Bill Cosby
05-01-2009, 01:22 AM
CAIRO — Comparing the images of children killed in the recent Israeli war on Gaza to the Holocaust has opened the gates of hell against sociology professor William I. Robinson, and American Jew, and brought accusations of anti-Semitism. (http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1239888544541&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout)
"That's like saying if I condemn the US government for the invasion of Iraq, I'm anti-American," Professor Robinson told The Los Angeles Times on Thursday, April 30.
"It's the most absurd, baseless argument."
In January, Robinson sent an e-mail to 80 of his students including 25 images of Jewish victims of Nazis and similar images taken from Gaza after Israel's three-week onslaught.
* Palestinian Holocaust Museum
* Killed by Israel, Eaten by Dogs
* "Dad, I'm Dying"
* "They Killed My Girls"
"Gaza is Israel's Warsaw -- a vast concentration camp that confined and blockaded Palestinians," Robinson wrote in the mail, entitled "parallel images of Nazis and Israelis."
"We are witness to a slow-motion process of genocide."
Israel's three-week war killed more than 1330 Palestinians, mostly women and children, damaged 14,000 homes, destroyed 219 factories and damaged 15 of Gaza's 27 hospitals.
Robinson's mail drew accusations of anti-Semitism from two national Jewish groups and triggered a campus investigation.
"I was shocked," said Rebecca Joseph, one of his Jewish students.
"He overstepped his boundaries as a professor. He has his own freedom of speech, but he doesn't have the freedom to send his students his own opinion that is so strong."
Robinson, a UC Santa Barbara university professor for nine years, disagrees.
"The whole nature of academic freedom is to introduce students to controversial material, to provoke students to think and make students uncomfortable."
He has hired an attorney while a hearing was scheduled on May 14.
Support
Despite the controversy, many students and faculty members have voiced support for Robinson.
"I don't think Bill Robinson's e-mail is anti-Semitic in any way," Harold Marcuse, a Jewish professor who teaches about Holocaust at UC Santa Barbara, told the LA Times.
"I think criticism of Israel is OK."
Marcuse defended the material of Robinson's e-mails as appropriate for the campus.
"It's something I could have used in a course."
Some of the university's students formed a group, the Committee to Defend Academic Freedom at UCSB, to defend Robinson and academic freedom.
Another group, the California Scholars for Academic Freedom which represents 100 professors at 20 college campuses, sent letters of support to the Jewish professor.
The group stressed that the accusations leveled against Robinson were aiming to "silence criticism of Israeli policies and practices".
Internationally renowned author and linguistics professor Noam Chomsky added his voice to international scholars demanding the dismissal of "anti-Semitism" charges against Robinson.
"They try to label any criticism as anti-Semitic, but they never respond to the criticism itself, because they can’t."
.................................................. ...........................................
UCSB prof probed after comparing Israel to Nazis
By ROBERTJABLON Associated Press Writer
Posted: 04/30/2009 10:51:09 AM PDT
Updated: 04/30/2009 04:52:00 PM PDT (http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_12263634)
LOS ANGELES—A University of California, Santa Barbara professor is under academic investigation and has been accused of being anti-Semitic for sending students an e-mail comparing Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip with the Holocaust.
Sociology professor William I. Robinson denied the claims on Thursday and portrayed the furor as a threat by Israel's supporters to academic freedom. Two prominent Jewish groups continued to demand that he apologize.
On Jan. 19 Robinson, who is Jewish, sent an e-mail to 80 students in his "Sociology of Globalization" class entitled: "parallel images of Nazis and Israelis."
"Gaza is Israel's Warsaw—a vast concentration camp that confined and blockaded Palestinians, subjecting them to the slow death of malnutrition, disease and despair, nearly two years before their subjection to the quick death of Israeli bombs," Robinson wrote. "We are witness to a slow-motion process of genocide...."
Robinson's e-mail included a forwarded e-mail featuring juxtaposed photos from the Nazi era and the Gaza offensive with similar subjects, including grisly photos of children's corpses.
The e-mail set off a furor on the campus. Two Jewish students dropped Robinson's class and filed grievance letters with the university, claiming they felt intimidated by his strong and unsolicited opinion and the graphic images.
The university's Academic Senate, comprised of faculty members, has created an ad hoc committee to
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review claims that Robinson violated university policy that bars professors from intimidating students and using campus resources for personal, political reasons unrelated to their classes.
That committee will decide whether the case should proceed to a standing Academic Senate committee, which in turn could make discipline recommendations to the school administration.
"There is a process and it does have history and integrity and I think faculty members should have some confidence in the judgment of their peers," UCSB spokesman Paul Desruisseaux said.
Robinson said he has hired an attorney and called the investigation a "violation of academic freedom."
"I expect to be totally vindicated," he added.
Some UCSB students have formed a support committee and outside academics, including famed philosopher-activist Noam Chomsky and other outside academics have publicly sided with Robinson. The student group plans a campus forum on the matter.
Jewish leaders on Thursday reiterated demands that Robinson apologize to the students he offended and to the Jewish community. They contended that Robinson crossed the line by using language from the Nazis' calculated genocide of Jews in relation to the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza as Israel was attempting to stop rocket attacks into its territory.
"It is anti-Semitism," Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a telephone interview from Jerusalem.
"What you really have is a hate spam," said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles.
Both men also argued that Robinson delivered personal opinion without providing context, differing views or an equivalent chance for his students to counter his claims.
"This is not a question of academic freedom, it's a question of intimidation," Foxman said.
Rabbi Aron Hier, the Wiesenthal Center's director of campus outreach, said Robinson's e-mail "demonizes those things that those students care about" and said he should repudiate his remarks.
Robinson said the allegation of anti-Semitism is "absolutely outrageous" and akin to claiming that someone who criticizes the regime of Iran is anti-Muslim.
"This is a course on global affairs. We discuss ... the most pressing," including wars, Robinson said.
Robinson said he has received hundreds of e-mails of support from students and academics but also has been bombarded with obscenity-laden hate mail.
The controversy is only the latest sparked by the Middle East conflict.
In 2005, a Zionist group filed a discrimination complaint against UC Irvine, arguing that it failed to take action against Islamic student groups for making allegedly anti-Semitic speeches. However, federal investigators concluded the activities were based on political issues rather than anti-Semitism.
"That's like saying if I condemn the US government for the invasion of Iraq, I'm anti-American," Professor Robinson told The Los Angeles Times on Thursday, April 30.
"It's the most absurd, baseless argument."
In January, Robinson sent an e-mail to 80 of his students including 25 images of Jewish victims of Nazis and similar images taken from Gaza after Israel's three-week onslaught.
* Palestinian Holocaust Museum
* Killed by Israel, Eaten by Dogs
* "Dad, I'm Dying"
* "They Killed My Girls"
"Gaza is Israel's Warsaw -- a vast concentration camp that confined and blockaded Palestinians," Robinson wrote in the mail, entitled "parallel images of Nazis and Israelis."
"We are witness to a slow-motion process of genocide."
Israel's three-week war killed more than 1330 Palestinians, mostly women and children, damaged 14,000 homes, destroyed 219 factories and damaged 15 of Gaza's 27 hospitals.
Robinson's mail drew accusations of anti-Semitism from two national Jewish groups and triggered a campus investigation.
"I was shocked," said Rebecca Joseph, one of his Jewish students.
"He overstepped his boundaries as a professor. He has his own freedom of speech, but he doesn't have the freedom to send his students his own opinion that is so strong."
Robinson, a UC Santa Barbara university professor for nine years, disagrees.
"The whole nature of academic freedom is to introduce students to controversial material, to provoke students to think and make students uncomfortable."
He has hired an attorney while a hearing was scheduled on May 14.
Support
Despite the controversy, many students and faculty members have voiced support for Robinson.
"I don't think Bill Robinson's e-mail is anti-Semitic in any way," Harold Marcuse, a Jewish professor who teaches about Holocaust at UC Santa Barbara, told the LA Times.
"I think criticism of Israel is OK."
Marcuse defended the material of Robinson's e-mails as appropriate for the campus.
"It's something I could have used in a course."
Some of the university's students formed a group, the Committee to Defend Academic Freedom at UCSB, to defend Robinson and academic freedom.
Another group, the California Scholars for Academic Freedom which represents 100 professors at 20 college campuses, sent letters of support to the Jewish professor.
The group stressed that the accusations leveled against Robinson were aiming to "silence criticism of Israeli policies and practices".
Internationally renowned author and linguistics professor Noam Chomsky added his voice to international scholars demanding the dismissal of "anti-Semitism" charges against Robinson.
"They try to label any criticism as anti-Semitic, but they never respond to the criticism itself, because they can’t."
.................................................. ...........................................
UCSB prof probed after comparing Israel to Nazis
By ROBERTJABLON Associated Press Writer
Posted: 04/30/2009 10:51:09 AM PDT
Updated: 04/30/2009 04:52:00 PM PDT (http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_12263634)
LOS ANGELES—A University of California, Santa Barbara professor is under academic investigation and has been accused of being anti-Semitic for sending students an e-mail comparing Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip with the Holocaust.
Sociology professor William I. Robinson denied the claims on Thursday and portrayed the furor as a threat by Israel's supporters to academic freedom. Two prominent Jewish groups continued to demand that he apologize.
On Jan. 19 Robinson, who is Jewish, sent an e-mail to 80 students in his "Sociology of Globalization" class entitled: "parallel images of Nazis and Israelis."
"Gaza is Israel's Warsaw—a vast concentration camp that confined and blockaded Palestinians, subjecting them to the slow death of malnutrition, disease and despair, nearly two years before their subjection to the quick death of Israeli bombs," Robinson wrote. "We are witness to a slow-motion process of genocide...."
Robinson's e-mail included a forwarded e-mail featuring juxtaposed photos from the Nazi era and the Gaza offensive with similar subjects, including grisly photos of children's corpses.
The e-mail set off a furor on the campus. Two Jewish students dropped Robinson's class and filed grievance letters with the university, claiming they felt intimidated by his strong and unsolicited opinion and the graphic images.
The university's Academic Senate, comprised of faculty members, has created an ad hoc committee to
Advertisement
review claims that Robinson violated university policy that bars professors from intimidating students and using campus resources for personal, political reasons unrelated to their classes.
That committee will decide whether the case should proceed to a standing Academic Senate committee, which in turn could make discipline recommendations to the school administration.
"There is a process and it does have history and integrity and I think faculty members should have some confidence in the judgment of their peers," UCSB spokesman Paul Desruisseaux said.
Robinson said he has hired an attorney and called the investigation a "violation of academic freedom."
"I expect to be totally vindicated," he added.
Some UCSB students have formed a support committee and outside academics, including famed philosopher-activist Noam Chomsky and other outside academics have publicly sided with Robinson. The student group plans a campus forum on the matter.
Jewish leaders on Thursday reiterated demands that Robinson apologize to the students he offended and to the Jewish community. They contended that Robinson crossed the line by using language from the Nazis' calculated genocide of Jews in relation to the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza as Israel was attempting to stop rocket attacks into its territory.
"It is anti-Semitism," Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a telephone interview from Jerusalem.
"What you really have is a hate spam," said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles.
Both men also argued that Robinson delivered personal opinion without providing context, differing views or an equivalent chance for his students to counter his claims.
"This is not a question of academic freedom, it's a question of intimidation," Foxman said.
Rabbi Aron Hier, the Wiesenthal Center's director of campus outreach, said Robinson's e-mail "demonizes those things that those students care about" and said he should repudiate his remarks.
Robinson said the allegation of anti-Semitism is "absolutely outrageous" and akin to claiming that someone who criticizes the regime of Iran is anti-Muslim.
"This is a course on global affairs. We discuss ... the most pressing," including wars, Robinson said.
Robinson said he has received hundreds of e-mails of support from students and academics but also has been bombarded with obscenity-laden hate mail.
The controversy is only the latest sparked by the Middle East conflict.
In 2005, a Zionist group filed a discrimination complaint against UC Irvine, arguing that it failed to take action against Islamic student groups for making allegedly anti-Semitic speeches. However, federal investigators concluded the activities were based on political issues rather than anti-Semitism.