Antisemitic Incidents up 12% in California

Antisemitic crimes in California have increased nearly 12% , according to the 2019 publication Hate Crimes in California, released on Thursday by the state’s Criminal Justice Statistics Center.

 
Overall, hate crimes overall declined statewide by 4.8%

Antisemitic bias events rose from 126 in 2018 to 141 in 2019, an increase of 11.9 percent. Anti-Islamic (Islamophobia) bias events fell from 28 in 2018 to 25, a decrease of 10.7%

Anti-Semitic hate crimes have been steadily increasing in California since 2014.

What Islamophobia? Most Religious Hate crimes in America directed towards Jews

The FBI's latest report on Hate Crimes in America is out.  Of crimes associated with a religious bias, nearly 57% were directed towards Jews.  

Of the 1,140 victims of anti-religious hate crimes:

• 56.8 percent were victims of crimes motivated by their offenders’ anti-Jewish bias.

• 16.1 percent were victims of anti-Islamic (Muslim) bias.

• 6.2 percent were victims of bias against groups of individuals of varying religions (anti-multiple religions, group).

• 6.1 percent were victims of anti-Catholic bias.

• 2.5 percent were victims of anti-Protestant bias.

• 1.2 percent were victims of anti-Atheist/Agnostic bias.

• 11.0 percent were victims of bias against other religions (anti-other religion). 

Read the entire report  for 2014 here

Hatem Bazian's Islamophobia Conference Sparsely attended.

Hot off his  Censoring Palestine event at UC Berkeley, which reportedly attracted any where from 8 to 25 participants, 

Poorly attended Censoring Palestine conference at Boalt hall, UC Berkeley

Hatem Bazian is at it again.

According to Cinnamon Stillwell and Rima Greene, reporting in CampusWatch , The University of California, Berkeley's recent Sixth Annual International Islamophobia Conference—organized by the Islamophobia Research & Documentation Project was also sparsely attended,  drawing anywhere from 20 -50 participants.

From the article in Campus Watch h/t Gary

"Islamophobia studies" is the latest addition to the academic pantheon of politicized, esoteric, and divisive "studies" whose purpose is to censor criticism of differing views by stigmatizing critics as racist or clinically insane. The University of California, Berkeley's recent Sixth Annual International Islamophobia Conference—organized by the Islamophobia Research & Documentation Project (IRDP)—was titled, "The State of the Islamophobia Studies Field." The fact that this "field" doesn't yet formally exist in the U.S. may explain why speakers the first day of the conference barely mentioned it. As in years past, the conference featured victimology, academic jargon, and anti-Western rhetoric....

While this year's conference may have failed to usher in the dawn of an officially recognized "Islamophobia studies," it wasn't for lack of effort. Soon after, IRDP announced the latest edition of its politicized bi-annual publication, the Islamophobia Studies Journal. Perhaps following UC Berkeley's lead, Georgetown University recently launched the Bridges Initiative, a project of the Saudi-funded Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding devoted to "protecting pluralism – ending Islamophobia."

The subject is all the rage in the field of Middle East studies and throughout academe, which is doing its utmost to silence critics of the Islamic supremacism, systemic social problems, and total chaos plaguing the region. If and when "Islamophobia studies" becomes a reality, we can't claim we didn't see it coming.

Read it all here

Yes Virginia, there is an Islamophobia industry

After the massacre of Jews in France, the mainstream media  was more concerned about a backlash of "Islamaphobia" then they were about the future of Jews in France.  It was as though Jewish lives didn't count.  Although Jews make up only 0.7% of France's population,  last year Jews were the targets of 40% of all hate crime. Its not much different here.  In America in 2012 of 1,340 victims of an anti-religious hate crime,  62.4 percent were victims of an offender’s anti-Jewish bias, and  11.6 percent were victims of an anti-Islamic bias.

So why is there so much noise about "Islamophopbia"? 

Ten years ago  the Organization of Islamic Cooperation began to prioritize protecting the reputation of Islam.  A confederation of "politicians, diplomats, writers, academics, bloggers and activists"  began targeting anyone, Muslim or non-Muslim that besmirched the name of Islam, using threats and harassment to silence their criticism.

“The OIC invented the anti-‘Islamophobia’ movement,” says Zuhdi Jasser, president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy and a frequent target of the honor brigade. “These countries . . . think they own the Muslim community and all interpretations of Islam.”

From the Washington Post,  an important article Asra Q. Nomani, a former Wall Street Journal reporter,  and the author of “Standing Alone: An American Woman’s Struggle for the Soul of Islam.”

She writes:

Alongside the honor brigade’s official channel, a community of self-styled blasphemy police — from anonymous blogs such as LoonWatch.com and Ikhras.com to a large and disparate cast of social-media activists — arose and began trying to control the debate on Islam. This wider corps throws the label of “Islamophobe” on pundits, journalists and others who dare to talk about extremist ideology in the religion. Their targets are as large as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and as small as me. 

The official and unofficial channels work in tandem, harassing, threatening and battling introspective Muslims and non-Muslims everywhere. They bank on an important truth: Islam, as practiced from Malaysia to Morocco, is a shame-based, patriarchal culture that values honor and face-saving from the family to the public square. Which is why the bullying often works to silence critics of Islamic extremism. 

Read it all here

Hatem Bazian forces his class to tweet about "Islamophobia"

 “I’ve been told by one of my professors I will be required, as part of my grade, to start a Twitter account and tweet weekly on Islamophobia. I can’t help but feel this is unethical. This is his agenda not mine.”

Many who have experience with Hatem Bazian believe he has repeatedly crossed the line from academic freedom to downright propagandizing and indoctrination. In the past,  Hatem has notoriously called for an "Intifada in America" and has been reported to have made antisemitic comments at an SJP rally at UC Berkeley in 2002. "Take a look at the type of names on the buildings around campus -- Haas, Zellerbach -- and decide who controls this university."

From Tarek Fatah, published in the Toronto Sun, who received a panicked message from a student enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley:

He wrote: “I’ve been told by one of my professors I will be required, as part of my grade, to start a Twitter account and tweet weekly on Islamophobia. I can’t help but feel this is unethical. This is his agenda not mine.”

The professor conducting this exercise was Hatem Bazian as part of a course titled, “Asian American Studies 132AC: Islamophobia”.

When I asked him to elaborate on his concerns the student wrote: “There are 100 students in the class, all of us forced to create individual Twitter accounts. I’m not wholly clear on what our final project is yet (I find it very interesting that he excludes both the Twitter account requirement AND the final project from his official syllabus), but we have to meet with a group in San Francisco, and our class will be surveying people of color on the impact of some ads put out by (anti-Sharia blogger) Pamela Gellar. Now I’m no Pamela Gellar fan, I think she’s nuts, but I feel ... between the Twitter stuff and the final project he’s basically using us as unpaid labor to work on his agenda.”

I wrote to Prof. Bazian, who co-founded “Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP)” at Berkeley, asking why he was using his students to pursue what appeared to me to be a political exercise meant to propagate a specific message to the Twitterverse.

Bazian replied, without referring to Islamophobia:

“My course is designated as an American culture community engagement scholarship class … Students are asked to send at least one posting per week on something related to the course content, be it from the actual reading or anything they read or came across.”

When I asked him why all the tweets by his students so far are about Islamophobia, he replied: “The class is titled De-Constructing Islamophobia and the History of Otherness … (Students) are asked to post based on … examining Islamophobia through looking at earlier historical examples.”

The fact remains Prof. Bazian appears to be using his position of authority to make 100 students — mostly non-Muslims — tweet about Muslim victimhood in America, irrespective of how it’s defined or whether it exists.

No student I have seen on Twitter has yet posted a tweet saying Islamophobia is a myth, nor has any student challenged the validity of the term.

Students at DeAnza College in Cupertino were treated to a extra large helping of Bazian-speak last night. Two professors offered their students extra credit as well as a free dinner in an effort to get them to attend the evening talk. The event, originally scheduled from 6:00pm until 8:30pm, was curtailed by a half hour after Israel-supporters in the audience challenged Bazian by providing historical context for the conflict. Bazian chose to break up the event prematurely, rather than allow an alternate perspective.

A full report will be posted when its available.

Jewish community Hero Tammi Benjamin under Attack

"When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser."

Socrates

A  eleventh hour resolution attacking  our Jewish Community hero, Tammi Rossman Benjamin has been introduced  to the ASUC under the guise of a resolution against hate speech.    It will be voted on at Cal Berkeley tomorrow.  The sponsoring senators include  ASUC Senator Sadia Saifuddin, Senator Klein Lieu, Senator Rosemary Hua, Senator George Kadifa and  Senator Daley Vertiz.  Tammi Rossman Benjamin has been  singled out because of her tireless work with the Amcha Initiative, fighting anti-Semitism on campus. This is just another attempt to silence her voice.

The resolution follows:

Resolution Condemning Islamophobic Hate Speech at the University of California

WHEREAS, the University of California has identified the issue of campus climate as a priority for administration, staff, and students across the UC system; and,

WHEREAS, the UC prides itself on welcoming students from any race, religion, gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, yet pockets of racism and hate still exist on this campus which makes the UC an unwelcoming experience for certain communities; and,

WHEREAS, Islamophobia is defined as the irrational fear of Islam, Muslims, or anything related to the Islamic or Arab cultures and traditions; and,

WHEREAS, since September 11, 2001, Islamophobia has become the latest “hazing” technique across the United States and has created a chilling effect for Muslims, Arabs, and South Asians in their communities, work-environments, and campuses; and,

WHEREAS, according to a Gallup Study, 60% of of Muslim Americans say that Muslims face prejudice from Americans; and,

WHEREAS, 48% of Muslim Americans say that they have personally faced racial or religious discrimination, which is on par with Hispanic Americans (48%), and African Americans (45%), while 54% of Arab Americans say they have experienced this type of discrimination; and,

WHEREAS, since 2006, Muslim students have been targeted for surveillance by the FBI in Orange County, who said that they are paying particular attention to Muslim students at UC Irvine and UCLA; and,

WHEREAS, this surveillance is occurring on the East Coast as well, with the New York Police Department surveillance of Muslim students at Yale, Columbia, Syracuse, Rutgers, New York University, and Brooklyn College; and,

WHEREAS, these racist and selective surveillance procedures are justified by figures in mainstream media, such as David Horowitz, who defines the core mission of the MSA to “advance the Islamic Jihad against the Jews and Christians of the Middle East, and ultimately against the United States”, and,

WHEREAS, attempts to mischaracterize and chill Palestinian activism have occurred on Berkeley’s own campus, with a lawsuit filed in July 2011(later dismissed in court) against the UC Regents and President Mark Yudof containing extremely Islamophobic and anti-Arab rhetoric referring to Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslims Students Association as “anti-Semitic” and “pro-terrorist”; and,

WHEREAS, the plaintiffs in the lawsuit allege that “the more publicly active SJP may be understood as the more militant arm of the outwardly benevolent MSA” and that SJP, MSA, and MSU all “fund terrorism” and are tied to terrorist groups; and,

WHEREAS, more recently, UC Santa Cruz lecturer Tammi Rossman-Benjamin has been responsible for inciting racist and Islamophobic rhetoric by claiming that students in the MSA and SJP are “...generally motivated by very strong religious and political convictions, they have a fire in their belly, they come to the university, many of them are foreign students who come from countries and cultures where anti-Semitism is how they think about the world … These are not your ordinary student groups like College Republicans or Young Democrats. These are students who come with a serious agenda, who have ties to terrorist organizations.”; and,

WHEREAS, claims such as those cited above create an unsafe and divisive environment for Middle Eastern, Muslim, South Asian students, and others who may be perceived as being of similar descent, and these claims are completely opposite to the values of a premier university system; and,

WHEREAS, the President of the University of California, Mark Yudof, is responsible for advocating for all students regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation; and,

WHEREAS, the University of California is no place for hateful and inflammatory rhetoric and holds its students, faculty, staff, and affiliates to higher standards that promote a positive and inclusive campus climate; therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED, that the ASUC condemn the remarks of lecturer Tammi Rossman-Benjamin and those described in the above-mentioned lawsuit as hateful and inflammatory; and,

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the ASUC urge President Mark Yudof to condemn these inflammatory, hateful, and racist assumptions by UCSC lecturer Tammi Rossman-Benjamin against Middle Eastern, Muslim, South Asian, and Palestinian activists; and,

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that EAVP Shahryar Abbasi write a letter to UCOP condemning the racist and bigoted language by Tammi Rossman-Benjamin and President Yudof’s failure to address the matter, as well as passing a similar bill with UCSA; and,

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the ASUC urge other campuses to pass similar bills in their respective student governments.

A reminder to Tammi: "  First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win."    Mahatma Gandhi.   And for the rest of you, consider dropping  the ASUC senators a quick email.  You can reach them here.   Ask them to eliminate the attacks on Tammi Benjamin  from this resolution

 UPDATE:

The resolution was passed by the ASUC last night.