Ariella Kimmell, vice-president, external, of the Canadian Federation of Jewish Students, filed a personal complaint with Equity Services at Carleton about the posters. She said the posters use ‘Nazi and Holocaust imagery’ to make the situation of the Palestinians in Israel look like that of Jewish people in concentration camps during World War II. (Jewish Tribune, Feb. 26, 2009)

Last week I spoke with a representative from Equity Services to file a complaint about censoring political speech and expression. I specifically mentioned that it is completely fraudulent to claim that Jewish suffering has a monopoly on the cartoon depiction of barbed wire, walls and military aggression. The representative was not there to debate with me, rather to courteously absorb my criticism and take notes.

I mentioned that there was a glaring double standard with activism on campus while showing the representative another article from the Jewish Tribune.

Called simply ‘Terror Built This Fence,’ the controversial presentation – which was at York and was on dislplay there for about two weeks before coming to Ottawa – arrived at the Atrium of the University Centre of Carleton University for one day only April 3.

The display itself comprises a 15-foot by 5-foot chainlink fence – a replica of Israel’s Security Fence – with photographs of Israeli suffering on one side, and terrorist beliefs on the other. The Israeli side shows about two dozen graphic colour pictures, including one of an Israeli emergency worker holding up a blood-soaked tzizit. It is hard to hold tears back looking at the photo of four yeshiva boys crying out in agony at the loss of their school mates in the attack last month in Jerusalem. There is a close up shot of a leg pierced with shrapnel. (Jewish Tribune, Apr. 13, 2008)

The representative from Equity Services had not heard of this event but she had only been with Carleton for about 10 months. However, when I asked Feridun Humdullahpur (Provost) about this incident, he said he couldn’t remember it ever happening! I told him that the fact he didn’t even remember was telling in and of itself and that I would be very surprised if the university did not receive formal complaints relating to the display.

This glaring double standard illustrates how the University’s claim of neutrality is demonstrably false. Why didn’t the university kindly remind the entire university community that “Terror Built This Fence” was not representative of the views or opinions of Carleton University like when Al Haq visited? Why did the administration not feel the need to remind everyone to be respectful and civil when debating controversial issues because of the “Terror Built This Fence” exhibit? Can you imagine the cries of anti-Semitism that would envelop Carleton’s decision to ban the “Terror Built This Fence” display because it was ‘likely to incite hatred’ or that it used ‘Nazi and holocaust imagery’ to make the case for Israel’s brutal subjugation of Palestinians?

Nonetheless, it would be a lie for me to say that the University took no action in respect to the fence display.

Eventually security came and asked the organizers to move the fence to a smaller place in the Atrium. (Jewish Tribune, Apr. 13, 2008)

The article that was earlier quoted (Jewish Tribune, Feb. 26, 2009) began with a statement not falling short from taking credit for the banning of the IAW posters.

Following B’nai Brith Canada’s full-page ad in the National Post demanding an end to ‘Hate Fests’ on campuses, Carleton University deemed Israeli Apartheid Week posters offensive and has banned them from its property.

When I called B’nai Brith asking about their defamatory ads in the National Post the secretary asked if I would like to contribute to their campaign financially. I was able to speak to Michael Mostyn. When asked about IAW, he told me that the term apartheid was ‘false’ and ‘repulsive’ in relation to Israel. He also told me that events such as this (IAW) would only further polarize any discourse on the subject. When asked if large advertisements in one of Canada’s national newspapers calling Carleton students anti-Semites and a legitimate event a hate fest was polarizing, he simply said ‘no.’

Carleton University President Roseann O'Reilly Runte (carleton.ca)

In response to the banning of the 2009 Israeli Apartheid Week posters at Carleton, over 100 students, professors and community members rallied in support of free speech and expression on campus (Feb. 26). The event consisted of a gathering to explain the current repression on campus relating to Palestinian solidarity and a symbolic silent march to the President’s office to publicly read a speech and deliver her a letter addressing their grave concerns dealing with the political repression on campus. While the speech was being read, Runte awkwardly stood by with CBC News cameras capturing the entire event. Runte responded to the speech by reassuring students that they are able to speak and are being listened to. She then went back into her office and locked the door, refusing an interview with the CBC cameraman.

I think your presence here is exactly an evidence that you can speak on campus. And the fact that I listened to you is a fact that you are heard. Thank you for coming here today.

In CBC’s reporting of the poster ban at the University of Ottawa, they made specific mention of Runte’s participation in public relations trips to Israel while President at Old Dominion University. When I asked Feridun Humdullahpur (Provost) about Runte’s public relations trips and mentioned that students were worried about outside pressure affecting university policy, he assured me that the university’s actions are not influenced by outside pressure or lobbying, including B’nai Brith’s recent ads attempting to bully students raising advocacy about Palestinian human rights.

In 2005, Runte filed a daily blog during her trip to Israel as part of the Israel Institute for University Presidents, a joint venture between the United Jewish Communities, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and a community relations council of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater. (CBC.ca – Feb. 24, 2009)

Following the protest at Carleton, students traveled to the University of Ottawa to join their fellow students to protest the poster ban on their campus. Unfortunately, protesters were not greeted by President Allan Rock and were instead greeted by police officers behind locked doors. For great coverage of the events click HERE.

Scheduled for Thursday, May 21st, from 1-5 pm, this pre-conference is a working session of about 40 communication scholars who will brainstorm research to analyze the problems of access to copyrighted material in the academic field of communication today, and to develop a proposal for addressing those problems further within our professional context. We expect that participants will look upon this event as the beginning of a project. The format will be that of a workshop; there will be no paper presentations. Cost: $25. To apply to participate, send a one-page document including: a short biography (one paragraph); and description (one to two paragraphs) of your interest and/or research on this topic, suitable for posting/publication. Send either in email text or Word attachment with “ICA preconference” in the subject heading to Patricia Aufderheide (atasocialmedia@american.edu).

Communication scholars need fair use to be able to do their work. Scholars and creators have increasingly found copyright restrictions to impose burdens harsh enough to affect the range, quality and type of work that we undertake. The recent rise of digital making and sharing practices, in combination with the growth of broadband distribution, has made this problem increasingly acute. In this process, the ideology of authorship–a reverence for individual authorship that is a legacy of 19th century Romanticism and that carefully excludes the social aspects of creativity–has been sedulously invoked by the publishers, distributors and content companies with which scholars and creators must interact.

Marginalized, by contrast, has been the underlying goal of copyright, to promote and reward the creation of culture. Similarly marginalized has been the recognition of art or expression not merely as finished objects but as practice, to borrow an insight from Raymond Williams, one of the founding thinkers of the field of communication.

Communication scholars have special needs to access copyrighted material in order both to analyze it and to create new work, as well as to teach effectively and support student creative and scholarly projects. Circulation of this work, not only in nonprofit environments but in the corporate world of distribution, is critical to its evolution and to growth of the field. Often neither the authors nor their publishers and distributors are well-informed about copyright and their options under the law. At the same time that scholars and creators have encountered obstacles to doing their work well because of copyright, they have also collectively found ways to assert their rights and develop tools to address the problem. For instance, as has been demonstrated dramatically and publicly since 2005, with the launch of the Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use, the copyright doctrine of fair use is a vital and useable tool to fairly and legally employ copyrighted material in new academic and creative work. In the wake of its success in changing industry practice, other creator groups, including media literacy teachers and film scholars, have publicly established their interpretations of fair use, through their professional associations. Communication scholars could build upon this example and extend the effort in the interest of their research and teaching.

The preconference is organized by Chris Boulton, PhD student in Communication at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Patricia Aufderheide, professor and director of the Center for Social Media in the School of Communication at American University. Sponsoring Divisions: Communication and Technology; Communication, Law and Policy; Philosophy of Communication; Political Communication; Popular Communication; Visual Communication Studies Division  It is partly supported by the Ford Foundation, through the Future of Public Media Project at the Center for Social Media at American University, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, through the Media Education Lab at Temple University.

___________________
C H R I S   B O U L T O N
PhD Student in Communication
University of Massachusetts, Amherst

See details in the press release below.

PRESS RELEASE: RANCOURT STUDENTS FIGHT FOR THEIR RIGHTS
Tuesday, February 24, 11:00 a.m., lobby of Tabaret Hall, University of Ottawa

Türkkaya Ataöv - Genocide denial?

McGill University in Montreal has apparently allowed an Armenian Genocide denier a platform from which to speak. No debate was organized, and Türkkaya Ataöv was not challenged on his views of history, including—according to witness accounts below—his take on the Nazis not getting a “fair trial.” When Armenian students asked questions in the face of Mr Ataöv’s revisionist telling of Turkey’s 1915 genocide of 1.5 million Armenians, they were shouted down by Turkish audience members, according to witnesses. This event raises important questions about academic freedom and freedom of speech – should the campus and academia be a place where someone is given platform to rewrite history in the face of international opposition, especially when that rewriting is denying the loss of so many lives? If this is part of academic freedom, should we as students, teachers and academics, demand a platform that instills debate over one-sided speech? Food for thought…

From the Armen Karo Student Association

397 Boul. des Prairies
Laval, Quebec
Canada
H7N 2W6
Tel: 450-505-1032
E-mail: armen.karo@gmail.com
Contact: Kevork Kazanjian

MCGILL UNIVERSITY ALLOWS GENOCIDE DENIAL ON CAMPUS
There is No Room in Canada for Genocide Deniers

Feb 26, 2009

Montreal – On Friday the 20th of  February 2009, McGill University decided that its campus was an appropriate stage, from which the known Turkish denialist Türkkaya Ataöv could spread the fabrications, omissions and factoids of official Ankara, that aim to question the veracity of the  Armenian Genocide of 1915, during which 1.5 million Armenians were massacred by the premeditated measures of the Turkish Ittihadist Government. Thus was set the precedent of any other history revisionist and Genocide denialist to find a podium in academia, in the name of “freedom of speech”. Apparently, this principle outweighed the lost lives of millions of innocent victims and their unspeakable suffering in the minds of the decision-makers of McGill.

Despite formal letters of protest, and meetings with the University Administration, initiated by the Armenian Students’ Association of McGill and Armen Karo Student Association, and supported by many associations  (International Association of Genocide Scholars, Amnesty International, Hillel Montreal, SHOUT, STAND UP, the Armenian Students’ Associations of Quebec and Ontario) the event still took place in a one-sided format, where the lecturer was free to be the mouthpiece of denial and distortion, without being challenged by an authoritative voice on this subject from the same podium.

From the start of this event, it became clear that this was an organized attempt to silence any voice of dissent and protest. The Turkish Society of McGill had ‘invitees’ from Ontario, the Azerbaijani community and functionaries from the Turkish Embassy in Canada. During the lecture, Mr. Ataov, after having labeled the West as racist in a recent Ryerson University lecture, went further and declared that the Nazi perpetrators of the Jewish Holocaust  ‘did not get a fair trial’ at Nuremberg. And at the end, to give the semblance of fairness to McGill administration, a short question period was allocated. But whenever an Armenian participant took the floor to ask a question, Turkish participants tried to prevent him from talking by either insulting him or interrupting and shouting in unison.

Despite the fact that the Armenian genocide is officially recognized by the Senate, Parliament and Government of Canada , this conference was another attempt by the Turkish government to spread the tentacles of its  denialist propaganda, taking advantage of  the valued principles of freedom of a democratic country, while in Turkey, the infamous article 301 of its penal code forbids people to express any view about this crime that contradicts the official line. It is worthy to mention that despite this article and persecutions in its name, in December 2008,  200 Turkish intellectuals defied their government, issuing a letter of empathy for the Armenian tragedies of 1915.  This was followed recently by an online petition to apologize to the Armenian nation that garnered the support of nearly 30 000 Turkish citizens.

The president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS), Dr. Gregory Stanton defines denial as the last stage of genocide. This is where the perpetrators and their successors actively fabricate and misrepresent information and deny any occurrence of the crime. They vilify the victims and deny them the right to mourn their losses. What happened in McGill was exactly a replica of this pattern, when the descendants of the survivors of the Genocide had to confront denialists such as Mr. Ataov, who manipulate and abuse North American university grounds to camouflage revisionism as pseudo-lectures. Hence, the argument of “freedom of expression” by McGill University, put forth to justify this conference is completely irresponsible, forcefully condemnable and casts a long shadow on its reputation.

“The falsification of History, denial of the Holocaust or of any Crime against Humanity recognized as genocide by the international academic community cannot be protected by a false label of “freedom of speech” said Kevork Kazandjian, President of the Armen Karo Student Association. “As Canadian-Armenian university students we felt outraged and deeply insulted. Aiding a genocide denier to find a credible platform in Canada is an affront to all of the people who have suffered from this crime. On behalf of the Armen Karo Student Association I request that a proper and formal apology be presented to the Armenian community of Montreal and that such an episode will never occur on any Canadian University campus again.” Mr. Kazandjian concluded.

Robert Fisk - Middle East Correspondent of The Independent (UK)

Robert Fisk spoke at the University of Ottawa on Saturday, Feb. 21. During his talk he made specific mention of the horrible state of Canadian media in covering the Middle East and specifically the Israel – Palestine conflict. Chronicling the Globe and Mail and National Post he wondered how such embarrassing editorials are passed on as journalism. I’m sure this latest gem from the National Post would have been included in his discussion if it had come out earlier.

National Post – February 23, 2009

George Burger: Anti-Semitism and its enablers

Anti-Semitism is a belief. It happens to be the repugnant belief, that Jews are inferior, deserving of hatred. Repugnant beliefs these days typically gain little currency, little purchase because of the general aversion that we civilized folks have for beliefs which discriminate. Like a germ a repugnant belief can only replicate, expand, grow, poison the body, if it has the right environment, is nourished, or is not halted by external forces like medicine, swiftly applied. A germ needs neglect to flourish; to neglect it is to enable its growth. It is critical to deconstruct the interplay between anti-semitism and its enablers, because a failure to do so will let it grow to unmanageable proportions, and poison us all again.

In the immediate context, without going beyond Canada’s borders, there are literal correlatives to the words “anit-semitism or anti-semite” and “enablers”. Here are some examples.

1. Syd Ryan is an anti-Semite. There is no point any longer in attributing benign motives to the positions he has taken. The rigid double standard he imposes on Israel, the passion he brings to his cause, to the exclusion of many other far more violent and egregiously one-sided conflicts, and his willful ignorance of the history of the conflict between Israel and its neighbours, not to mention the immediate circumstances of the targeting of the university in Gaza that so offended him (it was also a rocket manufacturing base, whose professors were dedicated to building more deadly missiles) defines him as an anti-Semite.

The CUPE Executive, and the rank and file that have voted for him, are his enablers. CUPE has provided him with a platform, with financial support, and with virtual free-reign to express his views. In doing so, CUPE legitimizes anti-semitic beliefs through its unwillingness to show its revulsion at Syd Ryan’s behaviour., with the result that many people both inside CUPE and outside, who are just plain folks, who have not spent their lives thinking about what has been done to Jews over the centuries, who may not have ever thought one way or another about Jews, now have reason to believe that maybe, just maybe, there is something wrong with Jews.

2. Supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah are anti-Semites. One need only witness a demonstration, whether at York University, or on Bloor Street outside the Israeli consulate, and hear the imprecations of the demonstrators aimed at Jews, whether it is to kill them all, or wish that they had all been thrown into the ovens, to be convinced that their hatred extends well beyond the borders of Israel.

Their enablers are many. Most recently they include the administration of York University. Last week, those anti-semitic demonstrators disrupted a press conference organized by a group of students which sought to present the results of a petition to recall student government. The reason behind the petition was not to recall them for their own anti-semitic behaviour. It could have been. York student government has created a politically charged atmosphere on campus between Jewish students and supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah that has led to phone calls at the home of a Jewish student threatening to kill and rape his family. That would have been reason enough. No, this petition simply had to do with a disagreement over the proper role of student government in the face of a teachers’ strike that closed the school for three months.(The student government supported the TAs, instead of advocating the students’ rights to finish their years and graduate).

Instead of getting all the campus police available to break up the demonstration, by any legal means necessary, the administration buckled, and made the student group slink out of their meeting room as if they were the offending party, as if the demonstrators’ right to terrorize them was more legitimate than their right to stay in a room at York University and hold a peaceful press conference. In doing so, again, without showing the University’s revulsion for the demonstrators’ behaviour, the administration added yet another subtle layer of legitimacy to the underlying premise of anti-semitism.

These “enabling” moments are only the most recent. One can mention the enabling effect of prominent politicians like Denis Coderre and Gilles Duceppe, marching with Hezbollah supporters in Montreal; or the enabling effect of politicians like David Miller, who fail to speak out against the virulent crowds on Bloor Street that were inexplicably issued permits, without restriction, to foment hatred of Israel and Jews, while openly supporting terrorist organizations designated as such by our federal government; or the enabling effect of the University of Toronto, year after year hosting the perniciously named Israel Apartheid Week, lending legitimacy to a comparison which does not stand up to the most cursory analysis; or the enabling effect of news organizations which endorse casualty statistics provided to them by Hamas, without each time pointing out that those statistics come from Hamas, for which deceit in such matters is a key element of their battle strategy; or the enabling effect of people who do not take to the streets and march in the thousands(we Jews are not blameless here) whenever a Jewish school is firebombed in Montreal, or a synagogue is set ablaze in Ste. Agathe. Each such failure contributes to the dehumanization of Israelis, and more and more these days , to Jews everywhere.

Edmund Burke warned, many years before the rise of Hitler, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” In most cases the enablers are good men and women, or organizations peopled by good men and women. As such they should unrelentingly be reminded that a lack of will to confront, a failure to apply critical thinking, a willingness to flow with the zeit-geist, as George Jonas so brilliantly wrote about several days ago, may again lead us to a time when there is no place for good men and women at all.

Interestingly enough, Fisk spoke about the numerous times he has been labeled an anti-Semite. Thankfully the libel laws in the UK stipulate that the accuser(s) must be able to prove it in court and Fisk was able to easily shake off such nonsense with legal challenges. The most interesting part of Burger’s McCarthyist diatribe is his clever use of the word ‘enabler.’ The last time I heard ‘enabler’ used in that fashion was one of this kook’s delusional denouncements.

Is the the claim of anti-Semitism an ideological weapon used to disarm legitimate criticism of Israel or is everyone in the Palestine Solidarity movement a virulent anti-Semite as Mr. Burger implies? The icing on the cake is his reference to Burke’s lovely quote. If a good man is incensed by the discussion of an academic boycott how could he be silent about the slaughter of innocent civilians including over 400 children? I think the ‘good men and women’ we need are like this…

Many have pointed out the irony. The cartoon depiction of violence in Gaza is deemed repulsive by university administrations, yet the actual act of violence (which killed more than 400 Palestinian children) elicits a deafening silence in the same university administrations (despite pressure from student groups and faculty). Is this representation alienating apathetic or uninformed observers? Or is it apt and justified?

On Thursday February 26th, join OPIRG-Carleton and students at U of O to show your support for SAIA and SPHR. Come to a public discussion and TWO RALLIES (one after the other) to call the Administrations at Carleton and the U of O to account by asking them to clarify why and how these posters were banned. Show these administrations that civil discourse is dependent upon rights to free expression and organizing, especially around contentious issues.

Date: Thursday February 26th 2009

Time: 11:30 – 1:00pm.

The regular shuttle service leaves Carleton at 1:30pm after the Carleton rally will and arrive at the U of O at 1:50pm. People will gather at the shuttle drop-off location (across from Montpetit) to begin the rally at the U of O. The rally at the U of O will begin in front of the shuttle bus-stop at 2:00pm.

Meeting location at Carleton: C264 Loeb Building

Meeting location at U of O: shuttle bus-stop (across from Monpetit)

Event Description: The rally at Carleton will be mostly silent. People are invited to symbolically cover their mouths. The rally at the University of Ottawa will not be silent. If you have letters (from groups, unions, organizations or individuals) you would like to deliver to the university administrations about the banning of the Israeli Apartheid poster please bring them with you. Both rallies will end at the presidents’ offices.

Defend the Right to Organize on Campus! Call on the Carleton University and University of Ottawa Administrations to uphold free expression and follow clear and transparent procedures.

On February 8th, Students Against Israeli Apartheid at Carleton University put up 100 posters for “Israeli Apartheid Week”, a series of lectures and public events that will occur on campuses in over 40 cities around the world. On February 9, these posters were taken down and banned from campus under the order of Carleton’s Equity Services. Their rationale was that the posters “could be seen to incite others to infringe rights protected in the Ontario Human Rights code” and are “insensitive to the norms of civil discourse in a free and democratic society”.

On February 13^th, Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR) at the U of O got the approval of the U of O Administration to put up the Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) poster. With the posters stamped, SPHR was ready to put them up at the end of reading week. However, on Feb. 20^th, the U of O Communications office sent the following message to SPHR U of O:

A poster from the campus group Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights has recently come to the attention of the Communications Office. All posters approved by the Communications Office must promote a campus culture where all members of the community can play a part in a declaration of human rights recognizing the inherent dignity and equal rights of all students. Consequently, we will not place this particular poster on our campus billboards.”

The poster was created by cartoonist Carlos Latuff and depicts a situation – a child being killed by aerial bombardment – that occurred over 430 times in Israel’s latest attack on Gaza according to United Nations reports.

Since it depicts a situation that has a factual basis and its intention is clearly to invite people to a lecture series, the notion that it is an incitement or a violation to norms of civil discourse is preposterous.

On Thursday February 26th, join OPIRG-Carleton and students at U of O to show your support for SAIA and SPHR. Come to a public discussion and TWO RALLIES (one after the other) to call the Administrations at Carleton and the U of O to account by asking them to clarify why and how these posters were banned. Show these administrations that civil discourse is dependent upon rights to free expression and organizing, especially around contentious issues.

“Fact: The university did NOT ban this event.”

This is correct. The University has not banned Israeli Apartheid Week, but we never claimed that they did. This clear attempt to misrepresent our position is simply a “straw man” argument.

It should be noted, however, that many who reacted to the Provost’s veiled e-mail to the Carleton community took derailment or banning of Israeli Apartheid Week at Carleton to be one of the implicit threats in the Provost’s letter. This underlines the dangers inherent in such a vague and threatening letter.

“Fact: The posters removed did not have the necessary approval for posting.”

A limited number of University boards require stamped approval by our student union before postering. All other postering on the University campus is done ad hoc, and no groups obtain approval beforehand. When we approached our student union to get our posters stamped, they sent us to Equity Services who said the poster had been banned. Nevertheless, not only were all of our posters taken down by University security but those on our pre-approved educational tables were summarily confiscated by University security as well. It should be noted that on each of the bulletin boards from which our posters were taken down, one could find dozens of unstamped posters which remained untouched.

“Fact: The posters removed did not contain information about any specific events planned at Carleton.”

The event is international and thus includes Carleton. As well, the reference information for SAIA Carleton was on the posters.

“Fact. The posters removed were deemed by Equity Services to incite hatred.”
“Fact: Carleton University’s Equity Services determined that the posters removed could incite infringements of the Ontario Human Rights Code.”

Equity Services made their decision about the International Israeli Apartheid Week posters without giving SAIA any opportunity to discuss the event it was sponsoring or defend the graphic it depicted. We find it astonishing that a University administration which refused the request of 56 Carleton professors to condemn the bombing of the Islamic University of Gaza, would be so offended by such a cartoon!

Equity Services gave the following rationale regarding why our posters were banned: the posters may “incite others to infringe rights protected in the Ontario Human Rights code” and they are “insensitive to the norms of civil discourse in a free and democratic society.” Equity Services refused our requests for further clarification.

Considering the fact that the poster itself did not violate the Ontario Human Rights Code, we find it quite bizarre that it would be banned on the grounds that another person may do something contrary to this code. Furthermore, we find the accusation that this poster “incites hatred” to be slanderous. There is nothing hateful about criticizing a government’s foreign policy. One can only imagine that such an analysis is based on blurring the line between Israel and world Jewry, as if an attack on the former’s policies is equivalent to an attack on the latter. This formulation indirectly makes all Jews responsible for the crimes committed by Israel, a clearly anti-Semitic concept itself. SAIA Carleton’s basis of unity clearly states “We oppose all forms of racism, including Islamophobia and anti-Semitism.”

“Fact: Should other posters be created, they can be submitted for approval and posting.”

The poster in question–chosen because it graphically conveys countless reports from Gaza–is being used for Israeli Apartheid Week in at least 45 cities around the world. We demand an immediate lifting of the ban on the Israeli Apartheid Week poster and a public apology. Furthermore, we would like a public explanation of why the decision to ban the poster was made and we want the administration to address how to prevent such violations from occurring in future.

“Fact: The Provost did not threaten students with expulsion. He said that offences would be treated within the parameters of the student code of conduct.”

Despite its carefully couched wording, the Provost’s widely-distributed letter to the Carleton community sent a chill on several fronts–as it was designed to do. It strongly implied or insinuated things which the administration knew were unwise or even slanderous to state openly. It made students question their rights to discuss, debate and dissent –free of Administration and external intimidation. It spuriously misused “human rights” to justify censorship and suppression of free speech. Though it did not mention SAIA Carleton activists by name, its targeting of them and of Israeli Apartheid Week was evident, even more so considering the recent banning of our posters. It attempted to marginalize, intimidate and threaten SAIA Carleton as well as send a message to others who might want to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people

“Fact: The University promotes free speech and debate in a context of respect and dignity.”

We hope this is the case. It is on these grounds that SAIA Carleton and numerous faculty at Carleton have called for the administration to participate in a debate on its position on the institutional boycott of Israeli Universities. Despite the fact that our current and former Presidents have taken very clear stands on this issue–without consulting the Carleton community–we have been repeatedly rebuffed in our request for such a debate.

One also needs to consider what kind of respect Carleton University is showing to its Palestinian and Arab students by this determined unwillingness to acknowledge what is taking place in Gaza and to empathize with the suffering of their people.

A diverse cross-section of Carleton students who are passionate about social justice and want their university experience to be one that nurtures and facilitates this instinct for justice have been unsettled by the Carleton Administration’s attempts to intimidate and silence. If the Carleton administration continues to ban the Israeli Apartheid Week poster and refuses to debate its unilateral position on the institutional boycott of Israeli universities, one needs to consider just how welcoming and embracing of diversity Carleton really is.

Avi Benlolo President & Chief Executive Officer Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies

From the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies, another communiqué equating Israeli Apartheid Week with racism and hate (sent in January, 2009):

Campus Affairs Committee

As some already know, there is a climate of hate permeating Canadian universities and now more than ever, it is targeting Jewish students, especially in Toronto.  Yearly events such as Week Against the Wall and Israeli Apartheid Week not only threaten Jewish students but spread intolerable propaganda throughout university communities.

The newly formed FSWC Campus Affairs Committee has decided to act in defence
of these students and in defence of truth.

The Committee will work proactively towards the following three objectives:
1.      Expose the culture of hate and intolerance on university campuses;
2.      Initiate direct campaigns of protest to university administrations;
3.      End Week Against the Wall and Israeli Apartheid Week

We would like to thank our co-chairs for the Committee, Alan Lechem and Oded
Orgil for their commitment to this project, we look very forward to working
with them on this initiative! If you are interested in getting involved with the Campus Affairs Committee,
or if you would like to participate in the first meeting, please RSVP to Bailey at bkoplowitz@fswc.ca

…

Copyright (c) Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies

You can watch a video version of the position of the FSWC on what B’nai Brith has called “hate-fests” (Israeli Apartheid Week events) on Canadian campuses. The video is quite inflammatory and inacurate, and is on the front page of the FSWC site.