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By: TJVNews.com
There are growing doubts about claims by an anti-Israel college professor that she was the victim of police violence at a protest in Dallas earlier this year.
The controversy concerns allegations made by Prof. Anne Gray Fischer about what took place at the pro-Hamas tent protest that took place at the University of Texas at Dallas on May 1.
Fischer, who teaches gender history at UT Dallas, wrote on a message board of the American Historical Association that she “experienced violence” at the hands of the police at the protest.
A&H Prof. Anne Gray Fischer’s essay “Police Sexual Violence Is Hidden in Plain Sight” was published recently in the Boston Review! https://t.co/dARdkkaGDC pic.twitter.com/3fn0xlc3QL
— Bass School at UT Dallas (@UTDallasArts) August 11, 2020
Chief Brent Tourangeau, spokesman for the UT-Dallas Police Department, told The Jewish Voice that his department “has not received any complaints” about the behavior of the police at the May 1 tent encampment. He also said Prof. Fischer was not among the twenty-one protesters who were arrested for trespassing that day.
Tyler Owen, spokesperson for the Texas Municipal Police Association, said that the association has not been informed of any accusations of police violence or disciplinary hearings against any officers in connection with the UT-Dallas protest. Regarding Prof. Fischer’s claim of violence, Owen told The Jewish Voice: “If she made a statement that is misleading or false, she should retract it.”
UT Dallas charges its own students $8K to respond to a public records request concerning the university’s handling of pro-Palestinian protests.
⬇️⬇️ https://t.co/Ack3Bg450n— Texas Conference of the AAUP (@TexasAaup) July 25, 2024
Owen said “it’s disturbing if anybody makes a false claim against police officers,” since “every single day, law enforcement officials throughout the state risk their lives to protect our citizens and their freedoms.”
Prof. Fischer’s colleague Ben Wright, a history professor at UT-Dallas, was among the 21 protesters arrested for trespassing when they refused police requests to dismantle the unauthorized encampment. Wright’s published account made no claims of violence by the police. In a detailed essay about his experience for D, an online magazine, Wright complained that the police van was “un-air conditioned,” but he did not mention any police violence occurring at the protest.
News media accounts of the episode likewise made no reference to any violence by the police.
The Jewish Voice has asked Prof. Fischer for clarification, but she has not responded.
A prominent Dallas rabbi, Bentzi Epstein, told The Jewish Voice that he has been an observer at many local pro-Hamas rallies, including the May 1 episode, “and I have never seen anything even remotely resembling police violence against the protesters.” On the contrary, he said, “some of the Hamas supporters have engaged in violence, such as throwing bottles at the police.”
“If Prof. Fischer can’t provide evidence that she ‘experienced violence’ by the police, she should withdraw her accusation,” Rabbi Epstein said. “I personally find it difficult to believe that they behaved violently, because in all my interactions with police officers in Dallas, they have been absolutely wonderful—respectful and professional.”
Rabbi Epstein heads a Jewish outreach center in Dallas known as TORCH, where many UT Dallas students go for classes or Shabbat meals.
The rabbi said he was “deeply concerned” that some UT Dallas professors have taken part in protests which either directly or indirectly justified the October 7 atrocities. He said their participation in such rallies was “giving legitimacy to anti-Jewish hatred,” reminding him of professors in Nazi Germany who used their positions “to spread horrific lies against Jews.”
Rabbi Epstein said he was “very troubled” by the activities of American “enablers” who sympathize with Hamas. He cited a Talmudic saying about how when a mouse grabs a piece of food, our concern should focus on “the person who made the hole in the wall, which is what let the mouse get in.”
The rabbi said it was not a coincidence that in recent months when there have been pro-Hamas rallies in Dallas, there has also been an increase in antisemitism in the area. “I myself have been the target of antisemitic hate mail,” he said. “And these rallies, which promote classic anti-Jewish stereotypes, are giving encouragement to these terrible trends.”
The Jewish Voice asked James Grossman, executive director of the American Historical Association, which posted Prof. Fischer’s allegation, for his comment on the episode. Grossman did not respond.
Much of Prof. Fischer’s work focuses on allegations of police misbehavior. She earned her Ph.D. at Brown University in 2018 with a dissertation titled “Arrestable Behavior: Women, Police Power, and the Making of Law-and-Order America.” The image on Prof. Fischer’s home page is a grainy black and white photograph of a somewhat menacing police officer approaching a woman on a darkened street.
