zaterdag 30 maart 2024

Why have I been censored by a Dutch university?

Israel’s war against Gaza has been deemed “too sensitive” by a Dutch university.
Ahmed TawfeqAPA images

The Netherlands – a reputed bastion of liberal democracy – is censoring solidarity with Palestinians.

Earlier this week, I was scheduled to give a talk at the University of Groningen on how the European Union has enabled the genocide in Gaza.

Less than 24 hours before the talk was due to take place, I learned that administrators at the college had banned it.

The reason cited was that the university objected to how I was described as an “activist-journalist” in material promoting the event.

The decision was taken by Thony Visser, a dean at the university.

I contacted Visser asking why she had a problem with someone who is both an activist and a journalist speaking at a college in a nominally democratic country.

The excuse she provided was convoluted and contradictory.

Visser first claimed that the reason for calling off the event was “not that you are a journalist and activist.”

She stated that the room for the planned event was booked by the group Groningen for Palestine before claiming that it is “not an organization that belongs to the university.”

Rooms for such events may only be reserved by faculty members who have an expertise in the topic under discussion, according to Visser. “This was not the case here,” she alleged.

“Your own profile as a journalist/activist also did not allow for the assessment of the event as the translation of academic expertise for a broad audience,” she added.

While Visser stated there is “nothing wrong with being an activist, nor with being a journalist,” she effectively conceded that she – or others in the university – had objected to me on those grounds.

Inaccurate

It is inaccurate for her to claim that the teacher at the university who reserved the room (in consultation with Groningen for Palestine) lacked expertise.

The event was arranged by a specialist in international relations. Palestine has been a major topic in international relations for decades.

Visser’s attempts to hide behind arcane regulations are unconvincing. In discussions with Groningen for Palestine, the university’s administration admitted that it regarded Israel’s current war against Gaza as an issue that is too sensitive.

Universities – particularly in countries priding themselves on being liberal democracies – are not supposed to shy away from “sensitive” matters.

The talk I was scheduled to give was planned as part of Israeli Apartheid Week.

Held annually in universities across the world, Israeli Apartheid Week is designed to raise awareness about the crimes committed against Palestinians. Predictably, Israel and its supporters have long tried to torpedo Israeli Apartheid Week through false allegations that it is motivated by anti-Semitism.

Events marking Israeli Apartheid Week have been allowed at the University of Groningen for many years. It was not until 2024 – amid the Gaza genocide – that the administrators banned such events.

Along with my talk, a screening of the film Farha was forbidden.

I will not capitulate to censorship.

The talk I had been invited to give went ahead as an online event, during which I insisted that the University of Groningen will not silence me.

David Cronin's blog

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Norman Finkelstein and Chris Hedges discuss Israel, Gaza, Oct. 7 at Prin...

vrijdag 29 maart 2024

Israel-Palestine

Israeli propagandist behind Hamas ‘mass rape’ narrative exposed as grifter, fraud

Cochav Elkayam-Levy, the Israeli lawyer at the center of the campaign accusing Hamas of systematic sexual violence on October 7, now stands accused by Israeli media of scamming donors and spreading misinformation. The allegations appeared just days after Elkayam-Levy received the prestigious Israel Prize.

As the founder of the so-called Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas against Women and Children, Israel lawyer Cochav Elkayam Levy has been a go-to source for Western media organizations pushing the narrative that Palestinian militants carried out sexual assault on a massive and systematic basis when they attacked Israel.

Elkayam-Levy has starred in a factually challenged CNN special on the topic narrated by the fervently pro-Israel host Jake Tapper, who identified her as “an expert in human rights law who organized a civil committee to document evidence.” Haaretz featured Elkayam-Levy as the subject of a puff piece which misleadingly claimed that her work “presents a horrifying picture that leaves no room for doubt: On October 7, Hamas terrorists systematically carried out acts of rape and sexual abuse.”

Then, on December 6, 2023, members of the White House National Security Council and Assistant to the President and Director of the Gender Policy Council Jennifer Klein hosted Elkayam-Levy in Washington to hear “about her work to gather testimony and document evidence of the events of October 7 and develop a comprehensive accounting of gender-based violence committed by Hamas.”

Now, the lawyer’s public relations extravaganza has earned her the Israel Prize, the most prestigious honor any Israeli citizen can receive from their government. “We must stand firm against the stark denial and the increasing tide of antisemitism,” she declared in a March 21 statement accepting the award.

Yet three days later, Israel’s largest newspaper, YNet, published a damning exposé accusing Elkayam-Levy of ripping off major donors, including a member of the Biden administration, spreading fake Hamas atrocity tales, and failing to deliver on her promise of a major report about sexual violence on October 7.

“People have disassociated themselves from her because her research is inaccurate,” an Israeli government official told YNet. “After all, the whole story is that they want to accuse us of spreading fake news, and her methodology was neither good nor accurate.”

Government officials were particularly incensed that Elkayam-Levy spread discredited claims that a Hamas militant cut a fetus from a pregnant woman before raping the woman – a lie first spread by confirmed fraudster Yossi Landau of the scandal-stained ZAKA organization. “The story about the pregnant woman who had her stomach cut open – a story that was proven to be untrue, and she spread it in the international press,” the official complained to YNet. “It’s no joke. Little by little, professionals began to distance themselves from her because she is unreliable.”

Elkayam-Levy further alienated the Israeli government by spinning her “Civil Commission” out of a one-woman operation she ran called the Deborah Institute, creating the sense that she was representing Tel Aviv in an official capacity. “In the beginning she was really very active, which was very nice,” a source told YNet. “Then it started calling itself a civilian commission. People got confused, members of Congress turned to people who work with Israel and asked what it is – ‘Israel built a commission?’ It’s a confusing name. And to the question of whether there is such a thing at all? Is there such a body? The answer is – no. It is the body. She is the civil commission.”

Through her Deborah Institute, Elkayam-Levy has raised millions of dollars. But if the government sources who spoke to YNet are to be believed, she conned wealthy American Jewish donors like Rahm Emanuel, currently the Biden administration’s ambassador to Japan, and channeled the money into her personal bank account.

According to YNet, Elkayam-Levy appealed for $8 million to launch her “Civil Commission,” requesting $1.5 million for “management and administration.” “Rahm Emanuel, the US ambassador to Japan, donated money to her, she took donations from a lot of people, and started asking for money for lectures,” the Israeli official complained.

After more than five months of research, however, the publicity-hungry lawyer has produced nothing of substance to justify her massive fundraising haul. Indeed, the “atrocity report” Elkayam-Levy had promised supporters, which would have provided clear evidence of systematic sexual violence by Hamas on October 7, has yet to arrive.

Meanwhile, she reportedly attempted to obstruct a visit to Israel by United Nations Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict Pramila Patten, whose report was ultimately touted by Israel as “proof” of sex crimes by Hamas despite Patten’s own admission that it contained no evidence and lacked any investigative mandate from the UN.

I first became aware of Elkayam-Levy’s penchant for fudging facts during a November 11, 2023 presentation she delivered to Harvard University’s Maimonides Society. There, she presented images of female Kurdish fighters killed in combat as Jewish Israeli women who had been killed and raped by Hamas militants at the Nova Electronic Music Festival on October 7.

After I exposed her glaring falsehood, Elkayam-Levy refused to correct her claim, taking to Twitter/X instead to thank me for promoting her work.

Elkayam-Levy’s fall from grace comes as the New York Times publishes a report casting further doubt on the paper’s already-discredited December 28, 2023 article alleging “systematic sexual violence” by Hamas on October 7. According to the March 25 Times report, an Israeli paramedic identifying himself as “G” (real name: Guy Melamed) lied to the paper when he claimed to have found the corpses of teenage girls in Kibbutz Beeri in a state of undress that clearly indicated rape. “Footage taken by an Israeli soldier who was in Beeri on Oct. 7… shows the bodies of three female victims fully clothed and with no apparent signs of sexual violence,” the Times stated.US State Dept's favorite celebrity chef builds Gaza aid dock with stolen rubble »