UCD BDS group have responded to accusations of "anti-Semitism" made by Irish Times columnist Oliver Sears, claiming Sears' comments were “intentionally divisive and inflammatory.”
In the early hours of Friday 23 August, UCD BDS released a statement on their Instagram account, directly responding to comments made in an article published by The Irish Times on Thursday 22 August. Written by frequent columnist Oliver Sears, the article claimed that the UCD Palestinian Solidarity Encampment in May contained “expressions that are anti-semitic” due to the presence of “Zionist-Free” zones in the encampment.
Founder of Holocaust Awareness Ireland, Sears is the son of a Holocaust survivor. He is also a guest lecturer at Trinity College Dublin who speaks on his own family history during the Holocaust. Sears is a frequent contributor to The Irish Times, regularly writing about the Jewish community in Ireland, anti-Semitism, and the State of Israel.
Sears’ articles have previously been criticised for his stance on anti-Zionist activists and Palestinian liberation protests. His latest article, ‘I told Christy Moore that a song he performs called Palestine makes me want to leave Ireland’, states that “anti-Zionism is the new anti-Semitism.”
In Trinity College, Sears recounts that Jewish students were offered a safe room on campus throughout the encampment, to which he adds “I wondered if it was the attic.”
Sears asserts that the Palestinian Solidarity Encampments in both UCD and Trinity College Dublin earlier this Summer were using “anti-Semitic” expressions when hanging signs that read “Zionist-Free Zone.” He claims that the phrase “Zionist-Free Zone” echoes the Nazi term “Judenfrei.” “[Judenfrei] refers to zones which Reinhard Heydrich, one of the architects of the Final Solution, sought to establish in Nazi-occupied eastern Europe, by deporting Jews from those areas and murdering them.” In Trinity College, Sears recounts that Jewish students were offered a safe room on campus throughout the encampment, to which he adds “I wondered if it was the attic.”
Trinity Lecturer and former-chair of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC), Dr David Landy, responded to Sears’ article on X by stating “It is telling that there were Jews at all the events where Mr Sears claims that Jews were in danger - the Trinity College and UCD encampments” adding “we weren’t simply present, we helped organise them.”
UCD BDS Issue Statement
In response to Sears’ article, UCD BDS published a statement to their social media platforms shortly after midnight and condemned the parallels made “between violent acts committed by Nazi Germany and a group of students fighting for peace and justice.”
The group argued that Sears’ comments were “intentionally divisive and inflammatory”, before arguing the comparison “serves only to diminish the devastating impact of the persecution and ethnic cleansing of Jewish people in a genocide rooted in similar principles to those which UCD student seek to fight today.”
“When Mr. Sears equates a zionist-free zone with a Jewish-free zone, he erases the Jewish students who planned, organised, participated in, and negotiated on behalf of the UCD encampment.”
The statement then spoke of the role of Jewish students in the 28-day May/June encampment, arguing that “When Mr. Sears equates a zionist-free zone with a Jewish-free zone, he erases the Jewish students who planned, organised, participated in, and negotiated on behalf of the UCD encampment.”
The statement continued, “We appreciate that the image of Muslim, Jewish, Christian, atheist, and other students working, living, eating, cleaning, singing, and even praying together for a free Palestine may not fit his narrative, but it is the reality that UCD staff and students lived from May to June.”
To close, the group said they would continue to “fight for a free Palestine and a campus free from racism, antisemitism and islamophobia”, whilst criticising Mr Sears for “slurring college students from behind a newspaper.”