House Committee Blasted UCLA for Ceding to Pro-Hamas Mobs

UCLA has responded to the report with a nebulous statement that offers nary a word of contrition for the horrors administrators inflicted on Jewish students as they allowed the pro-Hamas agitators to lay siege to campus.

The mammoth 325-page report was the culmination of a months-long investigation by the Committee that included hearings–where then-UCLA chancellor Gene Block, among many college leaders, testified–and also looked at anti-Semitic protests at a slew of schools nationwide, including Columbia, Harvard and Yale.

“UCLA’s leadership was unwilling to directly confront a violent, antisemitic encampment, even when antisemitic checkpoints denied Jewish students access to areas of campus,” the introduction to the report says. “These individual incidents and others that this report highlights are evidence of a broader environment on these campuses that is hostile to Jewish student s. Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VI), universities that receive federal funds have an obligation to prevent and address hostile environments based on race, color, or national origin (including a hostile environment against religious groups based on shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics). Instead of fulfilling these legal obligations, in numerous cases, university leaders turned their backs on their campuses’ Jewish communities, intentionally withholding support in a time of need.”

And at UCLA, the introduction says, “officials stood by and failed to act as the illegal encampment violated Jewish students’ civil rights and placed campus at risk.”

The report says that the pro-Hamas encampment that students erected violated multiple university rules but officials allowed it to operate with impunity and misrepresented its odious nature. The university sent out an advisory calling the encampment “mostly peaceful” but it was actually “obvious to many campus leaders that the encampment on Royce Quad violated a long list of University policies and presented a clear and present danger to Jewish students,” the report explained.  “As early as April 25, violence was documented within and around the encampment.”

For example, one Jewish woman who is also an American Indian was “assaulted by a protester with a stick.”

But UCLA coddled the protestors, allowing them to become more entrenched. This led to a violent confrontation between the Hamasniks and pro-Israel activists on April 30 of this year.

“Documents obtained by the Committee have revealed a stunning failure by UCLA administrators to enforce existing policies, creating the conditions for a violent end to the unlawful, antisemitic encampment that plagued campus for more than a week. The melee that occurred on the night of April 30, 2024, was the direct result of UCLA’s failure to hold rule-breaking students and their trespassing allies in the encampment accountable for days of civil rights violations and violence targeted at Jewish students and supporters of the existence of the state of Israel.”

Administrators acquiesced as the encampment violated multiple school rules. “Though the encampment was unlawful and in violation of UCLA policy from the second it was formed in the early hours of April 25, 2024, UCLA chose to ignore its own rules and “monitor” the encampment, prioritizing “de-escalation” rather than taking decisive action,” the report says. “The weakness shown by UCLA leaders over the entirety of the encampment period encouraged further disruptions in the days following the night of violence, forcing the campus to remain closed and classes to stay online.”

School officials also were aware of the anti-Semitic checkpoints at the encampment that blocked Jewish students’ access to parts of campus but did nothing to stop them, the report says.  “UCLA was aware of the formation of antisemitic checkpoints but failed to remove them or protect Jewish students in violation of the University’s Title VI obligations” to have a campus free of bias.”

School officials just stood by and watched as Jewish students’ free movement was impeded.

In fact, “Masked encampment members denied Jewish students and the media access to areas of campus, as uniformed Student Affairs Mitigators and Public Safety Aides stood idly by.”

The report also notes that students who took part in the pro-Hamas encampment got off virtually scott free. “Of the 96 UCLA students arrested on May 2, 2024, following their refusal to leave the school’s unlawful encampment, 92 signed an agreement with the Office of Student Conduct that allowed them to evade discipline in return for stating they would refrain from future violations of the Student Conduct Code.336 Of the four students did not sign the agreement, three of them are listed as “graduation hold in place,” while one remains enrolled at UCLA.”

And none of the members of the encampment who blocked Jewish students’ access to campus, the subject of an ongoing lawsuit that led to rebuke from a federal judge, were ever disciplined. “No UCLA students were disciplined for blocking Jewish students from accessing public areas of UCLA’s campus during the encampment despite overwhelming coverage of the issue, which prompted a court judgment against UCLA for failing to protect Jewish students’ rights.”

The UCLA media office said in a statement provided to the California Globe about the congressional report that “UCLA is committed to combating antisemitism and fostering an environment where every member of our community feels safe and welcome. We have learned valuable lessons from the events of last spring, and ahead of the start of this academic year, instituted reforms and programs to combat discrimination and enhance campus safety. We launched our Four-Point Plan for a Safer, Stronger UCLA; issued revised Time, Place and Manner policies for public expression activities on campus; and are working with multiple campus offices and stakeholders, including UCLA Hillel, to promote safety and protect civil rights.”

But saying you “learned valuable lessons” is hardly contrition. It is just self-praise.  There is nothing in the statement that acknowledges wrongdoing by UCLA.

Meanwhile, UCLA continues to fight the lawsuit that Jewish students blocked from parts of campus by pro-Hamas mobs filed this June. In August, Federal Judge Mark Scarsi issued an injunction requiring the school to provide equal access to Jewish students. He also blasted the school for how the Jewish students were mistreated.

But the litigation continues–with UCLA making no serious efforts to settle the case. Even though the school’s own task force on anti-Semitism urged them to do that.

The students are being represented by  the Washington, DC-based Becket religious liberty law firm.  On October 22, Becket lawyers filed an amended complaint that adds a Jewish UCLA medical school professor, Kamran Shamsa, MD,  as plaintiff.

The amended complaint says that Dr. Shamsa, a cardiologist, “was blocked from accessing the encampment by UCLA security and was later pushed back by security as he attempted to approach a proIsrael rally near the encampment.”

Becket lawyer Jordan Varberg told the California Globe that “he was directly affected by the Jew exclusion zone,” as it was known, “and the “anti-Semitic environment.”

Varberg said settlement talks were held unsuccessfully in September but there are none now. He expects UCLA to file a motion to dismiss by the required date for their response to the lawsuit on November 26.

Meanwhile, another pro-Hamas encampment popped up on campus last month but was quickly taken down by school officials because of the judge’s injunction.

Nevertheless, “Anti-Semitism is alive and well at UCLA,” Varberg contended.