OULC Chair quits and accuses Oxford’s left of anti-semitism

Alex Chalmers, Co-Chair of Oxford University Labour Club, has resigned in protest at anti-Semitic and terror sympathising members of the organisation.

He announced his decision minutes after a motion to endorse Israel Apartheid Week was passed at last night’s OULC General Meeting. In a lengthy statement posted on his Facebook page, Chambers said:

“Whether it be members of the Executive throwing around the term ‘Zio’ (a term for Jews usually confined to websites run by the Ku Klux Klan) with casual abandon, senior members of the club expressing their ‘solidarity’ with Hamas and explitictly [sic] defending their tactics of indiscriminately murdering civilians, or a former Co-Chair claiming that ‘most accusations of antisemitism are just the Zionists crying wolf’, a large proportion of both OULC and the student left in Oxford more generally have some kind of problem with Jews. The decision of the club to endorse a movement with a history of targetting [sic] and harassing Jewish students and inviting antisemitic speakers to campuses, despite the concerns of Jewish students, illustrates how uneven and insincere much of the active membership is.”

Chalmers

His decision has sparked speculation as to whether Ed Miliband, who is due to address OULC next month, will still agree to come and speak. Oxford JSoc have fully endorsed Chambers’ decision, releasing their own statement in which they say they are “unsurprised by this news.”

The statement continues: “It is not the first time that Oxford JSoc has had to deal with anti-semitic incidents within the student left and it will not be the last. Many of Oxford’s Jewish students who hold progressive views have long felt excluded from left-wing political spaces. Jewish students who raised the issue of anti-semitism at the OULC meeting were laughed at and mocked. It is high time that this issue is confronted.”

Chambers’ fellow co-chair, Noni Csogor, has decided to remain in her role, but has said that she respects Chambers’ decision to resign. Discussing the club’s 18-16 vote in favour of backing the Israel Apartheid Week, Csogor added: “We did not vote on a blanket position on the Israel-Palestine conflict; we voted to support Oxford’s Israeli Apartheid Week. At Oxford, IAW has hosted a wide variety of Israeli, Palestinian, and South African speakers, such as Denis Goldberg, who fought against apartheid in South Africa, and Oxford professors like Avi Shlaim, Karma Nabulsi, Sudhir Hazareesingh, and David Priestland. As the motion notes, OULC and the Labour Party have always been against racism and oppression in all its forms; this must include the policies of the current Israeli government.”