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U.S. education department opens antisemitism investigation at UC Berkeley, where pro-Israel advocates alleged ‘Jew-free zones’
(JTA) – For months, prominent pro-Israel and right-wing groups have pushed the narrative that the University of California-Berkeley’s law school is permitting antisemitism among its students.
Now the federal government is weighing in, as the U.S. Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights says it will investigate claims that the school hasn’t done enough to protect its Jewish students — in a similar manner to the department’s investigations at other universities where watchdogs have raised alarm about campus debates over Israel.
In a letter, the department said this week it was opening an investigation into “whether the University failed to respond appropriately in the fall 2022 semester to notice from Jewish law students, faculty, and staff that they experienced a hostile environment at the law school based on their shared Jewish ancestry.”
The department emphasized that its investigation does not mean that the complaint has merit, only that it falls under the office’s purview.
The complaint, brought by the Israel-based legal group International Legal Forum and the Miami-based law firm LSN Law P.A., stems from a bylaw passed by a handful of pro-Palestinian law student groups in August. The bylaw stated that the groups would pledge not to invite to campus “speakers that have expressed and continued to hold views … in support of Zionism, the apartheid state of Israel, and the occupation of Palestine.”
Even as the law school’s Jewish dean and various other members of the faculty condemned the bylaw, it became a rallying cry among pro-Israel groups after Kenneth Marcus, a Berkeley Law alum and founder of the pro-Israel legal group Louis Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, alleged in an op-ed that the school had created “Jew-free zones.” The Brandeis Center has brought several other antisemitism complaints against universities for allegedly discriminating against Zionist students.
The op-ed led to increased criticism of Berkeley from sources ranging from Barbra Streisand and Israeli antisemitism envoy Noa Tishby to the antisemitism watchdog group JewBelong, even as Berkeley’s Jewish faculty insisted that school does not have “Jew-free zones.” Outside attention included a right-wing group driving a truck emblazoned with an image of Adolf Hitler through campus, in a move that was condemned by the Anti-Defamation League.
“We initiated this claim because we said ‘enough is enough’ and decided that we must stand up for the Jewish students at UC Berkeley, who have been facing an unprecedent[ed] wave of discrimination and antisemitism on campus,” International Legal Forum CEO Arsen Ostrovsky and LSN Law partner Gabriel Groisman said in a joint statement celebrating the investigation. The groups have said they hope to compel the university to either invalidate the students’ bylaws or end funding and hosting for “organizations that engage in such blatant discriminatory conduct.”
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency has reached out to Berkeley Law for comment.
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The post U.S. education department opens antisemitism investigation at UC Berkeley, where pro-Israel advocates alleged ‘Jew-free zones’ appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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‘The Art of the Yiddish Monologue’ and other mini-courses in Yiddish
במשך פֿונעם חודש יאַנואַר 2026 וועט ייִוואָ פֿירן די ווײַטערדיקע מיני־קורסן אויף ייִדיש:
• „די קונסט פֿונעם ייִדישן מאָנאָלאָג“, וווּ מע וועט לייענען און אַרומרעדן מאָנאָלאָגן פֿון שלום עליכם, י. לץ פּרץ, דער טונקעלער, ב. קאָוונער, משה נאַדיר, רחל ברכות און יצחק באַשעוויס. מע וועט אויל אַרומרעדן די געשיכטע פֿונעם מאָנאָלאָג אין ייִדישן טעאַטער (שיין בייקער)
• שעפֿעריש שרײַבן, וווּ מע וועט אויפֿן סמך פֿון ליטעראַטור־מוסטערן באַטראַכטן די וויכטיקע באַשטאַנדטיילן פֿון פּראָזע — שפּראַך, סטיל, דיאַלאָג, געשטאַלט און פּייסאַזש (באָריס סאַנדלער)
• יצחק־לייבוש פּרץ און זײַנע באַציִונגען מיט די נײַ־געבוירענע ייִדישע סאָציאַליסטישע קרײַזן אין משך פֿון די 1890ער יאָרן (עדי מהלאל)
• די גרויסע אַקטריסע אסתּר רחל קאַמינסקאַ, וווּ די סטודענטן וועלן לייענען אירע זכרונות אויף ייִדיש (מיכל יאַשינסקי)
• די לידער פֿון דוד האָפֿשטײן, וואָס איז מערקווירדיק צוליב זײַן צונױפֿפֿלעכט פֿון דײַטשישע, רוסישע און אוקראַיִנישע ליטעראַרישע טראַדיציעס מיט תּנכישע און מאָדערנע ייִדישע השפּעות (יודזשין אָרנשטיין)
• די ייִוואָ־גדולים אין זייערע אייגענע ווערטער, וווּ מע וועט לייענען די שריפֿטן פֿון א. טשעריקאָװער, מ. װײַנרײַך, י. לעשטשינסקי, י. מאַרק, ש. ניגער, נ. פּרילוצקי, ז. קלמנאָװיטש, ז. רייזען, י. שאַצקי און נ. שטיף (דוד בראַון)
The post ‘The Art of the Yiddish Monologue’ and other mini-courses in Yiddish appeared first on The Forward.
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Suspect at Large in Brown University Shooting that Killed at Least Two, Injured Eight
Police vehicles stand near the site of a mass shooting reported by authorities at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, U.S., December 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Taylor Coester
Police in Rhode Island were searching for a suspect in a shooting at Brown University in Providence in which two people died and eight were critically wounded at the Ivy League school, officials said.
Providence Mayor Brett Smiley told a news conference that police were still searching for the shooter, who struck at Brown’s Barus & Holley engineering building, where exams were taking place at the time. Officials said police were looking for a male dressed in black and were scouring local video cameras in the area for footage to get a better description of the suspect.
Smiley said officials could not yet disclose details about the victims, including whether they were students. He lamented the shooting.
“We are a week and a half away from Christmas. And two people died today and another eight are in the hospital,” he said. “So please pray for those families.”
Brown is on College Hill in Providence, Rhode Island‘s state capital. The university has hundreds of buildings, including lecture halls, laboratories and dormitories.
President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House that he had been briefed on the situation, which he called “terrible.”
“All we can do right now is pray for the victims and for those that were very badly hurt.”
Compared to many countries, mass shootings in schools, workplaces, and places of worship are more common in the US, which has some of the most permissive gun laws in the developed world. The Gun Violence Archive, which defines mass shootings as any incident in which four or more victims have been shot, has counted 389 of them this year in the US.
Last year the US had more than 500 mass shootings, according to the archive.
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Rights Groups Condemn Re-Arrest of Nobel Laureate Mohammadi in Iran
Taghi Ramahi, husband of Narges Mohammadi, a jailed Iranian women’s rights advocate, who won the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize, poses with an undated photo of himself and his wife, during an interview at his home in Paris, France, October 6, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Hartmann
International human rights groups have condemned the re-arrest of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi in Iran, with the Nobel committee calling on Iranian authorities to immediately clarify her whereabouts.
Mohammadi’s French lawyer, Chirine Ardakani, said on X that the human rights activist was arrested on Friday after denouncing the suspicious death of lawyer Khosrow Alikordi at his memorial ceremony in the northeastern city of Mashhad.
Mashhad prosecutor Hasan Hematifar told reporters on Saturday that Mohammadi was among 39 people arrested after the ceremony.
Hematifar said she and Alikordi’s brother had made provocative remarks at the event and encouraged those present “to chant ‘norm‑breaking’ slogans” and disturb the peace, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported.
The prosecutor said Mashhad’s chief of police and another officer received knife wounds when trying to manage the scene.
CALLS FOR RELEASE
The Norwegian Nobel Committee called on Iranian authorities “to immediately clarify Mohammadi’s whereabouts, ensure her safety and integrity, and to release her without conditions.”
The European Union also called for Mohammadi’s release. “The EU urges Iranian authorities to release Ms Mohammadi, taking also into account her fragile health condition, as well as all those unjustly arrested in the exercise of their freedom of expression,” an EU spokesperson said on Saturday.
A video purportedly showing Mohammadi, 53, without the mandatory veil, standing on a car with a microphone and chanting “Long Live Iran” in front of a crowd, has gone viral on social media.
Ardakani said Mohammadi was beaten before her arrest.
Reporters Without Borders said four journalists and other participants were also arrested at the memorial for human rights lawyer Alikordi, who was found dead in his office on December 5.
Authorities gave the cause of his death as a heart attack, but rights groups have called for an investigation into his death.
The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said the crowd also chanted “death to the dictator,” a reference to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as well as: “We fight, we die, we accept no humiliation.”
Mohammadi, who received the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize, has spent more than 10 years of her life in prison, most recently from November 2021 when she was charged with “propaganda against the state,” “acting against national security,” and membership of “illegal organizations.”
This year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner, the Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, said on Saturday that the opposition’s campaign in Venezuela was akin to that taking place in Iran.
“In Oslo this week, the world honored the power of conscience. I said to the ‘citizens of the world’ that our struggle is a long march toward freedom. That march is not Venezuelan alone. It is Iranian, it is universal,” she said on X on Saturday.