Protesters screamed obscenities at the Chabad House rabbi in a demonstration that turned violent
UCLA’s Chabad House rabbi was assaulted, called a “f—ing pedophile” and “fake Jew,” and told to “go back to Poland” by campus anti-Israel protesters on Monday. University officials have yet to reach out to him or apologize.
“We haven’t had any communications since then with anyone in the administration,” Rabbi Dovid Gurevich, who has directed the campus Chabad House for the last 18 years, told the Washington Free Beacon. He added that the lack of communication isn’t unusual, noting that parents have been complaining that the university isn’t keeping them apprised on what is happening with the campus protests.
Gurevich filmed the entire incident in a live Instagram video of the demonstration, which kept moving to different parts of the campus whenever police tried to disperse the activists. The rabbi’s reel depicts two main male aggressors who had their faces covered with keffiyeh scarves while they lobbed obscenities at him. Protesters told him to “go back to Poland,” called him a “pedophile rabbi” and “f—ing traitor,” and tried to hit his phone out of his hand. The rabbi said neither of the two primary antagonists appeared to be students.
The administration’s failure to apologize to Gurevich comes as UCLA faces widespread criticism for its handling of anti-Israel protests. Early last month, state police had to come in to break up a weeklong encampment where activists took over a central part of campus and blocked students who didn’t pledge fealty to their cause from main thoroughfares. Weeks later, members of Congress grilled UCLA’s retiring chancellor Gene Block on why he allowed the encampment to persist as long as it did.
UCLA’s media representative did not respond to a request for comment.
Anti-Israel protesters have continued to roil the campus since the earlier stationary encampment was cleared and activists arrested and released. Monday’s demonstration was particularly disruptive and violent, as protesters attacked and injured at least six UCLA police and security. One officer “was left with his head bleeding after his head was struck with an object,” UCLA’s associate vice chancellor for campus safety Rick Braziel wrote in a Tuesday email to students.
Students missed finals because activists blocked them from their classrooms, and activists defaced buildings and dyed the water of a campus fountain red, Braziel added. Twenty-seven activists were arrested and the university is “still determining which arrestees are not members of the UCLA community.”
Gurevich said he went down to observe the demonstration to “be there for our students,” and live-streamed what he saw, both to keep alumni and parents apprised of what’s happening on campus and as a form of protection because “people are not as violent on camera as they can be off camera.”
Gurevich and UCLA students who spoke with the Free Beacon said many of the protesters were outsiders. The rabbi said when he tried to enlist support from campus security he was told officers couldn’t help him and were simply there to “de-escalate.”
“When the video was going on, they were not acting at all,” Gurevich said. “They said they were not authorized to do anything.”
