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Analysis: Education kills fascists | Maan News Agency
Analysis: Education kills fascists
Published yesterday (updated) 27/03/2014 20:50
(Brian MacCormack)
By Heike Schotten
Heike Schotten is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts Boston, where she teaches political theory, feminist theory, and queer theory (her work is available here). She has been active in the Palestine solidarity movement since 2006.
Remember back in 2010 when Israel denied Noam Chomsky entry into the West Bank?
All the bureaucratic scurrying in the world and embarrassed tsk-tsking about "misunderstandings" with the Interior Ministry could not mitigate the transparently outrageous fact that Israel actively prevented a soft-spoken, aging academic from delivering a public lecture at Birzeit University.
The fact that Chomsky is both Jewish and an outspoken critic of Israel only compounded the awkwardness of the whole thing. Formerly a guarantee of welcome into the country, being Jewish was apparently no longer sufficient qualification for access to the interior of Israeli-controlled borders.
Or, at least, being Jewish could now be sufficiently offset by being critical of Israel, making clear that only certain kinds of Jews are guaranteed a red carpet reception in the Holy Land.
The prevention of Chomsky's entry at the Allenby Bridge looked to all the world like the classic censorious decision-making that is the hallmark of authoritarian regimes. Even smooth-talking Israeli government spokesperson Mark Regev, who has comfortably finessed such atrocities as Israel's bombing of schools and prevention of the Red Crossfrom providing aid to dying civilians in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead, had a hard time spinning this one, protesting weakly that the denial was a "mishap" and suggesting that Prof. Chomsky try again.
Noam Chomsky (DDP/AFP/File, Sascha Schuermann)
I was reminded of this incident by recent events here in Boston, where Northeastern University just suspended its campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine after students distributed mock eviction notices in campus dormitories.
For some years now, Northeastern and its SJP have been the targets of a sustained campaign of slander, bullying, and intimidation by outside Zionist organizations looking to control the campus and silence critique of Israel.
Now, the university has (baselessly) charged the students with violating university policy, sent campus police officers to members’ dorm rooms, threatened the students with expulsion, and singled out two students in particular for disciplinary action—both of whom are women of color with Muslim backgrounds, and neither of whom were in leadership positions in the group.
Acting a lot like the border guard that kept Chomsky out of Palestine on orders from the Interior Ministry, Northeastern's Administration has cut off its SJP in response to pressure from outside Zionist donors.
What's more, they are engaging in a prolonged campaign of intimidation and harassment of these students, sanctioning the group in ways that punish its current leadership (who have been banned from serving in leadership roles later, in 2015, when the group will be allowed to re-convene) and scaring the daylights out of students less involved in the group, such as the two it is currently disciplining, thereby also ensuring SJP's stagnation by discouraging other students from becoming new members.
(Brian MacCormack)
These actions are atrocious. The students are legitimately terrified of being expelled. A climate of fear and intimidation no doubt silences many faculty who lack the security of tenure, much less staff who may fear for their own jobs if their political views are made known. Ali Abunimah credibly claims this is the harshest repression of an SJP in the US since the Irvine 11.
And yet, I can't help thinking back on those videos of an 81-year-old Noam Chomsky patiently explaining to yet another reporter that he was denied entry into the West Bank simply because Israel doesn't like what he has to say -- about Israel.
I harbor no ill-wishes toward Prof. Chomsky. But I must confess, I was quite delighted when he was denied entry by Israeli border officials. I was delighted because, in moments like these, Zionists do the work of the BDS movement for us. In effect, they reveal themselves to the world as the narrow-minded, defensive, reactionary bullies that they are. They lighten our load by divulging their strategies and tactics openly. And they make clear, over and over again, that the only leg the Zionist lobby has left to stand on is their increasingly shrill -- and diminishingly credible -- cry, "Anti-Semitism!"
......................
Analysis: Education kills fascists
Published yesterday (updated) 27/03/2014 20:50
(Brian MacCormack)
By Heike Schotten
Heike Schotten is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts Boston, where she teaches political theory, feminist theory, and queer theory (her work is available here). She has been active in the Palestine solidarity movement since 2006.
Remember back in 2010 when Israel denied Noam Chomsky entry into the West Bank?
All the bureaucratic scurrying in the world and embarrassed tsk-tsking about "misunderstandings" with the Interior Ministry could not mitigate the transparently outrageous fact that Israel actively prevented a soft-spoken, aging academic from delivering a public lecture at Birzeit University.
The fact that Chomsky is both Jewish and an outspoken critic of Israel only compounded the awkwardness of the whole thing. Formerly a guarantee of welcome into the country, being Jewish was apparently no longer sufficient qualification for access to the interior of Israeli-controlled borders.
Or, at least, being Jewish could now be sufficiently offset by being critical of Israel, making clear that only certain kinds of Jews are guaranteed a red carpet reception in the Holy Land.
The prevention of Chomsky's entry at the Allenby Bridge looked to all the world like the classic censorious decision-making that is the hallmark of authoritarian regimes. Even smooth-talking Israeli government spokesperson Mark Regev, who has comfortably finessed such atrocities as Israel's bombing of schools and prevention of the Red Crossfrom providing aid to dying civilians in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead, had a hard time spinning this one, protesting weakly that the denial was a "mishap" and suggesting that Prof. Chomsky try again.
Noam Chomsky (DDP/AFP/File, Sascha Schuermann)
I was reminded of this incident by recent events here in Boston, where Northeastern University just suspended its campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine after students distributed mock eviction notices in campus dormitories.
For some years now, Northeastern and its SJP have been the targets of a sustained campaign of slander, bullying, and intimidation by outside Zionist organizations looking to control the campus and silence critique of Israel.
Now, the university has (baselessly) charged the students with violating university policy, sent campus police officers to members’ dorm rooms, threatened the students with expulsion, and singled out two students in particular for disciplinary action—both of whom are women of color with Muslim backgrounds, and neither of whom were in leadership positions in the group.
Acting a lot like the border guard that kept Chomsky out of Palestine on orders from the Interior Ministry, Northeastern's Administration has cut off its SJP in response to pressure from outside Zionist donors.
What's more, they are engaging in a prolonged campaign of intimidation and harassment of these students, sanctioning the group in ways that punish its current leadership (who have been banned from serving in leadership roles later, in 2015, when the group will be allowed to re-convene) and scaring the daylights out of students less involved in the group, such as the two it is currently disciplining, thereby also ensuring SJP's stagnation by discouraging other students from becoming new members.
(Brian MacCormack)
These actions are atrocious. The students are legitimately terrified of being expelled. A climate of fear and intimidation no doubt silences many faculty who lack the security of tenure, much less staff who may fear for their own jobs if their political views are made known. Ali Abunimah credibly claims this is the harshest repression of an SJP in the US since the Irvine 11.
And yet, I can't help thinking back on those videos of an 81-year-old Noam Chomsky patiently explaining to yet another reporter that he was denied entry into the West Bank simply because Israel doesn't like what he has to say -- about Israel.
I harbor no ill-wishes toward Prof. Chomsky. But I must confess, I was quite delighted when he was denied entry by Israeli border officials. I was delighted because, in moments like these, Zionists do the work of the BDS movement for us. In effect, they reveal themselves to the world as the narrow-minded, defensive, reactionary bullies that they are. They lighten our load by divulging their strategies and tactics openly. And they make clear, over and over again, that the only leg the Zionist lobby has left to stand on is their increasingly shrill -- and diminishingly credible -- cry, "Anti-Semitism!"
......................
