Anti-Israel Activists Disrupt Talk by Israeli Ambassador at Syracuse University
Anti-Israel Activists Disrupt Talk by Israeli Ambassador at Syracuse University
So much for academic freedom and open discourse. Anti-Israel activists attempted to silence Israel’s consul general in New York during a speech at Syracuse University.
By: Shiri Moshe/The Algemeiner, Reported by United With Israel, April 26 2018
Dani Dayan, Israel’s consul general in New York, at Syracuse University. (Twitter)
Some 20 protesters disrupted a speech by an Israeli ambassador at Syracuse University in New York on Tuesday, raising concerns about efforts to chill free speech on campus.
Dani Dayan, Israel’s consul general in New York, began addressing around 100 audience members during an event exploring the future of the Middle East when a group of protesters situated outside the lecture hall started chanting loudly in an attempt “to drown out the talk,” Miriam Elman, an associate professor of political science at Syracuse, told The Algemeiner on Wednesday.
Elman, who attended and helped organize Dayan’s lecture, said the protesters — among whom were both students and professional activists — had assembled in advance underneath the windows of the event room, holding posters claiming “Zionism = Racism,” “Judaism Rejects Zionism,” and endorsing the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel. “They were quiet,” she noted. “They talked to people who came by. Nothing wrong with that.”
But the chanting started as soon as the event commenced at noon — and escalated about three minutes into Dayan’s speech, when Ariel Gold, a campaign director for the far-left activist group Code Pink who sat among the audience members, stood and unfurled a banner reading, “Free Palestine.”
“Dani Dayan, you have blood on your hands,” Gold shouted at the ambassador, according to video footage. “Israeli settlements are entirely illegal under international law,” she continued.
Dayan is a former chairman of the Yesha Council, which advocates on behalf of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
Gold was promptly removed by campus security, but her chants were echoed seconds later by Ursula Rozum, a member of the anti-war Syracuse Peace Council’s Justice for Palestine Committee.
“Free Palestine, end the bloodshed in Gaza,” shouted Rozum as she was escorted out. “Sanctions now, Dayan is an international criminal.”
While the room settled down shortly afterwards, the chanting outside the lecture hall intensified.
“It was still disruptive and hard to hear Dayan,” Elman recalled. The chanting continued increasing in volume until the protesters, led by Gold and Rozum, had entered the building and continued their demonstration directly outside the event room.
Associate Dean of the Maxwell School Carol Faulkner, who introduced Dayan, took the opportunity to ask the protesters to civilly join the event and ask questions at its conclusion. “They shouted in her face,” Elman said.
Gold was then forcibly removed from the building by a Syracuse safety official, and the protesters followed.
Disruptions Aimed at Silencing Speakers and Intimidating Students
Despite the disruptions, “the talk was well received [and] there were tough questions,” Elman said. Dayan took pictures with students and said on Twitter that he had “excellent meetings” earlier in the day with Syracuse University deans.
Nonetheless, the incident disturbed some members of the campus community.
“A few of the Jewish students who had also gone to the public talk … told me how ‘shaken up’ they were by what had happened,” Elman shared. “They were really upset that the talk was disrupted and also by the level of vitriol. One student especially mentioned the signs that were held during the protest — he said it wasn’t really protesting Israel’s policies but was anti-Zionist and even anti-Jewish.”
She expressed hope that the university would publicly recognize that while peaceful protests of campus events are legitimate, they would not be tolerated “when they descend into disruptions aimed at silencing speakers and intimidating students.”
Elman pointedly observed that Syracuse hosted a public screening and workshop with Palestinian director Mai Masri on campus last week, which was not “shut down or disrupted in any way.”
“We can disagree over the content of speech and there is a process for voicing that disagreement on campus — and pro-Israel students follow and adhere to those rules,” she said. “But yesterday, anti-Israel students did not.”
Jewish and pro-Israel campus groups have frequently complained that anti-Zionist students disrupt their programs with vocal protests meant to shut down dialogue.
A September report published by the Israel on Campus Coalition advocacy group on the 2016-2017 academic year found that BDS activists repeatedly engaged in “hostile disruptions of pro-Israel events, deliberately interfering with lectures and educational activities.”
“On several campuses,” the report noted, “protesters shouted down Israeli speakers and other guest lecturers, attempting to silence pro-Israel voices.”
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They won't, because they have neither civility nor any intelligent arguments to make, all they can do is shout.
When people have nothing to contribute in the way of facts, they shout down others.
It's their way of trying to shut people up who do not agree in lock step with their own ideals, political or religious preferences or share their own ethnic heritage. Much like some here on NT endlessly try to do.
It truly is a shame, and shows just how small and closed minded they really are. It also shows that they fear those who do not adhere to their own personal choices in life. IF they did not fear them, they would not have a reason to try to shut them up in such an aggressive manner. And no one group is without guilt.
I don't think you can generalize that, RW.
"I don't think you can generalize that, RW."
I wan't trying to generalize Buzz. Only that both groups have their own down side.
Please elaborate.
There is always a pro and con to everything. And there are those in both groups who will tend to resort to trying to disrupt, or shout down, the other side. Trying to prevent one group or another from presenting their own side of a topic of any kind is trying to control the minds/beliefs of others. Sometimes it may not be effective, other times it may be, depending on how aggressive one or the other group is in their efforts, or how well they present their case.
In the case of the Israeli Ambassador, the ones disrupting his speech at the University were hoping to influence the minds and beliefs of others to reject what he had to say, while hoping to promote their own objective/agenda. Had there been a counter group to support the Ambassador they would likely have made their own case by whatever means they were determined to use. Thus, both groups would have been guilty of interfering with the ability of the Ambassador to give his speech. However, as there was only the one side present at his speech, they were the guilty party.
But there wasn't. I have read of many cases of Israel-bashing or Jew-bashing groups shouting down speakers at lectures, many posted on NT, often at ultra-liberal campuses such as Berekeley, but I have never seen a reference to a pro-Israel shoutdown of a pro-Palestinian speaker at a lecture. Yes, there have been demonstrations, usually outside, but NOT shoutdowns of speakers. Can you please educate me by giving me an example of what I have not yet seen? And even if such did happen, do you not think that such an incident is an absolutely minimal case, especially as compared to the shouting down of pro-Israel or Jewish speakers.
Buzz....I wan't talking about a pro-Israeli group at a pro-Palestinian speaker. I was speaking of a pro-Israeli group at the lecture of the Israeli Ambassador. If there had been both groups at his speech they would have both been wrong to interrupt his speech. Perhaps I did not make myself clear, and I apologize.
No problem. Almost any hypothetical is possible, I suppose.
I always thought that our universtities should be a place of higher learning. How can someone learn when they fail to look at both sides of an argument? And to have instructors leading these protests, says a lot about the lack of education that transpires within out higher education institutes. It's sad, but it is the 21st century and people would rather yell than make educated decisions.
Yet another article on NT, about law students shouting down a speaker, is starting to indicate the direction university students are going in - and it is towards the dumbing down of America.