Target of a witch-hunt for opposing Israel

May 4, 2007 | Page 5

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN is the target of a witch-hunt that could cost him his job teaching at DePaul University in Chicago.

An outspoken supporter of Palestinian rights as well as a renowned scholar with a reputation for exceptional teaching, Finkelstein is being considered for tenure at DePaul. He won strong support from the political science department and the personnel committee of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, but DePaul’s dean refused to back his application for tenure.

Finkelstein’s longtime adversary, Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz, has publicly campaigned against Finkelstein getting tenure at DePaul. DePaul’s provost will make his decision before June, and the university president has until June 15, the last day of the quarter at DePaul, to issue his final word.

Students and faculty have come to Finkelstein’s defense. Hundreds signed a petition of support, and pickets and meetings were organized to draw attention to the case. Students began wearing armbands this week to show their solidarity, and plans are in the works for a week of support events starting May 21, culminating in a demonstration and town hall meeting on May 24.

Here, Finkelstein talks to Socialist Worker’s KATHRYN WEBER, a student at DePaul who has helped to organize the support campaign, about how and why he is still fighting for tenure, nearly 20 years into his academic career.

What you can do Sign a letter of support and find out more information on this case at the Norman Finkelstein Solidarity Campaign Web site. E-mail finkelgate@gmail.com for more on what you can do to help. Finkelstein’s Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict is a careful documenting of the history of the conflict and Israel’s apartheid system. His recent Ariel Sharon is a biography of Israel’s former prime minister and leading warrior against the Palestinians.

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HOW DIFFICULT has it been for you to make a space for yourself in teaching in the current political environment?

I GOT my doctorate in 1988. Until 2000, I taught as what is called an adjunct, where you get paid per course. I lived in New York and taught at various universities and colleges. I was paid about an average of $3,000 per course and taught five to six courses a year, so I lived in New York for about 12 years on a salary ranging from $15,000 to $18,000 a year.

Eventually, I got a ”visiting professorship,” which is a yearly position. I was paid substantially more, but those were exceptional years--I think three years out of the 12. My entire teaching career, I have only once been interviewed for a job.

My dissertation was on the theory of Zionism. I don’t want to bore people with the details--just let’s say it was very difficult for me to get a job, because it’s considered a prerequisite that one of the letters of recommendation required for work, if not two, are from your thesis advisors--and none of my thesis advisors would support my candidacy.

HOW DID you recover from that?

WELL, I never got a job! I was working as an adjunct and non-PhDs get adjuncting jobs. It’s the equivalent of substitute teaching.

WHAT HAS been happening at DePaul?

I THINK that had the tenure process been allowed to go along according to basic protocols and procedure, I would have sailed through tenure, but external pressures were applied to the university, which have corrupted the process and derailed my tenure application.

There are two factors, really. One is vindictiveness and revenge--to “get” me for my public opposition to Israeli policies in the Occupied Territories. The other is to transmit the message that if you step out of line on this question, you’re going to face the same penalties as Finkelstein faced. It’s a way of silencing others for coming up behind me.

Finally, the hope is that if I’m denied tenure, it will de-legitimize me. The claim will be made that this Finkelstein guy, because he couldn’t get tenure at what these people consider a “ninth-rate Catholic university,” doesn’t know what he’s saying. That’s not me speaking about DePaul--that’s what they say.

CAN YOU describe the development of this fight with Dershowitz?

I FIRST met Professor Dershowitz on a program called Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman’s nationally broadcast program. I had read his book The Case for Israel as soon as it came out, and it was plain to me that large parts of it had been plagiarized, and also large parts of it were sheer fabrication and falsification of the documentary record.

When I was on the program I effectively told him as much. He was furious when he left the interview. Amy actually told me to watch out.

I felt obliged, having leveled incendiary allegations, to document it all, because otherwise, it would seem as if I was speaking in an irresponsible manner. I went on to document the allegations and produce a manuscript.

When Professor Dershowitz got wind of the manuscript, he embarked on a huge campaign to suppress publication of the book. He wasn’t successful, and now he’s embarked on a new campaign to deny me tenure.

Basically, I think there’s elements of vindictiveness, but also a desire to discredit me--and hopefully, in his mind, to repair some of the damage done by my book and my public allegations.

TO WHAT extent do you think he’s been successful in framing the debate over your tenure?

I DON’T think he’s been very successful. I think he’s looking very foolish. Even mainstream publications like the New York Times, which are very much in his corner and very much not in my corner, didn’t give him a write-up that he can be particularly proud of. He’s not been very successful. He’s behaving at this point in a very self-destructive manner.

WHAT DO you think the state of academic freedom in the U.S. today?

I’M NOT as hysterical about these issues as other people. Mine is kind of an unusual case, because I don’t confine my activity to academia. I speak before large numbers of audiences and I’m a known quantity outside the ivory tower, and so I pose many more problems to the powers that be than most academics.

I could be wrong on this subject, but I don’t think that academic freedom is being threatened. There are some cases, but my case is simply unusual because I’m a political activist outside the ivory tower of academia.

DO YOU think that professors have an obligation to engage in political activity?

THEY DON’T have an obligation as professors; they have an obligation as citizens. They have the luxury of devoting their working life to trying to ferret out the facts and the truth about what’s going on.

For most other working people, their working lives are devoted to jobs which have minimal levels of personal gratification and have very little to do with mental activity of the sort that creates informed citizens. So since you have the luxury of sitting around and reading books, you do have an obligation as a citizen to pursue and expose the truth.

Noam Chomsky Accuses Alan Dershowitz of Launching a "Jihad" to Block Norman Finkelstein From Getting Tenure at Depaul University

Tuesday, April 17th, 2007

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We play Part II of our conversation with two of the country's leading dissidents, Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn on U.S. wars from Iraq to Vietnam, resistance and academia. We also ask Chomsky about Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz who is lobbying DePaul faculty members to oppose Norman Finkelstein's bid to receive tenure. Chomsky says, "[Dershowitz] launched a jihad against Norman Finkelstein simply to try and vilify and defame in the hope that maybe what he is writing will disappear."

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We turn to Part II of our conversation with two of the country's leading dissidents, Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky. We spoke with them yesterday in a rare joint interview.

Howard Zinn is one of America's most widely-read historians. His classic work "A People's History of the United States" has sold over 1.5 million copies and it has altered how many teach the nation's history. His latest book is "A Power Governments Cannot Suppress."

Noam Chomsky began teaching linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge over 50 years ago. He is the author of dozens of books on linguistics and U.S. foreign policy. His most recent book is titled "Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy."

In a wide-ranging interview, we spoke about US wars from Iraq to Vietnam, about resistance and about academia. I asked Chomsky about political science professor Norman Finkelstein - one of the country's foremost critics of Israeli policy - and his battle to receive tenure at Depaul University where has taught for six years. Finkelstein's tenure has been approved at the departmental and college level but the dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences has opposed it. A final decision is expected to be made by May. Finkelstein has accused Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz of being responsible for leading the effort to deny him tenure. In an interview with the Harvard Crimson, Dershowitz admitted that he had sent a letter to DePaul faculty members lobbying against Finkelstein's tenure. I asked Noam Chomsky about the dispute.

• Noam Chomsky. Professor Emeritus of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is the author of dozens of books on linguistics and U.S. foreign policy. His latest book is "Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy."

• Howard Zinn. Professor emeritus at Boston University. His classic work "A People's History of the United States" has sold over 1.5 million copies. His latest book is "A Power Governments Cannot Suppress."

Robert Fisk: Fear and loathing on an American campus

Robert Fisk

I have a desire to take Norm, Chuck and Al and bang their bloody heads together

Published: 14 April 2007

On the night of 11 September 2001, Al Dershowitz of Harvard law school exploded in anger. Robert Fisk, he roared over Irish radio, was a dangerous man. I was "pro-terrorist". I was "anti-American" and that, Dershowitz announced to the people of County Mayo, "is the same as anti-Semitic".

Of course I had dared to ask the "Why" question; Why had 19 Arabs flown aircraft into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and Pennsylvania? Take any crime on the streets of London and the first thing Scotland Yard does is look for a motive. But when we had international crimes against humanity on the scale of New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, the first thing we were not allowed to do was look for a motive. How very odd. The 19 murderers came from a place called the Middle East. Was there a problem out there?

But Al would have none of this. And I got the message. To ask the "Why" question made me a Nazi. Which is why I subsequently received a flood of mail, much of it from Denver - what has Denver got against me? - telling me that my mother was Adolf Eichmann's daughter. Thanks, Al. I'm sure you didn't dream of the hate mail your silly diatribe will inspire. I guess Irish radio host Eamon Dunphy did. He pulled the plug on Al.

I'm recalling all this nonsense because Al has been back at work attacking his old nemesis, Norm Finkelstein, who has just applied for tenure at DePaul University in the US where he is an assistant professor of politics. Norm's department has supported him but Al has bombarded faculty members with a blistering attack on Norm and all his works.

So let me just explain what these works are. Finkelstein, who is Jewish and the son of Holocaust survivors, has published a number of works highly critical of Israel's occupation of the Palestinian West Bank and the use Israeli supporters make of the Holocaust of six million Jews to suppress criticism of Israel's policies. He has accused Dershowitz of plagiarising portions of his 2003 book The Case for Israel. Finkelstein's book, The Holocaust Industry, earned Dershowitz's continued fury.

Now, I've known Norm for years and he is a tough, no-holds-barred polemicist, angry against all the traditional supporters of Israel, especially those who turn a blind eye to torture. Personally, I find Norm's arguments sometimes a little overwrought. In radio discussions, his voice will take on a slightly whingeing tone that must infuriate his antagonists.

But Al is clearly trying to destroy Norm's career, adding that the "dossier" he sent to DePaul academics - we remember that word "dossier" rather too well in Britain and, I should add, Al has absolutely no connection to DePaul University - contains details of "Norman Finkelstein's ... outright lies, misquotations and distortion".

It will be a disgrace, says Al, for DePaul to give tenure to Norm. "His scholarship is no more than ad hominem attacks on his ideological enemies." As if this is not enough, Al - who is also Jewish - takes a crack at philosopher and linguistic academic Noam Chomsky who has supported Norm and whom Al refers to as "the high priest of the radical anti-Israeli left".

Enough, I hear readers shout. I agree. But Norm's politics department give him top marks for scholarship and says he "offers a detailed argument that suggests that Dershowitz plagiarised or inappropriately appropriated large sections of others work in The Case for Israel". Norm has a "substantial and serious record of scholarly production and achievement" and has lectured at the University of Chicago, Harvard, Georgetown and Northwestern Universities.

So far so good. But now up pops "Chuck" Suchar, the dean of DePaul's College of Liberal (sic) Arts and Sciences, with an extraordinary recommendation that Norm should not be granted tenure. While acknowledging that "he is a skilled teacher" with "consistently high course evaluations," Chuck has decided "that a considerable amount of [his work] is inconsistent with DePaul's Vincentian values, most particularly our institutional commitment to respect the dignity of the individual and to respect the rights of others to hold an express different intellectual positions". Norm's books, according to Chuck, "border on character assassination and ... embody a strategy clearly aimed at destroying the reputation of many who oppose his views".

Now I have to say that scholars who read this column will be interested to know of Chuck's own work. I gather it has absolutely nothing to do with the Middle East, though I'm sure his study of Gentrification and Urban Change: Research in Urban Society (1992) had American readers queuing round the block of their major bookstores in search of first editions. All I do ask is how a college dean could involve himself in the same kind of ad hominem attacks against one of his own colleagues that he has accused that same colleague of being guilty of.

I loved too, that bit about "Vincentian values". That really does warrant a chortle or two. St Vincent de Paul - the real de Paul who lived from 1581 to 1660, not the de Paul of Chuck's soft imagination - was a no nonsense theologian who was captured by Muslim Turkish pirates and taken to Tunis as a slave. Here, however, he argued his religious values so well that he converted his owner to Christianity and earned his freedom. His charitable organisations - he also created a home for foundlings in Paris - became a legend which Chuck Suchar simply dishonours.

All over the United States, however, Norm's academic chums have been condemning Suchar's tomfoolery; even in Beirut, where Norm has lectured, academics of the American University have insisted that he be granted tenure in his department, Arabs supporting a Jewish professor and son of Holocaust survivors.

Of course, I grant that all this is a little heavy for the real world and I do have a secret desire to take Norm, Chuck and Al and bang their bloody heads together. But what is happening at DePaul University is a very serious matter in the anodyne, frightened academic world that now exists in the US. Norm's moment of truth comes up in May. As they say watch this space.

Related
Zionism vs. Anti-Zionism: Dershowitz Tries To Get Finklestein Fired

Harvard Law Professor Works to Disrupt Tenure Bid of Longtime Nemesis at DePaul U.

Thursday, April 5, 2007

The highly public feud between Norman G. Finkelstein of DePaul University and Harvard Law School's Alan M. Dershowitz has taken an unusual procedural twist, with Mr. Dershowitz attempting to weigh in on Mr. Finkelstein's bid for tenure at DePaul.

How Mr. Dershowitz's move will play out remains to be seen. Mr. Finkelstein's department supported his tenure bid, but the dean of his college has refused to support him. A final decision is expected next month.

There's no love lost between Mr. Finkelstein, an assistant professor of political science, and Mr. Dershowitz, a law professor. The two scholars have attacked each other repeatedly in the past few years, hurling accusations of plagiarism and polemicism at one another.

They've taken adversarial stances on such issues as the Israel lobby, anti-Semitism, and what Mr. Finkelstein terms "the Holocaust industry." Mr. Dershowitz threatened to take legal action against the University of California Press if Mr. Finkelstein's Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History (2005) went to print with allegations that Mr. Dershowitz plagiarized portions of his 2003 book The Case for Israel (The Chronicle, July 22, 2005).

Last fall, with Mr. Finkelstein up for tenure, Mr. Dershowitz sent the DePaul law school faculty and members of the political-science department what he described, in a letter dated October 3, as a "dossier of Norman Finkelstein's most egregious academic sins, and especially his outright lies, misquotations, and distortions."

"I hope that this will serve as an introduction and primer to the so-called scholarship that Finkelstein will present this term as he is considered for tenure," Mr. Dershowitz wrote.

Mr. Finkelstein said in an interview on Monday that Mr. Dershowitz had embarked on "this frenetic and relentless campaign to deny me tenure."

"He sent to every member of the law school ... a dossier which came, I think, to about 50 pages, leveling or, I should say, recycling all of the allegations he's been putting forth for the past couple of years. And he sent a copy of that dossier to every member of my department."

The packet included what Mr. Dershowitz's letter called "some of the lies I am absolutely confident that Finkelstein told" on such points as Israeli torture and whether or not Mr. Dershowitz writes his own books.

In a telephone interview on Wednesday with The Chronicle, Mr. Dershowitz confirmed that he had sent the information to "everybody who would read it." He said he had compiled the material at the request of some two dozen DePaul students, alumni, and faculty members who were alarmed at the prospect of Mr. Finkelstein's receiving tenure.

Asked what he hoped to accomplish, he said, "Revealing the truth -- all I'm doing is disclosing the truth."

Mr. Dershowitz continued, "It would be a disgrace to DePaul University if they were to grant tenure. It would make them the laughing stock of American universities. ... His scholarship is no more than ad hominem attacks on his ideological enemies."

He added, "I think, by every standard, he's worse than Ward Churchill. ... He's a propagandist, not a scholar."

Given Mr. Dershowitz's history of clashes with Mr. Finkelstein, some might conclude that the matter had by now become more personal than professional. Mr. Dershowitz denied that. "For me, it's not personal. It's institutional." He said that Mr. Finkelstein sent "a message to other pro-Israel writers: If you dare write anything scholarly in favor of Israel, I will call you names, I will call you a plagiarist."

Mr. Dershowitz's involvement has stirred serious concern among the DePaul faculty.

Gil Gott, a professor of international studies at DePaul who is chairman of its Liberal Arts and Sciences' Faculty Governance Council, said in an e-mail message on Wednesday that the council had taken up the matter at its November 17, 2006, meeting. (Mr. Gott was not then chair of the council.)

According to the minutes of the session, the council voted unanimously to authorize a letter to DePaul's president, Dennis H. Holtschneider, and the university's provost, Helmut P. Epp, along with the president of Harvard University and the dean of Harvard Law school. The letter was to express "the council's dismay at Professor Dershowitz's interference in Finkelstein's tenure and promotion case" and also to explain "that the sanctity of the tenure and promotion process is violated by Professor Dershowitz's emails."

The minutes add: "A discussion followed in which members expressed their views that this was a very disturbing intrusion which attacked the sovereignty of an academic institution to govern its own affairs."

Asked whether it was unusual for a scholar to weigh in on tenure deliberations at another university, Mr. Dershowitz responded, "What's so unusual about a concerned academic's objecting to his receiving tenure? He would be the first person in history ever to receive tenure based on no scholarship other than personal attacks."

Mr. Finkelstein contacted The Chronicle last weekend to discuss his concerns about the status of his case. He said that his department had investigated Mr. Dershowitz's claims and "concluded that none of the scholarly allegations that Dershowitz leveled against me had any merit."

But he added: "DePaul is in a growth mode, and they see me as an albatross because they’re getting all this negative publicity because of me. And they want to get rid of me. And now the question is, what's going to prevail? The principles of fairness, the principles of academic freedom, or power and money in the form of a mailed fist?"

According to Mr. Finkelstein and to departmental reports sent to The Chronicle, his department voted 9 to 3 in favor of granting him tenure, with the majority voicing strong support for his scholarship and giving him high marks for his pedagogy. One of the reports described him as "an outstanding teacher whose contributions to student learning and transformation are impressive." It concluded that "while not all members of the department share a love of polemic and inflammatory rhetoric as practiced by Norman and his adversaries, there is clearly a substantial and serious record of scholarly production and achievement."

The College Personnel Committee subsequently voted 5 to 0 in favor of tenure for Mr. Finkelstein. But Charles S. Suchar, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, shot down the recommendation in a March 22, 2007, memo, a copy of which was also obtained by The Chronicle.

In language similar to that used by Mr. Dershowitz, the dean wrote, "I find the personal attacks in many of Dr. Finkelstein's published books to border on character assassination and, in my opinion, they embody a strategy clearly aimed at destroying the reputation of many who oppose his views."

Because the process is not yet complete, the DePaul administration has not made a public statement about Mr. Finkelstein's case.

"No comment at this time," Mr. Suchar wrote in an e-mail message. "The promotion and tenure review process is still under way, and final decisions are not expected until mid- to late May." The final decision on whether Mr. Finkelstein receives tenure rests with the provost and president of the university.

By JENNIFER HOWARD

Also online are both Mr. Dershowitz's Web site and Mr. Finkelstein's.

Dershowitz vs. Carter: Peace Movement Is AWOL, Again

December 26, 2006

Peace Movement is AWOL, Again

Dershowitz vs. Carter in Beantown

By JOHN V. WALSH

"Jimmy Carter is to be congratulated for not having demeaned himself by debating Alan Dershowitz."

William M. Bulger, former president of the Mass. State Senate and University of Mass. (Full text of Bulger's one-sentence Letter to the_Boston Globe,12/18/06.)

At long last the Boston Globe published an op-ed by former President Jimmy Carter, defending his book "Palestine, Peace Not Apartheid," from the predictable, scurrilous attacks (e.g.,"lie" and "blood libel") by Alan Dershowitz, Abe Foxman and David Horowitz. Quite wisely, Carter used most of his space to reiterate the main contentions of his book, making his op-ed (1) must reading for those who cannot get to the book. In perhaps the most interesting paragraph, Carter links his book to war on Iraq, thus:
"As recommended by the Hamilton-Baker report, renewed negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians are a prime factor in promoting peace in the region. Although my book concentrates on the Palestinian territories, I noted that the report also recommended peace talks with Syria concerning the Golan Heights. Both recommendations have been rejected by Israel's prime minister."

It is not hard to conclude from this that American blood is being spilled in Iraq, in part because of Israeli rejectionism. No wonder the neocons are so disturbed by Carter's book. It is also remarkable, but not surprising, that Carter has had so few champions of his important book on the "Left."

The precipitating event in the Beantown brouhaha was a speaking invitation to Carter by a professor at Brandeis University, a "traditionally Jewish college." The invitation was issued way back in the middle of November when Carter's book was publishe. Upon learning that there was opposition on the campus to the invitation, Carter consulted an old adviser Stuart Eizenstadt, now on the Brandeis board of trustees, and good old Stu offered to be an intermediary. But Stu betrayed Carter. (Shades of Menachim Begin.) Eizenstadt contacted Brandeis president, Jehuda Reinharz, and suggested that Carter only be allowed to appear if he debated Alan Dershowitz. A debate "would make this a real academic exercise," Eizenstat enthused to the Globe, adding, "The president of the university is not in the business of inviting someone, even a former president, for a book tour." (Excellent put-down, Stu.) Carter was "stunned by the proposal," according to The Globe, saying: "I don't want to have a conversation even indirectly with Dershowitz. There is no need to for me to debate somebody who, in my opinion, knows nothing about the situation in Palestine." Now let's see. Dershowitz is best know for his high-priced defense of Claus von Bulow and O.J. Simpson, and Carter for making peace between Egypt and Israel, a peace agreed to by the Israeli government and defended by such principled defenders of Palestinian rights as the late Edward Said. (That last endorsement may go some way in explaining the neocons' enduring hatred of Carter.)

The Globe did not cover the controversy in its news section until the debate topic was broached (December 15), ensuring that the content of the book receded far into the background. (Excellent job of distraction, Boston Globe.) The very next day after the news coverage the Globe ran an editorial, charging that Carter, unlike the neocons' much beloved war criminal, Harry Truman, "can't take the heat." Another put down by the Globe. And the day after Carter's op-ed finally appeared on December 20, the Globe ran an op-ed by Dershowitz, again sliming Carter and ensuring that Dershowitz had the last word. In fact the Globe, like the New York Times and other major papers, has not given "Palestine, Peace Not Apartheid," a best-selling book by a former president and Nobel Prize winner, a legitimate review. If that is not testimony to the power of the Israeli Lobby, I do not know what is.

The only opening in this anti-Carter phalanx came from the readers of the Globe themselves in the letters to the editor, which appear to run strongly in Carter's favor, if one discards the obvious plants. Here are some excerpts from letters of December 18 and 23. They should give some holiday joy to those who have recently felt despondent about the prospects for peace.

"The discussion around Jimmy Carter's new book needs to move to the central issues. Carter's detractors and the media have discussed the book's provocative title but little of its substance. Carter's book clearly lays out the current conditions in which Israel is constructing a 40-foot wall entirely inside the occupied territories and around settlements that have been constructed in defiance of international law. Americans need to decide whether our policies (or the lack thereof) are in our best interests or Israel's. Now that Carter has provoked us, let the real conversation begin." D. Weden

"Instead of correcting what he calls Carter's 'factual errors,' Dershowitz attacks the former president, saying that the man who brokered the most significant peace agreement in Middle Eastern history lacks objectivity, is guilty of a conflict of interest and is a bully. Really? The mood in America is changing quickly. American blood is being spilled in the Middle East with no end in sight, and the days when Dershowitz could get away with this type of nonsense are over." J. O'Rourke.

"I'm sure that Brandeis is just trying to be fair by allowing Carter to speak only if he debates Dershowitz. No doubt, also in the interest of fairness, the next time a blatantly pro-Israel book is published, Brandeis will only allow the author to speak if he agrees to debate Noam Chomsky. And if the author refuses, the Globe of course will run a lead editorial accusing him of not being able to 'take the heat'." A. Martin

"Thank you for printing Jimmy Carter's op-ed. He is one of only a very few Christian leaders willing to speak the truth about the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. I have copied his op-ed and am inserting it into my Christmas cards to a hundred of my closest friends and family" J.P. Leary

Perhaps the best letter of all came from Norman Finkelstein who was the very first to defend Carter's book on the day it was published (2) right here in CounterPunch, which is one of the few publications to carry a full-throated defense of Carter. I include Finkelstein's letter in toto below (3). (In the exchange of letters and during this entire controversy, the peace and justice establishment in Beantown was largely silent, perhaps another indication of the reach of the Lobby.) As we go to press one hundred determined and principled Brandeis professors and students have signed a petition demanding that Carter be invited after all, and president Reinharz seems ready to relent. We at CounterPunch will keep you informed.

John V. Walsh can be reached at John.Endwar@gmail.com. He has the burden of sharing his home town of Cambridge with Alan Dershowitz. He hopes that CP readers will buy multiple copies of Carter's book. It makes a great Hanukah or Christmas gift.

(1)http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/
The LA Times also gave Carter some space, the only other major paper to do so. Interestingly when I tried to search for this piece through the LA Times search engine, it did not appear despite a valiant effort on this searcher's part! But it did come up on Google. See: http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/

(2)Norman Finkelstein. Peace Not Apartheid; Jimmy Carter's Roadmap. http://www.counterpunch.com/

(3) Norman Finkelstein's letter (12/18/06) in response to the Globe's editorial put-down of Carter:

"You write that former president Jimmy Carter's use of the word 'apartheid' in the title of his new book is 'irresponsibly provocative' ('Jimmy Carter vs. Jimmy Carter,' editorial, Dec. 16). This would make for a rather puzzling list of 'irresponsibly provocative' commentators on the Israel-Palestine conflict. For example, a study by the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem concluded: 'Israel has created in the Occupied Territories a regime of separation based on discrimination, applying two separate systems of law in the same area and basing the rights of individuals on their nationality. This regime . . . is reminiscent of . . . the apartheid regime in South Africa.' The roster of irresponsible provocateurs would also include the editorial board of Israel's leading newspaper Haaretz, which observed in September that 'the apartheid regime in the territories remains intact; millions of Palestinians are living without rights, freedom of movement or a livelihood, under the yoke of ongoing Israeli occupation.' Indeed, the list apparently includes former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon. Pointing to his 'fixation with Bantustans,' Israeli researcher Gershom Gorenberg concluded in 2003 that it is 'no accident' that Sharon's plan for the West Bank 'bears a striking resemblance to the 'grand apartheid' promoted by the old South African regime.' Sharon reportedly stated around that time that 'the Bantustan model was the most appropriate solution to the conflict."

NORMAN G. FINKELSTEIN, Chicago. The writer is a political science professor at DePaul University.

Eric Alterman: Here we go again. Jimmy Carter is coming under fire for departing from the accepted narrative about Israel.

December 6, 2006 08:45 PM

Eric Alterman

In case you haven't heard, Jimmy Carter has a new book out. In it, drawing on his experiences in the Middle East over the past three decades, he sets out a game-plan for putting an end to violence in the region. The book is entitled Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, and you should be able to guess the rest.

Martin Peretz, editor-in-chief of The New Republic, calls it a "tendentious, dishonest and stupid book." To Alan Dershowitz it's an "anti-Israel screed." Rick Richman of the Jewis press calls it "tendentious, dishonest, stupid," and "insidious."

An anonymous caller called into a C-SPAN interview and ranted at Jimmy Carter, calling him "a bigot, and a racist and an anti-Semite." The caller continued, accusing Carter of "cozying up with every dictator, thug, Islamic terrorist there is." MSNBC aired the attacks over and over , as if the ravings of a lunatic were somehow newsworthy--which given the fact that it's MSNBC, may be consistent).

To tell you the truth, it's not much of a book. I looked for a segment I cold excerpt on my website and couldn't find anything that was really worthy. It's simplistic and homiletic and gives only part of the story most of the time. Jimmy Carter is in some ways a great man, and in almost all ways, a good man, but he's not much of a historian,

Still the vituperation is explained not by the above, but by one thing and one thing only. Carter has departed from the accepted narrative that Israel's so-called friends in the United States insist on imposing on the Israeli-Palestinian narrative. Depart from it and expect to get called all kind of names, none of them nice.

Helpfully, Alan Dershowitz lays it out in the opening paragraphs of his review. "The former US president's use of the loaded word 'apartheid', suggesting an analogy to the hated policies of South Africa, is especially outrageous, considering his acknowledgment buried near the end of his shallow and superficial book that what is going on in Israel today 'is unlike that in South Africa - not racism, but the acquisition of land.' Nor does he explain that Israel's motivation for holding on to land it captured in a defensive war is the prevention of terrorism. Israel has tried, on several occasions, to exchange land for peace, and what it got instead was terrorism, rockets and kidnappings launched from the returned land."

Got it? Israel wants peace, not land. The more land you give the Arabs, the more they try to kill you.
It's really that simple.

Carter of course, puts it differently. In a short New Yorker piece, he explained, "I'm not alleging racism, and I'm not referring to Israel. I'm talking about Palestine." It is his contention that the situation in the Occupied Territories "is not debated or acknowledged or even known in this country," and that the "tremendous aversion" here to criticism of Israel's policies has contributed to the disintegration of the peace process. "I can't imagine a presidential candidate saying, 'I'm going to take a balanced position toward the Israelis and the Palestinians,' and getting elected," he said. "It's inconceivable."

And silently, Alan Dershowitz, Marty Paretz, AIPAC, and all the rest say, "Amen."

Eric Alterman is a Nation columnist and professor of English at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

Termed "the most honest and incisive media critic writing today” in the National Catholic Reporter, and author of “the smartest and funniest political journal out there” in the San Francisco Chronicle, Eric Alterman is professor of English at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

He is also the “Liberal Media” columnist for the Nation, the Altercation weblogger for MSNBC.com, and a contributor to the Huffington Post.

He is a senior fellow at both the Center for American Progress in Washington DC, for which he writes and edits the Think Again column, and the World Policy Institute at New School University in New York.

He wrote the national bestsellers:
What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News (2003, 2004),
The Book on Bush: How George W (Mis)leads America (with Mark Green, 2004).
His Sound & Fury: The Making of the Punditocracy (1992, 2000), won the 1992 George Orwell Award and his It Ain't No Sin to be Glad You're Alive: The Promise of Bruce Springsteen (1999, 2001) won the 1999 Stephen Crane Literary Award.
Alterman is also the author of Who Speaks for America? Why Democracy Matters in Foreign Policy (1998). His newest book is When Presidents Lie: A History of Official Deception and its Consequences (2004, 2005).

A frequent lecturer and contributor to virtually every significant national publication in the US and many in Europe in recent years, he has also been a columnist for Worth, Rolling Stone, Mother Jones, and the Sunday Express. A former adjunct professor of journalism at NYU and Columbia, Alterman received a BA in history and government from Cornell, an MA in international relations from Yale and a PhD in US history from Stanford.

He lives with his family in Manhattan, where he is at work on a history of postwar American liberalism and a history of the rock‘n’roll business.