Several Jewish groups dropped out of a Friday meeting with top Biden administration officials over its last-minute inclusion of far-left groups to the gathering, The New York Post reported.
The Zoom call with Education Secretary Miguel Cardona and White House Domestic Policy Council Director Neera Tanden was scheduled to discuss pro-Palestinian demonstrations that have rattled college campuses over the past several weeks.
Jewish Federations of North America, the Anti-Defamation League, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the Orthodox Union, the Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Hillel International chose to boycott the meeting. As a result, Cardona had to run his meeting a second time.
The addition of organizations opposed to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism, was at the crux of their departure.
“I was really surprised not to see them there,” Jamie Beran, the Bend the Arc CEO, said in an interview about the missing organizations. Noting that a number of centrist and conservative groups did agree to join the call, she added, “And I was grateful to be with groups that are taking the safety of students seriously and putting politics aside.”
“Sort of at the last minute, they told us they were adding some other participants to the meeting,” one participant who had dropped out told the outlet. Participants learned through text that the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations was working to get other groups to drop off, according to the Times of Israel.
The inclusion of T’ruah, the Nexus Leadership Project, Bend the Arc and Diaspora Alliance surprised the attendees.
Diaspora Alliance is a group that combats antisemitism in conjunction with minority communities whose leaders have harshly criticized Israel’s actions and was described by one guest as being “pretty anti-Israel.”
Nexus Leadership Project advances a different definition of antisemitism that gives a wider berth to criticism of Israel.
Also raised at the meeting was the need to balance free speech on campuses with the rights of Jewish students, some of whom have complained of being targeted and harassed by pro-Palestinian protesters, Beran said.
“The groups were really measured, saying that they need to protect free speech and students need to be protected from harassment,” she said of participants on the call.
Only one group, the National Council of Jewish Women, was represented on both calls.
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