Public Statements Released by JAABC

The Jewish Academic Alliance of BC (JAABC) is deeply concerned about the organized campaign to dismantle a longstanding archaeological course and research project run by faculty in the University of British Columbia’s Department of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Studies (“AMNE”). We are also troubled by the silence and inaction from UBC’s leadership.

Faculty in UBC’s AMNE department, through a longstanding partnership with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, runs a highly successful program that provides opportunities for experiential learning abroad in the State of Israel. This academic partnership is an important scholarly endeavour that advances the mission of UBC. In the program, UBC students, in collaboration with local students – whose demographic composition has significant cultural, ethnic, religious, gender, and sexual diversity – come together to learn about archaeology and ancient history. Like other study abroad programs, this program presents an opportunity for UBC students to encounter and interact with diverse people whom they might not otherwise meet.

The ongoing, concerted campaign to permanently cancel this course and research project is unacceptable. Protesters are engaging in intimidation tactics designed to prevent faculty members from doing their work. This pressure is part of a disturbing pattern of harassment targeting Jewish faculty, staff, and students, and those who partner with Israeli institutions. These actions constitute harassment under UBC policy and BC law and we are particularly worried by the conspicuous silence from UBC’s administration.

We call on the UBC administration to take the following actions:

• Ensure that UBC faculty can conduct their academic work free from intimidation and harassment. 
• Enforce harassment policies, with clear consequences for offenders.
• Establish designated protest spaces at a distance from faculty workspaces and classrooms.
• Issue a public statement affirming UBC’s commitment to academic freedom and collaborations with Israeli institutions.
• Educate the UBC community about academic freedom and about appropriate forms of protest.  

Under the University Act, UBC is obligated to be non-political in principle. UBC leadership must reject demands to sever ties with Israeli universities, and must stand firm against the targeted harassment of Jewish academics.

We are prepared to work with UBC administration to address these serious issues.

All participants in the Invictus Games have the right to feel safe on the UBC campus. The vandalism and graffiti aimed at Israeli participants in the Games on the night of Friday, February 14, 2025 is part of a pattern of harassment and intimidation on the UBC campus. The university is well aware of this problem. We ask UBC’s leadership to take a decisive stand on this issue; our university must be a safe space for all of us, including all of the athletes who are guests on our campus.

The Jewish Academic Alliance of BC is proud of the diligence and good faith that we and our membership devoted to months of often challenging engagement with UBC’s Office for Equity and Inclusion in the development of the anti-discrimination resources on antisemitism and Islamophobia. The recently published materials did not fully reflect our perspective, but we view these materials as part of an ongoing dialogue in the UBC community about these important topics.

We have reservations about the materials as they currently stand, which reflect points we have continued to make with UBC’s Office for Equity and Inclusion. They include especially:

1. 1. The failure to address our concerns about anti-Zionist conduct and expression on campus that marginalizes and harms the majority of Jewish faculty, staff, and students on campus.
   2. While we acknowledge that Palestinians can be subject to prejudice, hate, and discrimination on the basis of their identity, we believe the term “anti-Palestinian racism” is descriptively inaccurate and unhelpful. We are concerned about the conceptual coherence of considering anti-Palestinian attitudes a form of racism, and about the deployment of the important concept of racism in a politicized and un-nuanced way that risks damaging its broader value and meaning. We are concerned in particular that the concept may be instrumentalized against people who express support for Israel.
   3. We also wish to make clear that these reports do not substitute for further meaningful action by the university to counter both antisemitism and Islamophobia. We appreciate Dr. al Shaibah’s willingness to engage with us, and call on President Bacon and the University administration to do more to ensure that Jewish community members are not only safe on campus, but are welcome and able to thrive.

JAABC supports academic freedom and a diversity of viewpoints. The same principle that supports faculty teaching freely, also supports students learning and expressing themselves freely.

Especially given the power imbalance between professors and students, students can be silenced, or even pressured and intimidated, when professors cross a line in telling their students what they should believe and what political actions to take. We are worried that this may be what happened here. We believe that the classroom is a place that should foster critical thinking and that should allow students freely to come to their own conclusions and to express themselves and to be heard by others without embarrassment or fear.

Where faculty fail to do that, it is essential that the university enforce its own standards and ideals and we call upon UBC to do so.

On June 3, 2024 the UBC Senate convened for a special meeting called to discuss a proposal to cut or suspend ties with Israeli academic institutions. The full agenda for this meeting can be viewed here: June 3, 2024 UBC-V Senate Meeting.

After a thorough discussion, the Senate voted against adopting the motion, with 49 votes opposed and 16 in favor.

This outcome highlights UBC’s commitment to academic freedom, its support of open inquiry and exchange of ideas free form political pressures.