Students protest what they say is sports center's racist policy

Dozens of students demonstrated at Hebrew University in Jerusalem on Thursday to protest the Lerner Sports Center's refusal to allow non-student Arabs to obtain memberships.

The sports center is intended to serve students and staff at Hebrew University.

However, a Channel 10 TV news footage revealed that Jews who were not affiliated with the university were allowed to obtain memberships while Arabs not affiliated with the university were turned away.

Some 30 Hebrew University students took part in the protest, which was organized by Meretz-Yahad Youth. Students from Tel Aviv also traveled up to Jerusalem took part in the protest.

"This is an apartheid pool," Meretz-Yahad Youth Chairman Uri Zaki said. He said the protesters were boycotting the pool and called on those arriving at the center not to swim in a "racist pool." They also organized a petition calling for a boycott of the pool.

The sports center is managed by a foundation affiliated with the university.

"The Lerner Sports Center is meant to serve - first and foremost - the university community: students, staff and alumni," the university spokeswoman said Thursday.

The university said discrimination against Arabs at the sports center in neither a written nor official policy.

"The sports center does not have a discriminatory policy when it comes to new memberships of students or outside individuals. Many people have sports center memberships - Jews and Arabs together," the university said.

Hebrew University said it was looking into the Channel 10 investigative report.

But in an interview broadcasted Thursday on Channel 10 a former employee at the center said the discriminatory policy came at the instruction of the center's management.

According to the woman, employees were told to politely reject membership applications of Arabs by telling them the membership quota had been filled or that only university students and staff can become members.

The Abraham Fund condemned the apparent discrimination at the sports center and said "the source of this racist policy must be examined."

	Sstudents protesting outside Hebrew University's sports center in Jerusalem on Thursday. (Limor Mizrahi/Baubau)