While radical campus hate groups demand safe spaces from free speech that allow them to impose their supremacist agenda on other students, Jewish groups at UCI are fighting back after hate groups Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslim Students Association led an attack on Jewish students.
“They were screaming. They tried to push open the door, but we were holding the door from the inside,” said Katrin Gendova, the Israel group president, who said the attendees were mostly women and some felt intimated and trapped inside the room.
Sophomore Eliana Kopley had just left a Holocaust-related event when she was walking toward the facility featuring a screening of “Beneath the Helmet,” a documentary about the Israel Defense Forces. As she arrived at the event hosted by Students Supporting Israel, Ms. Kopley was met by an angry crowd pounding on the doors and windows—engaged in violent chants targeting the Jewish state.
“I was terrified. There is no other word to describe how I felt,” Ms. Kopley told the Haym Salomon Center.
With the crowd physically forbidding Ms. Kopley from attending the event and chants inciting violence against Jews and Israel such as “Intifada, Intifada—Long live the Intifada!” and “F**k Israel!” Ms. Kopley walked away from the scene.
But now the Jewish community is fighting back and JerusalemU will be holding a re-screening of the movie that the hate groups attempted to shut down.
COMMUNITY EVENT: UCI Stands For Free Speech!
On May 18, anti-Israel protesters tried to intimidate pro-Israel students watching the film
“Beneath the Helmet” on the UCI campus.They tried to suppress free speech and assembly, to smother ideas, and to bully those who are not like them.
This is not our way. It is dangerous. It is unacceptable. And we will not be silenced.Please join the UCI Jewish and pro-Israel communities for a special re-screening of Beneath The Helmet on the UCI campus:
GUEST SPEAKERS:
IDF Commander Eden Adler star of Beneath The Helmet
Elan Carr (Sponsored by StandWithUs), U.S. military officer, Iraq war veteran, and Los Angeles county criminal gang prosecutor.COMMUNITY EVENT: UCI Stands For Free Speech!
Wednesday, June 8, 2016 | 7:00 pm
UCI Student Center, Crystal Cove Auditorium, A
311 W Peltason Dr, Irvine, CA 92697Admission is Free, but all attendees must register to attend
Special thanks to the UCI campus police for making this event a Safe Space for Free Speech.
It's a sad and telling sign that extremist hate groups like Students for Justice in Palestine have become so dominant on campuses that safe spaces for free speech have to be protected by campus police.