More campus crackdowns, DOJ lawyers call for Israel investigation

Last week we published an article about universities implementing a new round of repressive measures to crack down on Palestine activism this semester.

“We were really busy over the summer and continue to be busy,” Palestine Legal senior staff attorney Radhika Sainath told me. “We have student conduct hearings where schools have either been late to file charges or have filed charges, but the hearings haven’t occurred yet. We’re dealing with appeals. There’s a lot of ongoing work.”

Since that piece ran, we’ve seen concerning developments across multiple campuses.

Chief among them is a story out of the University of Pennsylvania, where cops raided the off-campus home of student activists at 6 a.m.

The organizers say cops “stormed the house” and “pointed rifles and handguns” at the students. They refused to produce a warrant or share their badge numbers. One student was brought in for questioning and their “personal device” was seized.

During the questioning, the student was shown a warrant for suspicion of vandalism. This was connected to an incident in which red paint was thrown on a Ben Franklin statue in September.

“I’m pretty concerned that the university is using extreme tactics to try and suppress student movements. It’s been pretty consistent this entire year,” said state Rep. Rick Krajewski, in a statement. “A legal warrant is one thing, but the amount of force used for that warrant against young students is extremely alarming…At the end of the day 12 cops showed up with tactical gear and rifles against kids in a quiet neighborhood. It’s hard for me to believe that was justified, legal or not.”

“The raid on Friday was a clear act of institutional and state-sponsored terror,” one of the students told The Intercept’s Akela Lacy. “It comes a year after Penn disciplining students, suspending them, sending 300 riot cops to arrest and brutalize us multiple times over, throwing their own students and community members in jail. This is just another outrageous mark in their timeline of escalation.”

At UCLA cops quickly descended on a peaceful Gaza Solidarity Sukkot Encampment, erected by anti-Zionist Jewish students to honor the holiday. There’s a similar situation at Brown, where members of Jews for Ceasefire Now (JFCN) were threatened with conduct violations for sleeping in a temporary structure. The school’s Department of Public Safety claims that it’s not permitted under its green space usage policy.

“Brown’s supposed commitment to protecting free expression and students of all religious stripes is fundamentally at odds with their threats and restrictions on this religious practice,” said JFCN in a press release. “The administration continues to contort the University’s intentionally opaque policies to repress student expression and religious practice.”

A new report from The Guardian reveals that the University of Michigan’s governing board recruited state attorney general Dana Nessel to handle the cases of arrested student protesters, because she was more likely to file charges against arrested students than local prosecutors.

“A Guardian analysis finds Nessel’s office has so far charged about 85% of the protesters who were arrested or for whom arrest warrants were requested last year,” writes The Guardian’s Tom Perkins. “By comparison, Washtenaw county’s office only charged 10% of arrests, while the Wayne county prosecutor Kym Worthy dropped all five Gaza protest cases forwarded to her office by Wayne State University police in Detroit, data provided by protesters’ attorneys and prosecutors shows.”

You might recall that Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) was smeared as an antisemite by pro-Israel organizations and members of the mainstream media for suggesting that Nessel’s office might be targeting pro-Palestine students.

We expect to see more and more of examples of suppression. Follow our site for weekly updates.

DOJ lawyers want Israel investigated over killing of U.S. citizens

At Zeteo Prem Thakker reports that attorneys at Justice Department have sent a letter to Merrick Garland, pressing the US attorney general to‬‭ “investigate‬‭ potential‬‭ violations‬‭ of‬‭ U.S.‬‭ law‬‭ by‬‭ Israel’s‭ government,‬‭ military,‬‭ and‬‭ citizenry,‬‭ and‬‭ hold‬‭ the‬‭ perpetrators‬‭ to‬‭ account.”

The letter references a recent speech Garland gave highlighting the importance of the DOJ.

“In your speech, you stressed the importance of the ‘fair and impartial application of our laws.’,” it reads. “You also quoted the Principles of Federal Prosecution and reminded us that, as attorneys for the government, we should not be influenced by, among other factors, a person’s background, our feelings concerning the victim, and the effect of a charging decision on our professional and personal circumstances. You told us that ‘we must treat like cases alike,’ … And finally, you insisted that, guided by these norms, ‘we will not allow this nation to become a country where law enforcement is treated as an apparatus of politics.’”

The letter identifies three areas that could prompt an investigation: Israel’s killing of U.S. citizens (like Shireen Abu Akleh and Ayşenur Eygi), the U.S. connection to settlement expansion, and evidence that the Israeli army has engaged in war crimes and torture.

The letter is not an exactly an outlier, as we’ve seen growing anxiety and frustration among government employees over Israel’s genocide.

This week Democracy Now spoke with Hala Rharrit, who resigned from the State Department over the Biden administration’s Gaza policy earlier this year.

Co-host Juan Gonzalez asked Rharrit what she thought about the Biden administration recently threatening to hold up weapons to Israel in 30 days if Netanyahu failed to boost humanitarian aid to Gaza. Here’s her response:

Thank you, Juan, for highlighting that. I can tell you, as someone that worked within the State Department PR machine, that this, unfortunately, is a public relations ploy. I am sad to say it, but it’s the truth. It is conveniently 30 days, marking the time after the election. Also, it was conveniently leaked. It’s not typical for a statement like this to be leaked to the press, but it was.

The reality is that the State Department and the administration at this point is trying to give voters, especially those that are so concerned about the conflict in Gaza, some level of hope: “As long as you vote for us, after this 30 days, we’ll enforce the law, and we will make a change.” This is absolutely a deception for the voters and for the American people.

We don’t need another 30 days. We have had ample evidence from within the United States government, not just the State Department, but a multitude of U.S. agencies, with proof that Israel is violating so many of our laws, is systematically withholding humanitarian assistance from going in. As was mentioned in the report, as well, Leahy vetting is being violated, with army units determined to have committed gross human rights violations. We need to take action, and we should have taken action months ago. This 30 days is only a PR ploy, and that is the only thing it really is.

And that’s the devastation of all of it, because we have to ask ourselves: What is going to happen in these 30 days? Right after this letter was sent, the Israeli government announced that medical groups were no longer allowed to go into Gaza. They informed the WHO. These are medical groups, including from the United States, that are providing lifesaving assistance to people in need, to civilians in need. This was a slap in the face of the administration. If they had actually taken this letter seriously, they wouldn’t have taken that step. Additionally, the onslaught of northern Gaza is clear. They’re continuing the onslaught, specifically of northern Gaza, a complete blackout, no food, no water, no internet — all this in this 30-day period supposedly. Unfortunately, we need to stop with the words, with the PR, and we need to take serious action.