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The uni students who turned their backs on Jews · The Front

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  Speaker 1: From the Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
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  Speaker 1: It's Friday, May sixteen, twenty twenty five. Prime Minister Anthony
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  Speaker 1: Albanesi is on his way to Rome for Pope Leo's
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  Speaker 1: inauguration mass. It's the PM's first overseas trip since being
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  Speaker 1: re elected. Slater In Gordon's former Chief people officer, Murrie
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  Speaker 1: Ruiz Mathison, is suing for negligence after she was falsely
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  Speaker 1: identified as the culprit behind a malicious email attack that
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  Speaker 1: revealed the salaries of hundreds of employees. She says the
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  Speaker 1: law firm didn't come to her defense quickly enough when
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  Speaker 1: the true alleged offender was identified. Those stories alive right
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  Speaker 1: now at the Australian dot com AU. Jewish groups are
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  Speaker 1: condemning what they say was anti semitism and racism on
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  Speaker 1: a university campus after scores of students turned their backs
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  Speaker 1: on their Jewish peers during a student meeting. University of
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  Speaker 1: Sydney students voted to reject a new definition of antisemitism.
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  Speaker 2: Today, how the scenario.
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  Speaker 1: Unfolded and what it says about free speech on campus.
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  Speaker 1: It's a Wednesday afternoon at Sydney University.
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  Speaker 3: Angus.
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  Speaker 4: I'm the SRC president for this year.
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  Speaker 3: The purpose of this meeting.
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  Speaker 1: A couple of hundred students file into Electure Theater for
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  Speaker 1: a student General meeting where a protest group, Students Against War,
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  Speaker 1: has an important motion to push.
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  Speaker 5: And be their ray to vote, gret to fight for
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  Speaker 5: palesestign gree to reject the university's new definition of anti
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  Speaker 5: semitism that says, a we.
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  Speaker 1: Can't criticize Israel or their ties that legitimize it as
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  Speaker 1: the genocidal apartheid state. See there, they're angry because the university,
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  Speaker 1: led by Vice Chancellor Mark Scott, has and other tertiary
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  Speaker 1: institutions in signing up to a federal government endorsed definition
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  Speaker 1: of antisemitism. Here's how the ABC reported the definition when
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  Speaker 1: it was adopted by Sydney University.
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  Speaker 6: The definition says that calling for the elimination of the
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  Speaker 6: State of Israel is anti semitic, as is holding Jewish
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  Speaker 6: individuals responsible for actions taken by the State of Israel.
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  Speaker 6: The definition also says that criticizing Zionists people who support
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  Speaker 6: the creation of the State of Israel may also be
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  Speaker 6: anti semitic. Now that's a criticism.
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  Speaker 1: One of the students leading the meeting set out the
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  Speaker 1: ground rules.
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  Speaker 4: All speakers will be heard in silence.
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  Speaker 7: If you are not happy with what somebody is saying,
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  Speaker 7: do you not helple, do not shout, you just be silent.
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  Speaker 4: You ignore them.
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  Speaker 7: I will accept people standing up and turning their back
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  Speaker 7: on the speaker.
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  Speaker 2: I will not accept jurian I will not expect shouting.
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  Speaker 1: Pointing, and then student angus dermody from students against war
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  Speaker 1: stood up so on that I.
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  Speaker 5: Call the mover of the fire motions angustimotive.
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  Speaker 8: Answer ticking out of this meeting. It's a very very
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  Speaker 8: important meeting. So it's really good that we have hit
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  Speaker 8: the quorum. Then there are two hundred of.
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  Speaker 4: Us, see it. We're here.
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  Speaker 8: And because for the past year and a half Israel
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  Speaker 8: has committed a relentless order in Gaza, there is no
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  Speaker 8: question that Israel is guilty of genocide in his children.
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  Speaker 1: Thomas Henry is a journalist with The Australian and he
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  Speaker 1: was at the meeting.
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  Speaker 5: It was a real mixed bag. You have people who
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  Speaker 5: have just left class and a jeans and a T shirt.
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  Speaker 5: Then you have more members of the Socialist Alternative in
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  Speaker 5: their Kafirs and in Berets.
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  Speaker 2: Here's angus dermity again.
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  Speaker 8: Israel has no right to exist in Every student should
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  Speaker 8: be able to say that without fear of suspension or
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  Speaker 8: disciplinary action.
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  Speaker 2: Another student vieve, can't you stood up?
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  Speaker 7: This is not a war, this is not a conflict.
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  Speaker 2: This is a genocide.
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  Speaker 7: This new anti semitism definition has nothing to do with
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  Speaker 7: combating racism or predicting Jewish students use in management used
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  Speaker 7: this policy to threaten to suspend a transgender Starlum's Eco student, Luna,
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  Speaker 7: which put her at risk of deportation for the crime
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  Speaker 7: and writing from the River to the Sea on a.
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  Speaker 8: Whiteboard with a non whiteboard marker.
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  Speaker 1: And then two Jewish students stood up to speak defending
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  Speaker 1: the definition of antisemitism is okay.
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  Speaker 4: Look, I'm here as a representative of Forges, the Australasian
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  Speaker 4: of Jewish Students.
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  Speaker 2: This is an undergraduate called Jack Mars.
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  Speaker 4: I just want to point out as well, I don't
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  Speaker 4: really want to be here. Jewish students have undeniable experience
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  Speaker 4: a horrific rise in antisemitism on our cannuis. I don't
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  Speaker 4: think anyone here is really trying to deny that that's
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  Speaker 4: not what this meeting is abouts.
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  Speaker 5: It appeared as though he hadn't prepared as much as
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  Speaker 5: the other speakers. He was kind of speaking from experience,
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  Speaker 5: speaking from how he and presumably the Jewish students he represented,
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  Speaker 5: feel about campus safety and about anti Semitism on campus.
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  Speaker 4: Some of the experiences that I've been pretty to are
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  Speaker 4: you know, the physical, they're violent, they're polittaling because someone's
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  Speaker 4: identified the Jewish, who's had religious icons ripped from people's
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  Speaker 4: university dawns. So there's no real denying there's a problem
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  Speaker 4: on campus here. This was an attempt. The definition was
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  Speaker 4: an attempt to solve that problem. Right, you want to
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  Speaker 4: criticize Israel, go for your life, all right. I'm half Israeli,
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  Speaker 4: my dad's born in Israel, I have family in Israel.
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  Speaker 4: I've been to Israel twice. Criticizing Israel is a national
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  Speaker 4: pastime in Israel. All right, Look at the hundreds of
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  Speaker 4: thousands of Israelis that do it. Okay. This definition does
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  Speaker 4: not stop you from criticizing Israel.
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  Speaker 2: It does stop you.
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  Speaker 4: From using anti Semitic trucks when.
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  Speaker 2: You do that.
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  Speaker 4: Okay. The only way you know how to criticize Israel
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  Speaker 4: is by using Holocaust inversion, by using Nazi rhetoric, by
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  Speaker 4: using cartoons with trucks in them, or by calling for
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  Speaker 4: the entire elimination of the state. I'm sorry, you're not
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  Speaker 4: interested in criticizing Israeli policy. You're not interested in criticizing
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  Speaker 4: living and Yahoo.
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  Speaker 8: You're interested in.
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  Speaker 4: Making Jews feel unsafe. You're interested in vilifying the head.
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  Speaker 4: So you know, John your life, criticized the policy, criticized
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  Speaker 4: the government, But calling for the complete destruction of a country,
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  Speaker 4: I don't think that's legitimate.
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  Speaker 5: The room heard both Jewish speakers quite respectfully speak on
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  Speaker 5: the first motion. It then got to the second motion,
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  Speaker 5: which was on a call for a single secular state
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  Speaker 5: across all of historic Palestine. Members of the crowd progressively
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  Speaker 5: stood up. It wasn't all at once, but the large
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  Speaker 5: majority of the crowd stood up when a postgraduate Jewish
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  Speaker 5: student condemned Harmas and made comments about Gaza lacking any
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  Speaker 5: sort of democratic process. The majority of students by this
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  Speaker 5: had stood up and turned their backs, and some were
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  Speaker 5: chatting where their friends. Others were dancing. It was a
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  Speaker 5: very clear sign that they did not agree and did
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  Speaker 5: not have respect for the speaker. It was a clear
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  Speaker 5: indication that what this Jewish Israeli postgraduate student was saying
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  Speaker 5: was completely unpalatable.
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  Speaker 1: Coming up how students at this elite tertiary institution voted
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  Speaker 1: after hearing the pleas of Jewish students. All this, of course,
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  Speaker 1: arose after October seven, twenty twenty three, when Hamas militants
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  Speaker 1: swarmed into Israel and murdered and raped civilians and soldiers
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  Speaker 1: and took hundreds more hostage. Israel, in response, began a
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  Speaker 1: fearsome military attack by land and air on Gaza with
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  Speaker 1: the aim of eliminating Hamas leadership. It's been bloody and dispiriting,
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  Speaker 1: and here in Australia the controversy has manifested in street protests,
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  Speaker 1: encampments at universities including Sydney, and deep fear in the
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  Speaker 1: Jewish community about a rising tide of antisemitism. At the
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  Speaker 1: meeting on Wednesday, Pro Palestine speakers invoked Jewish people, saying
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  Speaker 1: even many Jews disagreed with the very existence of Israel.
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  Speaker 7: The way that they managed to convince so many.
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  Speaker 6: Jewish people to flee to Israel after the horrific Holocaust
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  Speaker 6: was to fear among.
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  Speaker 7: Them that they would never be safe anywhere else, and
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  Speaker 7: how is that not anti Semitic that the founder of
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  Speaker 7: political Zionism were saying that fundamentally.
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  Speaker 8: Jewish people are not like the rest of them, are
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  Speaker 8: not like people who are not Jewish, and thus they
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  Speaker 8: will never be.
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  Speaker 2: Safe with them.
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  Speaker 1: They argue, to be anti Zionist, that is, to reject
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  Speaker 1: Israel's right to exist, is not the same as to
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  Speaker 1: be anti Semitic, that is, to hate Jews. One of
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  Speaker 1: the Jewish speakers at the meeting took issue with this.
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  Speaker 3: Anti Designism currently takes all of the evils of the world,
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  Speaker 3: like colonialism, white supremacy, and genocide and projects them.
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  Speaker 4: Onto the Jewish people.
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  Speaker 3: This has been done throughout history, whether during the Black
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  Speaker 3: Death in the fourteenth century or during the economic downturn
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  Speaker 3: in the nineteen twenties in Germany. The Jews were always
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  Speaker 3: to blame. If you are not part of the Jewish community,
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  Speaker 3: you should stop and take a moment to consider why
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  Speaker 3: is that you deserve a louder voice, if any, On
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  Speaker 3: the topic of defining what is or isn't anti Semitism.
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  Speaker 5: All five motions passed virtually unanimously. The small group of
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  Speaker 5: Jewish students who were there really voted against. Saw all
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  Speaker 5: motions passed virtually with no opposition, Please raise the first
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  Speaker 5: of which was to reject the new definition of anti
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  Speaker 5: Semitism adopted by Australian universities. The second was to endorse
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  Speaker 5: the call for a single secular democratic state across all
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  Speaker 5: of historic Palestine, and the third was for USID to
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  Speaker 5: end its complicity in Israel's apathead regime, which basically entails
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  Speaker 5: cutting tires with universities in Israel and weapons companies which
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  Speaker 5: they deem to have a hand in the conflict between
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  Speaker 5: Palestine and Israel. The other two motions were related to
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  Speaker 5: a new camps access policy that USID has committed to,
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  Speaker 5: which they view inhibits on their right to protest. And
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  Speaker 5: then the final motion was a demand that the university
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  Speaker 5: financially provide resources to support the previous motion past.
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  Speaker 1: I think all of us have been to UNI, have
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  Speaker 1: been at a few meetings where there are lofty demands
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  Speaker 1: being made by a protest group. Is Sydney UNI in
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  Speaker 1: any way required to this stance taken by the students.
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  Speaker 8: No.
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  Speaker 5: I think the university has generally been very dismissive of
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  Speaker 5: the sc and its demands. I think its view is
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  Speaker 5: that the Student Representative Council is actually representative of a
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  Speaker 5: very small part of the student body. Previously, they've distanced
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  Speaker 5: themselves from statements made by the SRC. I don't think
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  Speaker 5: this obliges the university to do anything at all.
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  Speaker 1: You spoke to some of the Jewish community groups, what
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  Speaker 1: have they had to say?
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  Speaker 5: They viewed the material leading up to this student meeting
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  Speaker 5: and the meeting itself as pretty open examples of anti
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  Speaker 5: Semitism on campus, and they think this is a perfect
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  Speaker 5: example of why the definition for anti Semitism is needed
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  Speaker 5: and why Jewish students on campus feel so unsafe.
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  Speaker 1: Thomas Henry is a journalist with The Australian. You can
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  Speaker 1: read his story and all our coverage of Israel, Gaza,
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  Speaker 1: anti Semitism and more right now at the Australian dot
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  Speaker 1: com dot au