Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘campus’

Writer and journalist Irshad Manji gave a talk at McGill University last week, where she reportedly issued a challenge to the Concordia Muslim Students Association to join with Concordia Hillel in inviting her to speak there. MSA promptly turned her down:

“I challenge the Muslims and Arabs at Concordia to give proof of their love of democracy by inviting me to come speak and creating an open forum for debate and discussion,” said the 35-year-old Manji, who’s been labelled by The New York Times as “Osama bin Laden’s worst nightmare.”

When reached for a comment, the president of Concordia’s MSA, Ahmad Hussain, promptly declined Manji’s request for an invitation. “I don’t know why she didn’t extend the same invitation to MSA at McGill. It’s not fair and very provocative. She didn’t wait for the MSA.”

Hussain continued: “I think she’s angry with her experience with Islam. She’s a self-proclaimed scholar of the Koran and she doesn’t even read Arabic. Honestly, I think she’s looking for publicity. She’s quick and rash to judge and she’s not qualified. Her message is based on little more than rhetoric and personal anecdotes laden with speculations and generalizations. I’ve read many academics and journalists have dismissed her simply because the content of her message is unscholarly and unfounded as I’ve mentioned before. I think the only people who sponsor her speeches and hail her as “refreshing”, are those who already agree with her.”

Sounds like a lot of excuses to me. Could it be that MSA is afraid of Manji’s message?

The CSU council decided to ban Operation SICK from ever having the right to become an official club at Concordia… but the SPHR-cronies who pushed the ban vote through on council can’t seem to decide on a consistent excuse.

-”We banned it cause it’s racist!”

That’s inconsistent to say the least.

-”No, I mean, we banned it cause it’s affiliated with Israeli Hasbara.”

So what?

-”We disagree with OpSICK’s political stance.”

But that doesn’t give you the right to ban them.

-”Whoops, I meant that my problem is really that it’s not honest about its affiliation with Hasbara.”

Well, you found out pretty easily; it can’t be THAT big a secret. Besides, how about a little honesty about who really funds SPHR?

-”Um, what I REALLY meant is that we banned it cause it’s redundant, there are already similar groups on campus.”

Again, so what?

-”I mean… I mean… hell, it’s run by pro-Israel people and we don’t like you and we’re not gonna let you become a club no matter what, so screw you and stop asking us for a legitimate reason cause we don’t actually have one!”

And that, of course, is the crux of the matter. Council had no legitimate reason to ban Operation SICK (which, by the way, does not focus only on Palestinians, but on groups from countries all over the world who use child soldiers or incitement of hatred among children). They just decided that it was a group run by their “enemies” (read: Jews, Zionists) so they would come up with some reason to ban it. Just like they came up with a ridiculous excuse to ban Concordia Hillel last year.

The CSU is a picnic compared to these guys (via Damian):

In a West Bank university election for the student leadership that focused on which party had killed the most Israelis, the violent Hamas swept to victory Wednesday, defeating Yasser Arafat’s Fatah.

[ . . . ]

At a debate, the Hamas candidate asked the Fatah candidate: “Hamas activists in this university killed 135 Zionists. How many did Fatah activists from Bir Zeit kill?”

The Fatah candidate refused to answer, suggesting his rival “look at the paper, go to the archives and see for yourself. Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades have not stopped fighting the occupation.”

Fatah set up models of Jewish settlements and then blew them up with fireworks. The display was meant to emphasize the group’s focus on attacking settlers and their communities – considered by Palestinians to be one of the most provocative elements of Israel’s occupation of territory they claim for a state.

Hamas countered by blowing up models of Israeli buses, a tribute to the dozens of suicide bombings its members have carried out in the past three years, killing hundreds of Israelis. Activists held samples of the group’s homemade Qassam rockets – often fired at Gaza Strip settlements and Israeli towns that border the coastal area.

Student issues were barely touched on because the Palestinians’ main problem is the Israeli occupation, candidates said.

[ . . . ]

[A university spokesperson] said the student elections have wider significance. “The Bir Zeit elections are like a barometer to measure the political mood on the Palestinian street.”

Suddenly, voting scandals, ripped-down posters, and debates over club funding don’t seem so bad. How many indications do we need like this one that the Palestinians have absolutely no interest in making peace? How much more crystal-clear does it get?

When it comes to Palestinian-organized events on campus, the rule of thumb seems to be no dissenting viewpoints allowed, as is evidenced by a planned conference at U of T that was cancelled at the last minute:

The conference had a six-point political basis of unity which conference participants must support in order to attend. The administration brought up two points they specifically objected to: unconditional support for the Palestinian right of return and the principle that a two state solution is not a viable option for the Palestinian people.

According to Susan Bloch-Nevitte of the department of Public Affairs, the conference’s basis for unity was exclusionary and therefore the university delivered an ultimatum: either abandon the basis for unity or abandon the booking.

[ . . . ]

The conference would have included sessions on the refugees’ right to return, the current situation in all of historical Palestine, women’s involvement and solidarity with feminists, and queer activism. Sunday would have been dedicated to a session on strategies for resisting what conference organizers called the “Israeli apartheid.”

Of course, conference organizers are, in typical fashion, up in arms denouncing the university’s “blatant trampling on students’ right to organize” and demanding apologies, yadda yadda yadda.

If you recall, pro-Palestinian students made (false) allegations that they weren’t going to be allowed to get tickets to hear Benjamin Netanyahu speak at Concordia last year… they even used it as an excuse for their riot. But apparently it’s ok to organize a conference where nobody but the most hard-line extremist viewpoint is allowed to be expressed, and people can’t even attend unless they’re committed to the destruction of Israel. And yeah, then they have the gall to be angry when their event is cancelled.

This is a very clear example of democracy, Palestinian-style: we have the right to put forth our hard-line views, they say, and you have no right to object or dissent. Our viewpoint matters, yours doesn’t.

(Via Bob).

SPHR invited Netanyahu . . . ’s nephew to speak at Concordia, only just over a year after violently rioting against Netanyahu himself to get his speech shut down.

Eric Ben-Artzi came to speak on behalf of the Refusenik movement – Israelis who would prefer to go to jail than serve in the IDF.

SPHR once again demonstrated that the only speech it will tolerate is speech it agrees with. As for Ben-Artzi, the only thing he proved – besides being shameless about trading on his family connections – is that he represents nothing but a fringe minority in Israel:

The bigger issue involves his repeated claim that he represents the Israeli centre, while he himself admitted that despite the million Israelis who serve in the army, and the six million citizens, only 550 make a point to refuse to serve. He went further and explained that 1,300 other Israelis signed a petition in solidarity. That still makes it far fewer than one per cent of the population.

If we were to have a legitimate discussion about people refusing to serve in the Israeli army, I think the focus would most likely be on the thousands of people who don’t serve due to religious exemptions. Or even on the under-the-radar Israelis who look for creative ways to skirt the draft, including medical excuses or “instead of” service. The first group – and even the second – are surely much more numerous than the “Refuseniks”.

Either way, even the fringe element that Ben-Artzi represents doesn’t want to see SPHR’s goal of no more Israel. But SPHR wasn’t interested in any of that. They saw an opportunity to exploit him for their propaganda purposes, that’s all. As usual. Only this time, the attempt was as transparent as glass.

The Link reported that Concordia Hillel lost its court case against the CSU:

In an Oct. 10 decision, the Quebec Court of Appeals found against Hillel’s appeal on lifting the suspension of their lawsuit against the CSU. The court also found in favour of the CSU’s cross appeal to force the inclusion of the Union’s Judicial Board in the process.

The judgment, in my (admittedly non-legal-educated) opinion, seems on the face ridiculous. After all, the Judicial Board consists of people chosen by the CSU Council. The chances that Hillel would have gotten a fair hearing by the JB on this issue last year were pretty slim.

In plain language, this sucks. The CSU Council had no business banning Hillel last year, and the court ruling shouldn’t force Hillel to submit to heavy-handed blackmail.

Oh, and P.S., for anyone wondering what’s been going on at Concordia lately, SPHR is up to their usual Israel-bashing:

A petition presented to the CSU last week by members of Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights has demanded the Union hold a general assembly on Nov. 6 to denounce Israel’s “apartheid wall” built along the border between Israel and the West Bank. Many human rights groups have condemned the wall, which groups say encroaches on Palestinian territory. The petition was signed by 250 students, even though only 100 are needed to force an assembly.

Yep, and if they called a general assembly asking people whether they thought all Zionists should be banned from the premises, it would probably get the 100 signatures in a heartbeat.

Great system, eh?

I haven’t been able to blog lately, cause of a whole bunch of stuff all going on at the same time.

But there’s been lots happening lately. Check out some of the links on the left for more about the world’s reactions to the Malaysian PM’s antisemitic remarks, the hate-fest at Rutgers University that makes Concordia look like paradise, and of course, the Habs’ win over the Wings last night.

Hope to resume regular blogging soon. Sorry for the long hiatus.

September 9th, 2002:

They came to shut down free speech. They violently rioted, as explained in this widely-circulated eyewitness account. They didn’t want Benjamin Netanyahu to give this speech – or, indeed, to speak at all – and so they gathered to riot, cause mayhem, and rough up people trying to attend.

The fallout made international headlines, led to the blame game almost immediately, and caused a ripple effect that is still being felt.

September 9th, 2003:

They’d have us believe that everything has changed. There’s a new CSU executive, a big orientation party for incoming and returning students, and a lecture series on conflict resolution.

But ultimately, behind the scenes, very little has changed despite surface appearances. Hillel, which had its privileges suspended by last year’s CSU is still fighting to get them restored. The so-called “activists” are still defending the rioting. Benjamin Netanyahu has been invited back to Montreal but not to Concordia. Antisemitism still gets printed in the Link as “legitimate political criticism”. Indeed, there is still much work to be done.

One year later, some baby steps in the right direction have been taken. What happens from here, we’ll just have to wait and see.

If only the student union at Concordia spent more time focusing on issues like this and less on petty squabbles about the Mideast . . .

More fun news from Concordia (where else?) as a CSU-appointed hearings panel ruled that it’s ok to draw a swastika on an Israeli flag:

A student panel at Concordia University has dismissed a harassment complaint against activist Laith Marouf for drawing swastikas on an Israeli flag during a March 12 protest at the downtown campus.

In a 2-1 decision, the board ruled that while “Marouf’s gesture was in very poor taste,” it was made during a tense confrontation and did not qualify as harassment under the university’s code of rights and responsibilities, or warrant expulsion or other sanctions.

Adam Spiro, the finance student and Hillel member who filed the complaint, said he’s disgusted by the decision.

“It sends a terrible message,” he said, noting his paternal grandparents are Holocaust survivors. “It says that in the heat of protest, there are no boundaries.

“It legitimizes the swastika as a symbol of political discourse, which it’s not. It’s the worst symbol of hatred, racism and the genocide of 6 million Jews.”

So what is this, complaint number 912 against Laith Marouf that he gets tossed out? He was banned from Concordia two years ago, along with his buddy Tom Keefer, for spraypainting anti-Israel vandalism and threatening a security guard. But the university lifted that ban, and he’s been merrily shit-disturbing and displaying his intense hatred ever since. Apparently anything goes as long as you wrap yourself in the Palestinian flag and make ridiculous excuses for your actions, like this one:

At a May 14 hearing, Marouf testified he drew “the inverted swastika, the Hindu circle of life, not the Nazi swastika” on the Israeli flag, as a lesson in symbolism. However, he conceded he realized some people might not make the distinction and would be deeply offended.

Maybe it’s just cause it’s Friday, but I can’t seem to stop laughing at that one.