Free Speech—But Not for All
with Peter Beinart
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Advocates for free inquiry on college campuses—myself included—have bemoaned the rise “safe spaces” and objections to material that makes students “uncomfortable.” Examining unfamiliar and controversial ideas can indeed be an uncomfortable experience, and that’s a good thing. So where are the free speech advocates who mocked so-called snowflakes when pro-Palestine protesters get arrested, kicked off campus, and, in the case of Mahmoud Khalil, possibly deported? In this clip from this week’s episode, Peter Beinart highlights two ironies: the failure of these advocate to defend pro-Palestinian protesters on free speech grounds and the fact that it’s often Jewish protesters who are silenced in the name of fighting antisemitism.
Are people calling for censorship and to ban peaceful legal protests? 1a does not protect against threats of imminent violence, assault, trespassing, kidnapping, destruction of property, etc.. So if we are talking about a professor's syllabus content, or a student's paper, an organized peaceful protest in the quad, etc. then I'm concerned about free speech. If we are talking about building take overs, autonomous zones, dragging people from cars, firebombing, assaulting passerbys, trapping people against their will, etc. I'm not concerned about free speech. Those rioters and arguably terrorists by the legal definition deserve to see actual consequences for their actions.
Writing as an American Israeli, I marvel at the persistence of the red herring claim that Jewish critics of Israel face threats to their freedom of speech. From Breira in the 60s, to J Street, and Beinart (kind of in a class all his own), nobody is suppressing criticism of Israel. These critics are free to say whatever they want, and those calling them anti-Semitic are also entitled to voice their opinion. Being told you are an anti Semite is not tantamount to denying you free speech. In my opinion, Beinart reflects auto anti Semitism. He is so embarrassed by Israel's behavior because he prefers being Jewish in the Diaspora which does not require him to get his hands dirty. This is an auto immune Jewish gene which my father, the late Rabbi Jacob Chinitz, called the "Drag of Diaspora." Having lived in Israel for over forty years, the last three of them out every Saturday night protesting against the clownish evil government we have, I'll argue that many, if not most Israelis are as sad as Beinart about the destruction of Gaza, but they're more saddened by the worst day for Jews since the Holocaust. Despite the fact that thousands of Gazans, many of whom worked for peace striving Israelis who chauffeured them back and forth to work and hospitals in Israel (open air prison, give me a break) came to slaughter Jews, they differentiate between Hamas and other Gazans, though the distinction has become justifiably blurred. They can't understand why after Israel withdrew from Gaza, the Gazans didn't take advantage of the situation to build their own society. Beinart blames the denial of their rights for their violence, but no mention of fundamentalist religious based hate and the exploitation of their refugee status by maintaining it by the Arab world in a way no other refugees have been kept in their status (UNWRA is sui generis, otherwise Germans from the Sudatenland would still be in refugee camps). He blames Israel for hamstringing Saleem Fayad's attempts to build sound governance institutions for Palestinians, but neglects to mention the role of the Palestinian Authority, not to mention Hamas, in making his efforts futile. As Benny Morris recently said, the Jews spent at least 50 of the pre-state years building their institutions - parliamentary, educational, health and social services - before they got a state, and not knowing for sure they would get one. Let the Palestinians try that path. Even the most left wing Israelis, such as the late Zev Sternhall, criticized the Palestinians for not taking what they could get when they could get it, insisting on total redress of the injustices done to them in their eyes.
I could go on and on, and Beinart to my mind is a twisted lost Jewish soul. And, of course, that's only my opinion. But despite my distaste for him, I would welcome him, opinions and all, if he, and all of his friends who share his discomfit with Israel, were to move to Israel and get out on the streets with those Israelis who want Israel to change. Indeed, for a deeper dive into the real source of Israel's problems see https://davidchinitz.substack.com/p/the-jewish-peoples-dirty-little-secret-33c?r=2mop22