A loosely knit collection of student pro-Palestinian chapters gathered for its first national conference.
The three-day conference at Columbia University ended Oct. 16. It was restricted to members of Students for Justice in Palestine, one of the more active pro-Palestinian campus groups. Media were not allowed to cover the event.
The SJP was founded in 2001 at U.C. Berkeley, and has spread to 75 campus chapters.
In a report released this month on anti-Israel campus trends, the Anti-Defamation League called SJP “the primary organizer of anti-Israel events on campus.”
According to the conference website, the event focused on developing coordination between student groups supporting BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) and building skill sets for activists.
SJP is one of the largest proponents of the BDS campaign on campus but thus far has met with limited success. Nonetheless, critics voiced concern that an organized SJP might be more troubling, according to the Forward. — jta