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Speaker 1: From the Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.

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Speaker 1: It's Friday, May sixteen, twenty twenty five. Prime Minister Anthony

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Speaker 1: Albanesi is on his way to Rome for Pope Leo's

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Speaker 1: inauguration mass. It's the PM's first overseas trip since being

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Speaker 1: re elected. Slater In Gordon's former Chief people officer, Murrie

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Speaker 1: Ruiz Mathison, is suing for negligence after she was falsely

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Speaker 1: identified as the culprit behind a malicious email attack that

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Speaker 1: revealed the salaries of hundreds of employees. She says the

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Speaker 1: law firm didn't come to her defense quickly enough when

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Speaker 1: the true alleged offender was identified. Those stories alive right

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Speaker 1: now at the Australian dot com AU. Jewish groups are

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Speaker 1: condemning what they say was anti semitism and racism on

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Speaker 1: a university campus after scores of students turned their backs

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Speaker 1: on their Jewish peers during a student meeting. University of

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Speaker 1: Sydney students voted to reject a new definition of antisemitism.

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Speaker 2: Today, how the scenario.

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Speaker 1: Unfolded and what it says about free speech on campus.

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Speaker 1: It's a Wednesday afternoon at Sydney University.

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Speaker 3: Angus.

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Speaker 4: I'm the SRC president for this year.

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Speaker 3: The purpose of this meeting.

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Speaker 1: A couple of hundred students file into Electure Theater for

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Speaker 1: a student General meeting where a protest group, Students Against War,

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Speaker 1: has an important motion to push.

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Speaker 5: And be their ray to vote, gret to fight for

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Speaker 5: palesestign gree to reject the university's new definition of anti

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Speaker 5: semitism that says, a we.

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Speaker 1: Can't criticize Israel or their ties that legitimize it as

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Speaker 1: the genocidal apartheid state. See there, they're angry because the university,

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Speaker 1: led by Vice Chancellor Mark Scott, has and other tertiary

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Speaker 1: institutions in signing up to a federal government endorsed definition

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Speaker 1: of antisemitism. Here's how the ABC reported the definition when

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Speaker 1: it was adopted by Sydney University.

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Speaker 6: The definition says that calling for the elimination of the

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Speaker 6: State of Israel is anti semitic, as is holding Jewish

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Speaker 6: individuals responsible for actions taken by the State of Israel.

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Speaker 6: The definition also says that criticizing Zionists people who support

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Speaker 6: the creation of the State of Israel may also be

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Speaker 6: anti semitic. Now that's a criticism.

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Speaker 1: One of the students leading the meeting set out the

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Speaker 1: ground rules.

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Speaker 4: All speakers will be heard in silence.

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Speaker 7: If you are not happy with what somebody is saying,

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Speaker 7: do you not helple, do not shout, you just be silent.

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Speaker 4: You ignore them.

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Speaker 7: I will accept people standing up and turning their back

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Speaker 7: on the speaker.

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Speaker 2: I will not accept jurian I will not expect shouting.

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Speaker 1: Pointing, and then student angus dermody from students against war

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Speaker 1: stood up so on that I.

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Speaker 5: Call the mover of the fire motions angustimotive.

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Speaker 8: Answer ticking out of this meeting. It's a very very

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Speaker 8: important meeting. So it's really good that we have hit

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Speaker 8: the quorum. Then there are two hundred of.

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Speaker 4: Us, see it. We're here.

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Speaker 8: And because for the past year and a half Israel

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Speaker 8: has committed a relentless order in Gaza, there is no

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Speaker 8: question that Israel is guilty of genocide in his children.

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Speaker 1: Thomas Henry is a journalist with The Australian and he

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Speaker 1: was at the meeting.

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Speaker 5: It was a real mixed bag. You have people who

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Speaker 5: have just left class and a jeans and a T shirt.

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Speaker 5: Then you have more members of the Socialist Alternative in

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Speaker 5: their Kafirs and in Berets.

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Speaker 2: Here's angus dermity again.

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Speaker 8: Israel has no right to exist in Every student should

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Speaker 8: be able to say that without fear of suspension or

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Speaker 8: disciplinary action.

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Speaker 2: Another student vieve, can't you stood up?

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Speaker 7: This is not a war, this is not a conflict.

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Speaker 2: This is a genocide.

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Speaker 7: This new anti semitism definition has nothing to do with

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Speaker 7: combating racism or predicting Jewish students use in management used

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Speaker 7: this policy to threaten to suspend a transgender Starlum's Eco student, Luna,

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Speaker 7: which put her at risk of deportation for the crime

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Speaker 7: and writing from the River to the Sea on a.

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Speaker 8: Whiteboard with a non whiteboard marker.

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Speaker 1: And then two Jewish students stood up to speak defending

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Speaker 1: the definition of antisemitism is okay.

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Speaker 4: Look, I'm here as a representative of Forges, the Australasian

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Speaker 4: of Jewish Students.

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Speaker 2: This is an undergraduate called Jack Mars.

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Speaker 4: I just want to point out as well, I don't

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Speaker 4: really want to be here. Jewish students have undeniable experience

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Speaker 4: a horrific rise in antisemitism on our cannuis. I don't

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Speaker 4: think anyone here is really trying to deny that that's

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Speaker 4: not what this meeting is abouts.

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Speaker 5: It appeared as though he hadn't prepared as much as

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Speaker 5: the other speakers. He was kind of speaking from experience,

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Speaker 5: speaking from how he and presumably the Jewish students he represented,

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Speaker 5: feel about campus safety and about anti Semitism on campus.

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Speaker 4: Some of the experiences that I've been pretty to are

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Speaker 4: you know, the physical, they're violent, they're polittaling because someone's

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Speaker 4: identified the Jewish, who's had religious icons ripped from people's

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Speaker 4: university dawns. So there's no real denying there's a problem

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Speaker 4: on campus here. This was an attempt. The definition was

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Speaker 4: an attempt to solve that problem. Right, you want to

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Speaker 4: criticize Israel, go for your life, all right. I'm half Israeli,

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Speaker 4: my dad's born in Israel, I have family in Israel.

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Speaker 4: I've been to Israel twice. Criticizing Israel is a national

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Speaker 4: pastime in Israel. All right, Look at the hundreds of

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Speaker 4: thousands of Israelis that do it. Okay. This definition does

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Speaker 4: not stop you from criticizing Israel.

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Speaker 2: It does stop you.

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Speaker 4: From using anti Semitic trucks when.

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Speaker 2: You do that.

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Speaker 4: Okay. The only way you know how to criticize Israel

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Speaker 4: is by using Holocaust inversion, by using Nazi rhetoric, by

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Speaker 4: using cartoons with trucks in them, or by calling for

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Speaker 4: the entire elimination of the state. I'm sorry, you're not

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Speaker 4: interested in criticizing Israeli policy. You're not interested in criticizing

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Speaker 4: living and Yahoo.

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Speaker 8: You're interested in.

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Speaker 4: Making Jews feel unsafe. You're interested in vilifying the head.

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Speaker 4: So you know, John your life, criticized the policy, criticized

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Speaker 4: the government, But calling for the complete destruction of a country,

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Speaker 4: I don't think that's legitimate.

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Speaker 5: The room heard both Jewish speakers quite respectfully speak on

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Speaker 5: the first motion. It then got to the second motion,

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Speaker 5: which was on a call for a single secular state

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Speaker 5: across all of historic Palestine. Members of the crowd progressively

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Speaker 5: stood up. It wasn't all at once, but the large

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Speaker 5: majority of the crowd stood up when a postgraduate Jewish

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Speaker 5: student condemned Harmas and made comments about Gaza lacking any

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Speaker 5: sort of democratic process. The majority of students by this

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Speaker 5: had stood up and turned their backs, and some were

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Speaker 5: chatting where their friends. Others were dancing. It was a

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Speaker 5: very clear sign that they did not agree and did

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Speaker 5: not have respect for the speaker. It was a clear

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Speaker 5: indication that what this Jewish Israeli postgraduate student was saying

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Speaker 5: was completely unpalatable.

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Speaker 1: Coming up how students at this elite tertiary institution voted

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Speaker 1: after hearing the pleas of Jewish students. All this, of course,

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Speaker 1: arose after October seven, twenty twenty three, when Hamas militants

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Speaker 1: swarmed into Israel and murdered and raped civilians and soldiers

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Speaker 1: and took hundreds more hostage. Israel, in response, began a

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Speaker 1: fearsome military attack by land and air on Gaza with

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Speaker 1: the aim of eliminating Hamas leadership. It's been bloody and dispiriting,

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Speaker 1: and here in Australia the controversy has manifested in street protests,

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Speaker 1: encampments at universities including Sydney, and deep fear in the

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Speaker 1: Jewish community about a rising tide of antisemitism. At the

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Speaker 1: meeting on Wednesday, Pro Palestine speakers invoked Jewish people, saying

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Speaker 1: even many Jews disagreed with the very existence of Israel.

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Speaker 7: The way that they managed to convince so many.

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Speaker 6: Jewish people to flee to Israel after the horrific Holocaust

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Speaker 6: was to fear among.

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Speaker 7: Them that they would never be safe anywhere else, and

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Speaker 7: how is that not anti Semitic that the founder of

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Speaker 7: political Zionism were saying that fundamentally.

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Speaker 8: Jewish people are not like the rest of them, are

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Speaker 8: not like people who are not Jewish, and thus they

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Speaker 8: will never be.

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Speaker 2: Safe with them.

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Speaker 1: They argue, to be anti Zionist, that is, to reject

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Speaker 1: Israel's right to exist, is not the same as to

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Speaker 1: be anti Semitic, that is, to hate Jews. One of

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Speaker 1: the Jewish speakers at the meeting took issue with this.

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Speaker 3: Anti Designism currently takes all of the evils of the world,

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Speaker 3: like colonialism, white supremacy, and genocide and projects them.

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Speaker 4: Onto the Jewish people.

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Speaker 3: This has been done throughout history, whether during the Black

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Speaker 3: Death in the fourteenth century or during the economic downturn

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Speaker 3: in the nineteen twenties in Germany. The Jews were always

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Speaker 3: to blame. If you are not part of the Jewish community,

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Speaker 3: you should stop and take a moment to consider why

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Speaker 3: is that you deserve a louder voice, if any, On

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Speaker 3: the topic of defining what is or isn't anti Semitism.

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Speaker 5: All five motions passed virtually unanimously. The small group of

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Speaker 5: Jewish students who were there really voted against. Saw all

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Speaker 5: motions passed virtually with no opposition, Please raise the first

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Speaker 5: of which was to reject the new definition of anti

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Speaker 5: Semitism adopted by Australian universities. The second was to endorse

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Speaker 5: the call for a single secular democratic state across all

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Speaker 5: of historic Palestine, and the third was for USID to

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Speaker 5: end its complicity in Israel's apathead regime, which basically entails

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Speaker 5: cutting tires with universities in Israel and weapons companies which

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Speaker 5: they deem to have a hand in the conflict between

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Speaker 5: Palestine and Israel. The other two motions were related to

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Speaker 5: a new camps access policy that USID has committed to,

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Speaker 5: which they view inhibits on their right to protest. And

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Speaker 5: then the final motion was a demand that the university

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Speaker 5: financially provide resources to support the previous motion past.

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Speaker 1: I think all of us have been to UNI, have

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Speaker 1: been at a few meetings where there are lofty demands

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Speaker 1: being made by a protest group. Is Sydney UNI in

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Speaker 1: any way required to this stance taken by the students.

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Speaker 8: No.

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Speaker 5: I think the university has generally been very dismissive of

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Speaker 5: the sc and its demands. I think its view is

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Speaker 5: that the Student Representative Council is actually representative of a

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Speaker 5: very small part of the student body. Previously, they've distanced

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Speaker 5: themselves from statements made by the SRC. I don't think

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Speaker 5: this obliges the university to do anything at all.

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Speaker 1: You spoke to some of the Jewish community groups, what

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Speaker 1: have they had to say?

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Speaker 5: They viewed the material leading up to this student meeting

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Speaker 5: and the meeting itself as pretty open examples of anti

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Speaker 5: Semitism on campus, and they think this is a perfect

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Speaker 5: example of why the definition for anti Semitism is needed

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Speaker 5: and why Jewish students on campus feel so unsafe.

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Speaker 1: Thomas Henry is a journalist with The Australian. You can

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Speaker 1: read his story and all our coverage of Israel, Gaza,

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Speaker 1: anti Semitism and more right now at the Australian dot

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Speaker 1: com dot au