Its OK, yes, of course, for a certified anti-Israel obsessive, former President Jimmy Carter, to speak at Brandeis University. But when the university issues an invitation to Israels ambassador to the US, Michael Oren, to speak at Brandeis commencement, well, thats another story. Protesters might come. It might turn rowdy. Not to mention, Israel is terrible, and its ambassador should not be welcome at Brandeis!
So reasoned many on the Brandeis campus, blithely oblivious to their double standard, to the First Amendment, to the passionate Zionism of the Supreme Court justice after whom the university is named; not to mention, oblivious to Orens credentials as a scholar, which tower above Jimmy Carters and, frankly, even above many of the scholars at the university itself.
Happily, a Brandeis University senior, Adam Ross, decided to circulate a petition calling for the university to sustain its invitation to Oren. Guess what? Ross petition has gathered 5,000 signatures as of last count. Read Tehilla Goldberg’s related column
Not only 150 Brandeis students, but alumni, parents and members of the Jewish community have signed.
The fact that there was even a debate over the universitys invitation to Oren is disheartening. Universities are supposed to be bastions of free speech, not its suppression. Brandeis is supposed to be a Jewish university, not a degrader of the public face of Judaism today, the State of Israel. Scholarship is supposed to be honored at universitities, not dismissed. Heckling and other forms of disturbance that greeted Oren at the University of California, Irvine, in February, are supposed to call forth courage, not submission to the mob.
Adam Ross and those who signed his petition embody that courage. We trust that Oren will speak at Brandeis, that the university will honor its commitment to free speech, will be proud to have a leading representative of Israel on its campus, and will carry through on its intention to bestow on Oren an honorary degree, as befits his major scholarly contributions: Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East, and Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East 1776 to the Present. Both books occupied an honored place on The New York Times bestseller list for weeks. Their author should not speak at Brandeis University? The mere suggestion is an embarrassment.
