Violence against Israeli speaker is not an isolated incident
April 30, 2010 — Mira Vogel
http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2010/04/30/violence-against-israeli-speaker-is-not-an-isolated-incident/At the University of Manchester, anti-Israel demonstrators, reportedly from Action Palestine, surrounded and tried to attack deputy Israeli ambassador Talya Lador-Fresher after she’d given a political science lecture at Manchester University. She has the impression that they would have beaten her up if they could. The event had been postponed previously due to security concerns. A spokesperson for the University of Manchester commented irrelevantly:
“The University is fundamentally committed to freedom of speech, exercised within the law. It follows that it should also allow peaceful and lawful protest to take place on its campus.”
Not reassuring – the protest was not peaceful but violent.
There are political players at the extremes of Israeli and Palestinian society, along with their supporters, who would like us to consider this attack representative of Palestine solidarity, but it isn’t. At most, it represents support for the minority within Palestinian society which hates and attacks Israelis, and works to drive them away. In their approach and mentality Action Palestine activists have more in common with the extreme right Israelis who left a pipe-bomb outside the home of anti-occupation activist Ze’ev Sternhell than they have with genuine pro-Palestinian campaigners. They insist that they stand for Palestinian rights, dignity and freedom, and yet deny rights, dignity and freedom to Israelis. The only serious thing about them is their attempt to import the Middle East conflict onto a British campus.
Too often anti-Israel campaigners find antisemitism appealing, though they would be the last to admit this. Action for Palestine hosted Bongani Masuku back in December 2009, at the same time as the University and College Union. The South African Human Rights Commission found Bongani Masuku guilty of hate speech against Jews a few days afterwards. UCU and Action for Palestine would or should have known about the charges against him. They would or should have known that anti-Israel campaigning is often expressed as animosity to Jews, who are treated as proxy Israelis.
But, like UCU nationally, my local UCU branch at Goldsmiths attributes antisemitism to “the actions of the Israeli state” rather than to the groups and individuals who enact it, and leaves Jews to deal with it on their own. Harry’s Place points out that Action for Palestine is holding a seminar next week with Amnesty International and Ben White, who considers antisemitism “understandable”.
So where are we? A British campaign for Palestinian rights attacks an Israeli and seeks education from an antisemitic speaker. A reputable human rights organisation collaborates with them. A higher education institution can’t distinguish between peaceful protest and physical attack. A trade union invites a racist to speak on an anti-racist platform.
And precisely what does all this have to do with a political solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians?