New York Times ad accuses BDS movement, college professors of inciting murder of Jewish children

Ali Abunimah Lobby Watch 24 April 2012

In a sign of growing desperation among anti-Palestinian groups, a New York Times ad published today likens the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement to the Holocaust.

“The Holocaust began with boycotts of Jewish stores and ended with death camps,” begins the ad, placed by notorious anti-African American and Islamophobic agitator David Horowitz.

Citing the murder of three Jewish children and a rabbi in Toulouse, France earlier this year, the ad says, “it is time for supporters of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS) to ask themselves what they did to contribute to the atmosphere of hate that spawned these and other murders of Jews.”

Unsatisfied with blaming supporters of Palestinian rights in general of aiding and abetting murder, the ad names specific professors whom it holds responsible, and calls on them to be “publicly shamed and condemned for the crimes their hatred incites.”

The overwrought language in the advertisement is typical of Horowitz who has made a career out of such libelous accusations. It seems that no abuse or cheapening of the memory of Holocaust victims is too outrageous for anti-Palestinian crusaders such as Horowitz.

Acceptable?

The New York Times does have “Advertising Acceptability Guidelines” which state:

The Times may decline to accept advertising that is misleading, inaccurate or fraudulent; that makes unfair competitive claims; or that fails to comply with its standards of decency and dignity.

And:

In addition, an advertisement must sometimes be declined because of the applicability of laws dealing with such matters as libel, copyright and trademark, the right to privacy, the sale of securities, the sale of real estate and political advertising.

Some things do go too far for The Times. Last month the paper reportedly rejected an ad from Pamela Geller’s anti-Muslim hate group.

Apparently however, accusing specific individuals – effectively of responsibility for the murder of Jewish children in France – for supporting equal rights for Palestinians, does not cross any lines of deceny, dignity or accuracy for this newspaper of record.

Most, but not all, the names on the ad are of professors who have endorsed the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.

Horowitz: Black people should be grateful for slavery

As I wrote in last December, Horowitz has a record of the most vile racism and Islamophobia:

For those who have forgotten who Horowitz, the editor in chief and owner of FrontPage Magazine is, he has engaged in continuous campaigns against Muslims and African Americans. Ten years ago Horowitz notoriously ran ads in college newspapers across the country saying that black people should be grateful that their ancestors were slaves in America and in fact owed America a debt for slavery. The ads caused an outcry on campuses all over the United States.

More recently, Horowitz has defended Robert Spencer, another notorious bigot and inspiration for Norwegian mass killer Anders Breivik, as “a man of great courage and decency.”

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Comments

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Joe Smack replied on

Is there a way we can ask them to issue some kind of retraction?

Or perhaps we can draft some kind of a letter and have it signed by some of these professors to talk about why boycott is good. Normally there's no reason for NYT to publish BDS pieces but if a psychopath/racist is publicly condemning it then maybe it would be an opportunity to turn lemons into lemonade.

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Michael Rabb replied on

Horowitz as you say is desperate: resorting to McCarthyesque black-list tactics to denounce and intimidate college professors. The real hate crime here is the Jewish State of Israel as a Zionist project perpetrated against the Palestinian people. For 65 years Jews have been waging war against the indigenous people of Palestine -- a war that has included crimes of ethinic cleansing, military occupation, colonization, and apartheid. The world should come together in a a coherent and cohesive movement of BDS to aggressively (but non-violently) counter and resist the awful hate crimes of Israel.
Michael Rabb, Boulder Colorado USA

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Anne Norton replied on

Many of us have written letters to the NYT in response, and to the President of Penn asking for the University to condemn this call for persecution and defend the academic integrity of our colleagues. More letters would be welcome!

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Yousef Aljamal replied on

Horowitz is one of the figure of the Islamophobia network in the US at it was stated in the report of the Center for American Progress. He better shuts his mouth up. The New York, excluding some articles, is completely biased in favor of Israel. It has nothing to do with respectful journalism.

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Jack Dresser replied on

I hope and expect libel suits to be soon filed by each professor named. There is rich history of such suits against AIPAC et al. which are typically settled out of court to avoid the spotlight of a public trial. They have a treasury that needs draining and seem willing to drain it through self-indulgence in these hysterical declarations, so their self-defeat should be accommodated at every opportunity.

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seafoid replied on

Zionism is a morally bankrupt ideology. It's time to hand over the job of keeping alive the memory of the Shoah to people with values .

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Karen replied on

If you knew more about Zionism than what the haters claim it is, then you would be ashamed to libel it this way. It is a nationalism with the humblest of goals - to maintain one state for a small people.

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seafoid replied on

I know too much about Zionism. I have lived in Ramallah. I have visited Hebron and Beit El and places with centuries of Jewish history like Warsaw and Bratislava.
Zionism is a militaristic cult with a made up history.

Jewish values are of no relevance for the 16 oligarchs and the IDF and political sociopaths who run Israel.

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david hersch replied on

If boycotts helped end apartheid in South Africa, perhaps they can stop Israel's colonialism in the West Bank, where her illegal settlements and infrastructure already occupy 42% of the West Bank.

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Ryan Branagan replied on

German Anti-Semitism manifested as a boycott of local shops owned by German Jews; that is, individuals were boycotted specifically because they were Jews. To collapse that with the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against the Apartheid State of Israel is simply Orwellian propaganda. BDS targets not individuals, but corporations and institutions that do business directly with the illegal policies of the State of Israel, just like BDS targeted the State of South Africa in the 1970s and 80s. Targeting states is qualitatively different than targeting individuals, and the equation of BDS' push for human rights and international law with the genocidal designs of the Nazi State is at best a poor understanding of history, and at worst simply unethical.

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spurious correlation replied on

Er, boycott's don't always lead to genocide. If you are older than 11 you should be able to figure this out. People boycotted South Africa to end apartheid and there was no genocide against white people. The Irish boycotted rack renting landlords and there was no genocide. Americans boycotted scab grapes to support farm workers and there was no genocide. The first line is factually correct about the Nazis and a racist smear against the pro-Palestinian BDS campaign. And for the 10,000th time, boycotting Israeli is boycotting racism, not Jews per se. It is a racist lie to equate Israel with Jews per se.

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norwegian replied on

I just cannot believe that the respected New York Times has really printed this despicable ad. Nothing in the scanned copy tells me that it was placed in the NYT. Could it be a grave mistake here, that it was printed in the New York Post instead - a right wing paper that is much more likely to do such a thing?

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Amjad Faur replied on

Norwegian,

I hate to tell you that it is indeed very, very real. I saw this ad while eating lunch on my campus and browsing the New York Times. I must admit that even for the Times, it was a shocking piece of trash.

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norwegian replied on

Can anybody here confirm that the ad was really printed by the New York Times? I case they did, it is scandalous!

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Pierre Gilly replied on

In France it´s already illegal to suggest that israely product should be boycotted. At least, that´s what the goverment claims. Several people has been prosecuted. Boycott is considered a form a discrimination or hate speech. But suggesting that any other countries products should be boycotted is legal.

Ali Abunimah

Co-founder of The Electronic Intifada and author of The Battle for Justice in Palestine, now out from Haymarket Books.

Also wrote One Country: A Bold-Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse. Opinions are mine alone.