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May
23, 2003
Standard
Schaefer
Lifting the Sanctions: Who Benefits?
Ron
Jacobs
Long Live People's Park!
Michael
Greger, MD
Return of Mad Cow: US Beef Supply
at Risk
Elaine
Cassel
Tigar to Ashcroft: "Secrecy is the Enemy of Democratic Govt."
Sam
Hamod
The Shi'a of Iraq
Christopher
Greeder
After the Layoffs
Alexander
Cockburn
Derrida's Double Life (poem)
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Weblog 5/23
May
22, 2003
Mark
Gaffney
Christian in Name Only
Carl
Estabrook
Republic of Fear
Carl
Camacho, Jr.
Reason for Hope
Ben
Granby
What Rates a Headline from the Middle
East?
Vanessa
Jones
Terror Alerts in Australia
Mickey
Z.
Instant Understanding
Don
Monkerud
Snowballs in a Soggy Economy
Barry Lando
The Nether-Nether World of G.W. Bush
Steve
Perry
Total Information
Awareness: Secret Shadow Program?
May
21, 2003
Dave
Lindorff
Ari Fleischer Quits the Scene: The
Liar's Gone, the Enablers Remain
Chris
Floyd
How Blood Money Becomes Business Opportunity
Dr. Gerry
Lower
Graham's God and Bush's Pathology
Patrick
Cockburn
In Post War Iraq, the Signs of Breakdown
are Everywhere
Brian Cloughley
The Fatuous Braintrust: Newt, Rummy and Wolfowitz
Saul
Landau
Shopping, the End of the World and the Politics of Bush
Larry Kearney
Two Morning Poems, May 2003
Steve
Perry
Chaos in Iraq: Just What the US Wanted?
Elaine
Cassel
Ashcroft Justice Comes to Iraq
May
20, 2003
Tariq
Ali
The Empire Advances
Ahmad
Faruqui
Whither American Nationalism?
Ben Tripp
Dialysis with Osama
Linda
Heard
The Cage of Occupation
Cynthia
McKinney
Toward a Just and Peaceful World
Edward
Said
The Arab Condition
Mokhiber
and Weissman
Why Ari Should Have Resigned in Protest Long Ago
Stew
Albert
Yale Men
Steve Perry
The New Face of Al-Qaeda
May
19, 2003
Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
A Letter to Kofi Annan on Powell's Missing
Evidence
CounterPunch
Wire
"Terror" Slut Steve Emerson
Eats Crow
John
Chuckman
Blair's Awkward Lies
Matt
Vidal
Corporate Media and the Myth of the Free Market
Michael
S. Ladah
The Fine Print to Bush's Road Map
Robert
Fisk
Bush's Eternal War Backfires
Elaine
Cassel
Clarence Thomas, Still Whining After All These Years
Jonathan
Freedland
Ann Coulter's Appalling Magic
Steve Perry
Play It Again, O-Sam-a
May
17 / 18, 2003
Uri
Avnery
The Children's Teeth
Peter
Linebaugh
An American Tribute to Christopher
Hill
Gary
Leupp
Nepal Today
Rock and
Rap Confidential
The Republican Plot Against the Dixie Chicks
Walter
Sommerfeld
Plundering Baghdad's Museums
Ron Jacobs
Condy Rice's Yipping Tirades
Thomas
P. Healy
Dubya Does Indy
Tarif Abboushi
Bush, Sharon and the Roadmap
Francis
Boyle
Debating US War Crimes in Iraq
Mark Davis
An Interview with Richard Butler
Richard
Lichtman
American Mourning
Michael
Ortiz Hill
Overcoming Terrorism
Adam
Engel
Uncle Sam is YOU!
Alan Maas
The Best News Show on TV
Poets'
Basement
Reiss, Guthrie, Albert
Elaine
Cassel
Good Enough for an Alien
Website
of the Weekend
The 37 Americans Who Run Iraq
Song of
the Weekend
Talkin' Sounds Just Like Joe McCarthy Blues
May
16, 2003
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Wells
In Iraq Water and Oil Do Mix
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Fear Itself
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Smith
The Resegregation of US Schools
Ramzy Baroud
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A Nation of Fear
Phil Reeves
Baghdad Pays the Price
Robert
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The FCC's Big Grab
Mark Engler
Those Who Don't Count
Steve
Perry
We're All
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May
15, 2003
Ayesha
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How
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Julie
Hilden
Moussaoui and the Camp X-Ray Detainees:
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Tanya
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Bush's Roadmap: a Ticket to Failure
Laura Carlsen
Here We Go Again: NAFTA Plus or Minus?
Kenneth
Rapoza
The New Fakers: State Dept. Undercuts
New Yorker's Goldberg
Stew Albert
A Story I Will Tell
Steve
Perry
Bush's Little
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Website
of the Day
Strip-o-Rama
May
14, 2003
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Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
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Leopold
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Lindorff
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What? Me Worry?
Steve Perry
More on Saudi Arabia Bombings
Website
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A Tribute to Ted Joans
May
13, 2003
Saul
Landau
Clear Channel Fogs the Airwaves
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Steve Perry
The Saudi Arabia Bombing
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Guthrie
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May
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Uzi
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Sharon and Sons, Inc.
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Bush's War Web Log 5/12
Book
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Fooling
Marty Peretz
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Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
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Uzma
Aslam Khan
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Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
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May
24, 2003
Academic Freedom Under
Assault in Israel
The Dean, the
President, and the Historiography of 1948 Palestine
By ILAN PAPPE
Three weeks ago, my colleague in the University
of Haifa, Dr. Asa d Gahnim of the department of political science
suggested convening a conference on the 1948 historiography.
We agreed to present in the conference the recent developments
in both the Israeli and Palestinian historiography on the 1948
war and Nakbah. He and Salman Natur were asked to introduce the
recent critical trends in the Palestinian side (with particular
stress on works which deconstruct the roll of the traditional
leadership and the Arab regimes in the 1948 war). In the second
half of the day we wanted Udi Adiv, Teddy Katz and myself to
present an updated picture of the historiographical debates on
the 1948 war within the scholarly community in Israel. I asked
my own division, the International Relations division, to host
the meeting. The head of the division, Dr. Michael Gross agreed.
The Dean of the Faculty
of Social Sciences
The conference was published in the usual
sites as is common in the campus. Upon learning of the event,
Professor Aryeh Ratner, the Dean of Social Sciences, phoned the
head of the division and later me. He ordered Us--by direct instructions
from the Rector and the President of the university--to cancel
the conference. He clarified that he will not allow a conference
which included Udi Adiv. Adiv in the early 1970s was accused
and found guilty for spying for the Syrians and sat in jail for
that allegation. After his release, in the early 1980s, he finished
a Ph. D. thesis in the University of London, under the supervision
of Professor Sami Zubadia, one of the world leading scholars
on the Middle East. His thesis was about the Zionist historiography
and particularly on the 1948 historiography . He was then appointed
as a lecturer in the Open University of Israel, a position he
holds until today. I clarified all these details to Ratner. He
told me this is of no interest and that the conference will not
take place. He also explained he would send an official letter
claiming that I have not filled correctly the forms needed for
the convening of a conference. The same dichotomy between what
would be officially written in the letters and the real reasons
for the cancellation was explained to Dr. Gross (on the phone)
I asked what would happen if I would properly refill the forms
and was told that this would not change the decision, as its
source was ideological and not administrative. He also told us
that this was not his own policy, but that of the president of
Haifa University, Professor Yehuda Hayut.
In the university codex there is indeed
reference for the procedures of conference convention. Like many
other procedures it has never been implemented in the university
ever since its foundation in the early 1970s. After consulting
some people who were experts on the codex, it was suggested to
me that if the conference is a departmental symposium there is
no need for such a procedure to take place. So the conference
was re-defined as a departmental symposium. A room was ordered,
a day was set, and invitations sent.
The President of the
University
On May 22, at 14:00, the lectures and
the audience came to hall 715 in the university. The doors were
locked. In the corridor stood the chief of security forces in
the university and ten of his henchmen, all armed with pistols
and walki-talkies. I was pushed into a side room by the chief
and his lieutenant and handed a personal letter from the president,
Yehuda Hayut. This was done in front of my wife and my colleagues,
who watched helplessly the macabre scene. The letter said that
my actions were a severe breach of the university codex and hence
the room was blocked and the event cancelled. The chief explained
to me that I would not be allowed to conduct the event in any
other part of the campus. Outside the corridor, my wife heard
two other lieutenants of the chief informing the president in
their communication network , we caught him . They also said
to each other, high time: they should do the same to all the
leftist lectures in the university .
The Historiography
The participants and myself went to a
cafeteria. The chief explained to me that if we talk sitting,
but not standing, he would not regard it as a conference. We
followed the orders and conducted what to my mind was one of
the best critical symposiums on the 1948 historiography.
The University Spokesperson: The local
newspaper in Haifa, Kol Bo, under the headline Silencing the
Voices reported the event. The university spokesperson responded:
the conference was not up to academic standards of Haifa university
(indeed it was not).
Two reports
In the internal network of the university
there were only two references to the event:
One by Dr. Yuval Yunai from the Department
of Sociology he wrote:
It's also a shame that on the same day
that we made this -- may I say -- pioneering step, the university
management banned another event from taking place. The dept.
of international relations wanted to discuss the historiography
of 1948, but my friend and colleague, the Dean of the my faculty,
decided to use a doubtful prerogative and to ban the participation
of Dr. Udi Adiv, a sociologist who wrote on the 1948 war, because
of the sins he committed many years ago and for which he paid
abundantly in many years of incarceration. Many people didn't
like the composition of that event and its apparent challenge
to the decision about Teddy Katz' MA thesis (Katz himself was
supposed to talk too). Such objection is legitimate, but preventing
the event by an instruction from above is against the academic
spirit and freedom, even if Deans have this authority (which
is also legally questionable). In any case, it's against the
necessity to compromise and to heal the wounds of conflicts and
hostilities.
While the circle of violence runs amok
around us, can't we, here, in our campus with its unique composition,
show the citizens of Israel another way of living together, not
side by side, but really together?
Yuval (speaking on his behalf and not
necessarily reflecting the feelings of all Forum Smol members.)
Professor Micha Leshem from the Department
of Psychology wrote:
Can anyone explain why on earth the University
found fit to ban a seminar of Faculty and students and invited
speakers? I understand the doors of the meeting room were locked,
and security personnel on hand in great numbers to accompany
the participants away.
Such an action is inexcusable in a University,
and surely requires a bold and convincing explanation from our
University authorities. I fear that the good name of our university
will again be questioned by our colleagues and the media--might
it not have been wiser to let the meeting take place and its
organizers take responsibility for its consequences, if any?
How parochial can the University of
Haifa be? I suppose the next step will be for the Seminar to
take place in one of our less prejudicial and more Academically
orientated sister institutions. Either way we are left with mud
on our faces. Micah
Conclusions:
1. This is not an isolated event. It
is part of a daily reality in the campus that reflects and represents
the overall demise of basic civic and human rights in Israel.
The shooting of journalists and the assassination of human rights
activists in the West Bank on the one hand, and the reign of
terror and intimidation in the campus, on the other, are part
and parcel of the same phenomena.
2. This episode illustrates forcefully
why the boycott of Israeli academia abroad is justified, not
just as part of the overall pressure on the Jewish state to end
its brutal occupation, but also as a warning to the scholarly
community in Israel that its protracted moral cowardice has a
price tag on it. As long as this academia goes on exercising
a reign of intimidation and tyranny in its own campuses, and
is silent about the destruction of academic life in the occupied
territories, it can not be part of the enlightened and progressive
world, to which it wants eagerly to belong.
3. My colleagues who still find it difficult
to support or show solidarity, for some reasons, fail to learn
the historical lessons of the past. Today it is me, tomorrow
it is them. Many of them come from families who experienced the
same incremental process of silencing in Nazi Germany, Fascist
Italy and Spain and the military regimes of Latin America. They
still live in self-denial, believing it will never happen to
them.
As in the past, I ask you to express
your indignation and protest and react in any way you deem appropriate,
not for my sake, but for the sake of all those who are victimized
by the present trends and ideologies in the state of Israel:
the Palestinians under occupation, the minority within the country,
and the few dissenting voices inside the Jewish society. Such
a voice, in the end of the day, will be a valuable contribution
to peace and reconciliation in the Middle East.
Ilan Pappe
teaches history at Haifa University and is among the most prominent
of the historians who write about 1948. Pappe is the author of
"The
Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947-1951."
Today's
Features
Standard
Schaefer
Lifting the Sanctions: Who Benefits?
Ron
Jacobs
Long Live People's Park!
Michael
Greger, MD
Return of Mad Cow: US Beef Supply
at Risk
Elaine
Cassel
Tigar to Ashcroft: "Secrecy is the Enemy of Democratic Govt."
Sam
Hamod
The Shi'a of Iraq
Christopher
Greeder
After the Layoffs
Alexander
Cockburn
Derrida's Double Life (poem)
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Weblog 5/23
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