About two weeks ago, 11 students were arrested at the University of California-Irvine after protesting Israeli ambassador Michael Oren speaking at their campus. This is one of several protests during the past year of Israeli officials including Ehud Olmert and Danny Ayalon.
A recent USA Today article posed the question: On campus, is heckling free speech? Or just rude? One of the professors interviewed in the article (a scholar of protest and civil disobedience) argues that the issue of shouting down these officials is not an issue of free speech and that those who are speaking have a right to be heard. He also claims that these confrontations will not help the Palestinian cause and eventually: "It's only a matter of time until Norman Finkelstein speaks at UCI and Jewish groups shout him down."
As someone who attended the protests against Olmert speaking at the University of Chicago a few months ago, I consider the goal of protesting Israeli officials to be ensuring they understand that the transnational movement for ending the occupation is as vibrant as ever and continues to grow and gain supporters. There are events across the country every day all over campuses that are pro-Israeli and present a narrative that is very much one-sided. No one is protesting those events because even if the information being presented might not be the complete truth, people have a right to believe what they want and share their opinions.
But protesting these Israeli officials, who are directly responsible for crimes like the war in Lebanon in 2006, the Gaza attacks over a year ago and the continuing blockade of Gazans, is not an issue of stifling their right to speak. It is a form of nonviolent action in support of Palestinians and their continuing struggle to end the occupation. While pro-Israeli groups have their own behind-the-scenes methods to achieve their agenda, (Congress's rejection of the Goldstone Report and Finkelstein's denial of tenure at Depaul are only two of a countless number of examples) those working for justice in Palestine/Israel have to take more public actions in order that they can create a space and climate in which serious discussion of continuing blatant Israeli violations can flourish . And the latest planning for going after global peace and human rights groups is a signal that Israel is feeling the pressure from not only the nonviolent actions abroad but also those within the Palestinian territories and within its own borders as well.
And don't worry about those organizing protests against Finkelstein, he always handles himself quite well in such situations.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
china needs some lessons from israel
President Obama is planning to meet face to face with the Dalai Lama next week in spite of China urging him to withdraw his decision to meet with the Tibetan leader. It is interesting that the United States, which has a huge trade deficit with China (we import $27.9 million from them while exporting only $5.8 million) would be so willing to put this relationship at risk for the sake of human rights abuses in Tibet. Yet the United States would never dream of perhaps cutting the nearly $3 billion it sends annually over to Israel for the purpose of pressuring them to end their occupation of the Palestinians because of their "special relationship."
What China needs to do is get itself a Chinese style AIPAC. Although Chinese lobbying efforts have expanded over the past decade, it is still far less that the $15 million annual budget of AIPAC and far more friendlier. This Chinese lobby (ACPAC) needs to throw money at American Senators and Representatives, ruin the political careers of anyone who dares question Chinese policy and accuse all those who disagree with them as being anti-Chinese. And most importantly, make sure you gather enough Chinese American supporters whose main concern is the China issue and thus will make decisions about politicians based on nothing other than their support for China.
Trust me, not only will the Dalai Lama never again be invited to meet with a US president, but his reputation of a man of peace will be gone and the media will from now on be labeling him a troublemaker, violent and if ACPAC really does its job, a terrorist.
What China needs to do is get itself a Chinese style AIPAC. Although Chinese lobbying efforts have expanded over the past decade, it is still far less that the $15 million annual budget of AIPAC and far more friendlier. This Chinese lobby (ACPAC) needs to throw money at American Senators and Representatives, ruin the political careers of anyone who dares question Chinese policy and accuse all those who disagree with them as being anti-Chinese. And most importantly, make sure you gather enough Chinese American supporters whose main concern is the China issue and thus will make decisions about politicians based on nothing other than their support for China.
Trust me, not only will the Dalai Lama never again be invited to meet with a US president, but his reputation of a man of peace will be gone and the media will from now on be labeling him a troublemaker, violent and if ACPAC really does its job, a terrorist.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
NYT and its take on Palestinian nonviolence
“These are not sit-ins with people singing ‘We Shall Overcome,’ ” said Maj. Peter Lerner, a spokesman for the Israeli Army’s Central Command, which controls the West Bank. “These are violent, illegal, dangerous riots.” This was focus of a recent NYT article about the tougher stance Israel has been taking against protests in the West Bank against the apartheid wall.
Although one would think it is commendable that the NYT is finally covering the use of nonviolent actions among Palestinians in fighting the Israeli occupation, no media is definitely better than media biased against you. The reporter claims in the video portion of this story that the protests against the wall are nothing more than "a combination of desperate activism and staged theater."
So the reporter has decided that there is no actual nonviolent movement in Palestine and thus these protests are nothing more than a ploy to convince the world that the Palestinians are interested in peace. And to make sure that readers of the NYT don't fall into that ploy, the reporter makes sure Israeli officials are allowed to put their spin on these protests. They argue that since most of these protests end in violence, even if it is instigated by Israeli soldiers after they use rubber bullets and live ammunition to quell the protests, the protests are themselves an action of violence and not nonviolence.
So peaceful protests bring about violent Israeli reaction, which means the protests themselves are violent. Makes lots of sense, right?
It's interesting that Martin Luther King, Jr. address this issue in his letter from Birmingham Jail. He writes: "In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn't this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn't this like condemning Jesus because his unique God consciousness and never ceasing devotion to God's will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion?"
Although one would think it is commendable that the NYT is finally covering the use of nonviolent actions among Palestinians in fighting the Israeli occupation, no media is definitely better than media biased against you. The reporter claims in the video portion of this story that the protests against the wall are nothing more than "a combination of desperate activism and staged theater."
So the reporter has decided that there is no actual nonviolent movement in Palestine and thus these protests are nothing more than a ploy to convince the world that the Palestinians are interested in peace. And to make sure that readers of the NYT don't fall into that ploy, the reporter makes sure Israeli officials are allowed to put their spin on these protests. They argue that since most of these protests end in violence, even if it is instigated by Israeli soldiers after they use rubber bullets and live ammunition to quell the protests, the protests are themselves an action of violence and not nonviolence.
So peaceful protests bring about violent Israeli reaction, which means the protests themselves are violent. Makes lots of sense, right?
It's interesting that Martin Luther King, Jr. address this issue in his letter from Birmingham Jail. He writes: "In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn't this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn't this like condemning Jesus because his unique God consciousness and never ceasing devotion to God's will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion?"
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