The United States Department of Education (DOE) has launched an investigation of University of California, Berkeley, Law School over so-called “Jew-Free Zones” which banned Zionist speakers from campus events.
The agency announced last week that it will determine “whether the university failed to respond appropriately” when members of the campus Jewish community said they “experienced a hostile environment” after several student groups approved the bylaws disallowing Zionists from speaking at certain events.
Proposed by the law school’s Students for Justice in Palestine chapter in August, the Jew-Free Zones were part of a resolution endorsing the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.
News of the bylaws, first passed in October, immediately prompted a storm of responses from Jewish and non-Jewish leaders across the political spectrum, as well as a New York Congressman who vowed to propose legislation that would strip University of California, Berkeley of its public funding.
The DOE’s Dec. 15 decision comes in response to a civil rights complaint filed by Arsen Ostrovsky of the International Legal Forum and Florida-based attorney Gabriel Groisman.
