Director of ZOA's Center for Law and Justice Susan Tuchman speaking for a packed house at the home of Isaac
Winer, Esq. and Bonnie Rosenberg-Winer in Palo Alto, C.A.
of pro-Israel professors from the University
of California, Davis. This university has a
particularly aggressive chapter of Students
for Justice in Palestine (SJP), which hosted
an “anti-Zionist week” the previous month
— including a Holocaust-denier as a guest
speaker and a staged die-in with mock coffins
set up in the middle of campus. SJP tabled
with materials falsely accusing Israel of
land-theft and labeling Israeli leaders as war
criminals. Davis Faculty for Israel is a vital
network of support for beleaguered Jewish
students and can play a role in influencing
school administrators. ZOA plans to work
with these professors to counter any incidents
of anti-Semitism in the coming school year.
Second, Susan held a briefing on campus
anti-Semitism for legislators and their staff
in the State Capitol. This briefing was hosted
by the office of Assemblyman Kevin Kiley
and attended by 15 representatives of eight
legislative offices from both the Senate and
Assembly. Susan shared examples of how contemporary
anti-Semitism is manifesting from
anti-Israel rhetoric and activities, specific
incidents that have taken place on California
university campuses, and the radical connections
of the hate group SJP.
Susan also explained ZOA’s important legal
work to achieve Title VI (of the Civil Rights
Act) protections for Jewish students across the
country. ZOA asked legislators to adopt the
U.S. State Department’s working definition
of anti-Semitism, which includes anti-Israel
actions that cross the line into anti-Semitism,
and to apply it as a standard for evaluating
incidents within the state, including within
the public education system. ZOA also asked
for an investigation into SJP’s sources of
funding and its connection to radical Islamist
groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood
and American Muslims for Palestine. ZOA
will continue to work with California elected
officials as an information resource and public
advocate for the Jewish community.
Susan concluded her regional tour with a
special reception generously hosted by ZOA
board members Isaac Winer, Esq. and Bonnie
Rosenberg-Winer, M.D., at their home in
Palo Alto. This program was delivered to a
full-house of ZOA members from Silicon
Valley. Susan explained the important legal
precedents triggered by the ZOA’s work,
which will ensure that they have the legal
protections they may need should they face
anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination.
In August 2019, ZOA West Coast worked
with the Center for Law and Justice to
oppose a proposed curriculum for California’s
public schools. The curriculum was biased
and infused with numerous anti-Israel and
anti-Semitic references that, if adopted, would
have become mandatory coursework for high
school students throughout the state.
ZOA mobilized activists to write and call on
their representatives to reject and revise the
proposed Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum
(ESMC). In addition, the ZOA wrote to the
State Board of Education and issued press
releases to help spread awareness about the
dangers of the proposed curriculum and why
it should be rejected.
The proposed ESMC, which was meant to
encourage understanding of various ethnicities,
did not recognize Jews as an ethnic group
and did not mention anti-Semitism, despite
the fact that a majority of religious-based
hate crimes in the U.S. are directed against
Jews. Draftees of the proposed curriculum
inappropriately incorporated their own biases
and prejudices against Jews and Israel into the
text.
74 Around the Country: West Coast