Dear Members of the Emory Community,
We are writing collectively as Emory Students for Justice in Palestine (ESJP). We appreciate Dean Ajay Nair’s statement regarding free speech. We are writing to clarify some of our values.
We are nonviolent, student activists. On Sunday, Feb. 22, we built a display, a model of the Apartheid Wall that runs through the West Bank to draw attention to the walling-off of many Palestinians from their families, jobs, schools, hospitals and other crucial aspects of daily life. On this wall, we attached educational materials about the general situation in Israel and Palestine, international law as is applicable to the Apartheid Wall and statements about our group including that we “oppose all forms of oppression (including anti-Arab racism, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia).” Our goal is to increase awareness of the violations of Palestinians’ human and civil rights, Israel’s violations of international human rights law and the United States’ complicity in these violations. We hope that by raising awareness, we can increase support for the U.S. and Israel to move towards more humane policies and practices towards Palestinians.
The wall we built is a physical expression of our speech. It originally contained facts, quotes and pictures regarding what the United Nations (UN) defines as apartheid. While this is our understanding of the Palestinian reality, we also realize others have been exposed to a different understanding. In doing so, we also accept the freedom of speech for those who disagree. The Apartheid Wall is a sensitive subject for Israelis and Palestinians alike and we ask for restraint from expressions of physical and verbal violence.
We are disappointed that at least two individuals (during two separate incidents) defaced and destroyed what we created, rather than engage with us about their concerns. Our contact information was located on the wall along with an invitation to inquire about the issue. In the past, Emory has worked to facilitate dialogue about differing facts and ideologies. We hope that the Emory community will again engage with us.
As we discuss the conditions of Palestinians, we also acknowledge the history of anti-Semitic discrimination, and we distinguish between what some call hate speech and criticism. Members of ESJP are from a diverse background that includes an Israeli Jew and a Palestinian. We have diverse political ideas but agree that we cannot remain silently complicit as the State of Israel, with financial and material support from the United States, continues to violate the human rights of the Palestinian people as outlined in international law, including the Fourth Geneva Convention and the Rome Statute.
As we continue to use the name Apartheid Wall, it is important to understand why we call it as such. In 1974, the UN held the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid, which defines apartheid in Article II (c) as:
“Any legislative measures and other measures calculated to prevent a racial group or groups from participation in the political, social, economic and cultural life of the country and the deliberate creation of conditions preventing the full development of such a group or groups, in particular by denying to members of a racial group or groups basic human rights and freedoms, including the right to work, the right to form recognized trade unions, the right to education, the right to leave and to return to their country, the right to a nationality, the right to freedom of movement and residence, the right to freedom of opinion and expression, and the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.”
While some maintain that Israel does not engage in such acts, a glance at Israeli and Palestinian identification papers will quickly find that Palestinian IDs are color coded for quick distinction. The purpose of this system is to allow guards to quickly identify Palestinians in order to prohibit their travel. But this is only one example of Israeli policies that makes clear distinctions based on which side of the Apartheid Wall a person lives on.
We invite all members of the Emory community to engage with us from within a framework of social justice and international law as we move forward and discuss what steps we can take from within the United States to ensure that the human rights of all people in Israel and Palestine are defended.
Emory Students for Justice in Palestine
The Emory Wheel was founded in 1919 and is currently the only independent, student-run newspaper of Emory University. The Wheel publishes weekly on Wednesdays during the academic year, except during University holidays and scheduled publication intermissions.
The Wheel is financially and editorially independent from the University. All of its content is generated by the Wheel’s more than 100 student staff members and contributing writers, and its printing costs are covered by profits from self-generated advertising sales.
“In other news, _____ Chapter of Students for Justice in Tibet have insisted that the university cease doing business with any Chinese company.”
– Imaginary news report that would never occur because the bigots who attack Israel don’t actually care about “occupation,” they want to destroy the Jewish State.
The amount of conflated threads you weave to create your tapestry of distortion makes ones head spin.
1) If we adhere to principles of justice, it would require us to divest from such nations.
2) We ought to adhere to principles of justice here at home too.
3) Critique of Israeli policy is not equivalent to antisemitism, much as you desire to conflate in order to silence exposure of legitimate injustices toward Jews and Palestinian Christians, Muslims, Arabs and Africans
4) Israel, for better and worse, is not the representative of all Jews
5) Irrespective of #4, Jews en mass are not responsible for the actions of Israeli policy. To suggest otherwise, as you often do, is to expose your hypocrisy for having earlier supported the admonition by this author not to do so http://tuftsdaily.com/opinion/2015/02/23/go-moses/
6) Lots of people care about the occupation, and people of all stripes and backgrounds call it out for what it is, including fellow Jews and Israelis
http://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/
Arafat is a well known Disqus poster who trolls against minority groups like Muslims and their religion. He repeatedly highlights examples to promote a hateful narrative, while attempting to suppress anything that provides context. His diatribes are clearly driven in the hope hat some nutjob will act on his hateful narrative to deal with a “threat” of Muslims.
For a preview of what will follow:
1) Arafat will insult those who refute his narrative by invoking that they are “tards”, “liberals”, “apologists” and the like
2) Arafat will state his narrative as “fact” and all others as “opinion”
3) Arafat will randomly toss in derogatory remarks, quotes and snippits about Islam that show his level of understanding and interpretation is the same as extremists, which is to say, simply ignorant and invalid
4) Arafat will quote random historical figures who malign Muslims and Islam, as a “proof”, while failing to recognize many figures have said hateful things about people throughout history, including Jews, blacks, gays, Hispanics, Catholics, etc, etc
5) Arafat will dodge every discussion point by posting tangential responses
6) Arafat fails to adhere to honest dialogue and is an ideologue promoting a hateful narrative
7) Arafat will employ false equivalency and retreat after having sufficiently warped a Disqus threat to allow him to post his hate
8) Arafat will accuse opponents of the tactics he demonstrates repeatedly
You have a right to spout your bigotry. We have a right to call you out on it.
If people don’t like having their apartheid wall called out for being an apartheid wall, then tear it down and build real bridges to a just peace that benefits both sides.
I guess you define Troll as anyone who disagrees with your vile, anti-Semitic rants.
Calling something antisemitic doesn’t make it so. However, your approach to label those who call out bigots as being antisemitic is in fact detrimental because in your attempt to claim it without justification, you devalue the term in circumstances where it rightly applies. Tossing around the label is a tried and true method. Unfortunately, those days are over. And there are plenty of Jews and Israelis who are tired of its abuse.
Calling out people who promote a bigoted narrative toward a group of people (i.e., calling out trolls) isn’t vile. Otherwise, you have a pretty odd definition of what vile is.
http://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/
So much silence meanwhile and the Islamic state is beheading people in Syria. 300,000+ dead and we here nothing from student radicals. After all if you can’t demonize the Jews there is nothing to say.
They are taking sabbaticals to go join ISIS hence their lack of availability to comment.
I would suggest you do standup except your comment both lacks originality and humor. Not sure who ‘they’ are – but I’ve often found that bigots tend to use terms like ‘they’ when they use the deplorable example of a few to generalize against the unrelated many.
We see through you, too.
Watcht the news, liar
DHS/FBI is issuing warrants for so called “activists” who leave the US to help groups like ISIS and HAMAS on a weekly basis.
Well, I’m not a liar, but there wasn’t any claim that could be even construed as lying up above.. not sure if you’re getting your rants confused a bit.
Anyway, you act as the ISIS Hamas AQ PR firm anyway since you seem to support their irrational claims of legitimacy and their narrative. Bigots and haters all seem to be cut from the same cloth. I hope the DHS/FBI track you all and ship you off to an island to leave the rest of us alone.
Cheers.
Deflection Fail,
You insinuated that it wasn’t a crime to even sell land to Jews in Gaza and the PA and now you are backpeddling?
You attempt deflection and cite demands for special treatment of Arabs that the Arabs would never do themselves.
For you this issue is a one way street where the most bloodthirsty, bigoted and murderous ideologies and regimes on the planet are legitimate and Israel keeping their doors locked rather than be murdered in their own streets is a reasonable demand in the name of “peace”.
The only “Peace” you sell is Dead Jews
Scroll up and tell me where I said it isn’t a “crime”, then re-read what I posted and accused you for being antisemitic for trying to generalize the deplorable actions of individuals and government policy toward an entire people, then go back up and find where I backpedaled in the least.
Good God man, you really are something. Take your hysterics elsewhere. The only one advocating for dead anyone is you.
Let me explain this plainly for you: if you kill people unjustly, take their land, torture kids, engage in corruption, and promote racism and bigotry – you deserve to be condemned. I don’t care what your background is or the background of who you do it to.
Can you get on board with that? Or you are trying to justify Israeli injustice and repression with injustice and repression done by others?
How moral of you.
Please post a tangential, vitriolic, libelous rebuttal because obviously, whoever writes the last word must be the “winner”.
Goodnight.
I asserted Jews had no parity in peace negotiations when dealing with medieval, violent, homophobic, misgynist clowns who will even kill their own people for doing peaceable business with Jewish civilians.
You inferred I was lying, that is a tacit denial of my assertion.
Intellectual Dishonesty followed by attempts at plausible deniability.
What are you, an CIA agent?
“Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute
darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for
sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes
And clever in their own sight!” Isaiah 5:20-21
May the Lord deal justly between us both and condemn the one between us who sows hate with their lies.
I’ll take that oath.
Can I get an amen from you on that? No crossing your fingers!
You’ll bring a curse on yourself if you swear that oath because you’re a liar.
Not that anyone would actually believe that you weren’t some atheist or agnostic humanist anyway.
I take the oath wholeheartedly and I believe in God.
So, care to take the oath as well? Since I’m a liar and you are a truth-teller, what have you to fear from doing the same in front of all the people you are thinking to convince?
Looks like you have me in checkmate.
So do you take the oath?
Actually I have rejoiced at reading that with the Haftarah aloud before my congregation and though it usually evokes personal thoughts of dealing with unscrupulous coworkers who try to take credit for my work initially when in meditation it instantly causes me to recall an old black and white 1920s film of thousands of Egyptian Arabs coming at the behest of Haj Amin Al Husseini into “Palestine” via caravans to claim a chunk of newly revived land made habitable for the first time in hundreds of years by Jews who’d come there in the early days of Zionist settlement to drain the swamps and irrigate the dry land. Those itinerant Arabs eventually stayed and called themselves “Palestinians” despite having Egyptian family names and tribal customs.
Yeah, I can swear that as an oath but it’s actually meant to be a declaration of submission to G_d that you want to do the right thing and I do that a lot.
1920 – The year the Arabs discovered “Palestine”
https://youtu.be/pmXmFlp9eAs
https://youtu.be/MM9tV4-Hg_A
Glad you are familiar with the oath.
So do you take it then and swear to let the Lord of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob judge between us both for all that we post on Disqus and may the one who sows seeds of hate and lies about others be condemned and cursed?
I hate what Hashem hates without reservation and I do not lie about what I know to be true with my own eyes and understanding.
I’ll swear at least that I will not lie about Israel, the “hate” part of your request isn’t an obligation I care to undertake. I do hate the enemies of my people and my G_d and don’t feel bad about it in the slightest.
Seems like there are a lot of qualifiers there…and then you back out.
Well, thanks for being honest about your intended deceptions at least and that you are driven by partisanship than justice and honesty.
Now we all see through you as well.
Peace.
If you plug your ears, it’s pretty hard to hear. So unplug them and read up on the denunciations of Muslims and theologians from every major scholar, leader and organization across the world in regards to ISIS.
Oh and, by the by, the people they are killing day to day are Muslims. So, I’m surprised you’re not cheering them. Except that you are – because your intent is to be their PR firm by advocating that they represent orthodoxy, which is what they claim too.
No one is demonizing anyone except you.
Except the only people promoting apartheid are Israel’s enemies who seek to exterminate the Jews of Israel and leave an Arab only Palestine.
http://rhr.org.il/eng/
http://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/
http://jewishvoiceforpeace.org/
What of Jews, Israelis, and soldiers who see past Israeli policy and do advocate for justice even if the government that claims to be acting on their behalf does wrong in their name?
Injustice should be called out and it is.
Of course your goal it to kill Jewish leftists too. After all it doesn’t bother you the fact that Muslim states like Saudi Arabia ban citizenship for all non Muslims. That of course if justice in your eyes.
You’re pretty abhorrent to make such a lie. Have you stopped beating your wife?
Saudi Arabia along with most of the current Arab regimes are incredibly unjust. Or do you just spout of unsubstantiated accusations and assumptions as a common troll?
That’s funny.
This mental midget, this Jew hater calls Muslims a “minority” while promoting the destruction of the only place in the world where Jews can protect themselves from people like him.
Note to mental midget: There are 14 million Jews living in the entire world and more than 1.4 billion Muslims. Is your math strong enough to determine which is a minority?
In most Western nations, Muslims constitute a minority. You have a disdain for minorities as well and any group that opposes your right-wing viewpoints that enshrine racial hegemony of one people over everyone else.
Insulting with sophomoric rebuttals only shows the kind of person you really are.
Conflating the objectively heinous, deplorable actions of the Israeli government with the support of all Jews or Judaism is anti-Semitic. You hate Jews, Muslims, Christians, Israelis, and Palestinians more than anyone because it is your intent to promote generalized hate.
We should build bridges to peace. Lets start by having Jews build a synagogue on the Temple Mount just like Muslims have multiple mosques there.
Sure. Let’s have Israel be an open, non-ethno/religiocentric democracy where everyone has full equality, access to own land, tear down the walls and the police state that brutalizes citizens and occupied individuals, and build bridges where the people of faith can reopen Jerusalem to what it should be – a sanctuary to the world for peace and coexistence.
When Omar Khattab came to Jerusalem, he ordered the Temple Mount cleaned after the Romans had left it a trash heap. His practice was the allow for the rule of people according to their laws, which is far better than exists today. He prayed outside the Church wherein he was invited to pray out of respect to the Church itself because future people may claim the site of significance and want to establish a mosque, which they did.
So, I’m with you in that. In the meantime, end the Israeli policing that denies Palestinian Christian and Muslim worshipers access to their holy sites, if you are sincere.
Sure, as soon as an Arab living in Gaza or the West Bank can sell their own privately owned land to a Jew we might try that, lol
Seriously Gopher, you can’t be that ignorant of the lethal consequences of what you propose in any Islamic Entity.
Arabs wanted their own autonomous areas outside of Israel and now they have them. They can’t have it both ways and they can’t have anything as long as they are committed to terror and murder of even their own people much less the Jews they are making demands upon.
The Jews only have 1 holy site that really matters to them and they haven’t had free access to it for centuries.
I don’t really give a damn if plagiarist replacement theologies demand something from Jews that they have never offered in return.
Pound Sand
“Plagiarist replacement theologies”? Thanks for helping me understand your view of Christianity and Islam and hate of them. I suppose Herod was a paragon of morality and leadership to you.
No one is making demands of Jews, but nice try again at conflating things to obscure criticism. There are plenty of demands being made of the Israeli government and rightly so.
I’m not pounding sand. Peace.
If you really don’t have any idea that the penalty for selling land to a Jew in Hamas controlled Gaza is summary execution then you are wasting everyone’s time with your immense ignorance.
If you do know better but pretend it hasn’t been the state of affairs in Gaza since the 2006 elections then you are intellectually dishonest and trying to deceive anyone who might be reading your post in passing.
Either do your homework or stop being intentionally dishonest whichever might be the case.
Repeating something does not make it so, although there is that adage about hoping that if you repeat a lie enough times people may think it truth.
Let’s first begin with Hamas having been spawned with Israeli support as a counterbalance to the PLO in order to fracture Palestinian political unity. As for their extremism, let’s not forget that Israel is an occupier of territory. When you blockade land, air, and sea to a region, when you blockade medicine and finances to a people, when you starve a people and when you bomb their schools, churches, mosques, UN shelters and homes en mass with wanton disregard, you are an occupier. And when you abduct and torture human beings, you are evil. So let’s start with that first and call it out for what it is. Hamas and its extremism is the desired result of Israeli right-wing, settler driven, racist ideology hell bent on eradicating Palestinians from the land once and for all.
Look to Mr. Netanyahu, Mr. Feiglin, and many more of the right-wing who are in government and implementing their apartheid policies and take a look at the corrosive effects of modern day Jim Crow laws with respect to treatment of Palestinian Christians and Muslims.
Now, you want to point out the wrong and evils in Palestinian society, that’s fair. But to ignore the context in which they exist and originate and to ignore the reality of Israeli atrocities is completely and utterly intellectually dishonest.
Moreover, it reflects a morally bankrupt perspective.
PA: Life in prison at hard labor for selling land to Jews.
https://youtu.be/ehzr6vxSEoE
Fatah official imploring Palestinians to hang those who sold land from electric poles.
https://youtu.be/YfVsLzfuVu0
Gaza-Hamas: Seizure of all assets and property and you will not survive to make it to court to argue your innocence.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_the_Palestinian_territories
Now stop your damned lying and deceiving, Gopher.
Oh, we are cutting and pasting videos now? Here’s how Israel treats children. How humane. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqL048x4msM
Nice try to conflate “Jews” with “Israelis” and exclude any context of the situation. But that’s a common bigoted tactic. Try again.
Breaking the Silence, Jewish Voices for Peace and B’Tselem among many other organizations, Jews, Israelis and even soldiers stand squarely against you. But I guess to you they are all antisemites or self-hating Jews rather than the people of conscience that they are as are all people who do the same to stand for justice rather than bigotry.
As for the land laws, try being an Arab and purchase land in Israel. But I know that doesn’t matter to you. As for within the occupied territories, when one nations’ settlers aggressively steal another peoples’ land on a daily basis with, then contextually it does become an act of treason. Do you think Benedict Arnold was a hero? How about the Rosenbergs? Do you think some right-wing Mexican expats can buy up the land in Southern Texas if their intent is to annex it to Mexico?
Jews and Christians and Muslims lived and coexisted peaceably in Palestine before extremists decided to make it a land for one to the exclusion of all others.
Just more fake Pallywood BS just like this..
https://youtu.be/PGDBk_n7OV8
and this
https://youtu.be/fzMgEeem7eY
and this
https://youtu.be/umhy9LnorKQ
Pure Pallywood nonsense.
Hence your video lacking any actual juicy footage.
You posted last, so it must mean you win. Congratulations.
This is how a police state treats those who dissent from challenging those who challenge the racist order.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QiV9xn0RbI
Great article, hope SJP continues spur conversation at Emory about what’s up in the West Bank.
You ask what is up in the West Bank? Here’s something:
Feb 13, 2013
In another story the Western media apparently refuses to cover, any Palestinian who dares to criticize Hamas
or the Palestinian Authority risks being arrested or summoned for interrogation.
Palestinian journalists are now hoping to bring this to the attention of President Barack Obama when he
meets with President Mahmoud Abbas next month.
The journalists say they want United States and the rest of the world to know that the crackdown on freedom
of expression in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip is designed to hide the fact that Palestinians are governed by two repressive regimes that have no respect for human rights and democracy.
Lol, you enjoying being employed by Israel. 40000 posts all fighting against anti-israel articles, I hope you’re enjoying your life and getting paid decently for this. It isn’t working and the world is turning against your country. I hope you try and steer your people to a more accepted path or probably get in a lot of trouble in a global scale.
You would have made en excellent collaborator for the Master Race.
Not really we are doing great here in Israel. Do you like Facebook? Lots of Israeli developers working on it here in Israel. Intel is making its chips here. Like Google because it has a lot of Israeli based developers.
Pretty everything you use in the computer world is coming out of Israel. So enjoy living life with pen and paper if you really want to boycott the startup nation.
Be wary of your haughtiness. If you feel that your riches of this world are the proof of your supposed good standing and piety, then I would advise you to remember the admonition of the prophets of old, namely, Jeremiah and Daniel. The Lord doesn’t take kindly to anyone or any nation being arrogant or unjust or engaging in oppression. Or is the Lord of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob anti-Semitic too?
This is nothing but a violent hate group committed to genocide of Jews.
Meanwhile Israel prepares for elections, supervised by an Israeli Arab Supreme Court Justice Salim Joubran.
His identity card is exactly the same color as every other Israeli citizen. Of course a Jew hating group like SJP could never be expected to tell the truth.
Their membership should be welcomed by the Emory Community just as they would any other hate group seeking to demonize a minority.
Yes, elections where 22% of the country voted for a president and he got elected and 28% voted for someone and he didn’t. Watch Israel become irrelevant in international eyes.
Academic standards must be getting pretty low in Israel. Israel’s leader is the Prime Minister not the President. Not sure where your percentages come from nothing related to reality. Israeli’s vote for political parties not individuals. The leader of the party that can put together a coalition becomes Prime Minister.
You will find being a bigot doesn’t work as well in the work world as it does in your college classes. You have a long future of unemployment ahead of you.
The Israeli SUPREME COURT has Arabs presidng on it (Christian AND Muslim!)!
ALL Israeli citizens have VOTING rights (wherever they are in the world) & eagerly VOTED in the 17MAR15 election.
It’s why the Arab political bloc WON 13 Knesset seats that day.
ALL her citizens (incl. Muslims!) are PROTECTED from mindless MUSLIM suicide bombers by a BLAST WALL!
Israel will NEVER become an “apartheid state”, even if she’s FORCED to deport pro-JIHAD citizens!
I’m sorry, but I do know you. Quite well, in fact. And it’s all your doing. Your posts have been consistently directed to promote hate and bigotry. Anyone can click a button and read your record. They do not have to take it from me.
You’re neither reflective nor representative of Buddhism or Judaism or humanism. You are an avowed, inveterate Disqus poster who focuses on promoting hate. You hope that by doing this, we will all become embolded by our hate and by logic, act out to counter this threat you insist exists.
Keep posting, though. The proof of who you are is in the pudding you make for everyone to see.
Like anyone would risk angering these terror-symp head loppers, lol
They did this themselves ala Tawana Brawley