MuzzleWatch Watch

What American Jews Believe

2011-08-09T11:16:00.000-04:00

As do many fringe groups, Jewish Voice for Peace sometimes tries to cast itself as representing the mainstream, while painting the moderate majority on the left-of-center, center, and right-of-center as extremists.

Just to reground ourselves: what do American Jews really think about the Middle East conflict? The results of a recent poll answering that question can be found here.

Pass the Bourbon, Pass on the Bowmore

2011-06-02T23:14:00.001-04:00

This blog post is not strictly about MuzzleWatch and its parent organization Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). It is, however, about the bitter fruits of their efforts.

As I've explained here, JVP, despite its name, is not peace group. It is an anti-Israel group.

JVP is a proponent of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement targeting Israel for its presence in the West Bank, Gaza and eastern Jerusalem (which includes the Jewish Quarter). In other words, it promotes boycotting the Jewish state because Palestinian leaders have said no each time Israel offered almost all of the West Bank and Gaza in exchange for a secure peace agreement. Meanwhile, it is not a proponent of boycotting the Palestinians for rejecting those offers, for targeting Israeli civilians with rockets from Gaza, for repeatedly honoring terrorists thus teaching Palestinian children that the murder of Jewish children is a noble deed.

What does this all have to do with bourbon? Well, read on. Below is an unauthorized cross-post from the Muqata blog. I hope he forgives me.

To The Fine Whisky Distillers of West Dunbartonshire;

Morrison Bowmore Distillers Ltd.
Auchentoshan Distillery, Dalmuir, Clydebank, Dunbartonshire G81 4SJ
Distillers of Auchintoshan, Bowmore, Glen Garioch, McClelland’s

Loch Lomond Distillery Co. Ltd
Lomond Industrial Estate, Alexandria, Dunbartonshire G83 0TL
Distillers of Loch Lomond, Scots Earl, Distillery Select, Glen Scotia,
Littlemill, Croftengea, Craigslodge, Inchmurrin, Glen Douglas, Inchfad

Chivas Brothers
Kilmalid, Stirling Road, Dumbarton, Lanarkshire, G82 2SS
Distillers of Ballantine’s, Chivas, Royal Salute, Clan Campbell,
Something Special, Passport, 100 Pipers, Imperial, Long John
Aberlour, The Glenlivet, Glendronach, Strathisla, Longmorn, Scapa
Tormore, Jameson, Paddy, Powers
Walker Special Old, Wisers

Gentlemen,

I would like to preface this letter, in that I have enjoyed your fine whisky products for many years, and believe they are truly world-class. Unfortunately, due to the actions of your esteemed West Dunbartonshire council members, I will not be able to enjoy your whisky in the foreseeable future.

It has come to my attention that the West Dunbartonshire Council claims to have voted unanimously to boycott Israeli products.

The West Dunbartonshire Council clearly states their point on their website, updated on the 30th of May, 2011.

http://www.west-dunbarton.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/news/corporate-statement-on-the-boycott-of-israeli-goods/

The actual boycott resolution is as follows:

‘This Council deplores the loss of life in Palestine which now numbers well over 1,000. This Council also recognises the disproportionate force used by the IDF in Palestine and agrees to boycott all Israeli goods as a consequence. Officers should immediately cease the purchase of any goods we currently source, which were made or grown in Israel. Officers should also ensure we procure no new goods or produce from Israel until this boycott is formally lifted by WDC.’

I find it disturbing that the esteemed council found no reason to mention the reason for the IDF’s operation in Gaza. There was no mention of the intentional targeting of civilian infants, children, women and men by Gaza’s Hamas government, the thousands of rockets they launched at Israel’s civilian population, and the restraint that Israel employed over the previous years when attacked on a daily basis.

The IDF does not target civilians. The vast majority of Palestinians that Israel killed have been terrorists. Go check the facts. I have. Palestinians terrorists routinely use hospitals, mosques, and schools to launch their rocket attacks on Israel. Try defending your population from terrorists and see if you can guarantee zero collateral damage. Does your council not condemn the barbarism of the Arab terrorist because in the back of their minds they are concerned terrorists might hunt them down and terrorize THEIR families?

Why was there an IDF operation in Gaza in the first place? To oppress poor Palestinian Arabs? How would you deal with Gazas’ Arabs’ targeting Scotland’s babies, other children, and other civilians. Have you not seen the pictures of atrocities the Arabs have visited on innocent children, or does your council not care? We are not talking about isolated attacks on Israel, but about thousands of rockets they have launched at Israel’s civilian population.

The restraint of Israel under attack is astounding. Colonel Richard Kemp, previous Commander of British Armed Forces in Afghanistan said when presenting his report to the United Nations Human Rights Council in October 2009: “During its operation in Gaza, the Israeli Defence Forces did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.” (source)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said to the US Congress last week: "Of the 300 million Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa, only Israel's Arab citizens enjoy real democratic rights. I want you to stop for a second and think about that. Of those 300 million Arabs, less than one half of 1% are truly free, and they're all citizens of Israel! This startling fact reveals a basic truth: Israel is not what is wrong about the Middle East; Israel is what is right about the Middle East!" (source)

Lastly, the Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas stated this past Saturday that the future state of Palestine will be “free of Jews.” (source)

The State of Israel offers equal freedom for all its citizens, Jew, Arab, and Christian alike, including full parliamentary and judiciary representation. The State of Israel is the unchallenged leader of democracy in the Middle East, and the West Dunbartonshire Council boycott unfortunately attempts to undermine the very success of Israel as a democracy.

Therefore, it saddens me to have to inform you that the global counter-boycott of Scottish whisky products, distilled in the West Durbanshire Council region, is beginning. I don’t know anyone who bears malice toward these fine distilleries. When, however, your local council representatives boycott my country, under the most unethical and immoral of pretext, you cannot expect your market to sit idly and pretend you are not perverting justice.

• The counter-boycott is on the purchase of Scottish Whisky, distilled in the West Durbanshire council region.
• The counter-boycott is not retroactive and applies only to purchases made from June 2011 onwards.
• The counter-boycott will not prevented global residents from purchasing whisky products, distilled outside of West Dunbartonshire.
• Attempts to depict this counter-boycott as racist are also entirely inaccurate. The counter-boycott is instigated in response to conduct and boycott initiated by the West Durbanshire Council and applies to no specific ethnic or religious group. This is in direct opposition to the West Durbanshire Council which refuses to condemn the actions of Palestinian terrorists targeting Israeli civilians and the anti-Semitic, racist declarations of the Palestinian Authority, which calls for a “Jew-free” apartheid, State of Palestine.

The counter-boycott is publicizing the list of West Durbanshire distilled whisky by internet and distributing press releases to news agencies and others around the globe.

Sincerely,

Jameel Rashid
The Muqata Blog
www.muqata.com

Heckling, Intimidation and Violence Silences Israeli Law Lecturer

2011-03-08T11:51:00.002-05:00

MuzzleWatch and Jewish Voice for Peace insult the public's intelligence when they shamelessly promote themselves as being dedicated to free speech and peace, when in fact, just below the flimsy facade, they are nothing more than anti-Israel propaganda organizations.

Especially insulting, too, is their favorite talking point — that anti-Israel activists are "muzzled" by the Jewish establishment. This is offensive because the evidence, some of which I try to highlight on this blog, shows that if anyone is in danger of being systematically muzzled, it is those who defend Israel. I'm not aware of any incident in which crowds of pro-Israel activists violently acted to intimidate pro-Palestinian speakers. Yet from Concordia to York to Queen's University in Belfast, Israel's defenders have been harassed and intimidated in appalling ways.

From the UK's Jewish Chronicle:

An Israeli law lecturer had to be rescued by security officers when a seminar was abandoned after being disrupted by pro-Palestinian demonstrators.

Solon Solomon, a former legal adviser to the Knesset Foreign Affairs committee, had been invited to speak to law school students at Queen's University in Belfast.

But he was heckled by members of the university's Palestine Solidarity Society (PSS) and the youth wing of Sinn Féin shortly after starting his lecture about the legality of Israel's security wall on Wednesday last week.
Sally Wheeler, the law school acting head, abandoned the lunchtime session after less than 10 minutes, and a security team bundled Mr Solomon out of the lecture theatre.

Protesters then surrounded the room where Mr Solomon and other panel members were sheltering.
When the security team eventually moved him out of the university building, protesters attacked the car he was travelling in, punching the vehicle and attempting to smash its windows. One person's foot was run over in the melee.Mr Solomon declined to comment on the incident this week.

A spokeswoman for Queen's University said an investigation had been launched. She added: "We are disappointed that the event could not take place."

Supporters of the Northern Ireland Friends of Israel group were in the audience for the lecture but said that they had been forced to hide on the building's top floor until the protest ended, as they felt intimidated.

The protest was organised by Gary Spedding, president of the university's Palestine Solidarity Society. Mr Spedding works for the Holy Land Trust charity, which seeks to empower Palestinians in the West Bank.
When not studying in Belfast, he lives in Bethlehem.

Mr Spedding, who led the disruption in the lecture theatre by shouting at Mr Solomon, said the attack on the Israeli's car was not perpetrated by PPS supporters and said he did not condone violence.

Stephen Jaffe, of Northern Ireland Friends of Israel, said: "The situation on campus is extremely menacing for any speaker or student who is brave enough to be supportive of Israel."

MuzzleWatch and its parent organization Jewish Voice for Peace, of course, don't have anything to say about this incident; they don't care about when pro-Israel voices are gagged. On the contrary, as readers of this blog know, they celebrate the stifling of those who disagree with their radical politics.

Raheem Kassam on silencing of Israeli Bedouin diplomat: "Gagging is contrary to freedom of speech"

2011-02-08T17:20:00.001-05:00

Raheem Kassam, director of Student Rights, a London-based organization which fights extremism on campus, is appalled. MuzzleWatch surely is not. And we are left with another example of speech actually being muzzled. An excerpt:

Described as a scene “reminiscent of tyrants silencing their opposition,” a student organization has condemned a group of protesters who disrupted a talk at a Scottish university by an Israeli- Arab diplomat accusing them of shutting down debate and free speech.

On Wednesday evening, a group of anti-Israel activists, mainly nonstudents, descended on an event at Edinburgh University where Ishmael Khaldi, an Israeli Beduin diplomat at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was scheduled to address students.

The protesters surrounded the senior Muslim diplomat and hurled abuse at him. Security officers had to be brought in to contain the situation and the event was eventually canceled.

“This isn’t free speech; it is hatred, it is vandalism,” Khaldi told The Jerusalem Post on Friday.

“These activists abuse the values of freedom and democracy of the UK, they put the seeds of hatred in Europe and they betray the cause of moderate Palestinians who, despite everything, are ready to do everything to reach reconciliation and peace with Israel, toward establishing an independent Palestinian state.”

Israel’s ambassador to the UK Ron Prosor said he was not surprised to see this at a British university.

“Ishmael Khaldi reflects the tolerant and open Israel of 2011,” said the ambassador. “These attempts to suppress his freedom of speech come as no surprise.

Once more a British university views this intimidating, mob-rule as acceptable.”

Raheem Kassam, director of Student Rights, a London-based organization which fights extremism on campus, was appalled by the crowd’s behavior.

“It’s a shame these protesters, many of whom weren’t even students, didn’t feel confident enough to quiz Mr. Khaldi in a rational and academic manner,” he said.

Kassam highlighted that an event with the editor of an Arabic newspaper, Abdel Bari Atwan, at the London School of Economics in December was not disrupted despite radical views that people disagree with.

“Atwan is on record as claiming he would dance in Trafalgar Square if Iranian missiles hit Israel. However, his event was not subject to the disruption that took place at Edinburgh. It flies in the face of those who defend controversial speakers on campuses, if they attempt to silence people they don’t agree with.

“This gagging is contrary to the freedom of speech student groups work hard to defend,” Kassam said.

MuzzleWatch Discovers "Legitimate Expression"

2011-02-08T09:32:00.001-05:00

Jewish Voice for Peace, again taking issue with the punishment of students who repeatedly disrupted a speech at UC Irvine by Israeli ambassador Michael Oren, seems to have discovered the concept of "legitimate expression in an open and democratic society." A press release by the organization, quoted in the Los Angeles Times, uses this phrase to describe the planned interruption of a speech by members of the Muslim Student Union.

Looking back through this blog's postings, it seems pretty clear that to JVP (and its subsidiary MuzzleWatch) "legitimate expression" means anything said or done in order to criticize Israel. Meanwhile, the organization continues to regard anything said or done in order to defend Israel against unfair attacks as "muzzling."

Speaking of this LA Times piece, the reporter describes Jewish Voice for Peace as "a liberal group that advocates for peace between Israelis and Palestinians and against Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories." This, I believe, is an inadequately vague description that serves to mislead readers. Because that phase could be used to describe groups like Peace Now and B'tselem, which , faults and falsehoods notwithstanding, belong in a wholly different category than Jewish Voice for Peace. A "liberal group that advocates for peace between Israelis and Palestinians and against Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories" could also describe those who call themselves "liberal Zionists," or even members of Israel's mainstream Labor party.

Again, JVP does not fit in with these groups, and so should not share a description with them. It is, at best, a radical anti-Israel group.

Iranian Embassy Pressure, Anonymous Threats, Forced Cancellation of Film

2011-01-20T14:34:00.000-05:00

Now this is an example of stifling free speech. The Ottawa Citizen reported yesterday that

Threatening e-mails and phone calls resulted in the cancellation Tuesday evening of a film that exposes Iran’s efforts to build nuclear weapons and promote terrorism.

The threats followed a formal complaint last weekend from the Iranian Embassy, seeking to stop the showing of the film Iranium at Library and Archives Canada.

It should come as no surprise to readers of this blog that MuzzleWatch, which pretends to care about free speech, had nothing at all to say about this straightforward attempt to muzzle the open exchange of ideas.

Jung, Yewish and Plod...

2010-11-16T08:15:00.001-05:00

Our good friends at Jewish Voice for Peace have unleashed their most fearsome campaign yet: Young Jewish and Proud, the declaration of young Jews that they are mad dag-nabbit, and they don’t plan to take it anymore.

Fortunately, an intrepid dumpster diver who is also a Divest This fan stumbled across an earlier version of their manifesto which I thought I’d post for those who can’t get enough of those intrepid schmendricks of JVP. And so, we bring you:

The Young Jewish Declaration (original draft)...

Jewish Voice for Peace Watches the Muzzlers in the Mirror

2010-11-11T17:45:00.001-05:00

This blog has often shown how MuzzleWatch's purported concern over "muzzling" in fact amounts to nothing more than promoting anti-Israel rhetoric while attacking views they don't like. But I've also been forced to correct my views on the group.

You see, I first thought that MuzzleWatch and Jewish Voice for Peace merely "looked elsewhere" when anti-Israel activists attempted to disrupt the free speech of moderate pro-Israel voices. Then I realized that JVP went so far as to "cheer" when the open exchange of ideas was stifled, so long as it's ideas they don't like that are targeted.

Now I know better. JVP, it turns out, actually engages in the very muzzling they purport to watch.

"Hecklers interrupted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to a prominent American Jewish group on Monday," the AP reports. But AP, who exactly were these hecklers?

"The hecklers, members of the Young Leadership Institute of Jewish Voice for Peace, stood up and shouted at different times during Mr. Netanyahu's speech to the Jewish Federations of North America."

Seems that MuzzleWatch should watch itself. Maybe next time members of its parent organization think of stifling the open exchange of ideas, they should take a deep breath, gaze at the looking glass, and sing:

I'm Starting With The Man In
The Mirror
(Ooh!)
I'm Asking Him To Change
His Ways
(Ooh!)
And No Message Could Have
Been Any Clearer
If You Wanna Make The World
A Better Place
Take A Look At Yourself And
Then Make A Change!

Professor Kicked Off Panel; Dissent Not Tolerated at Queen’s University Belfast

2010-10-20T12:51:00.002-04:00

Professor Geoffrey Alderman, a historian who has defended Israel, was disinvited from a panel discussion about the Middle East conflict, apparently because the two other invited panelists, Avi Shlaim and Beverley Milton-Edwards, objected to his views.

Shlaim is well-known for his harsh, one-sided criticism of Israel, while Milton-Edwards has argued, in blatant contradiction to Hamas's own charter and repeated statements by its leaders, that the Islamist group "is not anti-peace" nor "anti-negotiation," and are not "anti-Israel" but rather "anti Israeli occupation."

CiF Watch posted Professor Alderman's statement about the incident:

On 20 September 2010 I received an email from the Director of the Belfast Festival, Mr. Graeme Farrow, inviting me to join a panel convened to discuss “Conflict in the Middle East” as part of the 2010 Belfast Festival, held under the auspices of Queen’s University Belfast. Mr. Farrow’s exact words were: “I would be delighted if you would join our panel.”

I was naturally pleased to accept this invitation.
The panel discussion is due to take place on Monday evening, 18 October 2010, in Belfast.

On Friday afternoon, 15 October 2010 I was shocked to receive an email from Mr. Farrow informing me that “a mistake” had been made in extending the invitation to me and that although I could join the audience the event was to go ahead without my panel participation.

In effect, I was being “disinvited.”

In a series of email exchanges with Mr. Farrow I refused to accept this situation, and I have made it clear to him that I intend to travel to Belfast tomorrow and shall expect to participate fully as a member of the panel.< I am frankly appalled at the way I have been treated, for which I hold Queen’s University, Belfast, responsible.

And as of this writing, we hear not a peep from MuzzleWatch. Why? Why don't the purported opponents of this type of "muzzling" have anything to say about this?

Well, that's because MuzzleWatch doesn't really care about muzzling.As thoroughly documented on this site, their purported concern for the open exchange of ideas is no more than a selectively-utilized vehicle for their radical anti-Israel activism — fine china filled with trans-fat. Yum.

The Rarefied Jewish Voice for Peace

2010-10-18T19:08:00.004-04:00

Congratulations are in order to Jewish Voice for Peace. The parent company of MuzzleWatch (definitely not to be confused with MuzzleWatch Watch — see below for the distinction between the two) came in 7th place on the Anti-Defamation League's list of top anti-Israel groups in America.

Of course, because the list is alphabetical, we don't know exactly where they stand relative to the others. But we do know they're in some pretty distinguished company. The ADL's list follows:

* Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER)
* Al-Awda
* Council on American-Islamic Relations
* Friends of Sabeel-North America
* If Americans Knew
* International Solidarity Movement
* Jewish Voice for Peace
* Muslim American Society
* Students for Justice in Palestine
* US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation

And as promised above, here's a cheat sheet to help you understand the difference between MuzzleWatch and MuzzleWatch Watch.

MuzzleWatch watches for anything it can find to cast Israel or its defenders in a negative light (See Bad News from...); supports BDS campaigns (including one whose website slurs Israel as a practitioner of apartheid, www.caldivestfromapartheid.com); backs Israel's most extreme defamers (e.g, Ali Abunimah, the International Solidarity Movement), claims that criticism of radical anti-Israel activists is akin to "muzzling," and poo-poos the intimidation of those who support Israel's right to self defense (you can find that type of poo here).

MuzzleWatch Watch, on the other hand, watches Muzzle Watch.

MuzzleWatch's Sister Site Also Muzzling

2010-10-13T13:50:00.000-04:00

Like MuzzleWatch, TheOnlyDemocracy is a web site run by the anti-Israel advocacy organization Jewish Voice for Peace. And as on its MuzzleWatch blog, JVP sees no irony in censoring other opinions even while accusing those in the holders of those opinions "muzzling."

TheOnlyDemocracy's comments policy:

We read all comments, but only publish a select few that we believe will contribute to the overall discussion about the struggle for democratic rights in Israel and Palestine.

Interestingly, all articles on the website conclude with the welcoming phrase, "Comments are closed." So in other words, if you email Jewish Voice for Peace, and your email is sufficiently in lockstep with their narrow, fringe viewpoints, they might just publish your email on their blog. Otherwise, shaddup.

Sydney and Omar's BDS Journey

2010-09-20T09:17:00.003-04:00

Well it seems that Muzzlewatch finally roused from its slumber after a blissfully quiet slumber.

Before going over what the new Genralisimo of MW, Jesse Bacon, has to say I thought some MWW readers might be interested in this little bit of warped fantasy which stars one of the key players at Jewish Voice for Peace (the puppeteer behind Muzzlewatch). Enjoy:

Sydney and Omar's BDS Journey - Part 1
Sydney and Omar's BDS Journey - Part 2
Sydney and Omar's BDS Journey - Part 3

Right! Right! Right! Right? Wrong.

2010-07-23T12:14:00.000-04:00

Check out the introduction to MuzzleWatch's July 16 posting. Anything stick out? (It will, because I'll bold the relevant text!)

Fenton Communications is a well-known liberal, Democratic public relations firm that caught the “adoring” eye of the Israeli Likudnik crowd because liberal Zionist lobby group J Street founder Jeremy Ben Ami is a former Senior Vice President. Back in March, 2009 Fenton signed a contract with the Qatar based Fakhoora campaign to advocate for accountability over Israel’s attacks on Gaza. Accountability and Israel-now that’s a no-no for the pro-settler lobby. But back then, the right wing echo chamber couldn’t do anything with that information, Ben-Ami had left the year before and denied any connection.

Fast forward over a year and The Israel Project and their right wing buddies are after Fenton (and Ben Ami) again. Amazingly, this time, they were successful and Fenton dropped the account. Completely.

Yes, it's the smoke-and-mirrors technique that casts anyone opposed to demonization and other types anti-Israel bigotry as a loyal minion of Dick Cheney. MuzzleWatch's version (though, to be fair, they're hardly the first anti-Israel activists to try this) is a subset of the practice by extremists of all stripes who act as if they represent the sober mainstream while everyone else represents the fringe.

So let's clear something up: The bond between the United States and Israel is unbreakable. It encompasses our national security interests, our strategic interests, but most importantly, the bond of two democracies who share a common set of values and whose people have grown closer and closer as time goes on.

Actually, those aren't my words. They are the words of well-known Likudnik, pro-settler, right wing echo chamber member President Obama.

Republicans support Israel, yes. And so do Democrats. In a January 2009 poll, a convincing plurality of liberal Democrats sympathized more with Israel than with the Palestinians or "neither." Liberal Democrats. During the Gaza War. Over twice as many Democrats of all stripes expressed sympathy with Israel vs. the Palestinians in that same poll.

So MuzzleWatch can pretend that people like me — pro-choice, pro-gun control, pro-environment, pro-gay rights and pro-Israel — don't exist. But we very much do. On the other hand, MuzzleWatch types — pro-Norman Finkelstein, pro-Stephen Walt, pro-BDS, and staunchly anti-Israel? Not so much.

Blue and Whitewash

2010-07-05T08:00:00.003-04:00

Muzzlewatch seems incapable of letting the whole issue of gay rights go, possibly because they realize what might happen to their self-anointed characterization as progressive heroes if the fact that they are allied with the most murderous anti-gay forces on the planet becomes widely discussed. Alternatively, they may simply be giving the latest term in the anti-Israel lexicon “pinkwashing” a drive around the block.

“Pinkwashing” refers to Israel’s alleged scheme of demonstrating its progressive cred (vs. that of its adversaries including, or should I say, especially, with those forces in the Middle East – such as Hamas - most beloved by Muzzlewatch’s Jewish Voice for Peace masters) by pointing out that Israel is the only place in the Middle East with genuine gay rights.

In the area of gay rights, similar to women’s rights, there is such a glaring contrast between Israel and its neighbors that any direct discussion of the matter must be avoided at all costs by JVP and its allies, and so they come up with creative terms (such as “pinkwashing”) to make the discussion of the reactionary attitudes of JVP friends and allies seem like a nefarious plot.

Under the circumstances, their choice is understandable, especially since their entire endeavor is an attempt to “blue-and-whitewash” the atrocious human rights record of those societies most at odds with the Jewish state. After all, JVP’s pose as humanitarians doesn’t hold up quite so well if they stated honestly that – in their opinion – the rights of gays, women, religious minorities and (in the cases of places like Sudan) ethnic minorities must all be thrown under the bus in favor of their holy cause of Palestinianism, regardless of how many gay (or female, or Christian) Palestinians find themselves forced to flee into Israel to escape death at the hands of their clansmen.

The thing I find most amusing about Cecile’s latest post on the subject is the notion that she and members of the fringe Queers Against Israel Apartheid (QAIA) group they’ve allied with are now involved with “Healing the Gay-Jewish Divide.” After all, there was no Gay-Jewish divide, at least in Toronto, until the QAIA group pulled out all the stops to ensure its divisive message was inserted directly into Toronto’s gay pride parade.

And so the divide they are trying to bridge is one they have created, a conflict they have chosen to cause through their own single-minded, selfish, obsession. And if the rest of the gay community in Toronto has to suffer for JVP/QAIA actions, they can at least comfort themselves with Muzzlewatch willingness to heal the breach they were responsible for opening.

Yoo hoo! Muzzlewatch!

2010-06-24T11:48:00.002-04:00

Just a quick thought for today.

Whenever I periodically Google “Muzzlewatch” as part of this or that research project or ego trip, the Muzzlewatch-watch Web site periodically comes up second only to the site we’re watching. And we’ve even gotten above them periodically on the blogsearchers.

I have no doubt that an organization as Web media-savvy as Jewish Voice for Peace (which, despite its despicable nature and program are reasonably good at leveraging Web 2.0 PR to help them punch above their weight) can see these same results and thus is fully aware of the existence of a site that has been taking apart each and every one of their accusations quite neatly for nearly a year and a half. And yet I don’t recall one mention of this fact (even a condemnation) in any of the volume of accusations JVP hurls at its critics on a daily basis.

Now I’m not making the claim that JVP/Muzzlewatch is under any obligation to pay attention to us, or even defend itself in our (still open!) comments section. But it is interesting that an organization that claims to crave debate over every issue it throws out has both shut down its own comments in order to prevent critical voices from challenging their claims and continues to ignore some folks who have offered them exactly what they supposedly desire more than anything else: a debate over the Middle East on their terms.

Sorry for the interruption – back to what you were doing.

Muzzlewatch vs. Consequences

2010-06-22T14:22:00.000-04:00

Muzzlewatch’s Commander-in-Chief Cecilie Surasky returns to the issue of the UC Irvine students who decided to shout down Israel’s ambassador to the US, Michael Oren, when he attempted to speak on campus last spring. Having never brought herself to consider the irony of a web site allegedly dedicated to free speech having nothing to say when her allies deny that right to those with whom they disagree, Surasky again chooses to focus on the punishment allotted to the Muzzlers.

At least this time, she’s dealing with realty vs. speculation, although the punishment meted out by the Irvine administration (suspension of the group responsible for the incident – the Muslim Student Union or MSU –for one year, plus a year on probation) could very likely be turned around via appeal or even legal challenge. The ability of the Middle East dispute to generate actual hard costs (in the form of legal bills) to student government is just one more aspect of the expensive chaos that tends to ensue when Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP – the organization that actually works the Muzzlewatch hand-puppet) decides to import the Arab-Israeli conflict into every institution in the land.

When reviewing Muzzlewatch’s selectivity on campus muzzling mattes previously, I pointed out my personal discomfort with campus administrators telling students what they could and could not say while also commenting on the challenges such administrators face when one person (or group) decides that their own free speech rights include the right to harass, intimidate, or put a halt to the free speech of others.

JVP/Muzzlewatch (as usual) also misses a bigger picture in which the type of debate they have dragged into campus after campus has a 100% track record of coarsening conversation, turning student against student, dividing the school along racial and religious lines, leading inexorably to a poisoned college atmosphere that administrators (not JVP) must deal with.

Naturally, Surasky presents “context” for the Irvine decision by pointing out a number of alleged (and undocumented) instances where people with whom JVP does not agree (supports of Israel, Republicans) supposedly behaved in ways Muzzlewatch’s friends always do. (And just as naturally, she hides this unproven set of accusation behind the quote from someone else, in this case the MSU’s lawyer.)

But even presuming these accusations are true, shouldn’t that trigger some spark of reflection on the part of those behind Muzzlewatch regarding the degeneration of discourse on our campuses to which they have contributed so much? When I attend events that require me to run a gauntlet of protestors (or cops), and have to pull myself closer to the stage to hear over protestor’s bullhorns, it depresses me that another place where a conversation could have taken place has been turned instead into an infantile shouting match.

Is there any similar sentiment to be found at Muzzlewatch? Any thought that their activity (including attempts to accuse critics of censorship for having the temerity of criticizing them) might be doing more harm than good? Not a chance. Just the usual self-righteousness and childish attempts to restate their ongoing case which can be boiled down to: “Free speech for me, but not for thee.”

Gay Pride and Prejudice

2010-06-15T20:23:00.002-04:00

Time to close out this month’s review of Muzzlewatch misfires with a discussion of their most bizarre accusation to date: that Israel supporters are somehow trying to stifle discussion of “Israel Apartheid” within the gay and lesbian community.

I say “bizarre” because if there’s one issue where Israel’s human rights record shines with supernova-scale light when compared to its neighbors (the folks who, among other things, support and fund Israel=Apartheid campaigns) it’s in the area of gay rights.

After all, it’s one thing to sweep the repression of women in the Muslim world under the carpet with a turn of the head and some feeble muttering about “understanding cultural differences” that implies that it is only the kept, hajibbed women trailing along her owner/husband by ten paces that is truly “free.” But there really is no way to ignore that gay pride parades that take place routinely in Israel would be met with machine gun fire if it took place in Cairo or Tehran (the latter being spared such concerns since, according to the Iran’s President, there are no homosexuals in that country – so much for 1 in 10).

Now I know that within Israel there are Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox individuals groups who rail against homosexuals, lesbians and the "Sodom and Gamorah" of Tel Aviv’s gay scene. But that’s simply because Israel has a gay scene to verbally rail against. And I know that some defenders of Israel with no track record of defending gay rights in the US will often draw a Muslim homophobia arrow from the quiver during political debate. But if only non-black pots were allowed to debate the subject of kettles, well there would be no Muzzlewatch or Jewish Voice for Peace, now would there?

The ludicrousness of trying to use the gay issue as a bludgeon against the Jewish state came home when someone forwarded me a letter begging Elton John to not play a concert in “Apartheid Israel,” claiming that, despite its supposed open-mindedness regarding homosexuality, Israel has in the past yielded to demands of Palestinians families to have their fleeing gay children returned to them. Yes, you heard that right. Partisans of the Palestinian cause now list, among Israel’s crimes¸ the Jewish state’s alleged choice to send gay men and women into the clutches of the very Palestinians these partisans spend their lives fighting for, and then blame Israel when said gay Palestinians are beaten to death by their brethren.

This nonsense makes sense only if you realize that the entire point of Muzzlewatch is as a preemptive strike. Remember, Jewish Voice for Peace wants to be able to say whatever it wants and do whatever it wants, whenever and wherever it wants. Yet it also wants to claim that anyone else exposing its lies or hypocrisy, or battling against its causes (such as BDS) are “muzzlers” trying to stifle debate on the Middle East. This moral inversion can only be accomplished because supporters of Israel actually possess a respect for open discussion and debate that JVP and its friends simply feign. And so, Muzzlewatch hopes that they can get their critics to question their own rights to engage in political activity, leaving JVP et al free to do their dirty work unhindered.

Extending this tactic to a gay pride matter is simply Muzzlewatch’s childlike way to try to preempt the facts stated above, notably that it is Jewish Voice for Peace that unquestionably supports a culture that tortures and murders gay people against an Israeli society that welcomes them. Hiding behind a “Queers Against Israeli Apartheid” splinter group that’s even more marginal that JVP itself is simply their clumsy way of hiding their own opinions behind someone else's.

Now that I think about it, if gay rights are such a vital issue with which to bash the Jewish state, why hasn’t Jewish Voice for Peace taken up this matter with gay leaders in JVP’s own North California stronghold? Could it be that local gay pride groups know how to respond to narrow partisans trying to morally blackmail them into embracing a cause they know is not theirs (with a hearty FU)?

Or perhaps the Muzzlewatchers haven’t gone down this route simply because, as in Tehran, there are no gay people in San Francisco.

Muzzlewatch: Lost at Sea

2010-06-13T10:22:00.001-04:00

God how I miss those weeks in May and June when the Jewish Voice for Peace crew were busying themselves with trying to spin the dogshit of defeat of their failed BDS campaigns in California into the gold of fantasy victory. For four blissful weeks, Muzzlewatch stayed silent, allowing me to do something other than shooting their latest “fish-in-a-barrel” arguments.

Alas, four accusations in one week require four responses. One and two can be found in last week’s postings, so today we take on Muzzlewatch’s take on the “Freedom Flotilla” in which a boat load of Turkish mercenaries suffered the fate that inevitably comes to those who bring a knife to a gunfight.

Muzzlewatch has a sticky problem with regard to portraying the recent Flotilla incident as nothing more than Israeli butchers dropping down to peaceful aid ships for Gaza and massacring or beating everyone in sight.

It’s not just that the world has seen video evidence demonstrating what happened before and after Israeli soldiers boarded the Mavi Mavera. After all, JVP and friends can simply rant on about how such evidence was “obviously” doctored (quoting like-minded Web sites as their only source for de-legitimizing overwhelming, clear-cut evidence regarding how violence broke out on that ship). After all, when JVP and its pals act as judge and jury (as they do at Muzzlewatch), it goes without saying any evidence Israel and its supporters provide for the defense will be immediately thrown out of court.

No the trouble for JVP is evidence those participating in the Flotilla provide. After all, there were six ships in that convoy (seven if you include the Rachel Corrie which rode on the wake of the previous week’s mayhem). And on all those ships except one, no one was shot, no one was wounded. Like every other ship that tried to run the legal, legitimate Israeli blockade of Gaza (including at least two gun running ships from Iran), the crew and passengers of all ships that did not go on the attack were brought safely to an Israeli port and sent home.

Israel’s video evidence is not all that’s needed to show the difference between the many blockade running ships where no one was hurt, and the one ship where several people were killed. For once the survivors of Mavi Mavera returned home to Turkey, they were not wailing about how they had been victimized. No, they were bragging about how they had drawn the blood of Israeli soldiers.

In other words, just as JVP and other friends and allies of the Flotilla are painting a picture of pristine victims on every boat that’s sailed towards the Gaza coast, crews full of nuns and orphans who would never lift a finger against anyone, other Flotilla friends (including those that participated) are boasting in national newspapers that attacking Israelis was why they set sail in the first place.

Here you have an interesting example of the dual role proponents of violence and propaganda play in the Arab-Israeli conflict with some parties (like Turkey’s IHH terrorist organization or Hamas) providing the muscle, the blades, the bullets and the rockets that allow the folks at JVP to get off on surrogate violence. In the meanwhile, JVP’s job is to turn the propaganda volume up to 11, trying to turn self-proclaimed warriors into the reincarnation of Martin Luther King, Gandhi and Jesus Christ.

According to JVP and Muzzlewatch, their hands are clean (except, perhaps, for the whitewash).

Don't Sanction Me!

2010-06-12T07:10:00.003-04:00

I guess another month of silence on the Muzzlewatch front was too much to hope for. Once again, they seem to be in the business of throwing accusation after accusation up against the wall in dim hope that at least one will stick.

Having dealt with their laughable attempts to make victims of themselves and Helen Thomas, one of Muzzlewatch’s most recent postings attempts to turn Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and all their allies in the BDS “movement” into martyrs of a scale never seen since Rome threw Christians to the lions.

Once more, a quick clarification. Muzzlewatch is not an organization, but a tactic used by the organization Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), a group whose main missions are to (1) pronounce anyone accused of anti-Semitism “not guilty” (with a Jewish accent) and (2) getting everyone in the world to boycott, divest from and sanction the state of Israel as the leading BDS organization with the word “Jewish” in its name.

Let’s think a moment about what BDS stands for (literally and conceptually). By “Boycott” (the “B” of BDS), that means they would like every retail organization on the globe to stop selling Israeli products. They would also like academics and artists to boycott the Jewish state, meaning researchers and professors (in any field) should stop sharing information with Israelis, stop inviting them to conferences, stop allowing them into graduate programs. And by “Israelis,” I mean just the Jewish ones. Palestinian “academics” like Omar Barghouti are, in contrast, free to not only skip such a boycott, but to enjoy a subsidized lifestyle at an Israeli university of their choosing while they jet around the world advocating for all other academics in the world to boycott their Israeli colleagues. And any attempted boycott of people like Barghouti is denounced as a form of bigotry.

Divestment (BDS’s “D”) means all institutions that in any way invest in Israel or in companies that do business with Israel should drop those investments in protest of this or that policy of the Jewish state. And Sanctions (“S”) extends this call for punishment to governments and international organizations, all of which are called upon by BDS advocates (like Jewish Voice for Peace) to take official action denouncing and punishing (economically and otherwise) Israel, using their government power and authority to pass judgment and take action against one and only one nation: the Jewish one.

But apparently, JVP has a problem when a government follows their advice to the letter, only this time turning that advice about “sanctions” against BDS activists themselves. Yes, after a decade of BDS activity targeting Israel, some Israeli parliamentarians are trying to create consequences for that activity, calling for Israelis who take part in a boycott to pay for any damages caused to those being boycotted, and not continuing to give BDS advocates all the privileges they have enjoyed entering and leaving Israel to spread their poison at will.

Now truth be told, I’m not personally a big fan of any government taking action against political activity inside or outside of their borders. And, while I could definitely be wrong, the resolution Muzzlewatch has gotten its panties bunched up over looks a lot like “get tough” posturing that rarely becomes law (or stays law) within a democracy (unlike, say, outlawing drawings of Mohammed which Muslim nations seem to be succeeding in turning into a global blasphemy law – to the silence of “Muzzlewatch,” of course).

The problem is, any case that such laws do more harm than good is undercut by the activities of Jewish Voice for Peace which clearly stands for universal jurisdiction of every country against every other through its incessant calls that all governments everywhere (not to mention all other institutions everywhere) drop their core missions to focus instead on JVP’s top priority: punishment of the Jewish state.

It gives me no pleasure to say “sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander,” and I would prefer that all governments stop shaking their fists at one another for reasons of political posturing. But if JVP finds the notion of government sanction turned against it and its allies so repellent, perhaps they should have a talk with the folks they see in the mirror every morning regarding how their own activity has made an Israeli response inevitable.

Words, words, words

2010-06-10T08:59:00.002-04:00

Well those delicate flowers at Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) seem so bent out of shape (or so busy jumping for joy) over events from the last few weeks that they have lost track of the fact that their Muzzlewatch site, which pretends to be advocating for free speech and open discussion of the Middle East, has broken into a huff over the fact that someone dares say things with which JVP does not approve.

First off, after nearly a month’s blissful hiatus, Muzzlewatch posts this disturbing video and transcript about angry voices allegedly raging against them by supporters of Israel protesting an event held by JVP and its friends denouncing the Jewish state for piracy and murder.

Naturally, we are required to take JVP at their word that this alleged hostility was the Alpha and Omega of the response to their protest, and that the hostility they encountered was only one-way. Those of us who have attended pro-Israel events where vile epitaphs are routinely shouted at us through megaphones (not to mention events where such protests degenerate into “direct action” to disrupt Israeli speakers and entertainers) may be a bit skeptical of Muzzlewatch’s self-serving account of the SF event.

And then we move onto Helen Thomas. After making the requisite criticism of “The Grand Dame of White House journalists” as “offensive and wrong” for calling for the Jews of Palestine to go back to Poland, they then dedicate the following 14 paragraphs to condemning all of their critics as contemptible racists. (Funny how a site which claims that its critics routinely try to shut down discussion of the Middle East through cynical accusations of anti-Semitism seem to have a hair trigger when it comes to stifling use of the “R-word.”)

What is missing from all of their discussion of the hurtful impact of words is commentary on this language:

“Shut up! Go back to Aushwitz!”

or the only slightly more tasteful:

"We're helping the Arabs go against the US, don't forget 9/11 guys!"

No, these are not recently discovered lyrics from John Lennon’s “Give Peace a Chance.” They are, in fact, the words spoken by “peace activists” aboard the one (and only one) ship in the recent “Peace Flotilla” that decided to attack Israelis with deadly force, leading to deadly force directed against them, leading to a crisis, leading to a JVP march against “Israeli barbarism,” leading to people protesting against JVP and its friends.

And what has Muzzlewatch distilled this entire episode down to? Selective excerpts of people saying mean things to them on the streets of San Francisco.

Unlike the boiling, hate-filled rage that spews daily from the Middle East media and educational curricula, Jew-hating incitement that has led directly to the death of thousands and doom for any hope of peace, any hostility JVP and its critics hurled at each other is not likely to ever go beyond angry rhetoric.

So the question is, does Muzzlewatch point its radar only at its critics, rather than its allies, because it feels it can impact the former, but not the latter? Or does it actually approve of the bile associated with those JVP supports, and hopes it can shame those who have the audacity to point out their hypocrisy into silence?

Muzzlewatch's Broken Record

2010-05-10T14:31:00.002-04:00

I suspect that Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) is having trouble finding a way to portray the defeat of its beloved Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) resolutions up and down the State of California as a form of “censorship,” which is why JVP’s Muzzlewatch mouthpiece has had to suffice with acting like a broken record over the last month.

The groove on they seem stuck is their reaction to the fact that the organized Jewish community of San Francisco is starting to exercise some judgment with regard to whom it gives money to and how people are allowed to present themselves when traveling under the official Jewish Federation banner.

You see, last year JVP and its friends managed to hijack the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, turning it into an event created in their own image where films and lectures depicting Israelis as intentional murderers were welcomed and hailed, while those defending Israel against such outlandish charges were heckled and jeered.

Members of the community naturally asked what had led to such behavior and what mechanisms were in place to ensure that people were not using the community’s money, facilities and name to assault the very things that community held most dear (including not being accused of being accomplices to war crimes).

Despite the enormous bureaucratic inertia that usually prevents institutions like the Federation from enacting changes of this type, the behavior of JVP and its allies was so outrageous that reforms began to be put in place. And, right on cue, the notion that an establishment Jewish organization would not automatically continue to underwrite the defamation of the Jewish people brought howls of “censorship” from JVP/Muzzlewatch’s Cecilie Surasky.

Naturally, Muzzlewatch’s outrage is portrayed in the form of statements made and petitions signed by local Jewish organizations who are understandably concerned with decisions of this type. The fact that these statements/petitions need to be seen in the context of equally valid statements supporting the Federation’s position (not to mention the reasons for the change in which JVP was so intimately involved) are dealt with at Muzzlewatch by simply pretending they don’t exist. And thus their cartoon of Federation fat cats suppressing a silent majority of peace-loving Jews prevails (at least in the minds of the 30 or so people who regularly read Muzzlewatch for something other than a laugh).

Columbia Unbecoming

2010-05-07T12:45:00.002-04:00

Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) has taken a few minutes off from injecting itself into every campus on the West Coast (where it’s been providing a Jewish face to the divestment votes currently failing all over the state), to have its Muzzlewatch mouthpiece issue a condemnation of Jewish organizations daring to play a role in the Middle East debate at Columbia.

This condemnation, a stretch even by Muzzlewatch standards, involves an actual Columbia student attending an actual Columbia class (gasp), even though he was not enrolled in it. Allegedly, his job in the classroom was to monitor what was said by a controversial teacher, supposedly at the behest of one or more super-duper-powerful Jewish organizations like CAMERA and (queue the mad-scientist organ music): AIPAC!

What do I think about that type of campus monitoring activity? In truth, I’m not particularly happy that it goes on. But I’m also not particularly happy that the phenomenon that triggered such activity (the politicization of the classroom by a number of professors who have abandoned academic principle for advocacy) takes place in far too many campuses, a fact known to all despite the best efforts of Muzzlewatch et al to cover it up.

I would far prefer it if the college campus was a place where important issues like the Middle East conflict were discussed civilly and rationally, where the best minds of the coming generation could be applied to the problems of the region, or at least taught enough understanding to prepare the way for peace sometime in the future.

But there’s not much chance of that with JVP/Muzzlewatch in the mix peddling its brand of toxic, uncompromising, dishonest rhetoric on every campus it can reach. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if it bothers the delicate souls at Muzzlewatch that those with whom they politically disagree are engaging in political activity on campuses that JVP considers it owns, they have a choice. They can keep turning these colleges into war zones year after year and live with the fact that their actions will cause an opposite reaction, or they can actually spend a few minutes reflecting on how much their activity is exacerbating and extending rather than solving conflict and behave accordingly.

Try as they might to get their political opponents to question (and censor) themselves via the ugly accusations that are the Alpha and Omega of Muzzlewatch, opposition to the assaults JVP and its friends have organized on college campuses is growing. And with every posting that appears on the Muzzlewatch site, the hypocritical “we get to do anything we want, but if you respond you’re censoring us” message becomes more laughably transparent.

The "Good Jews" of JVP Make Mearsheimer's List

2010-05-03T21:56:00.007-04:00

Congratulations to MuzzleWatch! The group's parent organization, which calls itself Jewish Voice for Peace, made Mearsheimer's list of good Jews, alongside such notables as Richard "Israeli 'holocaust-in-the-making'" Falk and Norman "Israel is a 'satanic state' from 'the boils of hell' which 'is committing a holocaust in Gaza'" Finkelstein.

Mearsheimer divides Jews into three categories: Mainstream Jewish leaders and journalists are dubbed "new Afrikaners"; the majority of Jews who are simply not savvy enough to realize Israel is satanic are called the "great ambivalent middle"; and then there are the righteous Jews:

To give you a better sense of what I mean when I use the term righteous Jews, let me give you some names of people and organizations that I would put in this category. The list would include Noam Chomsky, Roger Cohen, Richard Falk, Norman Finkelstein, Tony Judt, Tony Karon, Naomi Klein, MJ Rosenberg, Sara Roy, and Philip Weiss of Mondoweiss fame, just to name a few. I would also include many of the individuals associated with J Street and everyone associated with Jewish Voice for Peace, as well as distinguished international figures such as Judge Richard Goldstone. Furthermore, I would apply the label to the many American Jews who work for different human rights organizations, such as Kenneth Roth of Human Rights Watch.

It seems that to be righteous, you have to be anti-Zionist, either in intent or in effect.

Likely "new Afrikaner" Jeffrey Goldberg would remove a couple of Jews from the List, but he keeps JVP in the lineup. I guess I can understand Goldberg's demotions. But if we do scratch Cohen and Goldstone, can we at least replace them with Neturei Karta?

Muzzlewatch: Stop Doing as I Do!

2010-04-28T07:01:00.005-04:00

As Jewish Voice for Peace’s beloved Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) projects continues to crash and burn in JVP’s own backyard of California, the organization’s Muzzlewatch mouthpiece is having a bit of trouble finding new issues over which to declare its martyrdom.

For this week’s installment, Muzzlewatch lead Cecilie Surasky returns to one of Muzzlewatch’s favorite chestnuts: having been prevented from holding their umpteenth propaganda event at a forum of their choosing (an event that easily found another home), Surasky – as always – cries “censorship.”

Never mind that similar events have been held up and down the California coast at every college and university in the land all year long. Never mind that when Israel’s supporters held their own events, they were the subject of disruption, with Muzzlewatch waving their tattered free-speech banner in support of the disruptors. And never mind that Jewish Voice for Peace guards its own public spaces as jealously as a fanatical cock guards its roost (up to and including eradicating Muzzlewatch’s comments space to ensure that no dissenting voices will even be given minimal ability to respond to their endless charges).

While there’s nothing much new in Muzzlewatch’s latest empty accusation of “muzzling,” Cecilie seems to have reserved her hysteria for the fact that Jewish students protested the UC Santa Cruz event by characterizing the proposed talk as hurtful and threatening, something which led college administrators to ask the organizers of the program to find another location.

Still lacking the ability to look into anyone’s soul (and not knowing anyone at UC Santa Cruz), I cannot say for sure whether these student’s were presenting accurate accounts of their feelings, or if they were simply taking a page out of the playbook of JVP and its allies in attempting to trump the opposition by appealing to emotion rather than reason. But it seems to be the fact that Israel’s supporters have chosen to fight back using tactics that Israel’s defamers reserve for themselves that has gotten JVP’s panties in a bunch.

Which leads me to yet another appeal to my modified version of what I’ve been calling “The Surasky Formulation.” This is named after the head of Muzzlewatch who routinely claims that Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions projects are not the result of JVP and its allies working to get them enacted across the land seven days a week. No, according to “The Surasky Formulation,” Israel and its supporters are responsible for BDS which will only end when we do what we’re told.

To which I would counter: UC students fighting back at Santa Cruz, Berkeley and Davis is the direct result of JVP and its friends turning those campuses into war zones. If the whole Students for Justice in Palestine/Al-Awda/JVP axis didn’t force these kids to run the gauntlet between Israel Apartheid Week events, student council divestment resolutions and daily barrages of “Israel is an Apartheid War Criminal” propaganda morning, noon and night, there would be no need for these students to organize themselves and fight back.

Like most militant organizations, JVP would prefer that it be given free reign to do whatever it wants, wherever and whenever they like with no opposition and in full control of the language. Thus the need for a propaganda arm like Muzzlewatch designed to get Israel’s defenders to question their own free speech rights, a campaign that plays off the understanding that those defenders actually possess the concern for free speech that Muzzlewatch only feigns for their own political purposes.

In short, if students using their own free speech rights to fight against JVP propaganda so offends the delicate souls of Muzzlewatch, they have an easy out: stop shoving their nastiness in those student’s faces from dusk to dawn. There’s nothing written in any holy book saying that American college campuses must become an endless front of the Arab-Israeli conflict. This is a choice JVP and its allies have made. And if they don’t like the results, they and only they have the power to make the pain stop.

Canada Post Likes Israel

2010-04-22T15:10:00.000-04:00

Further proof that the Jews control the media? Nope. The Canada Post isn't a newspaper, but rather that country's USPS equivalent.

In other words, it's further proof that the Jews control the government.

I can't help but wonder, though, if the Canadian postal service is merely trying to make some money from the Buycott movement. (Read Jon's take here.)

Boycott Fails at Davis - Muzzlewatch Cries "Foul"

2010-04-12T04:42:00.005-04:00

I was wondering if Muzzlewatch would get around to denouncing the latest defeat of their beloved Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) “movement” at the Davis Food Co-op (DFC - one of the most successful Co-ops in the country).

The BDSers have been targeting food co-ops of late and, as noted here, the Davis Co-op’s board of directors recently voted unanimously that a ballot of members on whether or not to boycott Israeli products would not be appropriate for the organization. Needless to say, Muzzlewatch has cried “foul,” and – like the failed boycotters they echo – bemoaned the death of democracy at the Co-op.

If you can wade through the cement-like prose of Muzzlewatch guest author Jesse Bacon, he claims that DFC’s board rejected a ballot for two reasons: (1) fears that it was illegal and (2) fears of financial repercussion if members left the Co-op over the issue. Due to these fears, Muzzlewatch claims, DFC allegedly bypassed its own bylaws to prevent members from having their say on the issue.

Pretty damning, unless you know the actual details of the story which, unfortunately for Muzzlewatch, some of us do. For you see, the Co-op bylaws include an important clause requiring that any question must fulfill a “lawful and proper purpose” to get onto the ballot. And when they recently reduced the number of signatures needed to get a question onto the ballot from 15% to 5%, they explicitly stated that this easing would be accompanied by stricter enforcement of whether or not such a question passed the “lawful and proper” threshold.

Muzzlewatch chose to focus on the “lawful” part of the Co-op’s decision (and, indeed, the Co-op did issue a statement questioning whether or not a boycott at their store might fall afoul of US anti-boycott legislation). But by far the most critical decision by the Co-op (one that Muzzlewatch has chosen to ignore) was this statement as to why an anti-Israel boycott proposal was not considered “proper.” It was this decision that spelled the end of the Davis boycott project.

The Davis statement regarding the inappropriateness of a boycott of Israeli goods is remarkable in articulating every reason why a civic institution like the Co-op is not obliged to embrace boycott, divestment and sanctions just because the BDSers tell them they must. Such a motion, they state, demands that the organization hand over the “authority and discretion in the management and operation of the DFC to BDS, a third party entity that owes no [fiduciary] duty to the DFC or its members…” In other words, the BDSers are asking for a vote as to whether they vs. the Davis Co-op’s management have the final say over the store’s business practices.

Furthermore, the question would demand that the Davis Food Co-op accept the boycotter’s characterization of the Middle East as its own (the old BDS tactic of stuffing their words into someone else’s mouth), something the Co-op leadership rejects (especially since that characterization is dubious at best, one-sided and fraudulent at worst). The proposal is vague, they accurately claim, and creates no mechanism and sets no limits on how or when a third party (BDS) could veto the Co-op’s business decisions. And finally, the boycott would be in violation of principles Co-ops around the country (and world) have signed onto as the Co-op movement has grown over the last decades.

While the statement does include concerns over members leaving the Co-op over this boycott issue, this was just to highlight the fact that a boycott move would threaten the unity of the organization which the Co-op’s board is required to uphold.

In other words, a decision that Muzzlewatch would like to characterize as being based on questionable concerns over legality and fears of financial loss was actually based on sound, well-articulated principles (which may explain why Muzzlewatch decided to exclude the critical statement regarding the improperness of the boycott motion in their article on the subject).

Regarding decrying the death of democracy, it’s interesting to note that just last week Muzzlewatch was hailing a divestment decision by the Student Senate at Berkeley, a representative body comparable to the Davis Board, as the epitome of democratic decision-making and denouncing the decision of the equally elected Student Senate President to veto the measure. As usual, Muzzlewatch’s definition of “democracy” seems to change on a weekly basis depending on who is following the boycot party line on any given day.

Now Mr. Bacon does point out that several other Co-ops did put boycott questions to the ballot, only to see them overwhelmingly rejected by voters. And this does bring up a good point, albeit not the one Muzzlewatch might have thought. For these Co-op voter rejections of Israel boycotts simply join other near-unanimous votes by organizations like the Presbyterian and Methodist Churches to reject divestment from Israel, as well as decisions by representative bodies or individuals at places like Davis and Berkeley to give BDS the heave-ho.

Sometimes these decisions are made by voters, sometimes by elected officials, sometimes other types of decision-makers (like the management of Trader Joe’s). But in all cases they lead to the same place: boycott, divestment and sanctions being overwhelmingly rejected by everyone who gets a say in the matter (which, interestingly enough, includes the most progressive organizations in the country).

Death to the Moderate! Death to her Family! (And: Save Tufts from Temperance!)

2010-04-09T13:14:00.007-04:00

From the UK's Zionist Federation:

Death threats force Arab Israeli Eurovision singer to cancel London appearance at Israel Independence Day show – Mira Awad, the Arab Israeli singer who represented Israel at the last Eurovision Song Contest, has been forced to withdraw from the ZF Israel Independence Day Concert in London due to death threats made against her and her family. The singer is half of a duo with Achinoam Nini, also known as Noa, another of Israel’s top artists, and they perform internationally to packed audiences, promoting a unique message of peace and co-existence. The ZF who have organised annual Israel Independence Day events in Britain for many years took the decision to invite them to headline the show and celebrate the diversity of the Israeli population, of which almost 20% are non-Jewish citizens, mainly Arabs. Mira Awad’s Manager said: “Mira and Noa’s message is about finding a peaceful way forward. It is tragic that when both sides try to come together by any means possible to build a better future for Israel and its citizens, there are those prepared to use violence and intimidation to destroy it.” Mira will remain in Israel whilst Noa performs at the London concert, her first appearance in 6 months since giving birth to a daughter. The ZF’s Executive Director Alan Aziz said: “Our concert is a celebration of independence but it’s also about building understanding. Mira wanted to be the Arab Israeli voice promoting a peaceful way forward, and the threats to her life expose the real truth behind the conflict - that everyone is hostage to extremism, and it is a dangerous and growing phenomenon that denies Israel’s right to exist, and the world’s right to democracy.”

Needless to say, the death threats, surely the most dreadful type of muzzling short of actual physical harm, are not the type of intimidation that MuzzleWatch and Jewish Voice for Peace tend to concern themselves with. They fail JVP's ideological litmus test. It is, after all, an Israeli Arab moderate, someone who genuinely and boldly supports coexistence in Israel, who's being so brutishly intimidated.

Before and after fliers advertising the Zionist Federation's Independence day concert.

Speaking of moderates, a planned lecture by Palestinian journalist Khaled Abu Toameh's at Tufts University has been derailed. Not by violent extremists opposed to coexistence with Jews. This time, it's the student group Tufts Friends of Israel (!!) that's preventing the moderate voice from being heard on campus.

Abu Toameh is soon to arrive in the US for a lecture tour sponsored by Hasbarah Fellowships, but the planned stop at Tufts requires sponsorship by a campus group. Tufts Friends of Israel pulled out, apparently worried that a speaker who is, well, a friend of Israel (and of the Palestinian people) would be seen as "controversial" by less temperate members of the Tufts community.

Oh no! AIPAC (mwuhu ha ha ha!)

2010-04-08T08:01:00.004-04:00

I knew it was just a matter of time before my old friends at Muzzlewatch stumbled on this video that’s been floating around the Internet, usually bracketed with frightening text announcing that AIPAC is trying to take over America’s college campuses.

Naturally, Muzzlewatch throws in its own little flourish, trying to add a level of paranoia to the student government elections at UC Berkeley by musing about an “AIPAC-Manchurian candidate” which they bet (only in jest, of course) that everyone at Berkeley should be looking for.

Now I have a little perspective on this issue since (1) I’ve been dealing with the Berkeley divestment issue for many weeks; (2) I’ve been dealing with Muzzlewatch for many years; and (3) I attended the session on the video Muzzlewatch is using to try to whip up hysteria on yet another college campus (yes, I attended my first AIPAC Policy Conference this year – Boo!).

To put thing into context, AIPAC’s involvement with college campuses began as a way to connect with students who are interested in student government with the expectation that the political and leadership skills that would lead them to take part in student councils at the high school and college level mean these people may become the political leaders of tomorrow. As a lobbying group (one that takes part in the American political system alongside thousands of such groups), AIPAC stands out for thinking long term (something I see very little of in either public or private enterprise) by investing in tomorrow’s leaders today.

With regard to the comments Jonathan Kessler makes in this video, this was in response to a question from the floor (one I heard repeated at nearly every Policy Conference session I went to) with regard to what AIPAC was going to fight against divestment resolutions like the one that was vetoed recently at Berkeley. In response, Kessler said that AIPAC would do nothing with regard to protesting the vote, bringing pressure to bear on the university or organizing letter-writing or other lobbying to existing student leaders. Rather, their goal (again, thinking long-term) is to ensure that student leaders who support Israel develop the skills they need to succeed politically, and that student leaders who are not interested in Middle East politics at least have a strong enough understanding of the issues to not fall into the often brain-dead party line that passes for a Middle East debate on many college campuses.

Now here I have to return to what I will call the Surasky Formulation, named after Muzzlewatcher-in-Chief Cecilie Surasky who repeatedly claims that the BDS activity that Jewish Voice for Peace and allies groups spend their mornings, noons and nights campaigning for on campuses across the country is the direct responsibility of not JVP but of Israel. If Israel just did what it was told, Surasky has said, these activities would stop immediately.

But in the case of Berkeley, the only reason AIPAC has anything to say about campus politics is because friends of JVP (such as Students for Justice in Palestine) are perpetually inserting the Middle East conflict into those campuses by, among other things, drafting divestment resolutions and pressuring the Berkeley student government to pass them.

If they were not engaged in these activities, then AIPAC’s role on campuses would be limited to establishing relationships with student leaders with an eye towards the future, and most other Jewish organizations wouldn’t be involved with campuses at all beyond educational and cultural matters.

But as it turns out, JVP and its pals have put decades of effort into ensuring that America’s campuses become hotbeds of anti-Israel activity with Apartheid Week protests, divestment resolutions, teach ins that tell one side (and only one side) of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and so on and so on and so on. In other words, AIPAC’s activities on campus would have nothing to do with day-to-day campus politics if those that follow the Muzzlewatch line didn’t make it their business to make condemnation of Israel the business of student politics.

Now Cecile and her allies, like the rest of us, live in a democracy where they are free to take part in the political process in any way they see fit. I only wish that they would show enough respect for those with whom they disagree to let them do the same without declaring that anyone’s political activity outside of their own is part of an illegitimate “Manchurian Candidate” conspiracy.

For JVP but not for Thee

2010-04-05T09:15:00.005-04:00

A recent Muzzlewatch entry distills perfectly the “Constitutional Rights for Me, but Not for Thee” philosophy that undergirds the entire Muzzlewatch project.

Remember that Muzzlewatch is just one project/tactic of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), an organization that runs its own Web site, Muzzlewatch and another recently started site that is meant to question the characterization of Israel as the Middle East’s only democracy. In addition, the organization has been involved with every Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) project you can name, trying to push third parties (the Davis Food Co-op, UC Berkeley, etc.) to boycott or divest from Israel. This is in addition to its non-stop propaganda activities (in partnership with anti-Israel groups across the world) to continually characterize the Jewish state as the epitome of modern-day sin.

In other words, JVP is fully exercising its rights of free speech and assembly both domestically and internationally. And I would never challenge JVP’s exercise of those rights, even as I use my own free-speech rights to point out that JVP is using theirs to behave like whining, hypocritical assholes.

But apparently this respect for rights is not a two-way street. For in this piece, Muzzlewatcher-in-Chief Cecilie Surasky once again lets loose on the Reut Institute research report that dares to identify Jewish Voice for Peace and its friends and allies as doing exactly what they are doing (organizing to push for BDS against Israel as part of an overall de-legitimization strategy). In other words, JVP demands full freedom to engage in its political campaigns, but insists that anyone discussing what they do (much less organizing politically to counter them) is part of a sinister conspiracy.

If I were following Cecilie’s logic (which always comes back to her challenge that there would be no BDS or other anti-Israel activity if Israel simply followed JVP’s dictates), I think it’s safe to say there would be no Reut Report if JVP et al did not give the Reut organization something to write about.

There's no "me" (or JVP) in "democracy"

2010-03-27T09:43:00.005-04:00

Unsurprisingly, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) is in the thick of the latest BDS controversy going on at UC Berkeley. I say unsurprisingly because, as has been pointed out before, the entire purpose of Jewish Voice for Peace is not peace but propaganda, their primary mission being to provide a Jewish face to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) “movement.”

I’ll be providing running commentary on the Berkeley story here, but here at Muzzlewatch-Watch, I’d like to comment on how the JVP-BDS campaign is being portrayed at the JVP-mouthpiece “shut up our enemies” arm, otherwise known as Muzzlewatch.

In a piece bemoaning the fact that all commentary on the subject of Israel and its detractors does not conform to the JVP-Muzzlewatch world view, Muzzlewatcher-in-Chief Cecilie Surasky takes umbrage (as in Delores) with the fact that critics of the recent Berkeley divestment motion are not toeing the JVP party line that this vote is simply a commentary on “The Occupation” (queue scary organ music).

In other communication, JVP rails against the fact that BDS votes like the one at Berkeley are being described as part of a campaign “to delegitimize Israel,” rather than simply being taken as legitimate criticism of specific Israel policies.

Here Surasky and Company are being rather cute about highlighting just the parts of the Berkeley resolution that suit their purpose. If you read the resolution in its entirety, you’ll note that the vast majority of its 1700-word length is dedicated to a recitation of every accusation that can be dredged up about the loathsomeness and criminality of the Jewish state. Naturally, the text hides behind organizations like the UN when delivering its charges (never once noting that an organization that spends half its time and resources condemning just one country – at the expense of every other person on the planet – might be a wee bit biased). In other words, the Berkeley divestment resolution is a crystal clear example of an attempt to de-legitimize the Jewish state, which is no doubt why JVP-Muzzlewatch chose to hide most of its text (and actual purpose) in its public communication on the issue.

I also find it amusing that JVP is hailing the vote of the Berkeley Student Senate (which voted 16-4 in favor of the divestment proposal) as the height of democracy, while condemning the Student President for vetoing the resolution as an example of democracy being stifled. I say amusing because it was just last week that an elected board of the Davis Food Co-op (politically comparable to the Berkeley Senate) unanimously rejected a boycott of Israeli products, yet in this case the boycotters condemned this elected body’s action as – you guessed it – an example of trampling on democracy.

In other words, for JVP, Muzzlewatch and their friends and allies (such as the Students for Justice in Palestine organization behind the Berkeley vote), democracy has a new definition: them getting their way. To the Muzzlewatchers and their friends, anything short of people doing what they say is an example of censorship and democracy denied.

Consider the Muzzler...

2010-03-22T05:11:00.004-04:00

Looks like there’s a bit of catching up to do on the old Muzzlewatch monitoring front.

To start off, I noticed that our old MW pals have finally had something to say about the assault on free speech that took place at UC Irvine last month, the one which featured an orchestrated attempt to shout the Israeli ambassador off the stage to prevent his words from being heard from a large audience of UC students, most of whom (presumably) were there to hear him speak.

Now the Muzzlewatchers have stayed mum about this topic until now (keeping with their general refusal to acknowledge occasions when disruptive tactics – up to an including violence – have been used to prevent Israelis or their supporters from being heard at public gatherings). That said, as Adam has pointed out, Jewish Voice for Peace’s second “front” site (the first being Muzzlewatch) did mention the Oren incident, but only to demand understanding for those who tried to shut down free speech at Irvine.

Well a couple of days back, Muzzlewatch itself finally managed to chime in on the incident in a piece which focused exclusively on the punishments being contemplated for the perpetrators of the incident.

Now I don’t claim to be fully aware of how seriously school authorities are about making the incident an expellable or even prosecutable offense. Nor will I speculate (as does Muzzlewatch) on the involvement of parties outside the university in either planning the disruption of the Oren event or in attempts to influence how the perpetrators of that disruption are to be treated.

But I will note how interesting I find it that after 3-4 years online, the only statement I believe Muzzlewatch has ever made on the subject of people trying to stifle the free speech of Israeli or pro-Israel speakers (something that’s become routine in recent years, especially at West Coast universities) has been to ignore this clear-cut example of “muzzling” and instead ask us to consider only the (so far, theoretical) fate of the muzzlers.

You would think that an organization posing as champions of speech would at least be willing to acknowledge the achingly obvious fact that those with whom JVP/Muzzlewatch politically agrees might take part in attempts to stifle discussion of the Middle East (even if they can’t bring themselves to admit that virtually all attempts to shut down debate via tactics of intimidation and violence come from those they support).

But, once again, this question would assume that Muzzlewatch actually exists to promote free and fair debate which – as we’ve been proving here again and again – they most clearly do not.

Rather, Muzzlewatch is simply a tactic: a pre-emptive strike against any and all who might question the activities, motives, alliances or behavior of Jewish Voice for Peace and its allies.

While, to most of us, “muzzling” consists of actual attempts to limit free speech of others (much like what happened in Irvine), Muzzlewatch (as always) takes an opposite approach: defining as “muzzling” any attempt by their political adversaries to use their free speech rights to say things JVP would prefer never get spoken or heard.

BDS: The Hobgoblin of Tiny Minds

2010-03-08T06:42:00.004-05:00

I had considered setting up a Google Alert to tell me if the San Francisco Jewish Federation took action after last year’s Jewish Film Festival fiasco to ensure that groups like Jewish Voice for Peace could no longer exploit the community’s resources for their own narrow-minded ends. But then, I figured, why bother? If the Federation did pass such a measure, an audible shriek would reach my East Coast ears from Northern California far faster than Google could deliver the news.

Sure enough, the Federation did decide that if JVP and similar organizations wanted to defame the Jewish state, they would have to do so with their own money. And a split second later, Muzzlewatch was on the air describing this decision as a McCarthyite call for ideological purity on the subject of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Aside from the pot calling the kettle black vis-à-vis narrowing conversation to just one point of view, Muzzlewatch spokesperson Cecilie Surasky seems to have forgotten that just a few weeks ago she was announcing their independence from the elites, declaring herself a general in some sort of Army of Davids that would win the war without the need to suck up to groups like the SF Federation.

But, of course, if they cannot infiltrate or attach themselves to more mainstream organizations, Jewish Voice for Peace remains exposed as the minority of the minority of the Jewish community, increasingly committed to just two tasks: advocating boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel and declaring any non-Jewish individual or organization accused of anti-Semitism “Not Guilty” (with a Jewish accent). And so, the Muzzlewatch Army continues it's Battle Whine of accusations against those who have the audacity to stop writing them checks.

Which gets me to Muzzlewatch’s second response to the Federation decision: their challenge to have Omar Barghouti debate Rabbi Doug Kahn, head of the SF, on the subject of BDS.

As background, it’s an old tactic to challenge your political enemies to a debate on your own narrowly restricted terms. For example, today I call on Cecilie Surasky to debate me on the following topic: “Muzzlewatch: Censoring Hypocrites, or Simply Self-Righteously Delusional.”

The purpose of such a “debate” is to put your political foes a heads-I-win-tails-you-lose situation of either fighting on someone else’s territory, or being declared too cowardly to address the issue. Now usually this tactic is not used in such a laughably obvious way, but here again we’re dealing with Muzzlewatch, a closed circle that has walled itself off from feedback that might make them realize how ridiculous they sound.

Take Barghouti’s challenge that the SF Federation, having established filters to avoid funding the defamation of the Jewish state, has demonstrated itself to be in favor of “boycotting” Israel’s defamers, and thus – in order to prove their consistency – must also support the notion of boycotts and divestment targeting Israel. But by that same token, shouldn’t JVP/Muzzlewatch/Barghouti then be in favor of US sanctions against Iran and Sudan (not to mention previous sanctions against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq) to avoid accusations of hypocrisy?

Taking it one step further, aren’t Israel’s actions against Hamas-controlled Gaza simply an application of the BDS formula Barghouti and his friends would like to inflict on Israel and thus consistency demands that the entire BDS movement support Israel’s Gaza-related choices as well?

Now the whole Barghouti issue is complicated by the fact that this champion of sanctions, who travels the world demanding (among other things) that colleges and universities sever all ties to Israeli academia is currently a heavily subsidized graduate student at an Israeli university. So if we are all to follow his demands for consistency, shouldn’t JVP be boycotting Barghouti or (to be completely consistent) shouldn’t Barghouti boycott himself?

If this is all starting to sound like a trip through the looking glass, remember that Jewish Voice for Peace (in its various guises) is actually quite consistent: If you agree with their political opinions, then everything is allowed (boycott, blacklist, censorship, shouting people off the stage, etc.). But if you don’t agree with the JVP point of view or (God forbid) have the temerity to criticize the organization then you’re guilty of hypocrisy and censorship.

To anyone at Muzzlewatch who disagrees with my analysis, the invitation to debate me on this topic, here or anywhere else, remains open.

A Blog War Brings a Lesson on the Difference Between Criticism and Censorship

2010-03-06T19:40:00.003-05:00

I won't weigh in here on Blogwars: Wieseltier v. Sullivan — I haven't followed it especially closely, and besides, enough has been said on the topic already.

But one particular line in one's response to other's reply to a response to — well, whatever it was, one particular line is of some relevance to this blog's theme:

Sullivan makes the erroneous, and self-glamorizing, assumption that criticism is a call for censorship. His heroes Mearsheimer and Walt have made a career out of this mistake....

Anyway, they, and Sullivan, have the right to say any damn thing they want about AIPAC, and Israel, and Jews. And I have the right to respond as strictly and as definitively as I can. I do not wish to silence them, I wish to refute them.

I'd suggest that the MuzzleWatch crew would benefit from reading that passage over and over again. But I just can't get myself to do it; I'm too afraid that they'll respond by calling me a Muzzler.

Camel Joke-y

2010-03-03T06:16:00.002-05:00

Another Muzzlewatch semi-regular, Sydney Levy, seems to have his panties in a bunch over a recent Israeli government program to recruit the million Israelis who travel abroad each year as ambassadors for communicating an Israeli perspective on their country. This program, whose Hebrew-language Web site can be seen here, is part of an ongoing effort to try to portray the Jewish state in terms other than those approved by Muzzlewatch and its sponsors, Jewish Voice for Peace.

Now I have heard a number of reasonable critiques about not just the Masbirim program, but the entire effort to “brand” Israel based on the country’s contributions to the world (advances in computing, bio-tech and green technology, for example), as well as attempts to “normalize” the Israeli situation in the eyes of the world by highlighting the country’s cultural and social aspects. But most of these complaints focus on whether Israel should be talking about what a nice place it is vs. aiming its fire directly at the hypocrisy and bigotry that pass for discussion on the Middle East, best exemplified by the odious Israel Apartheid Week and by Muzzlewatch/JVP itself.

But the problem for Levy is not that Masbirim might be ill suited for the times (or even potentially lame). Rather, he seems most bent out of shape by the thought that anyone should be trying to tell a story about the Middle East that does not meet his demands, demands that Israelis and their supporters start any discussion by pronouncing themselves guilty.

As ever, the self-righteous seem impervious to things that the rest of us would recognize as irony. In one video segment, the Masbirim Web site portrays a fake British reporter yammering on about camels as the primary means of transportation in Israel, used by (among others) the Israeli cavalry. Once again, I’m not entirely sold on either the program or this joke (although the cavalry gag did make me smirk). But having spent time reading and watching (and even writing for) the British media in the past, the image of the dip-shit English scribbler way out of his depth in the Middle East, getting all the facts wrong while rhapsodizing melodically about the exotic landscape seems a fair target for ridicule.

Getting back to the main issue at hand, however, Muzzlewatch’s problem seems not to be with the details of the effort, but with the fact that Israelis are being asked to step up to tell their real, human stories in the first place. As this site has chronicled, Jewish Voice for Peace does accept Jewish voices that hue strictly to their party line, continually highlighting the Jewish last names of their members as “proof” that Jews support their cause.

But once the voice of vast majority of the Jewish and Israeli people try to get another word in edgewise, then – as far as JVP is concerned – they must be dismissed, ridiculed or shouted off the stage, with this censorship dismissed as an example of legitimate rage (coupled with accusations of “muzzling” against anyone who dares point out this reality).

For a site that pretends to be yearning for a free exchange of ideas, I’ve yet to discover any source more committed to stifling and limiting debate that Muzzlewatch. No doubt now that the site is only open to true believers they can continue to spend their time congratulating themselves on their virtues and courage, oblivious to the fact that most of us wised up to them years ago.

JVP Cheers Muzzlers. Really. (And: "They" Could Have Made A Two-State Solution Possible)

2010-02-26T19:15:00.004-05:00

Here's a correction. An earlier post on MuzzleWatch Watch suggested that Jewish Voice For Peace, the self-proclaimed watchers of muzzling, "looked elsewhere" after Israeli ambassador Michael Oren's speech was stopped by hecklers at UC Irvine.

How wrong I was. On MuzzleWatch's sister site -- the one with the title that casts Israel as not being a democracy (MLK be damned) -- Jewish Voice for Peace actually celebrated the assault on open debate: "Well, kudos to the protesting UCI students, let us support them if the authorities try to punish them, and let us hope that more and more diverse groups of protesters will face Michael Oren...." Wow.

Finally, I'll add one thing to Jon's comments about MuzzleWatch chief Cecilie Surasky's latest attack (targeting an organization that recently shed some light on the "anti-Israel lobby").

It's just too hard to resist saying something about this particular assertion by Surasky, in the same way it's difficult for circus-goers not to stare at a bearded lady. Here's the outlandishness: "If the Israelis really wanted the Palestinians to have a state of their own, they could have made it happen years ago..."

Are they even trying anymore? Surasky's statement is a testament to the piddling faith she has in the intelligence of her readers, or the enormous faith she has in their stubborn dogmas. Because, in the real world -- the world occupied by most of us, the people don't dwell in the fringe-left or -right revisionist circles, and consider facts and the historical record to be of some value, it's Israel that has accepted or offered peace plans that would have ended the occupation and created a Palestinian state, not once, not twice, but three times in the past ten years, and it's the Palestinian leadership which has rejected each offer.

Calm Yourself Cecile

2010-02-22T04:15:00.002-05:00

The level of hysteria over at Muzzlewatch seems to have reached fevered pitch lately.

As has been continually demonstrated, the mission of Muzzlewatch has nothing to do with free speech, and everything to do with getting those of us who actually care about free speech to question ourselves when criticizing political positions embraced by Muzzlewatch’s “parent company” Jewish Voice for Peace.

Similarly, Jewish Voice for Peace gets rather hot under the collar when it’s pointed out that – despite their name – their organization is dedicated to war with propaganda as its chosen method of militancy.

It makes no difference whether Muzzlewatch attempts to stifle debate and JVP plays its Orwellian game of “Peace is War” out of a deep cynicism or self-righteous fury. Whether they include themselves in the list of people they are trying to bamboozle is of no material interest.

Which gets us to Cecile Surasky’s latest tirade against yet another organization that has dared to use its free-speech rights to point out the truths Surasky and her friends so desperately want to remain hidden. In this case, an Israeli think tank has simply pointed out that, just as there exists an organized pro-Israel community of individuals and institutions dedicated to support of the Jewish state, so too there exists an organized anti-Israel community dedicated to the marginalization, demonization and (for some members of this group) elimination of said Jewish state.

JVP/Muzzlewatch frequently acknowledge the existence of a pro-Israel “scene,” imbuing it with as much sinister motive and scary implications as they can manage to cram into any paragraph that includes the acronyms ADL or AIPAC. But when someone else dares make mention of the obvious: that Israel’s critics are also organized into a community of individuals and institutions with a coordinated (if somewhat loose) organizational structure, out comes a new round of accusations and hilariously impotent threats.

“It’s not our tireless efforts on behalf of boycott, divestment and sanction that’s behind the BDS movement,” shouts Muzzlewatch (I’m paraphrasing): “It’s you lousy Israel supporters who refuse to do what you’re told and continue to insist that your political, civil and free speech rights include criticizing us in any way.”

“End the Occupation!” they shout, “The Occupation” being not so much a political state as it is a sacred talisman to members of Jewish Voice for Peace, a holy totem which magically washes away every sin of the Palestinians they claim as their moral lodestone: from rejecting countless offers of peace to starting one war after another.

It may seem petty to keep reminding people of Muzzlewatch’s choice to shut down their comments section on the flimsiest of pretexts, all to avoid the scrutiny of motives they demand as their right to dish out, but refuse to take. But now that the cat has escaped the bag, with the true nature of Muzzlewatch, JVP and its friends and allies becoming clearer by the day to more and more people, can you blame them for refusing to engage in the type of open dialog they pretend to crave?

Where do the Muzzlewatch Censors find the time?

2010-02-13T08:57:00.005-05:00

In his two most recent posts, the creator of this Muzzlewatch-Watch site has pointed out two very clear-cut examples of actual attempts to squelch debate on the Middle East: the pulling of an invitation to Professor Benny Morris to speak at a British university, and (yet another) attempt to shout down an Israeli official invited to speak on a campus that Israel-haters have decided is “theirs.”

Needless to say, Muzzlewatch has nothing to say about either of these cases of real “muzzling,” as opposed to the stories they generally post to demonstrate their own martyrdom (normally consisting of nothing more than people having the audacity to criticize the opinions of Jewish Voice for Peace, the organization for which Muzzlewatch is simply a mouthpiece).

It is interesting to look at two stories Muzzlewatch did find time to highlight during the same period when their friends and allies were either smearing Benny Morris in Britain or shouting down Oren at Berkley.

The first is simply another in a long line of Cecile Surasky’s incoherent rants set off by the fact that one blogger accused another of anti-Semitism. That’s it. No repression, no firings, no calls for government investigation. Simply one blogger using his free speech to criticize a public figure (albeit sloppily), much like Surasky and her friends at Jewish Voice for Peace/Muzzlewatch do every day.

Once again, it helps to keep in mind that the Surasky/Muzzlewatch/JVP crowd have different definitions for terms such as “censorship” and “muzzling.” While most of us view “censorship” as the use of government power to shut down political discussion, and “muzzling” as a more vague catch-all bucket in which some authority (such as a school’s administration) sets inappropriate limits on certain types of speech, Muzzlewatch has a much simpler definition of both of these terms. For them, censorship and muzzling consists of anyone doing or saying anything counter to the JVP agenda, a crime committed by anyone who has the audacity to criticize JVPers in any way.

The second story they found time to post on while Morris and Oren were dealing with attempted political stoning was this piece, written in a chilling tone, about how the American Jewish Committee is looking to expand its presence in Europe. The fact that the organized American Jewish community has always been involved with overseas partners (on projects such as the three-decade rescue effort of Soviet Jewry), or that resurgent anti-Jewish violence in Europe might give American Jews a reason to help out their landsmen overseas seems to have escaped Surasky’s attention.

Instead, she plays the old trick of citing a like-minded news service to push the point she really wants to make: that the Jews are trying to stifle debate in Europe, just as they have in the US. Which must explain why Surasky is drawing a paycheck for doing her blogging, rather than hiding under her bed from the AJC stormtroopers.

It’s interesting to note that at the same time Muzzlewatch was shrieking its condemnation of American Jewish groups reach out to their equivalents overseas, Jewish Voice for Peace was starting a new project designed to prove that Israel is not a democracy. And who are they working on with this project? Why numerous pro-Palestinian organizations in Israel and beyond. In other words, Israel’s critics are free to do whatever they want and work with whomever they want, but if Israel’s supporters do the same they’re guilty of censorship or worse.

At this hour, I don’t think it requires any more effort to demonstrate that JVP/Muzzlewatch, despite their posing as a peace organization committed to free speech, is simply a militant propaganda group dedicated to squelching all voices that do not agree with their party line.

While I presume they will not allow comments on their new site, JVPers are always free to comment here and show us where we’ve gotten anything wrong. Otherwise, readers can assume that this analysis stands unchallenged.

Oren "Muzzled" at UC Irvine, MuzzleWatch Looks Elsewhere.

2010-02-09T12:27:00.001-05:00

"Tracking efforts to stifle open debate about US-Israeli foreign policy." That's MuzzleWatch's tag line.

Maybe they are actually tracking such efforts. But what's certain is that they're not saying anything about attempts to stifle open debate when the ones being muzzled are moderate pro-Israel voices.

From UC Irvine, we have some more evidence that the Jewish Voice for Peace considers some muzzling to be condemnable, and some commendable, some types of speech to be good, and some bad.

This video shows what JVP and their MuzzleWatch blog seem to categorize as "commendable" muzzling of "bad" free speech:

Morris Muzzled, MuzzleWatch Silent

2010-02-05T12:06:00.000-05:00

Benny Morris has pissed off all sides of the debate about the Arab-Israeli conflict. But, as far as I can tell, he's only been "muzzled" due to pressure from the anti-Israel side. And as usual, being that the muzzling comes from Israel's critics, there's not a peep from MuzzleWatch.

Cambridge University's Israel Society had invited Morris to speak, only to disinvite him following pressure by critics, including "the university’s Islamic and Pakistan societies who claimed he was an 'Islamophobic hate speaker'."

The Israel Society's explaination:

Ultimately, we place respect for those who have been offended above the importance of hosting this speaker. As such, in response to complaints about this speaker, we have cancelled this proposed event, and apologise for any unintended offence.

Controversial and potentially offensive as some remarks by Morris might have been, the allegation that he is an Islamophobe seems pretty dubious to me. In any rate, even those who see in Morris's mind "highly disagreeable" views make no bones about describing this affair as a "stifling free speech."

Not so MuzzleWatch, which has a history of winking at, or even speaking highly of, the censorship of pro-Israel voices.

(UPDATE: Video Footage Casts Doubt On Story) On Canadian Campus, Pro-Israel Students Muzzled... With Fists

2010-02-04T14:29:00.007-05:00

See important update, titled Update II, below.

Is it irony? Or is violent intimidation of pro-Israel students on Canadian campuses so common that the odds of such coincidence are favorable? Only hours after MuzzleWatch Watch co-blogger Jon was writing his post about difficulties faced by pro-Israel students in Canada, we have a new physical attack at York University.

It's not Jon's fault, really. His typed words simply couldn't have conjured this incident. It's impossible (even if there are a couple of fantasy movies with that premise). But the news is disturbing nonetheless.

York's rather vague account of what happened is as follows:

York University is looking into an incident that occurred on Monday,

Feb. 1 at about 4pm in Vari Hall at the University’s Keele campus.

York Security personnel were summoned to that location, where they found two groups involved in a dispute. Order was restored and both parties indicated that they did not want to involve the Toronto Police Service. Security agreed to their request and provided information about further dispute resolution options. Subsequently, three people gave statements of their version of the incident.

York deplores any comments and actions that are racist or anti-Semitic in nature. An investigation is currently underway, with the potential for disciplinary action. The University is reviewing closed-circuit video of the incident and is speaking to students who may have been involved. If there is evidence of a crime, the matter will be referred to the Toronto Police Service.

York University is committed to respectful discourse and civil engagement and is encouraging the parties to avail themselves of the services of the University’s Human Rights Centre.

Ah, that helps clarify things. It was an incident. But wait... something something something "anti-Semitic in nature"? What really happened here?

More details were provided by the Canadian Jewish news website ShalomLife:

Two Jewish students at York University were assaulted on Monday during a pro-Israel program.

Tyler Golden, Co-President, Hasbara Fellowships at York University, who was on the scene when the incident occurred, described the happenings in a conversation with Shalom Life: “Hasbara was tabling for Gilad Shalit. We run a campaign called Free Palestinians from Hamas. It was a very peaceful day and we had permission from the university to table. At around 4 o’clock, several anti-Israel known faces on campus came to start questioning us and debate with us.”

Golden said that the debate that had sprung up between the Hasbara people and the anti-Israel individuals quickly escalated into an angry mob of around 50 students, who surrounded his group and chanted anti-Israel and anti-Semitic slurs. “Security has asked us, when we come across these types of things, to call them which we did, as well as videotape it so they can see the faces and hear the voices of the people that do it. A few students on the other side were upset that there were cameras in their faces, so they started yelling and screaming. As they were trying to push cameras out of the way, they actually hit two students.”

Two York Security officers arrived on the scene. “They took down stories and students were allowed time to file complaints. I heard from the president’s office this morning that an investigation is under way,” said Golden.

But there's more. According to some very reliable hearsay that comes my way, one of the students that was slapped was a young female undergrad.

And despite York University's sanitized version, campus security apparently laughed at the two Jewish students when they asked if they should report the incident to Toronto police, thus discouraging them from taking action. The camera was apparently damaged during the fracas after falling to the ground as the student was being smacked.

Update: The reliable hearsay also suggests involvement by York University student Jesse Zimmerman. Zimmerman is said to be one of the "anti-Israel individuals" who initially was debating with the pro-Israel students. According to the account, Zimmerman stepped away from the debate to made a phone call, after which the 50 students quickly appeared and started bullying the two students. If true, this wouldn't be the first time Zimmerman headed an angry mob — see more at Jewlicious.

Update II: As noted in the comments to this post, I should have been more precise with my language, and more skeptical about an account relayed to me, indirectly, from a student involved in the incident.

The word "reliable," which I used to describe the hearsay, was meant to suggest that the source was someone very close to the action — like I said, a student directly involved in the incident. But I should have chosen a different word, since "reliable" wrongly suggests that I vouched for the honesty of this source, whom I don't know personally.

The more I look into it, the more it seems as if the source was dramatically embellishing what happened. If so, the misinformation is unfortunate in-and-of itself — lying is bad — and also because it's just not necessary for Israel's moderate defenders to invent things. The facts work just fine.

Poster Child

2010-02-01T06:20:00.003-05:00

Cecilie Surasky once more draws her sword of righteousness to smite a grave violation of free speech. And lo and behold, yet again her ire is aimed at those who respond to provocative materials (in this case a poster) in support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement!

It goes without saying that Muzzlewatch is the Website of Cecilie and her friends at Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), and they are free to do with it as they want. Similarly, we here at Muzzlewatch-Watch are free to point out that the only times that Cecilie and Co seem to get hot and bothered about free speech issues is when anti-Israel partisans (particularly those in Club BDS) are limited (or even mildly criticized).

Back in the day before Muzzlewatch muzzled their audience by removing their comments section (from a recent visit, it looks like they’ve recently removed access to their archives as well so that people cannot even peruse exchanges from the past when other voices were allowed in), some of us asked rather pointed questions about the Muzzlewatchers reaction to frequent attempts by JVP supporters to shut down events featuring pro-Israel speakers through heckling, harassment and – occasionally – physical violence. I also responded to two pieces in which JVP members celebrated getting (presumably obnoxious) pro-Israel Web sites shut down, as well as asked why JVP was taking part in a muzzling lawsuit against local activists and the press in Boston.

With the exception of this final issue, Cecilie and Co never saw fit to explain this apparent contradiction, although they did find time to post dozens of entries before, during and since that characterized even mild criticism of the JVP party line as some kind of censorship.

Now getting back to the Carleton University issue, I will admit that my preference to telling students they cannot use this or that poster is to allow all voices (and posters) in the debate. In fact, this version of the controversial Israel-Apartheid Week poster would seem the appropriate antidote to the ugliness of those who are trying to hide their own nasty agenda behind suffering schoolchildren.

But that is just my opinion, and until I become the administrator of a large and diverse university (which is free to place certain limits on the student body, even in areas related to speech), it’s not entirely clear to me where to draw the line. No one would argue that racial slurs and sexual harassment have no place on a college campus (or anywhere else), but beyond that the grown-ups responsible for college campuses face tough choices when dealing with student activists who feel that their own cause is so important it gives them the right to trample on the opinions and feelings of others.

And keep in mind that Carleton is a Canadian (not a US) university and in Canada the debate over free speech has been dominated over the last year by discussions and even trials of people who have dared to speak or publish materials critical of radical Islam. And unlike 99% of what Muzzlewatch presents as stifling of free speech (most of which consists of other people using their free speech rights to criticize the opinions held by JVP), what’s been going on in Canada is a textbook definition of censorship (i.e., the use of government power to shut down discussion of a particular topic).

No doubt, divestment will fail at Carleton as it has in every college in North America over the last ten years. But that will never deter JVP and its allies from either declaring victory or claiming that the umpteenth failure of BDS was due to an administration that refused to allow them to launch a campaign based on childish provocations of the rest of the student body.

Muzzlewatch vs. the Elites?

2010-01-18T06:15:00.004-05:00

According to Muzzlewatch’s self-declared Generalisimo, Cecilie Surasky, Israel’s latest dastardly attempt to thwart its critics by building relationships with leaders outside of the Jewish community is doomed to failure. For, as Surasky points out, the Muzzlewatch army no longer needs these elites to win their battles, for they are now an army of unstoppable, Internet-connected grassroots Davids which, as she describes:

“We’ve all bypassed the elites in the state/media/law/culture etc.. who have failed miserably to bring a just peace. The era of centralized power, and the associated power of the gatekeeper, is quickly ending. Today it is quick-moving, under-funded, decentralized, non-hierarchical, grassroots activism that is winning and unstoppable.”

To which I would reply:

(1) As one of the three Internet-connected, non-hierarchical, grassroots activists who contribute to a site with “Muzzlewatch” in its name (the other being the creator of this Muzzlewatch-Watch site, and the third being Surasky herself), I believe that it is only Cecilie who draws a paycheck for her political activity.

(2) As Surasky points out, an important priority for Muzzlewatch’s parent organization Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) is the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) “movement” targeting Israel. Yet as I’ve pointed out in the past, the only successes BDS ever achieved was in the Mainline Protestant Churches between 2004-2006 when JVP’s friends and allies exerted enormous effort cultivating the very elites Surasky now declares they are going to bypass.

In fact, it was only by going behind the backs of rank and file members of a church, city, union or other organization and appealing directly to these elites that JVP’s pet divestment projects ever achieved any (albeit temporary) success. Once grassroots church members discovered what was being done in their name (and without their consent), they rejected these JVP-supported divestment projects in democratic votes by margins of 95-100%.

In other words, the folks behind Muzzlewatch spent years chasing after the very elites they now claim to disdain and if an opening presented itself to get a college president, union leader or other elite leader to embrace the BDS project, JVP/Muzzlewatch would leap at the opportunity like a dog on meat.

So what seems to be driving the new-found populism of Muzzlewatch is not the existence of “elites” per se but the fact that these civic leaders are listening to the Jewish community and – more importantly – to their own members, rather than simply trusting Jewish Voice for Peace, Muzzlewatch and their like-minded friends in the BDS movement for all of their information. Given the penchant for JVP et al to manipulate civic organizations and dump information needed to make informed decisions about the Middle East conflict down the memory hole, this strikes me as a wise policy indeed.

MuzzleWatching and Knee Jerking Into a New Decade

2010-01-14T13:13:00.000-05:00

It's January. A new year. A new decade. There's fresh, white snow outside my window.

And what is MuzzleWatch up to in 2010? Oh right, the same old knee-jerk defenses of the most virulent anti-Israel propagandists, and attacks against mainstream Jewish organizations.

Not new either is the dishonesty of said defenses and attacks. Currently at the top of their site is a January 13 article lamenting that an organization that doesn't share Jewish Voice for Peace's political views is "unfortunately ... still in business." (Yes, the free market of ideas is "unfortunate" in the mind of those self-proclaimed defenders of free speech.)

One of MW's criticisms of this organization is that they recently described professor/activist Rashid Khalidi as having been an "official spokesperson for the PLO," despite Khalidi's recent denials. (Never mind that the article MW criticizes doesn't actually use the word "official.")

In fact, question of whether Khalidi had been a PLO spokesman was deeply investigated during Obama's run for the White House. Now, this blog doesn't concern itself with the president's relationship with Khalidi. And frankly, I still have no regrets about having voted for ... well, I'll also leave party politics out of this blog.

The point is that MuzzleWatch's assertion that calling Khalidi a former PLO spokesperson is a "smear" because he had denied this affiliation makes clear that MW's "analysis" is not nuanced or thoughtful, but rather resembles a jerk of the knee. (Khalidi is anti-Israel? Then he must be right!)

Khalidi, it seems, was indeed a spokesperson for the PLO. The evidence is convincing, and as it emerged convinced at least one reporter to dramatically change his mind after initially insisting on Khalidi's innocence of PLO affiliation.

MuzzleWatch is also disturbed by Jane Fonda. A recent posting — okay, I admit the posting is from late-2009 and not 2010 — asserts (emphasis mine):

What is it about Atlanta and Israel?

First, in response to a firestorm of criticism and vilification, Atlanta resident and iconic film star Jane Fonda issued a mea culpa about the wording of a petition she signed protesting the Toronto International Film Festival’s celebratory spotlight on Tel Aviv. She said she signed it, “without reading it carefully enough, without asking myself if some of the wording wouldn’t exacerbate the situation rather than bring about constructive dialogue”. To her credit, Fonda did not remove her signature. But it was still an extraordinary move that reflected the intense pressure she was under. (This level-headed group of Atlanta Jewish leaders rose to her defense.)

Fonda upsets MW's because the actress expressed regret for behaving in a knee-jerk manner rather than with nuance and thoughtfulness.

"I signed the letter without reading it carefully enough," Fonda explained in her apology.

She added:

[I]t can become counterproductive to inflame rather than explain and this means to hear the narratives of both sides, to articulate the suffering on both sides, not just the Palestinians. ...

The Israeli-Palestinian story cannot be reduced to a simplistic aggressor-victim relationship. In order to fully understand this, one must be willing to come together with an open heart and really hear the narratives of both sides.

Sounds reasonable enough. Who would disagree that completely closing your ears to one side's narrative can be counterproductive? Oh right -- MuzzleWatch and its parent organization Jewish Voice for Peace disagrees.

Joining the Muzzlewatch-Watch

2010-01-05T15:03:00.003-05:00

[Voice of Troy McCleur]

Hello there Muzzlewatch-Watchers! You may remember me from such blog entries as this one, or this one, or from the comment section of Muzzlewatch itself (before they decided the kitchen was getting too hot and they shut the comments down forever).

The challenges raised by Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)’s Muzzlewatch project has led to, among other things, this Web site whose creator has been kind enough to let me start posting here occasionally.

As noted in the first story linked above, I originally got interested in Muzzlewatch as a way to explore how a demonstrably false thesis (that criticism of Israel – howled from the rooftops of every campus in the country - is somehow repressed) could gain traction with today’s allegedly sophisticated news audiences.

As I’ve watched postings at Muzzlewatch itself become more and more hysterical once they shut out all voices other than their own, it dawned on me that with Muzzlewatch we were watching a truly post-modern political phenomenon. For the key purpose of Muzzlewatch is to make sure that any discussion critical of Jewish Voice for Peace and its allies is immediately stifled by pushing it beyond the pale.

And how do they attempt to pull off this act of censorship? By turning the tables on their critics, accusing them of trying to stifle debate, despite the fact that every example of “stifling” Muzzlewatchers manager to dredge up look a lot like other people exercising their free speech rights to say something at odds with the world view of Jewish Voice for Peace, the arms, legs and hands behind Muzzlewatch.

This is where it gets interesting, for (whether consciously or unconsciously) those behind the Muzzlewatch site understand that it is their critics who actually maintain the respect for free speech that JVP/Muzzlewatch only feign. So by accusing those who comment negatively on JVP’s political positions of censorship, Muzzlewatch is trying to trigger our reflexive respect for open debate, hoping to confuse censor and censored, and making us doubt the legitimacy of using our own freedom of speech.

Of course, turning the tables on JVP/Muzzlewatch would only be effective if they actually believed in free speech, rather than simply pretending to possess a desire for open debate while actually working day and night to try to ensure that they are the only ones allowed to express their opinions freely.

But while they can shut down their own comment section once the reality behind their squalid little project gets too exposed, they have not yet managed to gain control over the Internet. Which means that this site (and others) will continue to watch (and expose) their attempts to censor others through cynical accusations of censorship.

And if anyone over at JVP wants to let us know where we’ve gotten it wrong, well comments are open over on this site…

Jon

Brandeis Students Disrupt Debate, Get Scolded. Audience Yawns.

2009-11-09T10:17:00.003-05:00

Seems that upon brainstorming ways to "disrupt the Zionist narrative," Students Against Open Debate decided to tape onto their t-shirts loose-leaf paper scribbled with quotations about peace (since, you know, Zionists hate peace). After Richard Goldstone had his turn to speak to the mostly polite audience, and Dore Gold dared to start presenting his own views, the handful of activists stood up, removed their jackets and showed their righteous handwriting to the attendees sitting directly behind them.

After a quick rebuke by a moderator, they sat back down, undoubtedly satisfied that they've sufficiently promoted the ideal that people should act out disruptively when someone they disagree with is speaking.

Brandeis Students Vs. Free Speech, Academic Freedom

2009-10-28T15:23:00.005-04:00

Below is an email sent by Brandeis student Jonathan Sussman to the list serve of Students for a Democratic Society. The note suggests "seeding the audience" at upcoming debate between Richard Goldstone and Dore Goldwith people who would "disrupt" the civil exchange of ideas, possibly with "direct action."

Since MuzzleWatch's tag line purports that their mission is "Tracking efforts to stifle open debate about US-Israeli foreign policy," they'll surely speak out about this particular effort to... well... "stifle open debate." Right? Right?? No silly, it's just an empty slogan meant to cover up their extremist, anti-Israel obsession.

From: "Jonathan M. Sussman" [jsuss@brandeis.edu]
To: sds [sds@lists.brandeis.edu]
Subject: Goldstone Forum Action Planning - Wed. @ 10!
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:32:19 -0400 (EDT)

Hey! As many of you know, Brandeis will be hosting a forum next Thursday, 11/5, to discuss the Goldstone Report, a report from the United Nations which determined that Israel used excessive force in its occupation of Gaza. Believe it or not, this was poorly received within the Zionist community. Thus Brandeis is hosting a forum between the report's author, international jurist Richard Goldstone, and former Israeli Ambassador to the UN, Dore Gold. Full details here: http://brandeis.edu/now/2009/october/goldstonegold.html.

Many of us are concerned that this forum is inherently slanted, as it contrasts 'nuetral' international opinion with a wildly pro-Zionist message, excluding voices from the Palestinian community. In light of this, activists across campus will be meeting this Wednesday, 10/28 @ 10 PM in the Village C Lounge to discuss a possible response. Possibilities include inviting Palestinian speakers to come participate, seeding the audience with people who can disrupt the Zionist narrative, protest, and direct action. Please come and help us coordinate a response!

Fuck the occupation,
Jon

Hamas and Israel on MuzzleWatch's Scale of Justice -- and the Winner is...

2009-10-02T21:51:00.010-04:00

... I wish it weren't so predictable, but yes, MuzzleWatch's Scale of Justice clearly tilts in favor of Hamas.

Seriously.

Let's take a peek at Rob Lipton's Sept. 24 post gleefully cheering the much maligned Goldstone Report. Here, with quotes directly from the MuzzleWatch post, is my feeble HTML attempt to visualize the trays of their scale:

Israel		Hamas
		"The war crimes committed by Hamas are deplorable ... but..."
		"... placed within the context of a people trying to fight occupation"
	/	Hamas, "like Jews or anyone else in the same situation, fight back"
"slaughter of civilians"		Hamas "dwarfed" by Israel
"governmental censorship efforts as well as government efforts to suppress dissent"
"massacre"

Clearly, there's a reason why I'm not a Web designer. I'm afraid my little illustration here doesn't do justice to just how stunning — and perhaps I should no longer be stunned, given the glimpses of MuzzleWatch's stance that I'm oh-so-slowly accumulating on this blog — the MuzzleWatch post is.

Here's the relevant excerpt in straight prose:

The recent release of the UN study headed by the South African jurist Richard Goldstone is a watershed of sorts in the diplomatic history of Israel. An ardent supporter/friend of Israel with family living in Israel, Goldstone’s report is sober yet scathing regarding Israel’s actions in Gaza. The report details not just the slaughter of civilians but the seemingly planned destruction of civilian infrastructure that could, in no way, be considered militarily related (unless the futile goal was to make the bombed civilians turn against Hamas). The report also unequivocally condemns Hamas for the war crime of firing on civilian populations in Israel, and likely for that reason, both Israel and Hamas were finally able to agree on one thing, their condemnation of the report.

Further, the report goes on to describe Israeli governmental censorship efforts as well as government efforts to suppress dissent within Palestinian Israeli populations (obvious Muzzlewatch concerns) . Perhaps most importantly, the report goes into detail describing the effects of the occupation in the West Bank as well as the siege of Gaza. This contextualization is particularly damning and frequently completely missing from mainstream analysis. The fact that such a high profile report seamlessly includes this context is refreshing from the point of view of those working to stop the occupation, and conversely, quite galling for those who seek to keep the status quo.

The war crimes committed by Hamas, are deplorable and also described in the report, but they are also placed within the context of a people trying to fight occupation. Israel’s actions are allowed no such context. Israeli maximalist existentialist fears, whether heartfelt delusion or cold eyed cynicism, are simply not treated. Thus most of the responsibility, as it should be, is placed on the shoulders of Israel, whose firepower, and the resulting death toll, utterly dwarfed that of Hamas. (One is left to conclude, logically, that a government seeking to protect the citizens of Sderot and Ashkelon, as it should, would do so by ending the illegal siege of Gaza, not by making life even more intolerable for people who would, like Jews or anyone else in the same situation, fight back.)

After one compulsory word ("deplorable") of criticism of Hamas, a group that unhesitatingly claims "credit" for attacking civilians on buses, cafes, pizza shops, dance clubs, and malls, the author wastes no time with his key follow up word: "but..."

And then, what certainly looks like a justification for the anti-Semitic group's murderous attacks. Hamas is just fighting against the occupation (what jaw dropping ignorance of Hamas's admitted goals!), and just doing what anyone else would do. And after this apologia, the author looks back toward Israel and adds, "there is no way to explain away Israeli actions."

Yes, I'm stunned. I knew MuzzleWatch is anti-Israel and soft on Hamas. But seeing these stances so closely juxtaposed so as to make apparent their relative views of the parties... wow.

Censorship of Holocaust Facts Ignored by MuzzleWatch

2009-08-28T15:57:00.008-04:00

The evidence continues to pile up that MuzzleWatch isn't really interested in muzzling, and it's parent organization Jewish Voice isn't really interested in peace.

The groups' raison d'être is much more narrow. It is attacking Israel while minimizing Palestinian responsibility for the ongoing conflict.

Here's the latest example of MuzzleWatch ignoring censorship that doesn't fit in with their anti-Israel message. The Jerusalem Post reports that

The publicly funded Multicultural Center's (Werkstatt der Kulturen) decision to remove educational panels of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husseini, who was an ally of Adolf Hitler, from a planned exhibit, sparked outrage on Thursday among a district mayor, the curator of the exhibit, and the Berlin Jewish community.

The curator, Karl Rössler, told The Jerusalem Post that it is a "scandal" that the director of the Werkstatt, Philippa Ebéné, sought to censor the exhibit

Predictably, there hasn't been a peep from MuzzleWatch.

I can't help but wonder, though: Since MuzzleWatch and its ilk like to argue that critique is actually "muzzling," perhaps they'll say that the Berlin Jewish community's "outrage" over the exhibit's censorship is itself censorship. Now wouldn't that be as convoluted as an MC Escher drawing...

MuzzleWatch: Muzzling Understandable if Targeting Pro-Israel Speaker

2009-07-30T11:33:00.005-04:00

Maybe they don't see the hypocrisy; or maybe they just don't care.

Either way, MuzzleWatch continues to provide evidence exposing the fact that its real interest isn't free speech, but rather to promote a narrow view of the Arab-Israeli conflict while attacking opposing views.

The byproduct of the discord that comes from being an anti-Israel organization while pretending to be a free speech defender seems to be — it's hard to think of a nicer word to describe it — hypocrisy.

Take the following statement, which was expressed by "a member of JVP’s Advisory Board" and approvingly relayed by MuzzleWatch not once, but twice in the past few days:

"The fact that the vast majority of people in the crowd at the Castro Theatre would not let the Voice of Israel representative speak his mind without interruption ..."

... is another example of muzzling? Is condemnable? Is unfortunate?

Nope. It's understandable, or even commendable. Here's how the JVP leader (Jewish Voice for Peace is the parent organization of MuzzleWatch) justified what is apparently, in their view, the good kind of muzzling:

“The fact that the vast majority of people in the crowd at the Castro Theatre would not let the Voice of Israel representative speak his mind without interruption reflects growing frustration with the use of pubic slander, character assassination, cancellation of speakers, firing of faculty and demand for resignations by the so-called defenders of Israel. Since when are people with views that differ from AIPAC, for instance, invited into mainstream circles to speak for five minutes before a pro-Israel speech or film? The representative of Voice of Israel was not there to dialogue. Only to chastise. The crowd refused to be chastised.

So let me get this straight: If a crowd refuses to let anti-Israel vitriol pass without critique, they are, as per the raison d'etre of MuzzleWatch, smeared as muzzlers. But if a crowd refuses to let a supporter of Israel speak in peace — check out the video below to see what happened — they are celebrated as noble resisters who "refuse to be chastised"!

Got it.

(This, by the way, is hardly the only instance of blatant hypocrisy by MuzzleWatch. For another telling example, click here.)

Here's the video of the speaker being muzz... err... shouted down... I mean... chastised... no, no. Here's the video of the speaker being the justified-target-of-good-aka-anti-Israel-frustration-as-opposed-to-bad-aka-pro-Israel-frustration:

Hate and The Daily Planet

2009-07-26T16:28:00.004-04:00

I got a note today in my inbox about Berekeley, California's small-time local newspaper The Daily Planet.

In a nutshell, the note calls for people to read and sign a petition calling on the newspaper's publisher to "display integrity and responsibility to ensure that their pages are devoid of irresponsible misstatements of facts whose sole malicious intent is to besmirch Jews at large, the State of Israel, and individual citizens who decry the Daily Planet’s practices."

The petition also links to a website that can help you decide whether there is indeed something rotten with the newspaper. Although a few of the points raised on that website fail to move me as much as they move the site's editor, much of it is extremely damning. There is, for example, the following passage quoted from the Daily Planet that blames the Jews for antisemitism:

One should ask why anti-Semitism has persisted throughout the centuries. Let us go back to 539 BC, when Cyrus the Great, King of Persia, went to Babylonia and liberated Jews. One can ask why Jews were enslaved by Babylonians. Also, one can ask why Jews had problem with Egyptians, with Jesus, with Europeans, and in modern times with Germans? The answer, among other things, is their racist attitude that they are the 'Chosen People.' Because of this attitude, they do wrong to other people to the point that others turn against them, namely, become anti-Semite if you will.

I checked, and yes, the Daily Planet did indeed publish this on Aug. 8, 2006. I don't want to boost their google ranking by linking to it, but if you really want to read it at the source, go to berkeleydailyplanet (dot) com (slash) issue/2006-08-08/article/24823?headline=Commentary-Zionist-Crimes-in-Lebanon&status=301.

Below is the relevant portion of the email I received, which includes a link to the petition. It introduces

a new online petition statement decrying the weekly inclusion of extreme anti-Israel screeds in the Berkeley Daily Planet. As you may already be well aware, the Berkeley Daily Planet (which is supposed to be a locally focused community newspaper) has turned itself into an open sewer for bashing Israel in any form, Zionists and Zionism in all its guises and sometimes Jews quite nakedly.

The statement now being circulated under the auspices of the Israel Action Committee of East Bay claims:

WE ARE JEWS AND NON-JEWS AND

We abhor the deliberate and willful publication of anti-Semitic and other hateful rhetoric and screeds by the Berkeley Daily Planet.

We stand with the free speech rights of those who would criticize the Berkeley Daily Planet for its obsessive and one-sided campaign against the State of Israel.

We join these people in insisting that the publisher and editor of the Daily Planet display integrity and responsibility to ensure that their pages are devoid of irresponsible misstatements of facts whose sole malicious intent is to besmirch Jews at large, the State of Israel, and individual citizens who decry the Daily Planet’s practices.

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/fight-anti-semitic-rhetoric-at-the-berkeley-daily-planet.html

Black is White, and Israel's Cellcom Commercial is Racist

2009-07-12T16:39:00.011-04:00

"They — those on the other side, the ones we are at war with — are actually exactly like us. They don't all want to hurt us."

You'd think that message would be welcome, even if it's in an advertisement meant to sell products. Or maybe especially in an ad, since it reaches so many people and, if the ad agency's consumer research is any good, reaches more than just their TV screens.

But in some quarters, the message isn't welcome. Because the message is in... Hebrew.

I'm breaking from the usual topic of this blog because I just can't help myself. The scandal caused by the ad is so contrived, and so absurd, I just can't help myself.

First, the commercial:

And now, the scandal. Reuters reports:

A television advert for an Israeli cellphone firm showing soldiers playing soccer over the West Bank barrier has sparked cries of bad taste and prompted Arab lawmakers on Sunday to demand it be taken off air. ...

Since the ad went out last week -- as Palestinians marked the fifth anniversary of a World Court ruling that Israel's walls and fences in the West Bank were illegal -- some Israelis have taken to blogs and social networking sites to voice dismay. ...

A Hebrew-language Facebook group called "I too got nauseous watching the new Cellcom ad" had signed up 218 members. They demanded "take this racist commercial off the air immediately."

Et cetera, et cetera.

Now I understand that most Palestinians don't like the barrier, whatever their reasons may be. I also understand that most Israelis are thankful that it prevents suicide bombers from making the short walk into Israeli cities so that they can kill kids on buses and in cafes.

So? In the end, the message is that we're all human. It is the opposite of demonization. In fact, I'd contribute a fair sum toward getting ads like this to air in the West Bank, Gaza, and across the Arab world...

(transition with foggy, wavy lines and wind chimes)

Some Lebanese soldiers are patrolling the border with Israel. They're invited by some Hezbollah gunmen to join them for some Turkish coffee. Once in the bunker, the soldiers and the gunmen start loudly singing The Beatles. Somehow, from across Hezbollah two-way radio, we hear faceless Israelis join in the singing. The Lebanese soldiers are initially startled by the sound, but when the figure out what's happening, they gleefully continue the song, taking the harmony part. The voice over says: "We all like good music and good times. Buy Pepsi!

(transition with foggy, wavy lines and wind chimes)

Okay, it's a shitty commercial. Hezbollah fighters probably don't sing The Beatles. But racist? Worthy of uproar? Worthy of a news article?? Give me a break. And give me an address where I can contribute to getting my version of the commercial aired. (Or at least a better version of one with the same message.)

Because I'd be heartened if that's what kids in the Arab world are taught about the faceless enemy. It sure beats this:

"Censorship" Loses Its Meaning

2009-07-10T21:44:00.004-04:00

From CAMERA Snapshots:

Some anti-Israel commentators, hoping to ward off criticism, charge those who scrutinize their claims as being guilty of censorship, intimidation, or otherwise stifling debate.

The thinly-veiled subtext is that criticizing someone is the same as censoring them. (See, e.g., CAMERA's Op-Ed "Asserting Mideast facts isn't the same as censorship.")

But why bother to thinly veil or to imply? One journalist recently did away with those formalities.

About the BBC Trust's ruling that Mideast editor Jeremy Bowen violated the BBC's ethical guidelines, a Guardian journalist wrote, simply:

"Criticising Bowen could affect his reporting of the region, which surely amounts to a form of censorship itself."

And that is how inane the "censorship" argument looks when stripped down to its essence and expressed in straightforward language.

Unsubtle Censorship

2009-05-28T11:43:00.005-04:00

In my last post, I offered the opinion that stacking the deck, as much as it may conceal certain points of view, can't be categorized as actually censoring those points of view.

This, on the other hand, is a story about a man who called for true censorship.

A leading candidate to be the next director general of UNESCO — the acronym is worth spelling out here: the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization — has called for burning Israeli books.

As the BBC recounts,

Opponents of Mr Hosny's candidature have cited his response to a question in parliament in May 2008 from an opposition MP about whether Israeli books were held by the new library in Alexandria.

He said: "Burn these books; if there are any there, I will myself burn them in front of you."

Hosny, perhaps concerned that wanting to burn books might not be the ideal qualification for heading the UN's culture and education center that acts as a "clearinghouse ... for the dissemination and sharing of information and knowledge," has recently apologized for his remarks. (He apparently hasn't apologized for saying that "Israeli culture is an inhumane culture; it is an aggressive, racist, pretentious culture based on one simple principle: steal what does not belong to in order to then claim its appropriation.")

Apology notwithstanding, book burning is, of course, censorship of the worst kind. To read MuzzleWatch's critique of Hosny's remarks, click here. (No really... click it. Otherwise the joke doesn't make sense.)

Subtle Censorship?

2009-05-27T11:45:00.004-04:00

I blogged earlier about UCSB professor William I. Robinson, who sent his students an email essentially saying the Israelis are the same as the Nazis. MuzzleWatch, if you recall, urged its readers to express support for the professor.

Here's a bit more on that.

A group at UCSB organized a panel to support Robinson, whose adherence to the school's ethics code is apparently being investigated by the school's Academic Senate. All of the panelists were united in opposing any investigation of the professor.

Here's what one Nobel Prize-winning UCSB professor said of this uniformity of opinions:

“It’s unfortunate that the constitution of the panel was one-sided,” [Walter] Kohn said. “I was wondering how four highly intelligent people who knew that they all had very similar viewpoints didn’t feel embarrassed to be up there without anyone from the other side of the argument.”

According to another observer,

All four panelists at the rally — sorry, “forum” — asserted that academic freedom requires the testing of ideas through dialog and intellectual exploration, yet there was little room for dialog or honest exploration on Thursday night. All four speakers agreed that academic freedom requires critical analysis of complex situations, but their talks were, for the most part, highly polemical. It is telling that they never once challenged or disagreed with one another on any point.

Valid points. But do I think this contrived, one-sided forum constitutes subtle censorship, as my headline might suggest? Not really. It is what it is: A one-sided panel meant not to challenge the audience by forcing them to weigh varying opinions, but to sway the audience to a particular point of view. It's certainly not academic freedom at its finest, but I'm sure all sides of all controversies sometimes do this.

I can only wonder, though, if this forum is the type of thing that MuzzleWatch, with their oversized and overactive "Muzzle" stamp, would label as a form of censorship if the panelists were all of the opposite point of view.

The True Story of Man Discovers MuzzleWatch

2009-05-12T19:39:00.004-04:00

The man described in the title of this post isn't me. It's Jon Haber, of Divest This!, who this past weekend shared his story on the Solominia blog.

An excerpt follows, but be sure to read the whole well-written piece here.

In my curiosity to discover how such a demonstrably false thesis (that discussion of Israel, the subject of perpetual high-volume attack on campus after campus, was somehow fearfully repressed) could be taken as gospel, I stumbled on a new Website/blog dedicated to perpetuating this accusation, a site called Muzzlewatch. And because my curiosity had gotten the better of me, I chose to do something I had not done in over a decade: participate in online debate on the site's comment section.

It's not that debate can't be fun (anyone else out there remember the Wild West days of Usenet?), but on highly trafficked sites with active forums, I've generally discovered that it takes about 25 comments before debate tends to "gravitate towards the meme" (i.e., degenerate to the lowest common denominator, normally a stale, un-listening slinging of accusations broken down along party lines). Still, the desire to get to the bottom of this conundrum overwhelmed me and in I jumped.

The first thing that needed to be pointed out (and still does) is that Muzzlewatch is a project of an organization called Jewish Voice for Peace, a group that (among other things) became very agitated when a different group of politically organized Boston citizens began criticizing the construction of a huge mosque in the region. To show their disapproval, JVP signed onto a lawsuit by the mosque as a friend of the court which attacked the Boston activists (as well as local media) for the scrutiny they were giving the mosque project. So my first question was why a group dedicated to using state power (i.e., the courts) to stifle public discourse about which JVP disagreed had chosen to project its own censorship agenda onto its critics.

It would be a while before the creators of Muzzlewatch got around to responding to my questions (and only then because I refused to stop asking them). In the meantime, I had several weeks to discover what Muzzlewatch had in mind when they claimed their point of view was routinely stifled or censored.

The thing was, in posting after posting (sometimes several a day), the creators of the Muzzlewatch site never managed to provide a single actual example of their opinion being shut down in the way they had tried to shut down debate about the Boston mosque.

MuzzleWatch's Holocaust Hypocrisy

2009-05-01T14:27:00.013-04:00

It's right there on the front page of the MuzzleWatch website, for all to see. One post "shames" someone who dared to point out the fact that a Palestinian leader was closely allied with the Nazis. And another, posted just a few days later, rushes to the defense of someone who distributed images suggesting that the Israelis are the same as the Nazis.

No rhyme. No reason. Just plain old hypocrisy.

Below is an image (click it to enlarge) from MuzzleWatch's April 26 posting. It attacks Alan Dershowitz because he referenced the very real collaboration and mutual admiration between Palestinian leader Haj Amin al Husseini and the Nazis. Thus, they protest, Dershowitz made a "shameful association of Palestinians with Nazis."

(It is indeed shameful that there was an association of Palestinians with Nazis; but it was Husseini who opted for that association, not Dershowitz. But I digress.)

Now look at the the April 30 posting by MuzzleWatch. In that entry, they urge their readers to "express support for Sociology and Global Studies Professor William I. Robinson."

William I. Robinson is the UCSB professor who, in the words of the Los Angeles Times, "sent [an email] message -- titled 'parallel images of Nazis and Israelis' -- to the 80 students in his sociology of globalization class."

That grotesque image meant to suggest that Israel's operation against Hamas in Gaza was no different than the Nazi genocide against Europe's Jews. In case his students didn't understand, the professor told them: "Gaza is Israel's Warsaw -- a vast concentration camp that confined and blockaded Palestinians. We are witness to a slow-motion process of genocide."

(The genocide is soooo slow motion, that it's actually moving in reverse rather than forward. Palestinian population growth, after all, is booming. But I digress.)

Here's a bit of what MuzzleWatch has to say on the Robinson affair (click the image to enlarge):

Got it? If you refer to Haj Amin al Husseini's Nazi links, then you deserve shame.If you tell your class that Israelis are doing to the Palestinians just what the Nazis did to the Jews, genocide and all, then you deserve support. (A link!)

MuzzleWatch Protests Darfur Protesters

2009-04-28T09:25:00.006-04:00

I'll leave it to BlueTruth to tell the story. But I do want to relay this quote from their analysis, because the observation perfectly captures JVP's reliance on ad hominem attacks:

And of course, in JVP-world, ANY group that supports the Jewish people's right to self-determination is a scary-right wing group — in the same way that if you are standing at the North Pole, every direction that you look is south.

I wonder how MuzzleWatch would read if you stripped from their posts the numerous attempts to slur groups they disagree with as "right wing." Would there be anything left?

British Theater Caves In to Anti-Zionist Pressure, "Muzzles" Israel Celebration

2009-04-21T13:31:00.003-04:00

Forgive me for borrowing from the MuzzleWatch crowd's language for the headline. I wanted to see how it feels to use "caves," "Zionist," "pressure" and "muzzle" in the same sentence. (I admit, the bombastic self-righteous outrage feels kind of good!)

Anyhow, here's the story: Ynet reports today that

London's Bloomsbury Theatre decided Tuesday to cancel a planned Independence Day show organized by the Zionist Federation of Britain and Ireland.

The Bloomsbury was set to host a show celebrating Israel's 61st Independence Day, including a set preformed by a military choir, but announced it would be cancelling it as a result of appeals by various groups campaigning for the rights of Palestinians filed following the Israeli offensive in Gaza.

According to a report by the Guardian, the event has been moved to a new, undisclosed venue. "A number of groups had contacted the Bloomsbury to protest the show," said a theatre spokeswoman. "Obviously, we couldn't have them perform here."

Obviously.

And will MuzzleWatch protest this shameful censorship? Obviously not.

Two Statements of the Day

2009-04-16T21:46:00.003-04:00

Is it so wrong to have a "statement of the day" when I thus far post less than once a week? I hope not, because I have today not one, but two statements of the day.

The first is the longer of the two. It's full of 3+ syllable words, and perhaps will require more than one reading. (It reads more naturally in its original context.)

This is Melanie Phillips' reference to

the foaming fury amongst the Israel-bashers, whose edifice of lies is maintained by casting critics who dare to call this by its proper name as a supremely manipulative lobby merely peddling their own paranoid propaganda -- and whose nefarious power is supposedly proved in turn by their very protests.

In other words, it's a reference to the well-practiced technique, utilized by Israel's opponents, of trying to stifle debate by accusing others of stifling debate.

The process is all too common: It begins with a statement or column or book that lies about or unfairly demonizes or delegitimizes Israel. People express that this statement lies about Israel (or perhaps that the book demonizes... or whatever other combination of the above you'd prefer). Inevitably, Israel's most dogmatic critics scream out against the lobby that tries to squash criticism. How dare they try to squash criticism!? How dare they speak out?! How dare they speak??

Oh wait... who's trying to muzzle whom?

Statement number two is shorter. There are no 3 syllable words. It's more funny than it is piercing. But then, maybe it's equally piercing. Tia, a reader from the West Coast (Jewish Voice for Peace's home turf) brings to my attention this pithy statement, used to describe JVPers:

Proud to be ashamed to be Jewish.

Perfect. Just perfect.

Some Lobby Sarcasm

2009-04-07T23:35:00.002-04:00

A blogger at Jewlicious lightens the mood by mocking claims that the lobby stifles free speech:

You see how CAMERA stifles free speech right there, by pointing out that a university professor who had no trouble publishing an op-ed critical of Israel used a false quote to impress upon his readers how evil Israelis really are. Talk about the effectiveness of the “Israel Lobby.” It only took five years for those powerful, wily Jews to get an egregious quote to be removed from a newspaper with some stature. Yes, those stifling Jewish voices at CAMERA are really punishing Israel’s critics!

You can read the rest of the post here.

J Street Chutzpa

2009-04-02T18:28:00.002-04:00

A new video by J Street — "the anti-Israel pro-Israel lobby" (okay, that's not their motto, though maybe it should be)— calls for the Jewish community to "speak out against" Israel's controversial new Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman. The video make its point by referencing a couple of Jewish leaders who expressing concern about Lieberman.

Putting aside the questions about Lieberman and his views, I have to say it took a lot of chutzpa on the part of J Street to quote Eric Yoffie, leader of the reform movement, in the video.

After all, this is the same Yoffie who described J Street's position against Israel's recent Gaza operation against Hamas as "a mistake" and "very wrong," not to mention "deeply distressing because they are morally deficient, profoundly out of touch with Jewish sentiment and also appallingly naïve."

Yoffie protested specifically that J Street

could find no moral difference between the actions of Hamas and other Palestinian militants, who have launched more than 5,000 rockets and mortar shells at Israeli civilians in the past three years, and the long-delayed response of Israel, which finally lost patience and responded to the pleas of its battered citizens in the south.

You certainly won't find those quotes in J Street's video:

What Do MuzzleWatch and Ahmadinejad Have in Common?

2009-03-24T21:38:00.000-04:00

Okay, the Iranian president and Jewish Voice for Peace's MuzzleWatch certainly have their differences. Jewish Voice for Peace hasn't denied the Holocaust. Nor is MuzzleWatch founder Cecilie Surasky known to have felt a mesmerizing aura around her head.

And MuzzleWatch hasn't called for Israel to be "wiped off the map" (or "erased from the pages of history" or whatever deplorable translation you prefer). At least, it hasn't said this in so many words.

In fact, JVP/MuzzleWatch is coy on whether it hopes to see the Jewish state, alone among all nations states, wiped out. In answer to the question "Are you Zionist, anti-Zionist, post-Zionist or something else?," JVP asserts that, though its members "hold a wide variety of views on many issues involved in the Israel-Palestine conflict," it "support[s] a solution to the Palestinian refugee crisis that will also preserve the right of the Israeli people to self-determination." (Real Jewish self-determination? Self-determination as "protected minorities" (i.e. dhimmis) in a majority Muslim state? That's not specified.)

Sometimes, though, MuzzleWatch leaders provide a hint about what solution they're rooting for. The aformentioned Cecile Suraky, for example is rooting for an end to Zionism. Literally. "Three cheers" to the Los Angeles Times, says Surasky, for publishing an Op-Ed that not only says Israel is worse than apartheid South Africa, but also explicitly calls for an end to Jewish self-determination. (This is little different than requesting discrimination against the Jewish nation.)

Three cheers to the LA Times, says Suraky, for allowing true debate by publishing this anti-Zionist piece and an opposing Op-Ed by Judea Pearl. Except, she makes sure to note in her blog post, she isn't really cheer for Pearl's peace, which she calls "corrosive," "closed" and "rigid."

Well then, three cheers for calling for the elimination of the Jewish state! That's something even Ahmadinejad and his hypnotized minions can clap for.

More Muzzling Ignored By MuzzleWatch

2009-03-13T22:09:00.000-04:00

From JTA:

At the University of California, Irvine, pro-Israel students have accused the administration of being unresponsive to acts of physical harassment and intimidation. The Zionist Organization of America offered complaints on their behalf to the U.S. Department of Education.

Once again, it seems that while people who express pro-Israel opinions are accused by MuzzleWatch of "muzzling," those who "physically harass and intimidate" Jews are simply ignored.

On campus, who is it that really has to worry about having their views suppressed? This guy, or the people he rails against?

And what of this? Who's muzzling whom? Who's intimidating whom? (And, to bring it back to the title of this blog, who is silent about this type of behavior?):

What MuzzleWatch Apparently Can't See

2009-03-13T21:30:00.000-04:00

I've seen nothing on the MuzzleWatch website about this. According to a British tabloid, the director of "Channel 4" has received death threats after broadcasting a documentary about homosexuality in the Muslim world.

And the director isn't the only one:

Indian film maker Parvez Sharma – who spent six years making the programme – revealed: “I have had death threats on my blog after making this film. Some countries have even banned it.

“I’ve been called an apostate because Muslims think I have insulted Islam but I think it will open up a debate.”

That's what I'd call muzzling. Not the free speech exercised by those who peacefully express their opposition to overblown anti-Israel rhetoric.

Jewish Voice for What?

2009-03-06T00:54:00.000-05:00

It seems odd to speak out against an organization named "Jewish Voice for Peace." After all, I'm Jewish. I have a voice. I'm for peace.

But despite its self-righteous name, and its occasional use of cautious, moderate rhetoric, JVP, the organization behind MuzzleWatch, is not much different than the number of other reflexively pro-Palestinian and harshly anti-Israel extremist groups that exist to demonize the Jewish state.

Here are some telling tidbits:

Jewish Voice for Peace signed a "friend of the court" brief supporting a law suit by the Islamic Society of Boston (ISB) that was meant to silence — yes, "muzzle" — the David Project and media organizations looking into a controversial land deal between the ISB and the city of Boston. (The lawsuit was eventually dropped.)

Also indicative of JVP's extremism is its booklist, which recommends, among works by other fringe anti-Israel activists, four books by Norman Finkelstein, a man who recently told the Iranians that Israel is a "satanic state" from "the boils of hell," which, by the way, "is committing a holocaust."

So extreme they are, that their newsletters feature essays by Ali Abunimeh, a co-founder of the Israel-bashing site Electronic Intifada, and Ran HaCohen, an activist who's so dogmatically entrenched against his country that he casts lifelong peace activists like Amos Oz and A.B. Yehoshua as war-hungry jingoists because they dared to think Israel had a right to respond to acts of war by Hezbollah. He even takes Yehoshua Sobol to task for asserting that Hezbollah is opposed to Israel's right to exist, though this is something openly and repeatedly admitted by the antisemitic (or "antiJudaic") terrorist organization.

Dishonesty About Bill Moyers

2009-02-03T10:47:00.001-05:00

MuzzleWatch apparently believes it's impossible for criticism of Israel to go too far or to be wrong. By extension, then, it's always wrong for people to take issue with anti-Israel statements. Here's one example of how MuzzleWatch dishonestly tries to convince their readers that the above is true.

Their Jan. 27 post about a controversial episode of PBS's "Bill Moyers' Journal" insinuates that Moyers was criticized — the Anti-Defamation League's Abe Foxman and others took issue with his broadcast — only because he drew a false parallel between Hamas's indiscriminate rocket attacks, which target civilians, and Israel's response, which targets militants but sometimes hits civilians. To Moyers, these both amount to "terrorism."

Frankly, that assertion alone is pretty disagreeable, and it would be quite reasonable for Foxman et al. to voice strong disagreement with Moyers' opinion.

Still, MuzzleWatch would have you believe that this expression of opinion alone led the public to charge Moyers with antisemitism. Calling someone antisemitic because he is wrong and morally confused? Well, that might not be quite as reasonable. The nefarious "Israel lobby," MuzzleWatch suggests, is trying to "muzzle" Moyers!

But MuzzleWatch is hiding something from its readers. A big something.

The back-and-forth between Foxman and Moyers makes perfectly clear that references to antisemitic statements focus not on the host's moral equivalence of Hamas and Israel, but on this shocking assertion he made on the air:

What we are seeing in Gaza is the latest battle in the oldest family quarrel on record. Open your Bible: the sons of the patriarch Abraham become Arab and Jew. Go to the Book of Deuteronomy. When the ancient Israelites entered Canaan their leaders urged violence against its inhabitants. The very Moses who had brought down the commandment “Thou shalt not kill” now proclaimed, “You must destroy completely all the places where the nations have served their gods. You must tear down their altars, smash their pillars, cut down their sacred poles, set fire to the carved images of their gods, and wipe out their name from that place.”

So God-soaked violence became genetically coded. A radical stream of Islam now seeks to eliminate Israel from the face of the earth. Israel misses no opportunity to humiliate the Palestinians with checkpoints, concrete walls, routine insults, and the onslaught in Gaza.

Wow. Jews (and Muslims) are violent by birth, Moyers seems to be saying. It's in their genes.

Now the references to antisemitism make sense.

Moyers himself eventually acknowledged that people found his "genetically coded" statement to be offensive, and argued, however unconvincingly, that he made a bad word choice and didn't mean to say what he said:

Some of you were offended by my comment that "god-soaked violence" has become "genetically coded." Those words were obviously not sufficiently precise, I was not talking about a specific people but of the violence in the DNA of the human race, as the Bible itself so strongly attests.

The MuzzleWatch post, though, doesn't acknowledge that Moyers made this offensive comment. If Moyers is willing to admit that the "genetically coded" statement drew fire, why isn't MuzzleWatch? Why do they feel the need to mislead?