A series of anti-Semitic Facebook comments posted by an undergraduate student at the University of California at Los Angeles have sparked outrage on campus, leading a school official to condemn the statements in an email to students.
The UCLA Daily Bruin reported that the student posted the comments to the Facebook page of Jewish actress Mayim Bialik, who is an alumna of UCLA. The rant included multiple disparaging comments about Jewish individuals, including a reference to Jewish people as "troglodyte albino monsters of cultural destruction."
Students Supporting Israel at UCLA, a pro-Israel group at the university, expressed outrage at the comments, which eventually led UCLA’s vice chancellor for student affairs Janina Montero to issue a statement to the community last week.
"The hurtful and offensive comments displayed ignorance of the history and racial diversity of the Jewish people. Bigotry against the Jewish people or other groups is abhorrent and does not represent the values of UCLA or the beliefs of our community," Montero wrote in the email to students.
"UCLA remains proud of the ethnic, racial, religious and cultural diversity of our campus. Sustaining such a diverse community is possible only if we treat each other with compassion and resist the temptation to stereotype or belittle those who may be different."
Students Supporting Israel called the letter from Montero a "step in the right direction" in a Facebook post last week but argued it fell short of "mak[ing] the link between demonizing Israel, the Jewish homeland, and demonizing Jewish Students on campus."
The Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA also called the anti-Semitic comments "reprehensible" in a letter to Students Supporting Israel, echoing the statement made by Montero. The student who wrote the comments allegedly held a work-study position in the University Health System.
UCLA spokesman Ricardo Vazquez said that the public university would not discipline the student because of the individual’s right to free speech. He also said the school will work to prevent similar incidents in the future.