Brown’s Leadership Capitulates to the Encampment Protesters
Profiles in Lack of Courage, Principles and Judgment
NOTE: BEFORE I WAS ABLE TO COMPLETE THIS POST, THE BROWN DAILY HERALD WROTE OF THE RESOLUTION OF THE ENCAMPMENT SITUATION, A RESOLUTION EXPOSING THE SCOPE OF BROWN’S CAPITULATION. THE HERALD ARTICLE IS ATTACHED.
Yesterday Brown President Paxson sent a letter to the Brown University Community Council (“BUCC”) stating, in pertinent part, as follows:
“The first motion [from the BUCC] requested that “a group of five students conducting activism for divestment be allowed to present a case for and resolution for divestment from the Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory to the Brown Corporation at its next meeting”. Brown’s leadership decided that, “provided that the encampment is peacefully brought to an end within the next few days and is not replaced with any other encampments or unauthorized protest activity (any protests violating University policies related to time, place or manner) this academic year, they will invite five students representing the current encampment activity and a small group of faculty members to speak with a similarly-sized group of Corporation members, including the Chancellor and the chair of the Investment Committee, about their arguments for divestment”.
The Paxson letter went on to note that this meeting “would occur during the upcoming Corporation meetings in May, though it would not place divestment as an action item for the Corporation’s business meeting…”. (SEE ATTACHED BROWN DAILY HERALD ARTICLE.)
Here we have proof positive that the inmates are running the asylum. First, Brown apparently takes seriously the idea that some number of pro-Hamas students and faculty demonstrating in violation of university policies are somehow “representing” others at Brown and, worse, competent - however loosely defined - to discuss divestment “from the Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory.” That, in and of itself, is a stunning concession by the university. Does Brown’s leadership even know what the campers are talking about when they say “the Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory”? Is it Jerusalem? The West Bank? Or, is it “from the river to the sea”, the going nowhere slogan of the Islamist butchers of Hamas supported by their cheerleaders among Brown students and faculty.
Will the students and faculty claiming to be serving as representatives at the meeting remain anonymous while cowardly hiding behind face masks and scarves in the shape of Israel (the keffiyeh style favored by Yasser Arafat)? Will any of the students - or perhaps faculty - who last night were chanting “there is only one solution Intifada revolution” be attending the meeting? Who at the meeting will speak for students and faculty who oppose divestment? Has Brown leadership given any thought to these and other problematic issues? If so, President Paxson has an obligation to disclose far more than she has about the meeting.
Second, have Brown President Paxson and the entire Brown Corporation forgotten or just chosen to ignore that the demonstrators are basically calling for the elimination of the Jewish state and its Jews? All one needs do is read the Hamas Charter to understand that giving Brown’s intifada supporters a voice begins to turn the campus into a college campus in Berlin in 1933. How has Brown arrived at the point where an encampment calling for the elimination of Israel and its Jews becomes the basis for a meeting with the highest levels of the university’s leadership? (It is certainly reasonable to assume that an encampment at Brown for anything other than opposing Israel would be shut down by the administration in hours - further evidence of the double standard that Brown and so many institutions have no difficulty applying.) That some number of the campers are Jewish, a point endlessly and gleefully made by the Hamas caucus at Brown, is of course, completely irrelevant.
Brown leadership has for years refused to take a divestment proposal to the Corporation. The university’s reasoning presumably was based, in part, on the fact that Israel was not, and is not, even arguably analogous to South Africa under apartheid no matter how many students and faculty mindlessly chant slogans to the contrary.
Also relevant, as reported by the Brown Daily Herald, a senior Brown investment manager recently noted that “given today’s realities, it’s not possible to divest the way Brown did in South Africa or Sudan.” She also stated that 96% of Brown’s endowment is handled by external managers and of the remaining 4%, none is invested in “any of the companies discussed in the current divestment debates.” Has something changed in the last few days as to how the endowment is structured and managed?
There is a clear right and wrong regarding divestment. Those who believe that to advance their global, political position Israel is fairly compared to South Africa under apartheid are clearly wrong; those who argue based on facts that Israel is not an apartheid state are clearly right. Brown leadership, one has to believe, knows right from wrong on this issue. What has changed that makes “divestment from the Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory” the basis for a serious discussion?
Discussing divestment under the gun, so to speak, is also wrong because the only divestment focus for Brown students and faculty is Israel - not, e.g., China or Russia or any of the predominantly Muslim countries where apartheid is the law of the land, or countless other countries also with abysmal human rights records. Brown leadership should have had the courage to say that discussing divestment when it comes to Israel, especially only as to Israel, is simply wrong and therefore off the table for discussion. Taking that position would have been a demonstration of leadership; taking the position that Brown took yesterday is a demonstration of the lack of leadership.
So what will happen with this upcoming meeting? If Brown signals that the university is open to considering divestment to some degree - whatever that may mean and however that may be accomplished - the protesters violating university policies will declare victory, and rightfully so. Is that in the overall best interests of the university? Of course not. And if nothing comes of the meeting with the students and faculty, then what? The campers will of course claim that the administration was just going through the motions and didn’t listen to their “morally and factually compelling” case. Why? Because Brown will not divest.
But as I write this, an article from the Brown Daily Herald was published a few hours ago headlined: “Brown University to vote on divestment at October Corporation meeting, encampment to be voluntarily cleared”. Beneath the headline is a photo of cheering and clapping campers. They should be happy. They won. Big time.
Brown completely caved so commencement could go off happily and nobody would take a peek behind the curtain to see what is really going on. That approach brings to mind what was done in preparation for the Berlin Olympics in 1936 - the city was temporarily cleaned up, swastikas taken down etc etc for a few days to pretend anti-Semitism didn’t exist in Nazi Germany. Or to paraphrase anti-Semite and Nazi sympathizer International Olympic Committee President Avery Brundage after Palestinian terrorists murdered 11 Israeli Olympic athletes in 1972, “the graduation must go on”. (It’s worth noting, once again, that Brown professor and holder of an endowed chair Beshara Doumani served as president of Birzeit University in Ramallah where the murderers of the Israeli athletes in 1972 are celebrated.) Has Brown President Paxson or anyone in the Brown Corporation wondered how many graduating Jewish seniors will be happy knowing the Brown administration thinks “from the river to the sea” and “there is only one solution intifada revolution” are concepts worth considering?
Shame on Chris Paxson and the rest of Brown’s feckless leadership.
Willis J. Goldsmith, Brown Class of 1969
https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2024/04/brown-university-to-vote-on-divestment-at-october-corporation-meeting-encampment-to-be-voluntarily-cleared