Letters to the Editor

Speaker Ignites Controversy With Tonight's Visit

We, as Jewish and non-Jewish students, faculty, staff, and community

members, are very troubled by Hillel's decision to sponsor Daniel Pipes'

visit to Berkeley.

While we support Mr. Pipes' right to speak on campus, we are concerned that

Hillel's sponsorship of this event gives the false appearance of an

endorsement of his views from the Jewish community. Pipes has used his

stature to espouse some of the most vilely xenophobic sentiments that we

have ever heard from a modern American public figure. Pipes portrays a world

so threatened by Islamism that Muslim organizations are inherently

dangerous, Muslim public relations groups are inherently dishonest, and

Muslim names are red flags. While Pipes claims to differentiate between

"bad" Islamists and "good" moderate Muslims, he is so relentless in his

insistence that violent Islamism is the most urgent of threats that he

defames the religion he claims to respect. We urge Berkeley Hillel, an

organization deeply concerned about the history and persistence of

anti-Semitism in the world, to consider the implications of its sponsorship

of an individual whose rhetoric towards Muslims so directly echoes messages

directed against Jews in the past.

Ehud Moshe Appel, Gidon Felsen, Kendra Froshman, Sarah Jebrock, Rebecca Pedinoff, Emily Shaw, Lisa Rachel Stampnitzky, Calanit Saenger, Sarah Adler-McDonald, Mehammed Mack, Hudi Brenman, Jacqueline Brandner, Cyrus J. Farivar, Maya Kronfeld, Sajidah Wahdy, Samuel Melton, Yaniv Scherson, Angele Rosenberg,

UCB students

Sarah Anne Minkin, Sarah Bailey, Joel Kamnitzer, Sarah Staveteig, Barry Eidlin, Snehal Shingavi, Sarah Levin,

Anne Wolf, Rob Lipton,

Daniel Hoffman,

Graduate Students.

Carol Sanders,

Member, Jewish Voice for Peace.

Dr. Emily Gottreich Vice Chair, Center for Middle Eastern Studies UC Berkeley,

Molly Freeman, PhD.,

Mary Beth Kaufman,

Research Fellow, Center for Latin American Studies.

Diane Ames, Yvette Chalom, Judith Butler, L. Ling-chi Wang, Eitan Saenger,

community members.

Wendy Brown, Professor of Political Science, UC Berkeley,

Michael N. Nagler, Professor, Peace and Conflict Studies,

Donald S. Moore, Assistant Professor, Anthropology,

UC Berkeley,

Susan Ervin-Tripp,

Janet Adelman,

Professor of English,

Elizabeth Abel, Professor of English, UC Berkeley,

Bluma Goldstein,

Professor emerita, German Department, UC Berkeley,

Kaja Silverman, Professor of Rhetoric and Film; UC Berkeley, Maxine Elliot, Professor, Rhetoric and Comparative Literature,

Shanie Aki,

UC Berkeley Summer Staff

Controversy Should not Deter Meaningful Dialogue

This evening Dr. Daniel Pipes will speak on campus addressing the topic, "The Middle East Now: Up Close and On Campus".

The appearance of Dr. Daniel Pipes' at UC Berkeley is part of the Israel Action Committee's, Jewish Student Union's and Hillel's commitment to bringing a broad range of perspectives on Israel, the Middle East and related issues to the campus community. Dr. Pipes' academic and professional credentials make him an important voice on the topic he will address.

Other recently sponsored speakers include Ehud Barak, Dennis Ross, Marcia Freedman and Yossi Beilin. Each has shared an individual perspective, raised thought-provoking ideas, challenged and stimulated audiences. Neither IAC, JSU, Hillel nor individual students necessarily agree with all a speaker says. However, by presenting a broad range of views, we insure a better informed campus engaged in debate and discussion of the major issues of the day.

We do not go out of our way to bring controversial speakers to campus. But neither should any of us – particularly on this campus that has earned an international reputation for promoting and safeguarding free speech – shy away from speakers who have an important message and are committed to the core values of democracy, civility and diversity, values that inform our work on a daily basis.

We are pleased that our campus community will have a first-hand opportunity to hear Dr. Pipes' views, whether they expect to agree or disagree with what he says.

Adam Weisberg

Executive Director, Berkeley Hillel

Fulbright Snafu Outrages Graduate Assembly

Graduate students on the Berkeley campus were stunned last week by

the Department of Education decision to deny 2004-2005 Fulbright fellowship applications from 30 of our doctoral students. In the face of monstrous fee increases and budget cuts, this is yet another blow to UC Berkeley graduate students and to the nature of our university as a highly respected research institution.

This shocking decision does not follow the mission of the Department of Education to "strengthen the Federal commitment to assuring access to equal educational opportunity for every individual." Denying Berkeley graduate students the opportunity to compete for an important fellowship-on the basis of a computer error beyond the university's control-unfairly punishes Berkeley students. These students submitted their applications in a timely fashion to the Fulbright Program Advisor on campus and should therefore have equal and fair access to the fellowship program. The decision also compromises the public interest, by excluding some of the country's best

and brightest scholars from competing for a federally funded research fellowship.

Finally, the rejection of Berkeley's fellowship submissions undermines the Department's stated mission to "increase the accountability of Federal education programs to the public."

A rejection of our graduate scholars would greatly disappoint students, faculty, staff, and administration of our esteemed research institution and its venerable peer institutions.

Temina Madon,

Graduate Assembly Academic Affairs

Vice President

Jessica Quindel,

Graduate Assembly President

Tags: