Israel Supporters Turned Away From BAKA Event At Rutgers
By Noah Glyn
Groucho Marx once quipped that he would never join a club that would have him as a member. I suppose my standards are not as high as Groucho’s because on Saturday night, even as thousands of Rutgers students poured into the RAC to watch the Scarlet Knights lose to the Pitt Panthers, I went to Trayes Hall on Douglass Campus for an event titled Never Again for Anyone. The premise of the event was that Palestinians are the victims of ethnic cleansing at the hands of Israelis, and that this is analogous to the Jews who were victims of genocide by the hands of Nazis. Of course, it is an idiotic premise that flies in the face of proper historical analysis, common sense and decency.
As I found out last night, I had no reason to expect any level of decency from the organizers of the event. The event was sponsored by the Rutgers University student group, BAKA: Students for Middle Eastern Justice. As a side-note, an event that I organized last semester had been interrupted and disrupted by BAKA. The event I held was for Ishmael Khaldi-an Israeli Bedouin who served as a consul to San Francisco. The BAKA disrupters viewed Mr. Khaldi as an “Uncle Tom,” who sold out his people out to the genocidal Israeli government.
At a little after 5 on Saturday, I walked with several of my friends to Trayes Hall where we entered peacefully, and signed in. The people behind the desk were polite, as they asked us to display our Rutgers ids, and to write our names and email addresses on a sheet of paper that was lying on the desk. On the same table, there was a sign that read, “$5-$20 Suggested Donation. No one will be turned away for lack of funds.” In addition, this event had been advertised on the Facebook event and on the official website as “Free and Open to the Public.” I declined to pay, as did all my friends. The people behind the desk continued to be polite, and said that our decision was fine.
The organizers told us that the doors would not open until 6:30 and that we should form a “queue” to be prepared to enter the room. We did as we were instructed. A couple minutes passed and I exchanged pleasantries with other people in the line. By now, the group of Jews and Zionists grew to several hundred. One report estimates the number at four hundred pro-Israel supporters. After a few minutes, a non-student, adult organizer of the event entered the lobby where we were waiting and told us that the $5 fee was now mandatory for admittance. The money, we were told, would go to the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network. At this point, the crowd got very upset that they had been lied to. One female organizer announced that anyone who did not want to pay could watch the event on Facebook. Up to this point, no such video of the event has been put onto Facebook.
Several witnesses who entered the actual event reported an organizer saying that they decided to charge $5 once “150 Zionists showed up.” The organizers asked Rutgers Police to refuse us entry into the room, which they did. There were about ten officers in the building to stop us from going into the room. Rutgers students took out their Rutgers id cards, held them out, and began shouting, “Let the students in!” In the meantime, non-Jewish and anti-Zionist students were allowed into the event for free without paying a $5 charge, since they were members of BAKA. When one student attempted to join BAKA on the spot to be allowed entry, he was-again-refused. It became clear that the organizers wanted to shut out all dissenting voices, even if doing so violated Rutgers University guidelines, let alone human decency.
One student who entered the event reported that the room-with a capacity of 320-was less than half filled. Those who entered had the chance to listen to several speakers, including Hajo Meyer, a Holocaust survivor. The speakers not only accused the State of Israel of ethnic cleansing, but they also marginalized the severity of the Holocaust. One speaker argued that while it is true that six million Jews died in the Holocaust, many survived, thus implying that the Holocaust really was not as terrible as those racist Zionists (alas, I repeat myself) want to make it seem.
As I noted above, BAKA has a history of intimidating others who disagree with their warped views. In addition to disturbing my event, they also have intimidated several of my friends who attended past BAKA events.
Even worse, they are engaged in an effort to delegitimize and to destroy the State of Israel. Their accusations are outlandish and false, but they are nonetheless dangerous to our society and to Rutgers University. Israel is the greatest friend America has in the Middle East, and possibly in the entire world. As we watch the Egyptian people struggling for their freedom, it is worth remembering that there is only one stable democracy in the Middle East that grants equal rights to women, gays, ethnic and religious minorities, and all of its citizens. That is Israel. BAKA actively seeks to undermine those liberties: the same liberties that we celebrate and embrace in this country. If BAKA is interested in comparing people to Nazis, perhaps they ought to look themselves in the mirror.
Noah Glyn is a junior at Rutgers University and a Fellow with the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA). Noah majors in economics and history.
More from my site
Tolerance takes a beating at Rutgers
Condoleezza Rice pulls out of giving Rutgers commencement speech
Drones may fly over Jersey Shore, under Rutgers research project
Higher Education Restructuring
Front Page News? 
Former Gov. Tom Kean to replace Condoleezza Rice as Rutgers commencement speaker
President Obama to speak at Rutgers commencement
Snooki is cheap
Ex-Rutgers cancer doc accused of filming women in the bathroom, admits theft, gets off with 300 days in jail
Open Letter To Governor Christie, The Senate and Assembly: Why Pay A Racist Speaker To Come To Rutgers?
He spoke for BAKA. I attended the demonstration.This is why we need to teach our young about fighting on behalf of Israel and about Jewish pride. Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
This is what I found out. I am here to expose him. Please help me.
Hajo Meyer
He is a radical anti-Israel activist who has been banned by most Holocaust remembrance organizarions (http://azvsas.blogspot.com/2010/01/auschwitz-survivor-hajo-mayer-banned-by.html)
Hajo Meyer (Bielefeld, 1924) is a Jewish-German-Dutch physicist and political activist.
In 1938 Meyer fled from Nazi Germany to the Netherlands alone, without his parents. He went into hiding in 1943, but was arrested after a year and spent ten months in Auschwitz. His parents, who were deported from Germany, did not survive.
After the war, Meyer returned to the Netherlands, and studied theoretical physics. He started working for Philips and eventually became director of the Philips Physics Laboratory (NatLab). After his retirement he took courses in England and worked as a builder of new violins and violas.
In recent years Meyer has been politically active, including as director of A Different Jewish Voice. He also wrote the book Het einde van het Jodendom (The end of Judaism) in 2003, which accuses Israel of abusing the Holocaust to justify crimes against the Palestinians. After a study of the Palestinian Territories with Dries van Agt, the former Prime Minister of the Netherlands, he came to the conclusion that the Gaza Strip is a large concentration camp. Hajo Meyer is a member of the Dutch GreenLeft.
My statement to the press:
Too often we romanticize the Holocaust and we believe all were righteous. The truth is there was the good and the bad. No Holocaust survivor should ever turn against their own people or the State of Israel.
Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
Jewish students turned away from anti-Zionist event
January 30, 2011
(JTA) — Jewish students at Rutgers University and their supporters reportedly were barred from a campus event sponsored by anti-Zionist groups.
Rutgers campus police on Saturday night prevented some 400 Jewish students and their supporters, including Holocaust survivors, from a program called “Never Again for Anyone,” the WordlNetDaily online newspaper reported.
The student-sponsored event was organized by three national organizations: the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network, Americans for Muslims in Palestine and the Middle East Children’s Alliance, according to the report. It was endorsed by BAKA: Students United For Middle Eastern Justice, as well as humanitarian, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, Greek life and anti-racist student organizations at the university, according to the Rutgers student newspaper, The Daily Targum.
A letter by BAKA published in the student newspaper Jan. 27 invited all members of the campus community to the event.
The campus police were asked to limit attendance to supporters of the program after it became clear the audience would be outnumbered 4 to 1 by the Jewish students, according to the report.
The Jewish students turned away from the event reportedly gathered in the lobby of the building where the program was being held and sang Hebrew songs.
“Never Again for Anyone” is billed as a nationwide tour “to honor those who perished in the Holocaust by upholding the human rights inherent to all people — and particularly for Palestinians living under Israel’s occupation.” At least 14 programs in 11 cities are planned through the end of February.
He spoke for BAKA. I attended the demonstration.This is why we need to teach our young about fighting on behalf of Israel and about Jewish pride. Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
This is what I found out. I am here to expose him. Please help me.
Hajo Meyer
He is a radical anti-Israel activist who has been banned by most Holocaust remembrance organizarions (http://azvsas.blogspot.com/2010/01/auschwitz-survivor-hajo-mayer-banned-by.html)
Hajo Meyer (Bielefeld, 1924) is a Jewish-German-Dutch physicist and political activist.
In 1938 Meyer fled from Nazi Germany to the Netherlands alone, without his parents. He went into hiding in 1943, but was arrested after a year and spent ten months in Auschwitz. His parents, who were deported from Germany, did not survive.
After the war, Meyer returned to the Netherlands, and studied theoretical physics. He started working for Philips and eventually became director of the Philips Physics Laboratory (NatLab). After his retirement he took courses in England and worked as a builder of new violins and violas.
In recent years Meyer has been politically active, including as director of A Different Jewish Voice. He also wrote the book Het einde van het Jodendom (The end of Judaism) in 2003, which accuses Israel of abusing the Holocaust to justify crimes against the Palestinians. After a study of the Palestinian Territories with Dries van Agt, the former Prime Minister of the Netherlands, he came to the conclusion that the Gaza Strip is a large concentration camp. Hajo Meyer is a member of the Dutch GreenLeft.
My statement to the press:
Too often we romanticize the Holocaust and we believe all were righteous. The truth is there was the good and the bad. No Holocaust survivor should ever turn against their own people or the State of Israel.
Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
Jewish students turned away from anti-Zionist event
January 30, 2011
(JTA) — Jewish students at Rutgers University and their supporters reportedly were barred from a campus event sponsored by anti-Zionist groups.
Rutgers campus police on Saturday night prevented some 400 Jewish students and their supporters, including Holocaust survivors, from a program called “Never Again for Anyone,” the WordlNetDaily online newspaper reported.
The student-sponsored event was organized by three national organizations: the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network, Americans for Muslims in Palestine and the Middle East Children’s Alliance, according to the report. It was endorsed by BAKA: Students United For Middle Eastern Justice, as well as humanitarian, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, Greek life and anti-racist student organizations at the university, according to the Rutgers student newspaper, The Daily Targum.
A letter by BAKA published in the student newspaper Jan. 27 invited all members of the campus community to the event.
The campus police were asked to limit attendance to supporters of the program after it became clear the audience would be outnumbered 4 to 1 by the Jewish students, according to the report.
The Jewish students turned away from the event reportedly gathered in the lobby of the building where the program was being held and sang Hebrew songs.
“Never Again for Anyone” is billed as a nationwide tour “to honor those who perished in the Holocaust by upholding the human rights inherent to all people — and particularly for Palestinians living under Israel’s occupation.” At least 14 programs in 11 cities are planned through the end of February.
He spoke for BAKA. I attended the demonstration.This is why we need to teach our young about fighting on behalf of Israel and about Jewish pride. Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
This is what I found out. I am here to expose him. Please help me.
Hajo Meyer
He is a radical anti-Israel activist who has been banned by most Holocaust remembrance organizarions (http://azvsas.blogspot.com/2010/01/auschwitz-survivor-hajo-mayer-banned-by.html)
Hajo Meyer (Bielefeld, 1924) is a Jewish-German-Dutch physicist and political activist.
In 1938 Meyer fled from Nazi Germany to the Netherlands alone, without his parents. He went into hiding in 1943, but was arrested after a year and spent ten months in Auschwitz. His parents, who were deported from Germany, did not survive.
After the war, Meyer returned to the Netherlands, and studied theoretical physics. He started working for Philips and eventually became director of the Philips Physics Laboratory (NatLab). After his retirement he took courses in England and worked as a builder of new violins and violas.
In recent years Meyer has been politically active, including as director of A Different Jewish Voice. He also wrote the book Het einde van het Jodendom (The end of Judaism) in 2003, which accuses Israel of abusing the Holocaust to justify crimes against the Palestinians. After a study of the Palestinian Territories with Dries van Agt, the former Prime Minister of the Netherlands, he came to the conclusion that the Gaza Strip is a large concentration camp. Hajo Meyer is a member of the Dutch GreenLeft.
My statement to the press:
Too often we romanticize the Holocaust and we believe all were righteous. The truth is there was the good and the bad. No Holocaust survivor should ever turn against their own people or the State of Israel.
Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
Jewish students turned away from anti-Zionist event
January 30, 2011
(JTA) — Jewish students at Rutgers University and their supporters reportedly were barred from a campus event sponsored by anti-Zionist groups.
Rutgers campus police on Saturday night prevented some 400 Jewish students and their supporters, including Holocaust survivors, from a program called “Never Again for Anyone,” the WordlNetDaily online newspaper reported.
The student-sponsored event was organized by three national organizations: the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network, Americans for Muslims in Palestine and the Middle East Children’s Alliance, according to the report. It was endorsed by BAKA: Students United For Middle Eastern Justice, as well as humanitarian, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, Greek life and anti-racist student organizations at the university, according to the Rutgers student newspaper, The Daily Targum.
A letter by BAKA published in the student newspaper Jan. 27 invited all members of the campus community to the event.
The campus police were asked to limit attendance to supporters of the program after it became clear the audience would be outnumbered 4 to 1 by the Jewish students, according to the report.
The Jewish students turned away from the event reportedly gathered in the lobby of the building where the program was being held and sang Hebrew songs.
“Never Again for Anyone” is billed as a nationwide tour “to honor those who perished in the Holocaust by upholding the human rights inherent to all people — and particularly for Palestinians living under Israel’s occupation.” At least 14 programs in 11 cities are planned through the end of February.
Another Holocaust Survivor Who Was There at Rutgers Saturday night. Beware of these liars. Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg
We must expose these liars.
Warn our youth about such vicious people . They are wolves in sheep’s clothing. Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg 732 572 2766
Hedy Epstein, another Holocaust survivor was at Rutgers Sat night.
Hedy Epstein (née Wachenheimer, 15 August 1924—) is an American political activist known for her support of the Palestinian cause through the International Solidarity Movement and for her background as a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany. Born in Freiburg, Germany, she immigrated to the United States in 1948, and she currently resides in St. Louis, Missouri.
Epstein was born to a Jewish family in Freiburg, Germany, and in 1939 fled Nazi persecution via the Kindertransport to England. All but two of her family were killed at Auschwitz concentration camp during the Holocaust. During World War II she worked in munitions factories and joined a group of left-wing German Jewish refugees who hoped to re-introduce democracy in their homeland – “the foundation of my political education which still stands me in good stead today,” she says. Some 60 years later, she was interviewed about this experience for the film Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport.
After the war, Epstein worked with the Allied occupying forces in Germany, including working on the Doctors’ Trial at Nuremberg. In 1948 she immigrated to New York City, then moved to Minneapolis, and then to St. Louis, Missouri. There, she took up activism for affordable housing, the pro-choice movement, and the antiwar movement. In 1982, news reports of the Sabra and Shatila massacres committed during Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon “horrified” Epstein; she began to study the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to express opposition to Israel’s actions. In 2001, she founded a St. Louis chapter of the Women in Black, and in 2003 she traveled to the occupied West Bank to work with the International Solidarity Movement. She has returned once a year since, despite being strip searched and cavity searched in 2004 by guards at Ben Gurion International Airport.
2004 speaking tour and controversy: Epstein has spoken about the situation in the occupied territories, and about her own life and experiences, for audiences in the United States. Prior to a talk at Stanford University on 20 October 2004, fliers promoting her presentation “juxtaposed an image of Jews in Nazi Germany with an image of Palestinians at Israeli checkpoints,” according to a news article in The Stanford Daily. (Anonymous fliers also appeared which accused Epstein’s ISM of advocating terrorism. After an “appalled” reaction from members of Stanford’s Jewish community, event organizers stated that no “direct comparison” was intended by the posters, or would be heard in Epstein’s remarks. Epstein echoed these sentiments, avoided comparisons between Nazis and Israelis, and spent little time discussing her background in Nazi Germany, writes the Daily. However, throughout the speech, audience members, many associated with off-campus Jewish organizations, interrupted her talk with shouts of outrage, and extra campus security quietly moved in.
Reactions to the talk were sharply divided. Adina Danzig, president of Stanford’s Hillel organization called the lecture “an abuse of history,” hoped that “this event and the isolated interruptions by a few individuals were an aberration,” and, while acknowledging Epstein’s general statement about avoiding comparison, said that “that disclaimer did not undo the damage” and that “[Epstein] made several remarks drawing the [Israeli-Nazi] parallel.”
Nathan Mintz, vice-president of the Stanford Israel Alliance, condemned “Epstein’s rhetoric of drawing comparisons of the initial stages of the Holocaust to the current situation in Gaza and the West Bank” as “outright demonization of Jews” representing “only one piece of what is a much larger trend of anti-Semitism on college campuses today.” He added that Epstein’s ISM colleagues have “direct ties to terrorist organizations,” and that “The atmosphere currently on campuses is not one in which a constructive dialogue about the conflict can legitimately take place.”
In contrast, a supporter of Epstein condemned these as “misrepresentations and false charges,” citing off-campus activists who, “with the intention of disrupting the event,” handed out fliers “demonizing” Epstein and “frequently yelled at and interrupted” her. “At one point,” he wrote a man suddenly jumped up while Epstein was talking and recited what appeared to be a prepared statement informing her of pending legal actions against her.” He asked why Mintz “failed to mention any of the egregious events” of this sort and “submitted his op-ed before actually seeing the event.”
In response to controversy over the paper’s initial coverage of the story, “an issue that has come to define more than one volume of the paper,” The Stanford Daily’s reader editor Jennifer Graham acknowledged that “plenty — if not unfairly too much” coverage was given to the claims of Epstein’s critics. She also apologized for the “wrong” and “misleading” decision to run Mintz’s op-ed criticizing Epstein’s speech before it had happened. “There are claims, that I can neither confirm nor deny, that Mintz’s column factually misrepresents the substance of Epstein’s speech,” she wrote.
As a “constructive response” to Epstein’s presentation, members of several campus Jewish organizations invited Harvard professor Ruth Wisse to speak at Stanford. “While her audience ate Challah bread and drank champagne for the Kiddush,” wrote The Stanford Daily, Wisse placed sole blame for Palestinian suffering on the Arab world and on Palestinian politics, and argued that since opposition to the Jews was the only thing that the Arab world had in common, the center of Arab politics became anti-Semitism. Stanford student Ahmed Ashraf responded with an op-ed contrasting the “pro-Israelis outraged by Epstein’s support for the Palestinians” to the “perfectly respectful” behavior of Arab and Muslim attendees to Wisse’s talk, “even as the acidic torrent of hate rained down on them.”
An Anti-Defamation League report from the next year characterized Epstein’s talk as an “example of anti-Israel campus activism” which “would meet both the United States government’s and [Israeli cabinet] Minister Nathan Sharansky’s definitions of anti-Semitism,” for “comparing Nazi treatment of Jews to Israeli treatment of Palestinians.” An online publication of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs cited Epstein’s talk on the same subject at UCSC among “activities that spill over into various forms of hate-speech demonizing both Israelis and Jews,” and which “compared Israel to a Nazi state and Israeli soldiers to Nazis.” In 2008, the Missouri regional director for the Anti-Defamation League noted, “For someone like Hedy, who came out of the Jewish community at a very difficult time, to criticize Israel … well, it’s difficult. Some people perceive it as disloyal.”
In August, 2008, Epstein planned to be on board the Free Gaza Movement’s ship attempting to break Israel’s naval “blockade” of Gaza, but had to cancel due to poor health.
In 2010, she embarked on one of the ships that intended to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, but decided in Cyprus, not to take part in the trip.
Susie Rosenbluth
The Jewish Voice and Opinion
Englewood, NJ
201-569-2845
The usual Hasbara nonsense….ignore the the theft of land from Palestinians and talk of everything else under the sun. Thou shall not steal.
Please share what I sent with whatever sources you have . I will expose these traitors. Please help me. I am a Holocaust scholar and also teach at Rutgers for 22 years, public speaking. We dare not be silent. My parents survived Auschwitz and Buchenwald. The Nazis murdered my two siblings, grandparents, aunts , uncles and cousins.
Rabbi Rosenberg
What does the Holocaust have to do with stealing Palestinian land. Oh wait, you may be a rabbi but stealing Palestinian land is A-OK
To MXM: You are a ridiculous sympathizer. The issue here was not the fact that there was a rally against the land, the issue was the comparison to the holocaust. There is no comparison that is appropriate in this situation. Au Contraire, all you have to do is listen to radical Islamist and you can find an appropriate comparison. The idea that this is an appropriate conversation just shows how desensitized out society has become and I personally am sorry that I have a need to write this at all.
MXM,
First of all, I am with CAMERA, not Hasbara.
Secondly, in what way did Jews “steal” the land of Israel? It is their historic homeland. Three times a day, everyday, for thousands of years, Jews have been praying to return to Israel. When Jews began returning in mass to Israel, most of the land acquired was purchased from absentee landlords.
The logical extension of your argument would be that if Palestinian refugees returned to Israel and displaced Israelis, then they too would be stealing the land. After all, Jews were displaced from the Land of Israel too. But somehow I don’t think you would say they are stealing. I think you would be supportive.
@Bagley — U are basically hiding behind “comparison to the Holocaust” and using it as a strawman to avoid any discussion of the theft of Palestinian land. It is not a question of how desensitized this society has become but rather calling a spade a spade and u hiding behind the Holocaust.
@Noah Glyn –
Sorry Noah, “historic homeland” does not give u the privilege to show up and kick out people living there. I fully support Jews who were living there. It is the Palestinians “historic homeland” too. They did not just drop out of a parachute in the 1800’s
India is the “historic homeland” of Budhism. Does that mean all the budhists from around the world can come to India and kick Indian villagers out. This is ridiculous.
How can a person who was kicked out of his land and probably have documents to his Home be stealing it. Oh wait ,this is the land of hasbara make believe.
@ mxm prior to the War of Independence, the incoming Jews bought every piece of land they settled on. This legal ownership did not prevent Arabs from attacking these communities and attempting to do what they now accuse the Jews of: stealing land (good idea though: sell land at top dollar to someone then come back and kill him so you can have it again). If the Arabs had not instigated violence against the Jews, there would have been no escalation to war and the Arabs would not have fled/been kicked out.
Parallel to these events there was a land and property theft against Jews all over the Arab world – none of whom had instigated violence against their neighbours, in fact they had been in those countries longer than the Arabs. The Jews of Egypt, Iraq, etc. were not poor fellahin like the majority of Palestinian Arabs, they had land amounting to around five times the state of Israel as well as businesses, factories, houses, capital, etc. Virtually all of this wealth was confiscated by their respective governments. Since there has been de facto a population exchange, the obvious solution would be to absorb the Palestinian Arab refugees and their descendents in the respective Arab countries using the land and wealth stolen from the Jews – albeit this has long since been “redistributed”.
That’s the trouble: the clock is a bitch and you cannot turn it back!
Rosenberg will go anywheres and do anything to get his name in the newspapers. The guy is just a big mouth with a small brain.
This Rosenberg reminds me more of a Sharpton than a Rabbi. I must say if he teaches at Rutgers that proves to me the teaching standards at Rutgers must have been lowered.