UC-Berkeley Adopts Relationship With Bethlehem University

By Dion Nissenbaum

While the University of California at Berkeley is associated with progressive politics from the Free Speech movement to the Third World Strike and more recent anti-apartheid demonstrations, it was not until this year that the student body took a firm stand on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

A coalition of four campus organizations—the Committee for Academic Freedom in the Israeli Occupied Territories (CAFIOT), Progressive Muslim Alliance (PMA), International Jewish Peace Union (IJPU), and Network of Arab and American Students (NAAS)—organized a successful campaign culminating in the Associated Students of the University of California (ASUC) senate adopting Bethlehem University as UC-Berkeley's first official sister university.

ASUC senator and Progressive Muslim Alliance member Shahed Amanullah introduced the bill, "Education is Not a Crime," which focused primarily on academic freedom and the effects of the almost two-and-a-half year closure of Bethlehem University.

"Maybe this bill passing represents a changing in perceptions among the public," Amanullah said. "People are starting to realize it is OK to question United States policy in the Middle East."

The campus Jewish Student Union—an umbrella organization of groups ranging from the Progressive Zionist Caucus to the Israel Action Committee—opposed the sister university idea as a political statement disguised as a question of academic freedom. Leaders of the group criticized the bill as divisive and out of context. They suggested supporting academic freedom in a less controversial country, such as South Africa or China. The JSU argued that the bill lacked a "balanced" treatment of the issue and proposed an alternative bill supporting "dialogue" between Hebrew University and Bethlehem University. Senators rejected this argument as well as appeals for a dual sister university relationship, including both Bethlehem and Hebrew University, proposed by one senator. After two hours of heated debate, the senate passed the Bethlehem bill by a vote of 20 to 6.

This endorsement was in sharp contrast to a similar issue also placed before the senate by Amanullah in 1988. That year Amanullah introduced a motion calling on the senate to endorse the city of Berkeley's initiative, Measure J, which would have established a sister city relationship with Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. At that time the senators declined to endorse Measure J, stating the issue was divisive and the initiative lacked balance. Measure J later lost in the city-wide vote after a highly combative and emotional campaign.

Activists cited both a shift in public opinion on the Middle East and a specific focus on academic freedom in the sister university bill to explain why it passed and the sister city campaign a year-and-a-half earlier failed.

"It is pretty hard to condone the denial of access to education." said IJPU member Susan Rivo, who worked on both the Measure J and Bethlehem campaigns. "The focus on education as a basic human right raises very little valid opposition."

Supporters of the bill hope to establish information and research networks for the Bethlehem students and faculty and to initiate student and faculty exchanges between the two universities. ASUC senators are also drafting a letter addressed to Israel's prime minister expressing concern over the continued closure of Bethlehem University. The Berkeley coalition of Arab, Jewish, Christian and Muslim groups also hopes to continue with its information campaign on the effects of the Israeli occupation on students and academic institutions, and to campaign for the release of Bethlehem students and faculty currently held under military detention.

Samer Shehata of NAAS noted the broad support of African-American and Latino and Chicano senators in the vote as a positive indication of the widening support for the Palestinian cause in this country.

"If we can broaden the coalition to include other people of color, this issue could enter the political mainstream in a context that has not been attained in the past," Shehata said.

Campaigns continue on various college campuses from Columbia University to the University of Michigan for sister university ties with Palestinian institutions such as those previously reached by the University of Wisconsin at Madison and California State, Long Beach.

Dion Nissenbaum is a student at the University of California at Berkeley and a reporter for the independent newspaper The Daily Californian.