UC Irvine Suspends MSU

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR Michael Oren spoke at UC Irvine. According to the disciplinary committee’s findings, members of the Muslim Student Union (MSU) disrupted the speech by standing up and yelling, one after the other, creating a chaotic situation in which the speaker could not continue.

This event takes place against a backdrop of disruptive campus action by the MSU. Over the past several years, they've organized demonstrations against Israel and on behalf of Palestinian and jihadi groups that have angered both the university and the surrounding community.

Efforts on the part of Islamic supremacist student groups to suppress free speech on campus have intensified in recent years. While attempting to deliver an address at UC Berkeley, Daniel Pipes was shouted down and obstructed by students from the Muslim Students Association and Students for Justice in Palestine who willfully disregarded signs posted outside the lecture hall warning that no banners, signs, shouting or violence would be allowed during the speech.

In another incident, Nonie Darwish, a critic of Islamic supremacism, was greeted by an unruly mob at Berkeley who shouted “Fascist! Fascist! Fascist!” at her and “You are nothing but a tool for the imperialism of the United States! You are here to spread racist filth on our Arab brothers and sisters!” When Darwish spoke at Boston University, someone deliberately lit a fire in a restroom near the site of her speech, 15 minutes before it was scheduled to begin. In none of these cases did the offenders face serious repercussions for their actions.

But UC Irvine investigated the incident and concluded that, “The disruptions were planned, orchestrated and coordinated in advance by the Muslim Student Union,” and noted that during one meeting prior to Oren’s speech MSU members had discussed how to “send the speaker a message – our goal should be that he knows that he can’t just go to a campus and say whatever he wants.”

The committee further found that following the disruption of Oren’s speech, the MSU engineered a cover-up and instructed its membership to lie about the organization’s involvement in the protests.

As a result of its investigation, the disciplinary committee decided to suspend the Muslim Student Union for one year. This is a good precedent to set for other campuses.

Read the whole article: A Rare Victory for Free Speech at UC Irvine.

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