Following the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Undergraduate Students Association Council (USAC) condemnation of a campus event featuring a former October 7 Massacre hostage, the university and the USAC president distanced themselves from the letter on Wednesday.
As first reported by Jewish Insider, the April 14 USAC letter had condemned a UCLA Hillel, UCLA Students Supporting Israel (SSI), and Nazarian Center for Israel Studies sponsored event featuring former hostage Omer Shem Tov.
"We reject the selective platforming of narratives that obscure the broader reality of ongoing state violence," read the letter. "Elevating a single narrative, absent of critical political and humanitarian framing, serves to legitimize and normalize...ongoing atrocities."
USAC had argued that the Nazarian Center's sponsorship of the April 14 event reflected a disregard for Palestinian life and made the university complicit in amplifying one sided narratives.
UCLA condemns letter, calls it 'antithetical to values of Bruin community'
Amid an uproar about the letter, UCLA said in a statement that the event featuring Shem Tov was "one of resilience and respect for human rights and dignity," and that it stood by the organizing bodies.
"We will review the process by which this letter was issued," said UCLA. "The condemnation of such a peaceful event to share a story of resilience in the face of extreme suffering is antithetical to the values of our Bruin community."
USAC president Diego Bollo said that he and other council members were not present at the meeting in which the letter was drafted, reviewed, or introduced. Bollo said that one USAC that was absent had promoted the Shem Tov event.
"It is my belief that the councilmember who introduced this letter chose to bring it forward on a day when the latter was not present and therefore unable to offer her perspective as someone with knowledge of the organized event featuring Omer Shem Tov," Bollo said in an Instagram statement. "The letter was introduced to the agenda the day of the meeting, and it was passed by a bare majority of USAC."
Bollo promised a review of USAC internal processes for drafting and releasing statements, and assured that he was committed to the principle of free speech.
UCLA Hillel and UCLA SSI said in a Wednesday Instagram statement that members of USAC had shown that they were against truth, antisemitic, and anti Jewish by condemning "a young man kidnapped from a music festival and held, tortured, and treated inhumanely as a hostage and human slave by Hamas in Gaza for over 500 days."