The Observer, March 28, 2008
Volume XL, Issue 22
Anti-Semitism strong at Case
Other than advancing a person's career opportunities or preparing a student for still higher education, one of the most important things any university can and should do is foster intellectual growth and development. For this to happen, open debate must be supported, with the dialog remaining honest and fair. Unfortunately though, our own university has failed to live up to this expectation, as demonstrated by its handling of the ever-uncomfortable Israel-Palestine issue.
Alice Bach, by virtue of her Hallinan Project position, is given ample funding to bring in some of the most vile, intellectually corrupt, and dishonest brokers of hate to our university. From Walt and Mearsheimer, whose book The Israel Lobby was called a collection of "well trafficked lies" by Harvard law professor and Israel expert Alan Dershowitz, to the Anti-Defamation League-listed "anti-Israel" Alison Weir who spoke on Wednesday, there seems to be no end to this list of unscholarly scholars. Every single speaker she has brought in to discuss the Middle East has a long, established history of distorting factual information to suit their own political purposes.
Sadly, it gets even worse. The school's one class on the Israel-Palestine topic is taught by Alice Bach, the same woman who chose to fund campus visits by these deplorable slanderers of Israel. As if to further illustrate her own bias, which permeates the course in a disturbing way, she is the faculty sponsor of Students for Justice in Palestine. In a 2002 expose of the SJP, which is active nationwide, Wendy Webb concluded that the group was "a dangerous and dishonest organization taking advantage of the ignorance of America's college youth to promote a deadly agenda." The UC Berkeley-founded group uses inflammatory rhetoric and extensive deception to create a poisonous hatred for Israel.
This would be quite alarming if it were but one fringe professor expending all of her energy misinforming the student body on one of the great contemporary political issues we face. But of course, this is not the case. When SJP hosted their inaugural event last semester, they featured some of the most offensive speakers this university has ever had the shame of hosting. And yet, they had groups lining up to co-sponsor the event. Perhaps most alarming was the school's Office of Multicultural Affairs. Its stated goal is the assistance of underprivileged minorities, which is laudable. However, that does not mean blindly financing and promoting events that make the campus environment hostile to Jews and non-Jewish Zionists, both of whom are clearly minorities.
The fact is, we cannot continue ignoring this, because the effects are more extensive than most people realize. I have several friends who, this year at our university, have been subjected to anti-Semitic violence. And there can be no question that it was exactly that, as they were called names like "kike" and "dirty Jew" while being attacked. As per their requests, I will not publish their names. The fact that I cannot give out their names, because they have never come forward, feeling that the administration is hostile to the Jewish community, should send up a serious red flag. How can this university or any other expect to maintain a positive reputation when it facilitates the sort of malicious rhetoric that engenders such sickening xenophobic violence?
