Today, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg became the latest to weigh in on the issue of allowing college campuses to be used as venues for promotion of the BDS campaign against Israel. Bloomberg, who touts himself as one of the greatest supporters of Israel in New York, claimed that those who condemned the decision of the political science department at the city’s Brooklyn College were, in effect, enemies of free speech. According to the New York Observer, Bloomberg said the following:
“I couldn’t disagree more violently with BDS,” Mr. Bloomberg explained. “As you know, I’m a big supporter of Israel–as big of a one as I think you can find in the city. But I could also not agree more strongly with an academic department’s right to sponsor a forum on any topic that they choose. If you want to go to a university where the government decides what kind of subjects are fit for discussion, I suggest you apply to a school in North Korea.”
But contrary to the mayor’s typically highhanded formulation, this is not a free speech issue. Using a public university to promote hate speech in which the one Jewish state in the world is hypocritically singled out for isolation and destruction is not a matter of tolerating a diversity of views. What is so frustrating about the debate about BDS is the willingness of even those who do not support it to treat as a merely one among many defensible views about the Middle East or, as the New York Times referred to it in an editorial on the subject yesterday, a question of academic freedom whose advocates do not deserve to be spoken of harshly. As I wrote last week about a related controversy at Harvard, the BDS movement is not motivated by disagreement with specific Israeli policies or the issue of West Bank settlements. It is an economic war waged to destroy the Jewish state and is morally indistinguishable from more traditional forms of anti-Semitism that do not disguise themselves in the fancy dress of academic discourse.
As Yair Rosenberg noted today in Tablet, the BDS movement has as its declared goal Israel’s destruction via implementation of the Palestinian “right of return.” This is consistent with their overall rejection of Israel’s right to exist as a separate Jewish state and their opposition to any means of self-defense against Palestinian terrorism.
It needs to be understood that those who take such a position are, in effect, denying the Jewish people the same right of self-determination that they support for every other nation on the planet. That is a textbook definition of bias and such bias when used against Jews is called anti-Semitism. That is why the various members of the City Council and New York State legislature who have spoken out on this issue are right to try to exert pressure on Brooklyn College to cancel the event and the Times and Bloomberg are wrong to defend the decision to uphold it.
Were Brooklyn College or any other state institution to hold a conference whose purpose was to oppose integration or the rights of African-Americans with academics who support the agenda of the Ku Klux Klan, there would be no question that this would be considered beyond the pale rather than free speech that deserved defense. The same standard should apply to those who wish to destroy Israel by waging economic warfare on it and its citizens.
Mayor Bloomberg is also wrong that opponents of BDS do their cause a disservice when they attack those who wish to appropriate college campuses for this cause. Rather than treat the BDS movement as an unfortunate but tolerable eruption of anti-Israel agitation or mere dissent about the settlements, it must be labeled for what it is: a hateful movement based in prejudice whose agenda serves the cause of those who wage violent war against the Jewish people. BDS advocates crave the legitimacy that events such as the Brooklyn College event affords them since it allows them to emerge from the fever swamps of the far left where they normally reside.
One may debate Israel’s policies or those of any nation (though it is fair to note that BDS supporters are uninterested in human rights except as that phrase can be manipulated to bolster their war on Israel), but a movement based in denying Jewish rights is anti-Semitism no matter how high-minded its supporters and its useful idiot enablers pretend it to be. Those who cannot draw a line between BDS and legitimate debate are defending hate speech, not free speech.
"Were Brooklyn College or any other state institution to hold a conference whose purpose was to oppose integration or the rights of African-Americans with academics who support the agenda of the Ku Klux Klan, there would be no question that this would be considered beyond the pale rather than free speech that deserved defense." n nKKK, nothing. Watch what would happen if a conservative group had a conference on Ann Coulter's latest book.
THE conference to have at Brooklyn College – and invite Mayor Bloomberg to attend. Invite Itamar Marcus of Palestinian Media Watch to make his presentation of what the so-called "moderate" PA/PLO/Fatah/Abbas tell its own people ve what it tells the US/West: in its own words its narrative of genocidal anti-Semitism, terror advocacy and adulation of terrorists and delegitimizing Israel's right to exist by teaching that there is NO Jewish history in the land – even Jerusalem is claimed to be exclusively Palestinian. n nJust watch how the campus jihadis react to such an event. They shout down every truth-about-PA event, shout down anyone who tells the real history of the region and the conflict. Check out the web site Palestinian Media Watch and invite the organization to make a presentation at your local campus, beginning with Brooklyn College. Watch how quickly people, including Bloomberg become ashamed to say they ever gave BDS a pass. Or take out an ad in your local college paper (beginning with Brooklyn College) directing all to the Palestinian Media Watch web site. Then on to the Jewish community press. Nothing like Team PA/Abbas in its own words for people to see the light.
Lord protect us from the likes of Bloomberg. n nMore 'we're better than that' crap and inanity, that historically only ever resulted in dead Jews
Fine. We need to mount an effort to have a conference discussing whether black slavery was all that bad or even whether it happened at all or to the extent it's said to today. If everything is up for grabs, so be it. And since it's a college campus we need to mount a campaign to have a conference on whether Gays should be exterminated or at least put in concentration camps and another to discuss whether women's right to vote needs to finally be repealed or even whether women are indeed chattel property or not. And none of those three conferences can be allowed to have presentations or attendance by blacks, gays and women, respectively. n nI am a 100% in favor of absolutely unlimited free speech on those terms.
n nI think Bloomberg is caught in a bind. He doesn't know if he should be a WASP, or a yenta. n nSo he splits the difference and ends up being detestable. n n
well said n n:-)
Mayor Mike: “As you know, I’m a big supporter of Israel–as big of a one as I think you can find in the city…." n nReally? Did Mort Zuckerman suddenly die? n nCan you see Jerusalem from your home in Bermuda? n nSorry, was just thinking this afternoon of how miserable he has made life for most New Yorkers, and now this? n n n
[continued] nIn a letter to the school's president, Williams wrote that he believed strongly in the First Amendment, but was concerned that both sides of the issue were not being included. n n"I support the views that have been expressed by my fellow alumnus Alan Dershowitz in this matter," Williams wrote. n nWilliams said he wanted to see "both sides of this hot-button matter to be discussed with equity, preferably in the same forum. If that cannot be accomplished, I urge the removal of the department’s sponsorship of this event." "
homeless people eating a diet too high in salt? children exposed to the dangers of 16-oz Cokes? THAT'S the kind of stuff that makes Bloomberg mad. organized Jew-hatred? not so much. n nthis reminds me of all the preening over the GZ mosque–see how tolerant we are! how enlightened! PLEASE, come build your mosque on top of the graves of 3,000 innocent people killed by Muslims; we don't mind–in fact, we encourage it! n nwe fancy that we're somehow showing the Islamic world how admirable we are. unfortunately, that's not the message they're getting.
horsespit about hate speech is truly Tobin sucking sap, sadly.
Thoughtful commenters from this person NEVER. (Can anyone point to a substantive comment this individual has ever contributed to these threads?)
Does anyone know the details of this BDS event? The reports I have seen don't go into them. n nWho are to be the speakers other than the execrable Judith Butler? Are members of the CUNY political science department participating, and if so, how? What exactly does it mean for that academic department to be co-sponsoring it, is it something other than an endorsement of this political attack on the Jewish state? Who are the other "co-sponsors," since there must be one or more, mustn't there? Is there anything to give it even the veneer of something "academic," that is involving scholarship, or is it 110% partisan politics, and unequivocally anti-Israel? Any anti-BDS people invited to participate? n nHow long will the event go on? What school facilities and resources will be used, and is the school to be paid for those, or is this to be an in-kind contribution by this public institution to the BDS cause? How will it differ from a political rally? Has the CUNY political science department expressed itself as an academic department in so clearly a partisan way before? n nI think those details are important to know.
The Nation just posted Judith Butler's prepared remarks online, but I can not bear to post the URL here because the universe could collapse with the colliding electrons. nShe says Omar Barghouti is main speaker. n nnot reading more. n nprefer wondering who paid for Hagel's speeches.
The BDS event, based on propaganda & lies and a one sided view (as those with another view are not invited), it's called a 'hate fest and should be allowed! n nInstead of moaning & protesting, organize big events based on facts & truth! n nSome truth & facts about the 'so called Palestinians & where they came from! What is their history? Who where their leaders? Why do they claim historic rights if they don't have a history as a people? Show some papers that they own the land they claim! The Arab denial of thousands of years of Jewish history & presence in the holy Land! Why are Arab Palestinians & their offspring still held hostage by the UNWRA, paid by Arabs & int. community as eternal refugee? Why is it the 'reason of living for the Arabs & Palestinians to get Israel of the planet? etc.etc.etc. n nThe right to 'freedom of speech works both ways. The right to 'freedom of lies only for the Arab Palestinians & their sponsors .
what a load of pissy little ghetto gossip. n nhow dare you call yourself a goyishe name such as charleston.
Thank you, that was helpful. There are still details I would like to have, but the most important were addressed, those being about the involvement of the political science department. I agree with the second position outlined, which focuses upon the "endorsement" by that department, though I am certainly sympathetic to the third one. n nDoes Brooklyn College have a Hillel? Why don't they or some other student organization, most likely but not necessarily a Jewish one, respond by inviting anti-BDS speakers to campus and asking the political science department to "endorse" their program? Then beat the drums to turn out those opposed to the BDS movement? If the political science department declined to endorse an anti-BDS program, then their "partisanship" would be undeniable and how serious was their abuse of "academic freedom." n n
The BDS movement is odious and misrepresents itself. The political environment on campuses is often intolerant and hypocritical in its own views of free and/or tolerated speech. The treatment of Israel on campuses is frequently one-sided, often unfair and often exhibits varying indicia of anti-Semitic beliefs. The hijacking of public money to subsidize politicized sinecures of indiscernable academic value in colleges is wasteful and wrong. Bloomberg is a posturing , would-be autocrat with certain bizarre obsessions. All true. n The question, however, is whether the BDS event should be permitted or not. Call it out . Protest the bias. Discuss its obvious flaws. Question the on-going value of the department and its curricula. Protest the use of resources for this purpose. The idea , however, of shutting it down as nimpermissible speech, however, is exceedingly dangerous and I think religious and political minorities in particular espouse it only at their own great peril.
A sensitive young black girl, a Gentile, from New Orleans named Chloe Simone Valdary (Haitian?) has shown more verve, guts, brains, loyalty in this degrading BDS affair than most of the Jews in NYC put together– from the progeny of the red diaper baby yidlach at brooklyn college who love to hate Israel to the busy cosmopolitan intellectuals of Park Slope to the Williamsburg Satmar ghetto types all the way to mr. moneybags, bluster blumberg . Read her comments in the Jewish Press, e.g. She's beautiful! Too bad, truly too bad, that the JDL is dead and the great Rabbi Meir Kahane was assassinated. What entities do Jews today have to "defend" themselves against defamation? Oh, the Anti-Defamation League you say? Surely you jest, everyone knows the ADL is a fat bureaucratic wasteland more interested in some isolated skinhead or homophobe than in big current threats to Jews, i.e., 1) the hard left and 2) the Islamists– and 3) their liberal defenders who yell racist! or McCarthyite! if one raises objections to 1 and 2.
philfromboston: Chloe Simone Valdary is probably NOT Haitian. The USA bought New Orleans from France (Louisiana Purchase), and there was already a free black/Creole population in NoLa two hundred years ago, including some immigrants from Haiti after their slave rebellion, one of the reasons Napoleon sold to T Jefferson. n nNot that Ms. Valdary should ever be mentioned in same sentence as Kahane, or the rest of your nasty words about the various Jewish communities in Brooklyn. – what? no nasty words about Borough Park? n nMs. Valdary is lucky – she has no professors who went to Harvard, source of the 'evil colonial' narrative in CUNY classrooms, based on my experience at CUNY, which was due to the arrival of a wonderful history professor from Harvard, wonderful except for his clinging to the evils of all colonialism. n nBoston is far worse than New York City in their academic power to push the palestinian narrative.
This was not a forum to discuss ideas; it was advocacy to push a political agenda. The College may provide secure space for it. It should not sponser it.