The movement to economically isolate Israel to protest its treatment of Palestinians has led to heavy trading in recriminations among American scholars and sparked debate over the limits of free speech and academic freedom.
Among recent developments, four public universities in California are resisting demands from a pro-Israel advocacy group, the Amcha Initiative, that they block academics from using publicly financed university resources to promote what is commonly known as the “Boycott, Divest, Sanction” (or BDS) movement to pressure Israel.
Meanwhile, more than 140 professors at American colleges have signed on to a letter to The New York Times formally objecting to the newspaper’s publication last month of a conservative group’s advertisement that attacked several scholars involved with the boycott movement. The ad, published on April 24, said the scholars “should be publicly shamed and condemned for the crimes their hatred incites.”
The controversy over speech associated with the boycott movement comes at a time when the nation’s Jewish organizations are themselves struggling to find a balance between embracing open debate over Israel and seeking to stifle criticism of that nation that they see as crossing the line into anti-Semitism.
The Jewish Council for Public Affairs, an umbrella organization representing more than 130 local, regional, and national Jewish groups, is expected at its annual assembly on Sunday to approve a resolution stating that federal complaints of anti-Semitic discrimination on campuses are a valuable tool but could trigger a backlash if filed too hastily with the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights. Jewish activists who have formally accused colleges of violating federal law by tolerating anti-Semitism argue that such complaints are justified. The incidents the complaints cite, the activists say, reflect just a portion of the anti-Semitism they associate with critics of Israel on college campuses.
Links to Controversy
The Amcha Initiative has accused professors at both California State University at Northridge and the University of California at Los Angeles of promoting the boycott-Israel movement on Web sites hosted by the universities. The group has asked both of those institutions to take steps to keep university resources from being used in such a manner. The group also recently sought, without success, to persuade the presidents of three Cal State institutions—the campuses at Fresno and Northridge, and California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo—to revoke their universities’ sponsorship of talks by Ilan Pappé, a historian who is director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter. Mr. Pappé is a harsh critic of Israel who has been accused of anti-Semitism, despite being Jewish.
Charles B. Reed, chancellor of the Cal State system, has backed the campus presidents in their decisions to defend their institutions’ sponsorship of Mr. Pappé's talks on free-speech grounds. He has also stood behind the decision by Harold Hellenbrand, interim president of the Northridge campus, to let David Klein, a professor of mathematics, continue to post a link on his university Web site to a separate site with resources for people involved in the movement to boycott Israel.
Last month, Mr. Hellenbrand, who is also the campus’s provost and vice president for academic affairs, sent faculty members and administrators a letter accusing the Amcha Initiative of attempting to squelch criticism of Israel. His letter said the group’s characterization of Mr. Klein’s Web page as anti-Semitic “reflects a partisan and sectarian view.” Giving in to the group’s demands, he said, would threaten not only the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech but also its guarantee of separation of church and state, by letting a sectarian group determine what speech is acceptable.
“To enforce this view on political academic speech is to truncate the only enduring corrective to error and abuse, discourse itself,” Mr. Hellenbrand’s letter said. “It is to suborn speech and thought to the very thing George Washington warned against, entangling alliance with a foreign power.”
Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, a lecturer in Hebrew and Jewish studies at the University of California at Santa Cruz who is a co-founder of the Amcha Initiative, called Mr. Hellenbrand’s letter inappropriate, insensitive, and defamatory, arguing this week that “he goes to great lengths to delegitimize us in ways that effectively demonize us.” The Global Frontier Justice Center, an advocacy group based in Brooklyn, N.Y., has asked California’s attorney general, Kamala D. Harris, to step in and stop Mr. Klein from posting any links to the boycott movement on his Web site. Ms. Harris has not responded.
Disagreement in UCLA Case
It is unclear where UCLA stands in regard to the Amcha Initiative’s complaint about David Delgado Shorter, an associate professor of world arts and cultures. Mr. Shorter posted a link to a boycott-Israel petition, which he had signed, on a Web site for students in a course on “Tribal Worldviews,” which he taught last winter.
Last month, Andrew F. Leuchter, chairman of the university’s Academic Senate, sent Ms. Rossman-Benjamin an e-mail in which he said the head of Mr. Shorter’s department, Angelia Leung, had told Mr. Shorter that posting such materials was inappropriate. “Professor Shorter’s chair assures me that he understands his serious error in judgment and has said that he will not make this mistake again,” said the e-mail from Dr. Leuchter, a professor of psychiatry and behavior sciences.
Mr. Shorter, however, has denied saying he made a mistake and agreeing not to post such links. At his request, the UCLA Academic Senate’s committee on academic freedom has stepped in to investigate how administrators there have handled his case. Ms. Leung did not respond to an e-mail requesting comment. Mr. Leuchter said in an e-mail this week that he considers the matter closed. “This matter was resolved informally, but effectively and appropriately, with Professor Shorter’s department chair simply speaking to him about it,” he wrote.
Recriminations Over an Ad
The New York Times advertisement that has stirred controversy was purchased by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, an organization founded by the conservative writer for which it is named. The ad cited the recent murder of a rabbi and three Jewish children in Toulouse, France, and said it may have been inspired by an “atmosphere of hate” fueled by the boycott-Israel movement. Specifically naming 14 American college professors who have been supportive of the boycott-Israel movement, the ad says, “If BDS activists refuse to moderate their rhetoric and end their scapegoating of Jewish businesses, they should be held accountable for the consequences of their hate.”
In their letter to the newspaper, sent last month, the more than 140 professors protesting the advertisement said the ad “grossly distorts the statements” made by the professors and represents an attempt by the Horowitz center “to shut down informed debate.”
“Even those of us who do not support BDS are alarmed at your carrying an advertisement that misinforms and names individuals who do not have the money that Horowitz has to defend themselves through this chosen medium,” the letter said.
The newspaper has responded to the letter, which it did not publish, by saying it does not base its decisions on whether to publish advertisements on the opinions they express.