  The use of the criminal justice system to police student speech is detrimental to the values exemplified by the academic and intellectual environment on our university campuses.

We strongly oppose the dangerous precedent set by the use of the criminal law against non-violent protests on campus.  Therefore we urge the District Attorney to dismiss all criminal charges against these students.”

Signatories include:

Rutie Adler, Coordinator of Hebrew Language, Near Eastern Studies, UC Berkeley

Michael Alexander, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, UC Riverside

Bettina Aptheker, Distinguished Professor of Feminist Studies, History and Jewish Studies, UC Santa Cruz

Marc Baer, Associate Professor of History, UC Irvine

Holly S. Cooper, Clinical Professor

David Biale, Emanuel Ringleblum Professor of Jewish History; Professor and Chair, Department of History, UC Davis

Ra’anan Boustan, Associate Professor, History and Near Eastern Languages and Culture, UCLA

Daniel Boyarin, Taubman Professor of Talmudic Culture, Professor of Near Eastern Studies, UC Berkeley

Nathaniel Deutsch, Professor of Literature and History, UC Santa Cruz

Jaimey Fisher, Associate Professor, German; Director of Film Studies, UC Davis

Alexander Gelly, Professor, Comparative Literature, UC Irvine

Emily Gottreich, Associate Adjunct Professor, History and Vice-Chair, Center for Middle East Studies, UC Berkeley

Erich Gruen, Gladys Rehard Wood Professor of History and Classics, Emeritus, UC Berkeley

Gildas Hamel, Lecturer, History, UC Santa Cruz

Deborah Hertz, Wouk Chair in Modern Jewish Studies, Professor of History, UC San Diego

Ari Y. Kelman, Associated Professor of American Studies, UC Davis

Chana Kronfeld, Professor of Hebrew, Yiddish and Comparative Literature, UC Berkeley

Mark LeVine, Professor of History, UC Irvine

Julia Reinhard Lupton, Professor of English and Comparative Literature, UC Irvine

Zeev Maoz, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, UC Davis

Susan Miller, Associate Professor of History, UC Davis

David Myers, Professor and Chair, History, UCLA

Teofilo Ruiz, Professor of History and Spanish and Portuguese, UCLA

Brenda Deen Schildgen, Professor and Chair, Comparative Literature, UC Davis

Gershon Shafir, Professor of Sociology, UC San Diego

Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Maurice Amado Chair in Sephardic Studies and Professor of History, UCLA

Irene Tucker, Associate Professor, English, UC Irvine

Diane L. Wolf, Professor of Sociology, UC Davis

Robert Moeller, Professor of History, UC Irvine

David Theo Goldberg, Director, Humanities Research Institute, UC Irvine

For a full list of supporters and allies of the Irvine 11, click here.