Chemerinsky is the the dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law. Although he suffered some name calling when he was kid (like everyone else, ever) that he ascribes to antisemitism, he asserts in an op-ed that "none of this prepared me for the last few weeks."
I was stunned when students across the country, including mine, immediately celebrated the Hamas terrorist attack in Israel on Oct. 7. Students for Justice in Palestine called the terror attack a “historic win” for the “Palestinian resistance.” A Columbia professor called the Hamas massacre “awesome” and a “stunning victory.” A Yale professor tweeted, “It’s been such an extraordinary day!” while calling Israel a “murderous, genocidal settler state.” A Chicago art professor posted a note reading, “Israelis are pigs. Savages. Very very bad people. Irredeemable excrement…. May they all rot in hell.” A UC Davis professor tweeted, “Zionist journalists … have houses w addresses, kids in school,” adding “they can fear their bosses, but they should fear us more." There are, sadly, countless other examples.
And he asks: "How can anyone celebrate the killing of 260 people attending a music festival, or the brutal massacre of more than 100 people in a kibbutz, or the pulling of people from their houses to take as hostages?"
Well, to be blunt, it is because Chemerinsky and people like him taught them to do so. The bio at the bottom of his op-ed notes that his latest book is “Worse Than Nothing: The Dangerous Fallacy of Originalism.” The Los Angeles Review of Books says this about this book:
In his timely and devastating refutation of originalism, Worse Than Nothing: The Dangerous Fallacy of Originalism, Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law and Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law, calls originalism “a dangerous approach to constitutional law that would jeopardize many basic rights and advances in equality” which is likely to “dominate the Court’s interpretation of the Constitution for a long time.” He sets out to “unmask” the “nonsense” of originalism, which is “just the rhetoric conservative justices use to make it seem that they are not imposing their own values, when they are doing exactly that.”
Originalism is the the legal philosophy that the Constitution (like every other law written) should be interpreted according to its original intent and meaning and not whatever progressives think it should mean at any given moment. Chemerinsky has taught his students that the law is not immutable but can be twisted and misinterpreted according to the needs of the moment. So why shouldn't international law and norms “adapt[ ] to changing circumstances and evolve[ ] over time”?
On April 22, 2022, Chemerinsky hosted a podcast to, in his own words, to discuss "what law schools, students, and professors can do to make our legal system better and more equitable for everyone. Today, we’re here to talk about how law schools respond to the attack on critical race theory, and ultimately how law schools could do better to be anti-racist and to work for greater racial equality." All his students are doing is applying critical race theory to the relationship between Israel and the Palestinians, quite reasonably deciding under such theory that Israel is an oppressor, and are simply doing their jobs as anti-racists to work for greater racial equality for the Palestinians.
In a video posted to YouTube this past June, Chemerinsky was filmed in a law school class discussing how his law school engages in illegal, stealth discrimination against white applicants for teaching positions. So, he has taught his students that the end justifies the means.
And now he is surprised that his students took his teachings to heart? He reminds me of the befuddled professor in Alfred Hitchcock's film, Rope, who is shocked to discover that his students took his philosophical teachings seriously, using them to justify murdering a classmate. Chemerinsky's shock, I suspect, isn't that he created monsters (golem), but that the golem have turned on their creators.
Related article: "'Watch out Jews, jihad is coming': FBI investigate Cornell University messaging board after vile anti-Semitic threats are made against students"--Daily Mail.
Remember the good old days when it was Islamophobic to interpret jihad as meaning "war" or "violence"? I do. From a 2001 article from Radio Free Europe by Alexandra Poolos entitled "The True Meaning Of The Islamic Term 'Jihad'":
The use of the term "jihad," however, is one of the most misunderstood aspects of Islam. When some Americans picture the word jihad, they imagine a so-called "holy war" by Islamic militants, waging terror against civilians using suicide bombings and other extreme methods.
The Islamic concept of jihad, however, is usually not one of violence.
The Arabic word is often translated as "holy war," but its true meaning is actually "holy struggle." In a religious sense, as described by the Koran and the teachings of the Prophet Mohammed, jihad means striving for the benefit of the community or the restraint of personal sins. It can refer to internal as well as external efforts to be a good Muslim or believer. It primarily refers to efforts to improve oneself.
If a jihad is required to protect the faith against others, peaceful means should be used. Islam does allow the use of force but only in situations of self-defense and not against non-combatants.
That article was written less than 10-days after the 9/11 attacks.
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