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New correspondence shows that when Clare wrote to several vice-chancellors on October 11 asking them to report urgently on how to protect students from anti-Semitism and Islamophobia amid escalating hostilities in the Middle East, they planned to increase visible security patrols, monitor social media for signs of protests and work with police.
In the letter, Klein revealed that he had expanded the scope of the campus safety task force to include issues of concern to Jewish students. “The events of the past few days have made this work even more urgent,” he wrote.
Monash University Students claimed last month The school, which had been threatened with expulsion for its involvement in the protests, responded to Clare on October 17, telling the minister that it had warned students against racial slurs and had set up a hotline for students and staff.
The Australian National University, which was forced to relocate the students’ camp last month, said it held regular meetings with student representatives to prevent racial discrimination, met with Jewish students and sent academic advisers to talk to students who felt harassed.
The universities of Melbourne and Sydney have highlighted their anti-racism statements, while the universities of Sydney, UNSW, UTS and Wollongong have stepped up security or set up incident response teams.
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The University of NSW and the University of Wollongong are also working with local police to monitor social media and websites for signs of protest activity or threats.
Western Sydney University said it had worked with police crime prevention and multicultural liaison officers, increased security patrols and introduced daily security reports to identify problem behaviour.
It is also testing responses to scenarios where free speech and safety could conflict and reviewing events scheduled on campus, such as prayer meetings for Muslim students.
But the student protest movement did not take off until this year, when activists set up camp on university campuses. The protests have heightened unease about the legal line between free speech and discrimination. Prompting university presidents to seek clarification from Attorney General Marc Dreyfus On May 9, the question was whether certain phrases such as “revolt” and “from the river to the sea” were permissible.
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The university regulator, the Higher Education Quality and Standards Agency, first wrote to university vice-chancellors on May 10, seven months after the fighting began. It said it was aware of the potential for protests to fall outside the protections of free speech and hamper universities’ ability to teach or conduct research.
The report lists several steps universities must take to keep campuses safe. These include removing illegal “materials” or removing them from their property, taking action against students and faculty who misbehave, strengthening relationships with law enforcement and taking action against outsiders who cause trouble on campus.
“We recognise that events are evolving very rapidly and require ongoing review and adjustment of responses,” the agency’s chief commissioner Peter Coaldrake and chief executive Dr Mary Russell said in the letter.
But Mr Leeser said it was wrong for people to equate anti-Semitism with other forms of racism at a time when anti-Semitism is at its worst in Australia’s history.
“It lends a dangerous tone to our social harmony, suggesting there is a conflict between Jews and Muslims in Australia, when in fact a lot of anti-Semitism is being propagated by the radical socialist left,” he said.
The Human Rights Commission was asked to comment but was not given a chance to view Lisse’s speech before the deadline.
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