UCLA’s Pro-Hamas ‘Mob Rule’ Overruled

Mob rule at UCLA was dealt a stinging rebuke earlier this month when a federal judge issued a scathing ruling that barred the school from allowing pro-Hamas activists to continue to block Jewish student’s access to campus facilities.

You might think this would be something administrators would find non-controversial and a basic principle of non-discrimination that UCLA would abide by. But Jews are considered oppressors in the woke world view and therefore unworthy of basic protections.  So the school quickly announced that it would appeal the ruling, deeming it an unjust intrusion on campus autonomy that would “hamstring our ability to handle events on the ground.”

UCLA filed an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit just days after the  District Judge Mark Scarsi issued his August 13th injunction in response to a lawsuit filed by Jewish students who were denied access to parts of campus by pro-Hamas mobs earlier this year.

But last Friday August 23  the school abruptly withdrew its appeal, apparently under pressure from the University of California system leadership.  Lawyers for UCLA asked the appeals court  that its appeal be dismissed but did not give any reason for doing so.

UCLA spokesman Ricardo Vazquez said in a statement to the California Globe that “UCLA is committed to fostering an environment where every member of our community is safe and feels welcome. We are in full alignment with the court on that point. While we will always create conditions for the free expression of ideas, we will not tolerate antisemitism, Islamophobia or any forms of discrimination or harassment. The University will forgo an appeal given UCLA’s own anti-harassment and anti-discrimination policies and the current implementation of the directives [on campus protests] issued by the UC Office of the President. We will abide by the injunction as this case makes its way through the courts.”

Just days after UCLA filed its appeal University of California system president Michael Drake issued a letter that sounded like he was cracking down on campus mobs.

 “Clear communication and consistent application of policies and laws are key to achieving the delicate but essential balance between free speech rights and the need to protect the safety of our community and maintain critical University operations,” he wrote on August 19.

Drake promised to implement policies that ”that prohibit camping or encampments, unauthorized structures, restrictions on free movement, masking to conceal identity, and refusing to reveal one’s identity when asked to do so by University personnel.”

So it looks like UCLA dropped its appeal of the judge’s injunction demanding equal access for Jewish students  because continuing to cater to campus mobs would have put administrators at odds with the new official University of California policies.

Although the judge’s injunction is not being fought the lawsuit against the school will continue in the coming months.

The students in the lawsuit are being represented by the Washington, DC-based Becket Fund, a religious liberties law firm. Becket president Mark Rienzi said in a statement that, “We’re glad to see UCLA in full retreat. Appealing Judge Scarsi’s very reasonable order to stop discriminating against Jews was always a bad idea. Dismissing that appeal is the first step on the road to recovery of a campus that welcomes all, including its Jewish students.”

Rienzi did not respond to a request for comment.

The lawsuit was filed on June 6, 2024 in the United States District Court for the Central District of California against UCLA and the regents of the University of California system.  The Jewish plaintiffs were two undergraduates at UCLA and one law student.

It paints a startling picture of UCLA administrators turning over the campus to pro-Hamas mobs terrorizing Jewish students. The complaint says that “Starting on April 25, 2024, and continuing until May 2, 2024, UCLA allowed a group of activists to set up barricades in the center of campus and establish an encampment that blocked access to critical educational infrastructure on campus.”

University administrators allowed the campus hooligans free reign. “With the knowledge and acquiescence of UCLA officials, the activists enforced what was effectively a “Jew Exclusion Zone,” segregating Jewish students and preventing them from accessing the heart of campus, including classroom buildings and the main undergraduate library. In many cases, the activists set up barriers and locked arms together, preventing those who refused to disavow Israel from passing through.”

“To enter the Jew Exclusion Zone, a person had to make a statement pledging their allegiance to the activists’ views and have someone within the encampment ‘vouch’ for the individual’s fidelity to the activists’ cause. While this may have prevented a pro-Israel Christian from entering the Zone and permitted access for a Jewish person willing to comply with the enforcers’ demands, given the centrality of Jerusalem to the Jewish faith, the practical effect was to deny the overwhelming majority of Jews access to the heart of the campus,” the complaint reads.

The administrators’ support for the mobs was more than just tacit. They ordered campus police not to intervene and had personnel support the exclusion of Jewish students from restricted areas.

Moreover, “Defendants not only failed to marshal resources to intervene— they adopted a policy facilitating the Jew Exclusion Zone, ordering, among other things, UCLA campus police to stand down and step aside. “

“UCLA also hired security staff and stationed them on the outskirts of the encampment and other restricted areas. UCLA  instructed them to discourage unapproved students from attempting to cross through the areas blocked by the activists. The security officers, acting as agents of Defendants, informed Jewish persons that, if they wished to access the encampment or other restricted areas, they would first need to obtain the permission of the encampment members,” the lawsuit says.

All the plaintiffs in the case were blocked by the Jewish exclusion zones.

“Joshua Ghayoum, a sophomore and history major, was repeatedly blocked from passing through the encampment to reach meetings and study sessions. Eden Shemuelian, a second-year law student, was shooed away by a security officer who chastised her and called her “the problem” for attempting to peacefully observe the encampment. And Yitzchok Frankel, a second-year law student, was harassed and blocked from approaching the encampment by antisemitic activists, all with the assistance of UCLA security.”

The complaint charged that UCLA’s collusion with the pro-Hamas mob  “violates numerous federal and state constitutional guarantees, including the Equal Protection Clause, the Free Exercise Clause, and the freedom of speech.”

In response to the lawsuit, on August 13, United States District Judge Mark Scarsi issued a 16 page injunction blasting UCLA for allowing the Jewish exclusion zones and ordering the school to provide equal access for Jewish students.

“Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith,” he wrote.”This fact is so unimaginable and abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating.”

Scarsi also ordered that campus officials “ are not to aid or participate in any obstruction of access for Jewish students to ordinarily available programs, activities, and campus areas.”

UCLA had argued in response to the lawsuit that  it was not responsible for how members of the encampments behaved because they were not students  But Scarsi had little patience for this little bit of sophistry that displays a remarkably insouciant attitude towards mob rule on campus.

“UCLA claims that it has no responsibility to protect the religious freedom of its Jewish students because the exclusion was engineered by third-party protesters,” he wrote. “But under constitutional principles, UCLA may not allow services to some students when UCLA knows that other students are excluded on religious grounds, regardless of who engineered the exclusion.”

Now the injunction stands.

Glenn Ricketts, spokesman for the National Association of Scholars, an academic freedom group, told the California Globe, “My guess is that UCLA realized that they had no case and would be still further behind the 8 ball if they” continued to fight the judge’s ruling.

But Ricketts added that he doubts the outcome of the judge’s ruling is going to break the stronghold that pro-Hamas mobs have on elite campuses, including UCLA. “Antisemitism actually doesn’t seem a strong enough term for what we’ve been seeing,”  he emailed. “Unfortunately, I don’t see the campus Zeitgeist changing at UCLA or in many other elite venues.  If I were a Jewish student, however, I’d certainly apply elsewhere, as many are apparently doing.”