L’shana tova! L’shana tova?
L’shana tova! L’shana tova?
For the second year in a row, we as a community in Burlington are facing antisemitic attacks just before the High Holy Days. Last year it was the angry, frothing at the mouth, push to boycott Israel at City Council. This year, it is the reaction to the Department of Education’s investigation into systemic antisemitism at UVM. In response to multiple student complaints, the Brandeis Center for Human Rights under Law followed up on those complaints and determined that UVM’s inaction warranted their filing suit with the Feds, and that prompted this investigation.
Within days, the President Garimella of UVM issued a response that dismissed the accusations and criticized the students for painting a picture of UVM that is “patently false.” Also, within days, anti-Israel protests were organized on campus with students and faculty, arguing that discriminating against Zionists is not Jew-hatred, even though the vast majority of Jews are Zionists. Within days, a long list of major national Jewish organization signed a letter strongly criticizing Garimella’s denials.
I wanted to let Temple Sinai know that I have been involved in this issue, working with Hillel and Jewish student leadership on advocacy and strategy, as well as getting to know them. I want to share the letter I wrote to President Garimella and the UVM Board, and to let you know that Temple Sinai will do whatever we can to support the UVM Jewish students. Just this week, I sent a giant box of chocolate rugelach and black-and-white cookies from Katz’s Deli to the Hillel. Stacie is working on getting JewBelong to come up, and I am working with Hillel to bring a major speaker on antisemitism to Burlington this year.
If you have a connection with UVM, I want to encourage you to look into it, talk to students, and consider writing a letter to the President, the UVM Board, or the UVM Foundation. I have been advised that UVM is very concerned about the reaction in the local community, so the more letters from individuals in our community that are sent, the more effective they will be collectively.
Here is the President’s contact info:
· Phone: 802-656-3186
· Email: president@uvm.edu
Here is the contact info for the UVM Board of Trustees:
Here is the contact page for the UVM Foundation that includes a staff list.
And here is the letter I sent on Monday to the President:
Dear President Garimella,
My name is David Edleson, and I serve as the rabbi at Temple Sinai in South Burlington, Vermont. As a Reform rabbi, I have long been in active in the fight for social justice, which is why I was so upset at President Garimella's recent response to the allegations made in the Department of Education's investigation into systemic antisemitism at UVM.
Denying the lived experiences of Jews is itself one of the most virulent forms of antisemitism; your recent public response to the Department of Education’s investigation did just that. Please reconsider the message you are sending to Jewish students at UVM and to the local Jewish community.
I began serving as the rabbi at Temple Sinai in South Burlington in 2018. Having been a Hillel President in college, I quickly made connections with the UVM Hillel and the students there. I have been invited repeatedly to work with Jewish student leaders, to do trainings on antisemitism, on responding to misinformation about Israel, and to plan and lead worship. I also know students that attend my congregation, and UVM Hillel members that work for us in our weekly Hebrew school. Again and again, year after year, these students have made it painfully clear that they feel increasingly unsafe and alarmed at the rising levels of antisemitism on campus, and that the university has paid lip-service, but taken no significant steps to address their concerns. They openly advise each other to avoid taking classes with certain professors because of the instructor’s clear hostility toward any statement supportive of Israel or the Jewish connection to it. Students also confess they have chosen to be silent out of fear when students or faculty make hostile statements about Jews who support Israel’s right to exist. Some students have shared with me a reluctance to display any outward signs of their Jewishness, including wearing Stars of David, Hillel t-shirts, or putting mezuzot on their doors. Jewish UVM staff and faculty in my congregation have corroborated these accounts, having had similar conversations with Jewish students. These are not anonymous conversations.
There is widespread consensus in these myriad conversations over years that UVM does not take seriously students’ experiences of antisemitism. There seems to be a blindness to it especially when Jew-hatred tries to disguise itself as anti-Zionism. The overwhelming majority of American Jews are Zionist, supporting Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state in our indigenous ancestral homeland. Every major Jewish organization in America is Zionist. For a student organization to openly exclude Zionists is to exclude Jews, and claiming that is not antisemitic is to hide behind a distinction without a difference.
As a former Middlebury College administrator, also during times of ideological conflict, I empathize with how complex these issues are, and with your need to defend your institution. What is so upsetting in your recent response to the Department of Education’s investigation is that in doing so, you erased the lived experience of many of your Jewish students. UVM’s inaction on anti-Jewish racism on campus is giving tacit approval for those fomenting it, particularly when contrasted with your intolerance of other forms of racism. The resulting hostile environment and sense of marginalization is deeply and negatively impacting your active Jewish students. Your response has made this worse.
Please listen to your Jewish students, the local Jewish community and stand up to antisemitism on your campus. If there is any way I can be your partner in doing that, please do not hesitate to call.
Sincerely,
Rabbi David Edleson
David Edleson, Rabbi
Temple Sinai