UC protests test the limits of Zionist fiction

On April 30, a mob of Zionist vigilantes descended onto UCLA’s Palestine Solidarity Encampment, besieging it and waging horrific violence against students for hours throughout the night. On May 1, UCLA called in the LAPD to clear the encampment by force, unleashing yet another brutal attack on students before the blood from the previous night had a chance to dry. On May 2, UCLA Chancellor Gene Block hosted a town hall for UCLA alumni during which he glossed over the horrific events that took place on campus under his watch.

During his webinar, to an audience of 1000 alums unable to comment, Chancellor Block described the violence of the first night as a scuffle with some “pushing and shoving.” When asked about clearing the encampment the following night, he went so far as to praise police conduct as “patient” and “professional.” He claimed that police did not cause any “serious injuries” and that they had used techniques to “minimize harm.” He told these lies with a straight face as if his audience did not have access to the internet — as if we haven’t seen countless videos of rabid agitators beating students with metal rods and planks of wood, spraying students in the face with bear mace and launching explosives and other projectiles into the encampment. As if we haven’t seen the images of students bleeding profusely after being shot in the head with rubber bullets by brutal police forces. As if we haven’t heard the screams of terror as students fought for their lives on their own campus.

These outright lies from the Chancellor would have come as more of a shock if they did not perfectly align with the reality that we have all become accustomed to over the last six months: Zionism relies entirely on fiction, and its defenders will lie blatantly and shamelessly to uphold it, even in the face of irrefutable evidence. Without any substantive basis for the position, the best defense of Zionism has always been censorship and intimidation. Zionists are aware that even the tiniest opening for a legitimate conversation on the topic would send their entire argument crashing down.

A recent example of this phenomenon played out when Dean Erwin Chemerinsky of Berkeley Law, one of the most lauded legal minds of our time, was too afraid to let a student speak about Palestine during a school event held at his home. A vocal and staunch champion of free speech, Chemerinksy chose to shout over the speaker and silence her to avoid being confronted with her words — words he would not be able to refute. It is telling that Chemerinsky is able to argue persuasively and confidently before the Supreme Court, but cannot defend his position on Palestine before one of his students. 

The use of censorship and repression to uphold Zionism is not exclusive to university contexts; the incidents at UCLA and UC Berkeley are just two examples of a widespread phenomenon. Here are a few more examples: Israeli leadership continues to argue that civilians killed in Gaza are unfortunate collateral damage, even after it has come to light that the IOF uses AI to target men in their homes when they are with their wives and children. Western leaders proclaim that Israel has the right to use force in “self-defense,” while in reality, Palestinians are the ones who are afforded that right under international law as people living under a belligerent and illegal military occupation. The New York Times — America’s paper of record — peddled an October 7 rape hoax that has been thoroughly discredited by multiple sources, and the paper has failed to pull the story from its site. In fact, the only effort NYT has made to correct the record for their journalistic malpractice has been launching an internal investigation to identify the source of the “leak” revealing the paper’s shoddy investigation. Every Biden administration spokesperson gets up on a podium and proclaims that Israel is working tirelessly to minimize civilian casualties, even as this administration bypasses Congress to send 2000-pound bunker bombs to drop on refugee camps. All these lies are told to manufacture consent for a genocide that killed more children in its first four months than were killed in all other conflicts globally in the last four years.

We live in an upside-down world where facts mean nothing and fantasy dominates. Where we rant and rave about property damage on college campuses as we fund the destruction and decimation of every home, hospital, and school in Gaza. Where university presidents resign for failing to protect students from protest slogans while Chancellor Block allows his students to be beaten to a pulp two nights in a row. Where we advocate for free speech until that speech says, “stop the genocide.” 

This perpetual manipulation and dishonesty is a sign of desperation — a last-ditch effort to salvage an indefensible ideology used to justify ethno-supremacy and apartheid. As these lies grow even more grotesquely convoluted, they accelerate the demise of the system they seek to defend.