A congratulatory meal hosted at the house of UC Berkeley School of Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky was disrupted this week when a pro-Palestinian student began an impassioned speech about the Israel-Hamas conflict and refused to leave.
The incident occurred Tuesday evening when several upcoming law school grads were invited to one of three patio dinners at the Oakland home of Chemerinsky, a left-wing researcher, and his wife, law school professor Catherine Fisk.
The first dinner, held in the couple’s garden, was abruptly interrupted when Malak Afaneh, a Palestinian American law student at the school and co-president of Berkeley Law Students for Justice in Palestine, approached a set of steps and attempted to give a speech about the people killed in Gaza as a result of the Middle East war.
A video of the incident between Afaneh and the pair was published online, with the student urging the institution to divest from firms participating in Israel’s war. The video also shows Chemerinsky and his wife constantly appealing to the students to leave the dinner and their property.
Fisk approached Afaneh while she was holding a microphone and reading from her phone.
“Today, we are gathered here to commemorate our final few weeks as law students,” stated one of the students. “Tonight is also the last night of the holy month of Ramadan, where millions of Muslims from around the world fast.”
Fisk then approached Afaneh and placed her arm around her in an apparent attempt to shift her to the side.
“Leave,” Fisk instructed the student. “It’s not your house. “This is my house.”
“Stop touching her,” another student is heard saying in the video. “You don’t have to get aggressive.”
“We have attorneys,” Afaneh informed Fisk.
“Please leave our house,” Chemerinsky told the students. “You are guests at our house.”
Afaneh then claimed her First Amendment right to speak at the outdoor dinner, to which Chemerinsky said, “This is my house.” “The First Amendment does not apply.
Fisk, who informed the student that she was no longer “welcome” at the event, threatened to contact the police, to which Afaneh responded, “Okay, you can call the police.”
Attempting to continue her speech, Fisk grabbed Afaneh’s microphone and began bringing her up the steps.
“If you don’t want to be here, please leave my house,” Chemerinsky yelled amid the scuffle.
Fisk can then be heard explaining to Afaneh that she was not invited to the meal “for this purpose.”
“We are talking about Ramadan and the holy month of Ramadan as Muslim students,” the youngster said. “We refuse to break our fast on the blood of Palestinian people – that UC has committed sending $2 billion to weapons manufacturers…”
Afaneh later told Fisk that she planned to inform people about how she “pulled a Muslim woman’s scarf during Ramadan,” and that “putting your hands on my hijab is unacceptable.”
Afaneh then claimed she was assaulted by Fisk, which Chemerinsky denied as he got extremely upset, repeating, “Please leave our house now!”
In a statement on the incident, Chemerinsky wrote with “profound sadness” that the dinner was “disrupted and disturbed” by the student who “stood up with a microphone, stood on the top step in the yard, and began a speech, including about the plight of the Palestinians.”
“My wife and I approached her immediately and told her to stop and go. The woman proceeded. When she proceeded, there was an attempt to remove her microphone,” he recalled. “We repeatedly told her that she was a guest in our home and should go. About ten pupils plainly agreed with her and eventually left as a group.”
“I am enormously sad that we have students who are so rude as to come into my home, in my backyard, and use this social occasion for their political agenda,” he went on to say.
Noting that the other dinners would still take place with security present, Chemerinsky said he hoped “there will be no disruptions” and stressed that his “home is not a forum for free speech.”
“Any student who disrupts will be reported to student conduct and a violation of the student conduct code is reported to the Bar,” he said. “I am deeply saddened by these events and take solace that it is just a small number of our students who would behave in such a clearly inappropriate manner.”
Prior to the dinner, Chemerinsky stated that an “awful poster” circulated on social media and school bulletin boards at the law school building, depicting him holding “a bloody knife and fork, with the words in large letters, ‘No dinner with Zionist Chem while Gaza starves.'”