← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Malachi
Thread ID: 4913 | Posts: 7 | Started: 2003-02-10
2003-02-10 19:56 | User Profile
[url=http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6053]Help Stop the Anti-Israeli Divestment Campaign[/url]
By David Horowitz FrontPageMagazine.com | February 10, 2003
Dear Friend:
The anti-America left, which has formed a fifth column in this country to betray us from within, is also targeting Israel as America's ally in the Middle East. Israel is a tiny country and vulnerable. The left is testing its strength on Israel, but its ultimate target is the United States.
Israel is the canary in the mine. What happens to Israel will eventually happen to America itself. Yasser Arafat built the first terrorist training camps. Arafat was Saddam's staunchest ally in the first Gulf War. Palestinian terrorists were involved in the first bombing of the World Trade Center in February 1993 and the destruction of the Khobar Towers barracks where 19 U.S. servicemen died in 1998. Suicide bombing began as a tactic of leftwing terrorists against Israel. It reached its culmination on 9/11.
Knowing your concern for Israel, and your awareness of its enemies in America and around the world, I want you help me fight the latest leftist attack on America's staunchest supporter in the war on terror.
I want to make sure you're aware of this new tactic and I want to enlist your help in exposing its loathsome purpose to the light of day.
I'm talking about the "divestment" or "disinvestment" movement. It's a campaign to get colleges and universities - and towns and cities, too - to destroy Israel's economy through economic pressure.
I've enclosed an ad that lays bare what this movement is really about, and who is behind it. I want to run it in hundreds of college newspapers nationwide, starting with those colleges where the movement is taking hold.
The aims of the divestment campaign vary from campus to campus. All of them advocate selling the stock of any companies that sell arms or military equipment to Israel. Most also advocate selling the stock of all American companies that do business in Israel or have subsidiaries in Israel. And many of the supporters also advocate boycotting every product made in Israel.
But they are united in their purpose. They want to squeeze Israel economically, supposedly to force it to stop "oppressing" the Palestinian population in what they call occupied Palestine as well as in Israel proper.
Here's how a leader of the movement - who has elsewhere denounced America as a criminal and terrorist state -- puts it:
"Concerned citizens and governments all over the world must organize a comprehensive campaign of economic disinvestment and divestment from Israel along the same lines of what they did to the former criminal apartheid regime in South Africa. This original worldwide...campaign played a critical role in dismantling the criminal apartheid regime in South Africa. For much the same reasons, a worldwide disinvestment/divestment campaign against Israel will play a critical role in dismantling its criminal apartheid regime against the Palestinian people living in occupied Palestine as well as in Israel itself." (Francis Boyle)
These America- and Israel-haters continually refer to Israel's "apartheid" policy, in order to evoke the same passionate hatred for Israel that college students and faculty used to hold towards the white government of South Africa. And South Africa's Archbishop Desmond Tutu - a man who has denounced America's war on terror as "vengeful"- has made this link explicit. He said: "Israel is like Hitler and apartheid" and is urging students to fight for divestment.
But the differences between South Africa and Israel could hardly be greater. Apartheid was a repugnant practice of making distinctions between racial classes of people in South Africa and allowing one race to subjugate the others.
In Israel, Arabs have full rights as citizens, equal to Jews. They can vote in Israel's democratic system. They have their own political party in the Knesset, Israel's parliament, with ten percent of the seats. They've even served in high-level government positions.
No Arabs anywhere else in the Middle East have as much freedom and opportunity as Arabs who are citizens of Israel.
In fact, here's how many Arabs who actually live in Israel feel about their condition: When it looked as if a Palestinian state might become a reality in 2000, before Yasser Arafat rejected Israel's offer, thousands of Israeli Arabs signed a petition to the government asking to remain citizens of Israel if a Palestinian state were to be created.
The Arabs who live in the territories do not have these citizenship rights. They are Israel's avowed enemies and make every effort to kill Israelis and to destroy the nation of Israel, through suicide bombings, sniping, and propaganda. These Arabs lack citizenship because of their actions, not their race or nationality.
No one in his right mind would suggest Israel or any country should give special rights to those who are trying to destroy it.
But that's exactly what the divestment people advocate. They want these enemies of Israel to have full citizenship. Further, they think all Palestinians should have the "right of return" - that is, they should all be welcomed into Israel proper to live.
And that's in addition to their getting their own Palestinian state - a country where all Israeli settlements would be removed to make it completely free of Jews.
The divestment campaign is not a homegrown movement of people concerned about Israel's treatment of Palestinians. This is part of the same international leftist movement that seizes every opportunity to destroy America and the west. And Israel is at the top of their agenda as the most vulnerable outpost of western civilization.
The Arab nations have been boycotting Israel for many years. You could say they are carrying on their own divestment campaign. Their goal is not better treatment for the Palestinians. It is the total destruction of Israel.
Now the radical left in America has joined the Arabs' campaign - with the same goal of destroying Israel. The movement hasn't yet become large and powerful - but that does not comfort me. It took quite a while for the anti-apartheid divestment campaign against the South African government to get anywhere, but once it began to catch on it spread like wildfire. The divestment movement is growing and gaining strength every day.
And while it grows, this anti-Israel divestment movement provides one more way for Israel's enemies to spread lies and stir up hatred of Israel and hatred of Jews.
There are divestment groups active on more than 50 campuses, including many of America's most prestigious universities: Harvard, the University of California, Princeton, MIT, the University of Pennsylvania, and Yale, to name just a few.
The constant hate-filled attacks against Israel on campuses are bringing about a resurgence of anti-Semitism at a level that has never been seen at American universities. A recent graduate of Berkeley, Rory Miller, wrote an article in which he described the atmosphere there last year:
"Two orthodox Jews were set upon and beaten, the Hillel center had a brick thrown through its window, and several synagogues received bomb threats. Flyers comparing the Israeli army to the KKK appeared around campus, and several had "kill Jews" scrawled on them. The conditions were serious enough that many Jewish students removed their yarmulkes so that they would not be the next targets. The UC Administration, which is normally hypersensitive to the least slight against ethnic groups, sat on its hands. At the same time it removed its ban from the criminal trespassers, Students for Justice in Palestine, and reinstated the group as a student organization."
The constant drumbeat against Israel on the campuses is probably why a recent poll found that young adults show more prejudice against Jews than do middle-aged Americans. I was shocked to read last month that 23 percent of Americans aged 18 to 35 agreed with the statement that Jews were a "threat" to the "moral character" of the country.
That, my friend, is frightening. And it's only going to get worse if we do not take strong action to fight back by getting the truth out.
It's at colleges and universities, above all, where the lies about Israel are finding receptive audiences. Many faculty, instead of seeking objective truth as their profession demands, have signed on to the radical left's agenda. They influence impressionable students with their hatred of the United States, Israel, and Western civilization.
This is why the divestment movement is focusing on the campuses. And this is why our campaign to counter it must also focus there.
In addition to the ads, I am continuing to visit as many colleges and universities as I can to speak directly to the students and faculty and give them a point of view and facts on Israel that some of them might never have heard before.
Will you send a contribution of $35 to help me bring the truth to colleges and universities? I need to raise at least $100,000 in the next 28 days to place the ads and to continue my speaking tour.
If it's possible, I ask you to give $50 or even $100. But any amount you can send will help our cause. Please click here to make your contribution now.
Our most important job is to expose the real aim of these divestment proponents. They claim they are simply concerned about the human rights of the Palestinians. But if that were true, they would be attacking Yasser Arafat for his corrupt and cruel rule of his people.
They would be screaming about the torture of Palestinians who oppose Arafat's regime, or who try to make friends with Israel. They would be raising money to help the Palestinian people kept for decades in squalid refugee camps by the Arab countries who refuse to take them in. They would be demonstrating against the way the Palestinian Authority confiscates the property of its subjects who try to start a business and improve the lives of the people.
No, they don't care a bit about the Palestinians. What they care about is their hatred of Israel. Some of them are anti-Semitic, others are rabid leftists who hate everything connected to western civilization - especially Israel.
But they are clever at disguising their motives. And the mainstream media take them at their word, and even glorify their actions as old-fashioned, true American protest.
It's up to us to get the truth out. I am relying on you as someone who has already shown you understand how vital the truth is to the future of America, Israel, and western civilization.
Please let me hear from you soon, with your generous contribution to help us tell the truth about the Divestment movement and their real goal to destroy Israel.
And thank you for everything you've already done.
Sincerely,
David Horowitz President
P.S. Attacking Israel is the only "hate speech" that is allowed on campuses by the politically correct speech monitors. Anti-Israel speech and activity are widespread and growing at colleges and universities - and increasingly they are leading to anti-Semitism in words and in attacks on Jewish students and organizations.
Please help me fight this horrifying trend. Click here to make your gift of $50, $100, or more to support my campaign to get the truth out through campus newspaper ads and my speeches to students and faculties nationwide.
2003-02-10 20:09 | User Profile
** I need to raise at least $100,000 in the next 28 days...**
Wow. Those guys move around some serious cash.
When reading this kind of stuff it just strikes me how our Republic, once sovereign, independent and free, is now utterly held captive by ancient bloodfueds in some armpit-of-the-world country halfway around the globe.
It's just depressing.
2003-02-10 20:26 | User Profile
**The anti-America left, which has formed a fifth column in this country to betray us from within, is also targeting Israel as America's ally in the Middle East. Israel is a tiny country and vulnerable. Israel is the canary in the mine. What happens to Israel will eventually happen to America itself. **
No viler lie has ever been spoken.
But unless we divest ourself of our Jews, en masse and in haste......that last sentence will be true
2003-02-10 20:42 | User Profile
Originally posted by il ragno@Feb 10 2003, 16:26 > The anti-America left, which has formed a fifth column in this country to betray us from within, is also targeting Israel as America's ally in the Middle East. Israel is a tiny country and vulnerable. Israel is the canary in the mine. What happens to Israel will eventually happen to America itself. **
No viler lie has ever been spoken.
But unless we divest ourself of our Jews, en masse and in haste......that last sentence will be true**
Israel is the canary in the mine. What happens to Israel will eventually happen to America itself.
An insulated Jew like Horowitz doesn't understand the purpose of the canary in the mine. He's made an entertaining mistake here. We'll know that the mine isn't safe when the canary dies. The canary, you see, is disposable--and the purpose of the canary is to save the miners, so the miners wouldn't be focusing on keeping the canary alive, but merely using its death as a barometer. Israel hasn't died yet. I think we should wait and see until it does, then we'll know the mine is dangerous--and if that analogy holds, it means America then gets out of the mine and ceases its interventionist foreign policy and comes home.
2003-02-10 21:11 | User Profile
The issue is not "divestment of Israel". The issue is coerced INvestment IN Israel - with not only taxpayers' money, but their futures.
[url=http://www.forward.com/issues/2003/03.01.31/news11.html]http://www.forward.com/issues/2003/03.01.3....31/news11.html[/url]
States Put Up Fight, Dollars To Defeat Divestment Push By E.J. KESSLER FORWARD STAFF New York is the latest state to adopt measures to counter the movement to force governments and universities to withdraw their investments in Israel.
The state's second highest-ranking official, Comptroller Alan Hevesi, told the Forward that he intends to increase the investments of the state's $105 billion pension in Israel, and has spoken to entrepreneurs and fund managers about plans to lead an economic development mission there.
"We want more jobs, business and economic growth, which are excellent strategies for advancing the peace process," Hevesi said.
Hevesi joins politicians from Pennsylvania and California, among others, in speaking out against divestment and in increasing investments in the Jewish state even as pro-Palestinian activists increase their calls for divestment at colleges and universities.
"The divestment movement is not gaining ground. If anything, we are finding that people are rallying around investing in Israel," said a spokesman for State of Israel Bonds, Raphael Rothstein. Rothstein said 2002 was a banner year for his organization, which sold $1.3 billion in bonds. "We sold South Carolina, where there are very few Jews, $5 million. Illinois bought $10 million....We have close to two dozen states buying bonds. We've had very good support from states, labor unions and pension funds."
While such investments help shore up Israel's shaky economy, the rhetorical support of Israel by American officials also has been strong and welcome, Jewish officials say.
Last month, calling the divestment campaign "immoral," Philadelphia Mayor John Street recommended to the city's pension board that it buy $10 million more in Israel Bonds, a six-fold increase its investment in the Jewish state.
"I am particularly outraged by the immoral campaign calling for disinvestment in Israel," Street said in a speech to the Philadelphia chapter of the Anti-Defamation League. "This initiative to injure Israel's economy and reputation is reprehensible.... It is particularly offensive to me given the effort to analogize this divestment movement to the campaign used against South Africa," continued Street, who is black. "I was the author of Philadelphia legislation recommending divestiture as a means to fight apartheid and the racist South African state. I find it disgraceful that some could use that model to attack the one Jewish state and only Middle East democracy and a country that, every day, is a front line in the war on terrorism."
Two weeks ago, New York City Comptroller William Thompson announced the purchase of $5 million of Israel Bonds for the city teachers' pension fund, its first such direct purchase.
In August, California's State Assembly passed a bill urging the University of California, a flash point of the divestment movement, to reject calls to divest its pension funds from companies with ties to Israel. A petition calling for divestment at the university has garnered more than 6,000 signatures, including those of 211 faculty members. While the University of California is a separate entity that does not necessarily take direction from the state, the legislature "thought it was important to take a clear stance against this kind of movement," said the bill's sponsor, Assemblyman Keith Richman.
Organizers of the divestment campaign, however, say they are not discouraged, pointing to the growth of new divestment campaigns, such as one at Barnard College and Columbia University that has already gained 107 faculty signatures. An organizer of the divestment campaign at the University of California at Berkeley, law student Will Youmans, said, "We are not going to be discouraged by the amount of power on one side." Of the politicians taking steps to bolster Israel, he said, "history will come back to judge them."
2003-02-10 23:14 | User Profile
Will you send a contribution of $35 to help me bring the truth to colleges and universities? I need to raise at least $100,000 in the next 28 days to place the ads and to continue my speaking tour. If it's possible, I ask you to give $50 or even $100. But any amount you can send will help our cause. Please click here to make your contribution now.
Can somebody point out how this man is any different than Jimmy Swaggart or Robert Tilton? (I mean besides his repellent physical ugliness.)
2003-02-11 17:53 | User Profile
Ah, teacher retirement funds. So well managed, so profitable.
Yeah, right. I seem to remember that the Texas version of the same was heavily invested in Enron, and kept buying its stock right up until even the guys in comas realized that company was sunk.
I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts there's going to be a lot of surprised teachers out there when the bonds mysteriously become worthless. Either that or they'll be paid back using U.S. "loans".