UC Irvine: A New and Improved Jewish Studies?

At the University of California at Irvine, there is a bit of a controversy on campus over the university's effort to "expand" its Jewish studies. While there is no formal Jewish Studies department, there is something called a Center for Jewish Studies within the School of Humanities and History Department, and one can pursue a minor in Jewish studies, while certain associated faculty are listed as teaching Jewish studies-related classes. Up to now, some critics have charged that certain of these faculty members are anti-Israel activists. Critics have reportedly been assured by the Center that any mistakes of the past will not be repeated with this expansion. Yet, that assertion is also being challenged. 

In 2023, in conjunction with 4 million dollars in matching funds from other donors, Henry and Susan Samueli, probably UCI's biggest donors, pledged funding toward the expansion of the Center. It is my understanding that no matching funds were pledged and the Samuelis withdrew their pledge.

On June 5, 2024, Dean of Humanities, Tyrus Miller, issued a statement complaining about "misinformation" concerning 2 new hires to teach Jewish studies classes, replacing one lecturer who was a rabbi with Orange County Hillel (the Jewish student support center). Miller was reacting to complaints that both the new hires are strong opponents of Israel.

In this National Review article dated June 10, 2024, the lecturer who was replaced, Rabbi Daniel Levine, insisted that the change was intended to put more anti-Israel voices in the Center.  According to the article, Susan Morrissey, the head of the History Department, is reportedly a member of Faculty for Justice in Palestine at UC Irvine.

On January 23, 2024, I attended a pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel  "teach-in" at UC Irvine. One of the organizers, UCI history professor Mark LeVine, is listed as "associated faculty" for Jewish studies at UCI.  The moderator was the aforementioned Susan Morrissey.

As for the two new hires, they are identified in the article as Rachel Smith and Myriam Fitoussi. You can read their background in the above article. According to the article, both signed a letter last October calling for all Jewish Studies centers to demand a cease-fire in Gaza and accusing Israel of human rights violations in that war. I should note that there is a Margaux Fitoussi who signed the letter; I cannot say for sure they are the same person, but it appears her full name is Margaux Taylor Myriam Fitoussi. Another signee was Mark LeVine. I have heard LeVine speak many times on campus, always accusing Israel of human rights violations, and occupation, among other things. 

Finally, I note that one of the members of the Steering Committee for the Center for Jewish Studies, Irene Tucker, is listed as a signee of this letter issued by a group called Jewish Studies and Israeli Studies Scholars in May 2021. Below is an excerpt from the letter

"We also acknowledge that the Zionist movement, a diverse set of linked ethnonationalist ideologies, also was and is still shaped by settler colonial paradigms that saw land settlement as a virtuous means of solving political, economic, or cultural problems, as well as modern European Enlightenment discourses that assumed a hierarchy of civilizations and adopted the premise that technological progress and development of an ‘underdeveloped’ territory would be an unqualified good. These paradigms, as implemented by the Zionist movement and the state of Israel in twentieth-century Palestine, have contributed to unjust, enduring, and unsustainable systems of Jewish supremacy, ethnonational segregation, discrimination, and violence against Palestinians that have been forcefully condemned, including by Jews, Israeli citizens, and Israeli human rights groups such as B’Tselem. Israeli culture, society, and politics, moreover, continue to unfold on land whose majority Palestinian population the state displaced, whose lands it confiscated, and whose return it prevented during and after the 1948 war, and on lands that it has occupied and settled since 1967."

I want to make it clear (as a non-Jew) that those mentioned above have a right to their opinions on the Israel-Palestinian conflict, as well as to express them publicly. I am not suggesting there should be a litmus test for a professor to teach in a Jewish studies program as to whether they support or oppose Israel and/or Zionism. Ideally, if a prospective professor has the qualifications, why not hire that person without even knowing his or her position on that issue-or any other issue? That's just my view, and some might disagree or think I am being naive. The reader will note that there are several names of associated faculty in the Center whose positions on Israel I don't know. For all I know, they may all be pro-Israel.

But here is my question: Is there a deliberate effort at UC Irvine to stack their positions with people actively opposed to Israel-some to the point of being activists? If this is the case (and I don't think UC Irvine is the only university where this is an issue), it would be troubling. We already know that Middle East studies departments in many universities lack diversity of thought when it comes to Israel. Are Jewish studies departments or centers simply going to become their allies marching in lockstep against Israel, say like Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace? I think the question is valid and this issue at UC Irvine bears following.