– The Washington Times
The pro-Palestinian activists who swarmed college campuses, erected encampments and terrorized Jewish students for two years had plenty of support — from university professors.
Faculty activism played a key role in driving the demonstrations against Israel that roiled University of California campuses after the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israeli civilians, said a report released Wednesday by the AMCHA Initiative.
“Drawing on hundreds of documented incidents, the report shows how faculty and academic departments have used their positions of authority and university platforms to advance a coordinated anti-Israel agenda that has fueled harassment, exclusion and intimidation of Jewish and pro-Israel students,” said the organization, which fights antisemitism in U.S. higher education.
The 153-page report, “When Faculty Takes Sides: How Academic Infrastructure Drives Antisemitism at the University of California,” provided case studies from three UC campuses: those at Los Angeles, Berkeley and Santa Cruz.
Faculty advocacy was largely funneled through two networks: the anti-Israel boycott, sanctions and divestment movement already in place before the Oct. 7 massacre, and the Faculty for Justice in Palestine or Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine chapters that surfaced on all three campuses after Oct. 7.
“Together, these drivers provide both the ideological framework and the organizing capacity through which departments, programs and faculty networks repeatedly route activist agendas through UC-branded platforms and academic authority,” the report said.
The faculty groups pushed an “anti-normalization” campaign that called for cutting institutional ties with Israel and for rejecting speakers, programming and partnerships tied to the Jewish state.
Large numbers of faculty at each campus signed academic boycott statements — 115 at UCLA, 171 at Berkeley and 55 at Santa Cruz — during the 2023-2025 academic years. They included department chairs and others responsible for hiring, curriculum and messaging.
As a result, department-sponsored events were “systematically anti-Israel and overwhelmingly featured BDS-supporting speakers without balancing perspectives,” the report said.
Sharp increases in antisemitic activity were reported on all three campuses from July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2025, compared with the period from July 1, 2021, to June 30, 2023.
The number of incidents at UCLA against Jewish and Zionist students rose from four to 130, while the number of incidents glorifying violence or calling for Israel’s elimination soared from four to 51.
“A significant portion of these incidents (40%-60%) involved faculty, academic departments, or FJP/FSJP — through organizing, participation, sponsorship or public legitimation,” the report said.
At the June 2025 commencement ceremony for UC Santa Cruz students majoring in critical race and ethnic studies, graduates were presented with custom stoles adorned with the Palestinian flag on one side and a kaffiyeh pattern on the other.
The ceremony also featured a backdrop of the 2024 student encampment, blurring the lines between “academic operations and political demonstration.”
At UC Berkeley, a faculty group issued “tool kits” showing instructors how to “embed anti-Israel narratives directly into course syllabi” and how to circumvent campus rules on classroom advocacy and stage walkouts.
Universities have reacted to the student protests by tightening discipline and promoting awareness of antisemitism, but the report said the problem won’t be solved unless the University of California Board of Regents takes action.
The report recommended that the board move to bar academic departments and units from using their association with the university system to promote boycotts and political agendas; prohibit political activism in the classroom; increase oversight; and require the faculty senates to address misuse of departmental authority.
“This is far bigger than a student discipline issue — it’s a faculty governance failure,” said Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, director of the AMCHA Initiative, who wrote the report with UCLA professor emeritus Leila Beckwith. “Until UC enforces clear boundaries on faculty and academic-unit conduct, Jewish students will continue to face intimidation, exclusion and harassment sanctioned by the institution itself.”
The University of California entered into a systemwide agreement with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights on Title VI, which bars discrimination based on race, color and national origin in federally funded programs.
That didn’t end the federal scrutiny.
Under the Trump administration, the Office for Civil Rights opened a Title VI investigation into UC Berkeley in February 2025. A month later, the Department of Justice began a Title VII investigation into accusations of discrimination against Jewish faculty and staff.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
