Posted on 03/29/2004 8:23:09 AM PST by Nachum
The other day, I experienced violent anti-Semitism for the first time in my adult life. It took place in front of Faneuil Hall, the birthplace of American independence and liberty.
I was receiving a justice award from the Jewish Council on Public Affairs and delivering a talk on "Civil Liberties in the Age of Terrorism" from the podium of that historic hall. When I left, award in hand, I was accosted by a group of screaming, angry young men and women carrying virulently anti-Israel signs. The protest was denominated a peace event and was sponsored by a group calling themselves by the vague name ACT-MA. Their website describes them as promoting peace and justice and associated with larger solidarity organizations, but there was nothing peaceful or just about this protest.
Although the signs they were carrying were not anti-Semitic, the sign carriers were shouting epithets at me that crossed the line from civility to bigotry. "Dershowitz and Hitler, just the same, the only difference is the name." The sin that, in the opinion of the screamers, warranted this comparison between me and the man who murdered dozens of my family members was my support for Israel. It was irrelevant to these chanters that I also support a Palestinian state, the end of the Israeli occupation and the dismantling of most of the settlements. They also shouted "Dershowitz and Gibbels [sic], just the same, the only difference is the name" - not even knowing how to pronounce the name of the anti-Semitic Nazi propagandist.
One sign carrier shouted that Jews who support Israel are worse than Nazis. Another demanded that I be tortured and killed. It wasn't only their words; it was the hatred in their eyes. If a dozen Boston police were not protecting me, I have little doubt I would have been physically attacked. Their eyes were ablaze with fanatical zeal.
The feminist writer Phyllis Chesler aptly described the hatred often directed against Israel and supporters of the Jewish state by some young people as eroticized. That is what I saw: passionate hatred, ecstatic hatred, orgasmic hatred. It was beyond mere differences of opinion. When I looked into their faces, I could imagine young Nazis in the 1930s in Hitler's Germany. They had no doubt that they were right and that I was pure evil for my support of the Jewish state, despite my public disagreement with some of Israel's policies and despite my support for Palestinian statehood. There was no place for nuance here. It was black and white, good versus evil, and any Jew who supported Israel was pure evil, deserving of torture, violence, and whatever fate Hitler and Goebbels deserved.
I do not believe that criticism of Israel, or even of Zionism, is tantamount to anti-Semitism and I have so written over the years. But what happened in front of Faneuil Hall went beyond criticism. To be sure, it was constitutionally protected speech, just as the Nazi march through Skokie was constitutionally protected speech. But the shouting was plainly calculated to intimidate. An aura of violence was in the air, and had the police not been there, I would not have been able to express any views counter to theirs.
As it turned out, I was not actually able to express any of my opinions, even in response to their outrageous mischaracterization of my views or their comparisons of me to the most evil men in the world. When I turned to answer one of the bigoted chants, the police officer in charge gently but firmly insisted that I walk directly to my car and not engage them. It was an order, reasonably calculated to assure my safety, and it was right. The officer got into my car with me and only got out a few blocks away. The intimidation had succeeded. I was silenced, and their horrible message went unanswered in the plaza near Faneuil Hall.
That is not the way the marketplace of ideas is supposed to work. It is not the conception of liberty for which Sam and John Adams spoke so eloquently and controversially in and around Faneuil Hall more than two hundred years ago. It was far more reminiscent of rallies conducted by Nazi thugs in Berlin seventy years ago.
I will not be silenced nor intimidated. The shouters know that. Their goal is to silence and intimidate others, who do not get police protection and do not have access to the media. Let the debate about Israel and the Palestinians continue unabated. Let all views be heard. The shouters in front of Faneuil Hall wanted no views but their own to be seen and heard. They succeeded that day in front of Faneuil Hall, as they have on some university campuses, but the marketplace of ideas is far too vibrant to be shut down by a bunch of self-righteous thugs shouting ugly and bigoted epithets.
snip
If a dozen Boston police were not protecting me, I have little doubt I would have been physically attacked. Their eyes were ablaze with fanatical zeal.
Maybe Alan should rethink his views on "Israeli occupation" and "support [of] a Palestinian state".
Trust me Alan, that's how they all are. It's all about extermination of Jews, not about a "Palestinian State".
Enjoy the hatred Al-this only the beginning.
When Sharon is history, watch the acceleration of Israel's demise at the hands of the Israeli leftist elite in cahoots with the Arab-Euro axis.
Stop and think about that. A lot of people don't like Dershowitz. There are many reasons. But, apparently, his Jewishness has not been one of those reasons. He has been a controversial figure, very much in the public eye, for probably 30 years -- and he has not experienced any violent anti-Semitism in that time.
This is a great, tolerant country. The only people who don't think we're tolerant enough are the people who just showed Alan Dershowtz what violent anti-semitism is like.
There have been no anti-semitic incidents caused by that movie. All anti-semitism is from the Left and the Islamics. Yet, they always seem to escape the blame.
The Nazi party is a Socialist party, and has thus always been an extreme leftist party. The Nazi party has been associated with right-wing groups because right wing groups are anti-communist, and so were the Nazis. Also right-wing groups tend to be somewhat hawkish - which is often confused with the outright aggresiveness of the Nazis. However the Nazis have way more in common with the left wing than the right wing. The Nazis were stongly in favor of wealth redistribution, strong central government, government-led social change, gun control, etc.
That's part of his problem.
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