Trump's War on the Palestine Movement Is Something Entirely New

[Celerity]

Never before has a government repressed its citizens’ free speech and academic freedom so brutally in order to protect an entirely different country.

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/trump-palestine-campus-repression-analysis/

https://archive.ph/QyG1M



As people across the nation look on, aghast, at the footage of vulnerable students of color being abducted in broad daylight by the masked gunmen of ICE, it’s important to acknowledge the unprecedented nature of what we’re living through.

This moment has been compared to McCarthyism. But the Red Scare was sold (however fraudulently) to the American people as a way to protect the country and its government from the threat of communist infiltration. The campaign of brute intimidation ravaging campuses across the country is not being framed as a way of safeguarding the American government or political system; it is, rather, intended to protect a distant foreign regime and to shield it from criticism in the country whose taxpayers are increasingly unwilling to finance its system of apartheid and its program of genocidal violence.

After all, not one of the students being pursued or detained today is accused of criticizing the United States or its system of government. Even now, in this gathering darkness, you can stand with a bullhorn in the middle of any American college campus, say what you want about Donald Trump or the American government, and not fear that you will be kidnapped by the state. Instead, what Trump’s targets are alleged to share is their criticism of Israel’s genocide in Gaza and their advocacy of universally acknowledged Palestinian rights.

Similarly, Columbia’s Department of Middle East, South Asian and African Studies has—by the combination of unprecedented government fiat and craven administrative capitulation—been stripped of its institutional autonomy not because some members of that department have been critical of the United States, but because they are viewed by certain people as too critical of Israel.

snip

[question everything]

1. Saree Makdisi the author

Saree Makdisi is of Palestinian and Lebanese descent. He also writes on contemporary Arab politics and culture.

It was proven that foreign groups were behind the anti Israel protests.

“ no blacklist of the hundreds of Zionist faculty members at universities across the country who have abused their positions of power against their own students, intimidating them, silencing them, harassing them?”

Where is he coming from? Jewish students were barred from classes and were harassed by professors.

The whole article is so upside down that one has to wonder where Mr. Makdisi has been.

[AloeVera]

3. I don't wonder about Mr. Makdisi, but I do wonder where some people have been.

You have seen "proof" of foreign funding behind the student protests? Can you share?

To me, what is upside down is the entire accepted narrative about who has or has not done been barred and harassed. Also beaten up, jailed, silenced, doxxed and now about to be deported. Their lives ruined.

We live in a truly upside down world.

[question everything]

8. Iran encourages Gaza war protests in US to stoke outrage and distrust, intelligence chief says

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Iranian government is covertly encouraging American protests over Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza in a bid to stoke outrage ahead of the fall election, the nation’s top intelligence official said Tuesday.

Using social media platforms popular in the U.S., groups linked to Tehran have posed as online activists, encouraged protests and have provided financial support to some protest groups, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines said in a statement.

“Iran is becoming increasingly aggressive in their foreign influence efforts, seeking to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions,” Haines said.

This effort noted by the top U.S. intelligence official is the latest evidence that America’s adversaries are harnessing the internet to warp domestic debates and widen political divides ahead of the election.

https://apnews.com/article/gaza-war-protests-iran-foreign-influence-95e0a161119ed0e060332feda95b4e4f

[AloeVera]

9. I still don't see how it's been "proven".

Not exactly "proof" of what you asserted.
Neither is it "news" that Iran would agree with the demands of the protesters to end the onslaught on Gaza.

But getting back to the O/P, why do you think these students and leaders are being targeted? For "anti-semitism" or for criticism of Israel? Or do you think they are the same thing?

[iemanja]

14. Jews also protested

As did many Anglo-Americans. A Yale Professor said Jews were the second largest ethnic group represented in the protests at his university. Your “proof” is false. Protesters came from all races and nationalities. It is possible to care about human life without being a foreign agent. Not all Americans are unconcerned.

[question everything]

2. On Democracies and Death Cults - Israel, Hamas and the Future of the West a book review

On Democracies and Death Cults: Israel, Hamas and the Future of the West by Douglas Murray
Douglas Murray’s latest book is a painstakingly researched commentary on Hamas’ terrorist attack on Israel on 7 October 2023. Documenting not only that day’s horrific events, Murray contextualises the history that preceded 7 October and offers a disturbing analysis of the antisemitism that has underscored so much of the global response to both Israel and diaspora Jews that followed.

In a world of mainstream media and commentary that frequently fails to report Israeli affairs without a contemptuous bias, Murray cuts through the noise with a rare clarity. His arguments are rational, fact-based and dispassionate. As a non-Jew, Murray also brings “no skin in the game” whatsoever when he writes about the Jewish state.

Murray’s dispassion makes the book an emotional challenge. His documenting of the details of the 7 October massacres, drawn from numerous conversations with many of the day’s witnesses and survivors, makes harrowing reading. An outstanding interlocutor, Murray adds no sensationalism to his reporting, letting his subjects’ testimonies speak for themselves. There are moments in the book when the sheer inhumanity of that day’s barbarity defies comprehension, proving impossible for the reader not to weep.

The antisemitic hatred that has erupted across Western cities and campuses over the last 18 months is equally well documented, not least the evil duplicity of those nobly calling for “all women to be believed” unless, of course, they are Jewish women.

The book is bolstered by Murray’s depth of historical reference. He points to the scourge of radical Islamism having been sparked by the 1979 Iranian Revolution that saw the return to Tehran of Ayatollah Khomeini from his Paris exile and the subsequent banishing of Iran’s Shah. He reports the irony of Iran calling Israel a colonial outpost of the USA while simultaneously establishing its own colonial outposts in Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen and elsewhere.

Murray highlights the UN Conference in Durban, South Africa (of all places) in 2001 that was to provide the fallacious grounding for Israel being described as an “apartheid state”. We also learn that as early as 1964, some three years before Israel’s borders were redrawn following the Six-Day War, Yasser Arafat’s PLO was calling for the “liberation” of the “occupied territories” – ergo, the destruction of the State of Israel.

Murray’s research and travels have been extensive. He has visited most of the countries that border Israel and, since October 7 alone, has visited not only Israel but also Gaza, enabling him, unlike most contemporary commentators, to offer an evidence-based perspective. When Murray reports that Egyptian bookshops still stock numerous copies of Mein Kampf and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, believe him.

https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/book-review-on-democracies-and-death-cults-israel-hamas-and-the-future-of-the-west/

[Celerity]

4. Fuck Douglas Murray, he is a RW POS.

[AloeVera]

7. Douglas Murray has been described as an anti-Muslim polemicist, is a neo-con...

..even alt-right and apparently holds some fringe and despicable views.

Murray has been praised by conservatives, and criticised by many others.[8][9][10] Articles in the academic journals Ethnic and Racial Studies and National Identities associate his views with Islamophobia[4][11] and he has been described as promoting far-right ideas such as the Eurabia, Great Replacement, and Cultural Marxism conspiracy theories.[12][13][14][15][16]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Murray_(author)

Not a fellow I would want to read.

[Prairie Gates]

5. They wouldn't be coming so hard if it wasn't working

[iemanja]

6. I don't think it's about protecting Israel.

But rather about Trump’s hatred of Muslims.

[AloeVera]

11. It's ideology.

Non-Muslim students and leaders are getting targeted too. The only criteria are their views on Israel and how vocal/effective they've been in the protest movement. Rather, that's the criteria for the blacklists created by these rabid pro-Israel groups like Canary Mission and Betar. That these blacklists are being used by the Trump Admin to ruin lives is really disturbing.

Further:

The surest evidence that this crusade is ideologically grounded in protecting Israel, not the US, isn’t just in the roster of those chased or abducted by ICE so far—every one of them supposedly in connection with the anti-genocide, pro-Palestinian protests at campuses last spring—but also in the ransom list presented by the Trump government to Columbia in order for the university’s $400 million in suspended federal funding to be restored.

Every single item on that list represents a long-standing demand not simply of the MAGA right but rather of the institutions or individuals who, for years, have lobbied and cajoled (and are now openly threatening and coercing) Columbia, like other universities across the country, to suppress criticism of Zionism and Israeli policy and stifle the advocacy of Palestinian rights on campus.

Chief among these demands is the forcible adoption of an illegitimate, abusive, and thoroughly discredited redefinition of the very concept of antisemitism. By mendaciously seeking to conflate Judaism and Zionism, this redefining of antisemitism aims to classify criticism of Zionism and of the Zionist state’s policies of apartheid and genocide as a form of anti-Jewish hate speech—and therefore to banish it from classes, readings, textbooks, assignments, lectures, debates, conferences, and forums on campuses across the United States. This campaign has been relentlessly promoted—for years—by groups like the ADL, AIPAC, and the American Jewish Congress. Only under the threat of government sanction is it finally being imposed on institutions like Columbia and Harvard. Others will surely follow; some (such as NYU and Yale) already have. What Zionist lobbying groups, donors, regents or trustees have been unable to achieve through conventional methods of enticement, complaint, or emotional blackmail, they are finally able to accomplish through their direct influence over the government of the United States, which has, in turn, willingly allowed itself to be co-opted...

[iemanja]

12. I'm not sure of that, precisely

Because there are so many antisemites in Trump’s administration. Antisemitism is clearly a pretext for going after universities, and it’s not just about Israel. The right wants to control education and information. Look, for example, at their demands to Harvard. They wanted control over admissions and ALL academic departments, few of which have anything to do with Israel.

I agree with you about the weaponization of antisemitism. Clearly it’s been perverted into a massive lie to protect Israel’s mass murders. Trump is fully on board with that, but I think his end game is far more expansive and sinister. He wants to exert totalitarian control.

[comradebillyboy]

10. Oh look...a group of people who helped Trump get elected

are getting fucked over by Trump. Who could have guessed this would happen?

While I have little sympathy for the pro-Pal folks, their first amendment rights, including the right to peaceful protest must be defended.

[iemanja]

13. The majority of Muslims voted for Harris

which you can’t say about white people, yet white peoples use the minority vote as an excuse to blame others—for many reasons. Moreover, Palestinians didn’t vote in our election at all, while the overwhelming majority of college faculty vote Democratic. Before you express your lack of concern for authoritarianism, you might remember that it’s going to affect you too.

[Beastly Boy]

15. I fail to see how Trump's assault on free speech in the US is aimed "to protect an entirely different country "

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argumentt that Trump's assault on free speech is by no means limited to universities,

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that academic freedom extends to university faculty alone and not its students or administration (https://www.aaup.org/programs/academic-freedom/faqs-academic-freedom),

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that neither free speech nor academic freedom are absolute and do not include hate speech,

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that Trump's rhetoric calls for protecting America's Jews from antisemitism, which, after all has risen fourfold in the past year alone in the US,

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that a significant number of Jewish students reported intimidation and harassment which suppressed THEIR rights to free speech and constitutional rights,

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that an extraordinary number of expressions of free speech by the protesting students were accompanied by acts of vandalism against universities and violations of university rules,

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that Trump is using all of the above to justify his assault not only on free speech, but specifically and arbitrarily on targeting residents of the US for deportation,

Even if we forget for for the sake of an argument that not a single action of the Trump administration did anything to protect the"entirely different country",

Even if we forget all of the above, how can the author possibly overlook a most obvious, most consistent and best known fact that Trump is in the business of protecting himself, and himself alone, and is exploiting every opportunity, absolutely free of ideology or affinity to anyone and anything, to do just that, and that alone?

You start with a false premise, you get garbage for a conclusion. Yet another excuse to blame "Zionists" for an entirely American problem.. This trash is intellectually pathetic.

[malaise]

16. THIS

Rec

[David__77]

17. Trump likes foreign fascists.