Do progressive Americans care about the Israel/Palestine issue? I think they do. Last night Josh Ruebner spoke at Brooklyn College and supported BDS (then rode Amtrak back to DC) and tonight Ben White will be speaking there, despite a vigorous campaign to shun him. His subject is Israel: Apartheid not Democracy. The British author will “unpack the facts” about segregation and colonization in Palestine.
Check out these amazing photos of pro-Palestine activists bracing for the two speeches. The one above is particularly moving, because it is so defiantly about the status of the Other in American society– a category that minorities and majorities, from blacks to Jews to women, have defiantly occupied when they sought their rights. 
More photos here and below, from friends at We Will Not be Silent.
Naturally, the New York Daily News is going nuts over Ben White’s appearance. It publishes an attack by Tammi Rossman-Benjamin:
Does Brooklyn College have a Jewish problem?
For the second time this year, the university’s political science department has outraged the Jewish community by agreeing to co-sponsor events hosted by Brooklyn College Students for Justice in Palestine, an organization whose sole mission is to engage in campus activities that demonize and delegitimize the Jewish state.
And this editorial slamming Brooklyn College’s administration, for not having more pro-Israel speakers on campus. I wonder how many students are demanding such appearances?
Now, [Political Science Chair Paisley] Currah’s department is again pushing talks by anti-Israel speakers — Josh Ruebner and Ben White — who view the very establishment of the Jewish state as illegitimately and immorally oppressing Arabs. And [Brooklyn College president Karen] Gould and Currah can’t get their stories straight about what role the college is playing and under what standards….
After the controversy early this year, Brooklyn College drafted a manual defining what it is to co-sponsor, support and sponsor a speech. How’d that work out? Gould’s office and Currrah are fighting over whether the poli-sci department is “co-sponsoring” or “supporting” this week’s talks, with both sides saying the department doesn’t endorse the events…
In an email exchange with this Editorial Board, Currah said there were a “variety of speakers we have co-sponsored in the past , including pro-Israel speakers like Elliott Abrams, Alan Dershowitz, and Leonard Garment.” He also said that “our department has never refused a request from a student group or an academic department to co-sponsor a talk,” suggesting that poli-sci had supported a pretty full range of ideas.
Pressed further, Currah revealed that Dershowitz lectured in 1974 and Garment in 1998 — which only serves to highlight how scarce the department’s pro-Israel speakers have been. Abrams spoke this year. Count him a lone voice in the wilderness.
As for the full list of co-sponsorships, Currah sent what appeared to be 10 events. Five were presentations on gay, lesbian and transgender issues. The others included talks by Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez, Glenn Greenwald and Abrams. There was also a Shirley Chisholm Day and an Anita Hill Conference.
Here’s the scorecard: three lectures by pro-Israel figures, who may or may not have talked about Israel, over nearly four decades. Three lectures by virulently anti-Israel advocates in the space of 10 months. That is not balance.
Israel: “The Jewish State”? “The State Which Borders Jordan and Egypt and Lebanon and Syria (and Palestine)”? “The Apartheid State”?
At least the last two are accurate. At least, I believe there is no other state well known as an apartheid state. Maybe Israel is only (oh, the disgrace!) “An Apartheid State”.
The first is a hope for some folks, a fear for others (Palestinians, for example), and a falsehood for others (simply because it ignores 20% of its own population).
Is America a “Hispanic State”?
Those pictures are amazing! I especially love the one at the top with the lovely girl and her stark message. I also love her sweet smile, her stance, her scarf and her keffiyeh juxtaposed with the man walking away from her, clutching his kippah to his head as though a fierce wind might blow it off.
Thanks Phil, and good luck to Ben White and his honorable tour.
i love these photos
The top photo is the best. She comes closest to making a demand. Her sign features four words, taken almost verbatim from William Lloyd Garrison’s defiant declaration against slavery in 1831: “I WILL BE HEARD.”
She is perhaps the bravest student in the Palestine solidarity movement.
The other photos show an excellent protest posture, but with signs that demand nothing. The signs express 1% of the wholly justified outrage in these students’ hearts.
They whine that Israeli “democracy” is flawed. Come on! Is that the best we can do?
Millions of Arabs have been exterminated by four successive U.S. Presidents, and by many more Israeli Prime Ministers.
Isn’t one student ready to just say “Boycott Israel” in any public place– until she or he is finally heard?
Now read and learn from William Lloyd Garrison. His words, in 1831:
“I am aware that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, or to speak, or write, with moderation. No! No! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; – but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in earnest – I will not equivocate – I will not excuse – I will not retreat a single inch – AND I WILL BE HEARD. The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal, and to hasten the resurrection of the dead.”
That is the spirit you need — otherwise, Palestine will continue to be strangled to death while you snivel.
Basically what the ‘Jewish community’ is saying here is, ‘screw academic freedom’ – you either love Israel OR ignore that the conflict exists in Israel/Palestine.