Two people can be seen on video allegedly attempting to steal a student’s Israeli flag during a pro-Palestinian rally at the UC Berkeley campus on Monday.
Stop Antisemitism posted a video of the incident to X, formerly known as Twitter on Thursday, claiming that the two protesters assaulted the student. Dan Mogulof, assistant vice chancellor for executive communications at UC Berkeley, said in a statement to the Journal that according to university police, “the targeted student did not, in his report to police, allege that he was struck. He did allege that force was used in an effort to take his personal property, an Israeli flag, which would be robbery or attempted robbery. Those are serious crimes.”
Mogulof also said that “the campus and the police department are taking this very seriously. The alleged behavior is simply intolerable and completely at odds with what this university stands for. We are working to identify those involved. We have a long-standing commitment to ensuring appropriate consequences are imposed when laws are broken and/or the Code of Student Conduct is violated.”
I reached out to the university about this and and they told me: “According to UCPD, the targeted student did not, in his report to police, allege that he was struck. He did allege that force was used in an effort to take his personal property, an Israeli flag, which would be… https://t.co/pN7wrjMJdg
— Aaron Bandler (@bandlersbanter) October 20, 2023
Here’s the university’s full statement on the matter: pic.twitter.com/9Gx9cQymZb
— Aaron Bandler (@bandlersbanter) October 20, 2023
Mogulof noted that the incident is why Chancellor Carol Christ issued a letter to the community last week stated that the university is “increasingly concerned by the growing prevalence of online threats, doxxing, and harassment connected to the conflict between Israel and Hamas. We decry any calls for violence in any form or support for terrorism as we continue to mourn the loss of innocent life. We understand this rhetoric is creating deep fear and concern among many members of our campus community.” In that message, Christ shared a signed statement by Dr. Hatem Bazian, lecturer of Middle Eastern languages and Cultures and Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies, and Dr. Ron Hassmer, professor of Israel Studies, that read: “We are two professors on this campus who disagree, vehemently. But we have always treated one another with respect and dignity. We love this campus with its diverse communities and all of our students and are heartbroken to hear of incidents of near violence between students in recent days. We will not tolerate our students harming one another. Disagreement and differing points of view are an essential part of campus life, and we expect that you treat one another with the same respect and dignity that we are modeling here.”
CBS News Bay Area reported that Monday’s pro-Palestinian protest at UC Berkeley featured chants of “resistance is justified when people are occupied” and quoted a student named Yezzin who said, “We are protesting the occupation of Palestine by Israel and the bombing of Gaza and killing of innocent lives. We’re hoping we can get our message out and make people aware of the atrocities Israel commits on Palestine every day. We believe Israel occupies Palestine and that land belongs to the indigenous Palestinians.” Stop Antisemitism shared video footage on X of pro-Palestinian protesters chanting, “We don’t want no two state, we want all of ‘48.” “We’re curious what these students would plan to do with the 7 million Jews currently residing there,” Stop Antisemitism posted on X.
“We don’t want no two state, we want all of 48” – we’re curious what these students would plan to do with the 7 million Jews currently residing there. pic.twitter.com/CJkhixaTDr
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) October 20, 2023
The local CBS affiliate also noted that there was a pro-Israel counter-protest, and spoke to one pro-Israel protester who said, “My friends were killed in the battle. There was a festival, a music festival in Israel. 3,000 people went to this festival. About 500 young people celebrating peace, celebrating music, celebrating values for the world by the boarder with Gaza, celebrating good things were massacred.”
