Calling Criticism of Israel “Anti Semitic” Is
Challenged as a Way to Silence Free Speech
Allan C. Brownfeld, Editor
Special Interest Report
August 2016
There is a campaign on campuses across the country to silence criticism of
Israel as “anti-Semitic,” particularly the advocacy of boycott, sanctions
and disinvestment (BDS).
At the University of California, a single right-wing Jewish group, Amoha
Initiative, called on the university to condemn all forms of opposition to
Zionism. One of the group’s founders, Rossman Benjamin, said: “BDS is in
virtually all its aspects anti-Semitic.” At the City University of New York
(CUNY), the Zionist Organization of America made the same argument.
In fact, argues Eric Alterman, professor of English and journalism at
Brooklyn College and a strong opponent of BDS, the movement calling for BDS
“… is filled with young Jews. The pro-boycott group Jewish Voice for Peace
is perhaps the fastest growing Jewish organization on campus nationwide. And
many liberal Zionists share the movement’s complaints about the brutality
and self-defeating nature of Israel’s nearly 50-year occupation, even if
they believe BDS language and tactics to be counterproductive to the goal of
a peaceful two state solution.”
In an article, “Free Speech, Even If It’s Obnoxious,” in The New York Times
(March 29, 2016), Alterman states: “I’ve never heard a single anti-Semitic
syllable on any CUNY campus in the dozen years I’ve been on the faculty. My
classes on Jewish history and culture discuss extremely delicate questions
of Jewish identity without anyone, Jew or gentile, evincing the slightest
discernible discomfort … The notion that politicians can demand that a
university prohibit certain types of political speech it finds distasteful
by threatening its funding not only makes martyrs of those whom it seeks to
silence, it also bespeaks a lack of confidence both in its own beliefs and
in the value of reason itself.”
In March, the University of California Board of Regents adopted a set of
principles that condemned anti-Semitism. But it rejected the demand that all
opposition to Zionism be condemned. Pro-Palestinian groups complained that
this was designed to stifle opposition to Israel’s policies. Dima Khalidi,
the director of Palestine Legal, an advocacy group, said that pro-Israeli
groups had “succeeded in convincing the regents that Palestine advocacy is
inherently anti-Semitic and should be condemned. It’s very clear that they
have as a goal a restriction on political speech criticizing Israel and its
policies.”
Naomi Dann, media coordinator for Jewish Voice for Peace, says that, “As a
recent graduate of Vassar College … I work daily with the growing number of
Jewish students who see the BDS movement as the most effective way to shift
the conversation from a debate over whether or not Israel’s nearly 50-year
military occupation is a moral problem to one that centers on Palestinian
rights to freedom and equality. … For many anti-Zionists, opposing the
ideology that led to a state that privileges Jewish lives at the expense of
Palestinians is an anti-racist position based on the value of equality for
all people.” (The New York Times, April 1, 2016).
Jewish Voice for Peace endorses the call by Palestinians for BDS until
Israel abides by international law. It states: “We reject the idea that BDS
is inherently anti-Semitic and defend activists who employ the full range of
BDS tactics when they are demonized and wrongly accused of anti-Semitism. We
believe BDS is a meaningful alternative to passivity engendered by two
decades of failed peace talks and is the most effective grassroots means for
applying nonviolent pressure to change Israel’s policies.”
There is some sympathy in Israel for a boycott of products from the occupied
territories. Israeli peace activist Uri Avnery and his group, Gush Shalom,
have published a list of products made in areas beyond the Green Line.
Israeli politician, Zehava Gal-Oh, head of the Meretz opposition party, said
that while she opposes international boycott efforts against Israel as a
whole, she refrains from consuming settler products since there “must be a
price for the occupation.”
Whatever one thinks of the BDS movement, it enjoys widespread Jewish
support, making charges of “anti-Semitism” seem a tactic to silence open
debate. •
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