USYD student council passes anti-Israel motion
“Picking and choosing from a series of complex historical events misleads the general student population, and is insensitive to those students directly impacted."
THE University of Sydney Students’ Representative Council (SRC) has passed a one-sided motion encouraging student activists to take part in a Nakba solidarity demonstration organised by the Palestine Action Group.
The motion condemns Israel’s “daily repression and violence” against Palestinians and labels Israel an “apartheid” state, “brutally established through the expulsion of 85 per cent of the Palestinian population and the murder of 15,000 people.”
It goes on to condemn the Australian government’s support of Israel and states, “It is important to build a fighting, radical Palestine solidarity movement in Australia, as our government is complicit in Israel’s genocide in Palestine”.
The motion – which passed with 16 votes in favour, three against and three abstentions – also supports Palestinians “fighting back against daily repression and violence”.
“The USYD motion mischaracterises history,” AUJS Vice president Alissa Foster said.
“Picking and choosing from a series of complex historical events misleads the general student population, and is insensitive to those students directly impacted. Whilst expressing solidarity with Palestinians is one thing, the motion rather falsifies the story of the land of Israel. Acknowledging Israel’s right to exist and supporting Palestinians are not mutually exclusive.”
She added, “Moreover, to use incendiary terms such as “apartheid” without a factual basis cheapens this term.
“This comes after The University of Sydney’s Student Union passed a motion commending the Boycott of the Sydney Festival in February.
“Since then the Student Union has been reluctant to engage with AUJS, leaving Jewish students feeling unheard by and uncomfortable with their representative body.”
NSW Jewish Board of Deputies CEO Darren Bark said, “This divisive, hateful and one-sided rhetoric has no place in our tolerant and multicultural society.
“The lack of balance in the motion and the slanted view of current events highlights the gross double standards of the university’s SRC. Such blanket statements do nothing to advance the cause of peace.
“The motion is entirely outside the University of Sydney SRC’s responsibilities to advocate on behalf of all its students. Every student has the right to feel safe and included on campus, and we condemn the motion in the strongest possible terms.”
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO Peter Wertheim said, “Once again, a non-representative group of far-Left ideologues consisting mainly of Greens and Trotskyist students has rammed through an anti-Israel resolution at short notice based on a ludicrous rendering of history. The USyd SRC passed a resolution in February in support of the Sydney Festival boycott. It has a long history of supporting actions that show antipathy towards Israel’s very existence and towards students who support Israel’s right to exist.
“All of this reflects poorly on the University’s standards and on the integrity of the anti-Israel vigilantes in the SRC. It seems that they are opposed to racism against everyone except Jews. Their statements condemning antisemitism are empty and self-serving. Their idea of what constitutes antisemitism flies in the face of what most Jewish people understand it to be, based on historical and personal experience. The University cannot simply wash its hands of this chronic problem. At the very least it should adopt and apply the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Working Definition of Antisemitism.”
The motion comes after the University of Melbourne condemned a motion passed by its own student union, labelling it antisemitic and “not the position of the University of Melbourne”.
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