How the Jews control the campuses of American universities
Baba耑ey the Turk
http://www.counterpunch.org/youmans0922.html
"Campus Watch: The Vigilante Thought Police"
by Will Youmans
A Philadelphia-based pro-Israeli organization with the seemingly innocuous
name, the Middle East Forum, began a website to monitor US college campuses
for academic pro-Palestinian bias and happenings. Campus-Watch (http://www.campus-watch.org)
publishes dossiers on professors, as well as some examples of their writings.
It describes itself as a group of "highly qualified American academics that
have banded together in defense of US interests on campus, which includes
the continued support of Israel." This statement is misleading since all
the content of the website centers on criticism of Israel and concerns no
other supposed "US interest." That would be like the pro-Israeli lobby group
AIPAC stating as its mission "to bring more American support for the countries
of the world, including Israel."
Part of "the problem" they are confronting is that sectors of academia "reject
the enduring policies of the U.S. government." How odd, professors disagreeing
with the government? I thought academics were supposed to be hired based
on the extent of their agreement with the government!
While the website dresses their monitoring as a purely academic exercise,
it generates hostile phone calls and e-mails to listed professors and their
families, as a profiled academic told me. Not only is this website inflammatory,
but it clearly seeks to bring political pressure to bear on the professors
and institutions. Under the guise of keeping the public informed, they are
trying to force professors who do not share their unquestioning support for
Israel to be silent.
It does not engage their views in an attempt to change their minds; it merely
offers a public file on individuals and institutions. The Middle East Forum
seeks to create such a backlash that will force them into keeping their opinions
to themselves.
Campus-Watch encourages students to snitch on their professors. It has a
whole section dedicated to student reports. Campus-Watch is essentially forming
a paramilitary thought police, a private TIPS program for pro-Israeli advocates.
What the site omits is more interesting than its transparent goal to quiet
public expression of support for the Palestinian cause. .
Oddly, it only has 8 professors and 14 institutions profiled right now. This
is a miniscule proportion given that over 400 faculty members have signed
petitions calling for divestment from Israel at the University of California,
Princeton, Harvard, and M.I.T. Even one of the founders, Martin Kramer, admitted
to the Chronicle of Higher Education that "the list [of professors] is actually
too short."
The brevity of the list of dossiers is intentional in order to isolate the
few chosen ones and depict them as anomalies. The list is not short because
each dossier requires difficult research. These are essentially Google dossiers,
and would involve about 15 minutes of labor. The point is not to substantiate
criticism of the given professor's work, but to lay out the targets for pressure.
If they find that Campus-Watch is successful, they will be strategic and
calculating about who and when they add dossiers.
After Snehal Shingavi announced his class on "The Politics and Poetics of
Palestinian Resistance," the University received several thousand calls,
e-mails and letters. Donors also withheld their contributions. What Campus-Watch
seeks to do is to arm and direct similar campaigns. A list of even half of
the Palestinian sympathizers on campuses would present academic institution
lobbyists with too broad of a base to start with.
Interestingly, none of the featured professors are recognizably Jewish, while
some of the most prominent critics of Israel are. The majority of the faculty
they aim to expose are of Middle Eastern and South Asian descent. I suspect
that Campus-Watch is engaging in a bit of race-baiting. This complements
the stereotype that critics of Israel are foreigners and anti-Semitic, and
that support for Israel is in "US interests." Including dossiers on Jewish
professors such as Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelsetin, and Joel Beinin would
be inconsistent with the site's insinuations.
Despite the fear the targeted professors and their families now have to face
from the organized hostility this site invites, there is something I like
about it. It proves that academic freedom and debate are not particularly
valued at the Middle East Forum and by the pro-Israeli zealots who are accustomed
to their opponents having no institutionalized avenues of expression in this
country. They are responding like the spoiled child whose candy has been
taken away.
Why are they so afraid of differing opinions that they must file and chronicle
those who hold them? This is a response to their insecurity in the midst
of a gradual withering away of the efficacy of Israel's propaganda. I feel
bad for the crusading defenders of Israel, they have no factual basis for
their positions, so they have to resort to these kind of low tactics.
What can activists do about this cyber-idiocy?
Activists should inundate the site with reports. Our goal should be to have
more information, more professors, more institutions. Every utterance of
criticism of Israel should be sent to them. First, they may not be able to
handle to flow of information logistically speaking. Second, if they actually
add more information it will undermine their project. If many professors
are on there, it may actually become apparent that there are some independent
logical and moral bases for their positions, despite the dismissive tone
of the website.
Professors should send dossier information to them and ask to be included.
It not only will show solidarity with those who are profiled, but it will
give proof that they are trying to focus pressure on certain targets rather
than do what their mission states.
For now, I am pursuing my own activism against it. I decided to infiltrate
this program. I am going to submit several reports to Campus-Watch, under
different aliases, that show how stupid and uninformed their efforts are
(I am using fake names since one day I hope to have my own dossier).
Report 1:
"I agree wholeheartedly with the fact that bias in the Israel-Palestinian
conflict is a huge problem in the academy. Even worse, many outrageously
one-sided academics have worked their way through the revolving doors that
connect campuses, think-tanks, and the government. I want to report several
individuals whose unflinching partisanship, combined with their positions
of influence, make them detrimental to the prospects of Middle East Peace:
Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense, is a former professor at Johns
Hopkins University. He spoke last April at a pro-Israeli rally in Washington
DC. There he declared that "we stand with you (Israel) in this time of trial."
He is publicly and privately in the hands of the pro-Israeli lobby.
Douglas Feith, the Pentagon's third-highest official, Undersecretary of Defense
for Policy and Richard Perle, Chief of the Defense Policy Board are also
ardently pro-Israeli. In 1996, Richard Perle was an Assistant Secretary of
Defense in the Reagan Administration, Feith was his Special Counsel. They
wrote a paper suggesting that Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu 'break
from the peace process.' They argued that Israel has a right to all of the
land. This position interestingly, was more extreme than that of most Israelis.
This is the truly dangerous academic bias because it affects directly US
policy. It is essential to note that since there are no countervailing voices
in the government; there is no meaningful debate. That cannot possibly be
in the US's interest, which according to your website, is what you really
care about, right?
Michael Francisco, New York"
Report 2:
"I want to report several professors dead and alive who are virulent haters
of Israel. Something must be done to combat their legacy and counter their
stupidity and academic dishonesty:
Hannah Arendt and Albert Einstein wrote in an op-ed in 1948 that condemned
one of the pre-cursors to the Likud party, which current Prime Minister,
Ariel Sharon belongs to. They wrote, That this party is "closely akin in
its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the
Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following
of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organization
in Palestine." They accused then future Israeli Prime Minister Menachim Begin's
party of committing a massacre at Deir Yassin where allegedly 240 civilians
died.
Noam Chomsky, the world famous Linguist and professor at M.I.T. is an outspoken
of American policies, including its unending support for Israel.
Though Gandhi was not technically a professor, he had much input into the
formation of Indian universities. In 1938, he wrote that "Palestine belongs
to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France
to the French. It is wrong and inhuman to impose the Jews on the Arabs...
Surely it would be a crime against humanity to reduce the proud Arabs so
that Palestine can be restored to the Jews partly or wholly as their national
home." Need I say more?
Ahad Ha'am, the founder of Hebrew University, criticized the ideological
progenitors of Israel, the Zionists. They wanted exclusively Jewish political
control and power over the land of Palestine. He wanted a Jewish cultural
presence only. While they said Palestine is a "land without people for a
people without land," he noted that there were indeed native inhabitants.
Thus, according to that crazy old man, it was already a land with people.
As a result, he wanted to "prepare the people for the land, not the land
for the people." Campus-Watch should create a dossier for an anti-Israeli
fanatic for this anti-Israeli fanatic without a dossier.
In 1949, the famed Philosopher Martin Buber told Israel's first Prime Minister
that "we will have to face the reality that Israel is neither innocent, nor
redemptive. And that in its creation, and expansion; we as Jews, have caused
what we historically have suffered; a refugee population in Diaspora.
We must address anti-Israeli bias in the past as well as the present since
the intellectual legacies of these so-called academics is very much alive.
Can you believe we actually study some of these people's work and lives?
Thank you, Stan Carbunkle, Youngstown, Ohio"
Report 3:
"Today in my sociology class Professor Nick Johnson said that there are 'two-sides
to every issue, including the Israel-Palestinian conflict.' This rejects
the position of the government and most reasonable Americans, who know there
is only one-side, Israel's, and it is the right one. I did a search for Professor
Johnson in Google and found a letter to the editor he published in the Boise
Daily Bugle in 1997. He wrote that 'the Arabs have a long and proud history.'
These disturbingly anti-Israeli statements must be reported.
Fred Russell, Boise State University"
Will Youmans is a 3rd year law student at UC-Berkeley. He can be reached
at wyoumans @ umich.edu
September 23, 2002
Frank Arthur
"Baba耑ey the Turk" <bababey...@bababeyler.net> wrote in message
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