A Riot is the language of the unheard
Netanyahu talk shut down at Concordia
JON ELMER
Dalhousie Gazette, 11 September 2002
While former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sipped drinks at the bar of the nearby Ritz Charlton Hotel, upward of 2,000 protestors gnarled the Hall Building at Concordia University, making delivery of the Hardliner's exclusive speech on Monday impossible.
As riot police escorted ticket-holders (tickets were not available to Muslims or Arabs) into the auditorium, taunts were exchanged between protestors and the exclusive group of attendees (who were encouraged to bring Israeli flags) and it wasn't long before tensions exploded into a battle between police and protestors. In the ensuing riot, the front windows were smashed and police used shields, baton blows, tear gas and pepper spray to clear the lobby of the building; protestors responded by barricading the escalators with tables and resisting the police advance with chairs, newspaper stands and even a fire extinguisher.
Police-baton attacks injured several protestors and five violent arrests were made: "No symbolic arrest gestures here, they were dragged away kicking and screaming," one activist told me. The university was shut down for the day, as students and staff exited the building gagging and choking on the teargas that permeated through the corridors and classrooms.
For Netanyahu, it is the third time in less than two years that he has had talks canceled amid raucous protest at North American universities - the others were at UC Berkeley in late November and at Northwestern in February. Articulating the impetus for the string of protest against the former Likud leader, activists in Montreal, Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights, issued a warrant for Netanyahu's arrest for "crimes against humanity" charging "gross violations of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories and in the state of Israel".
A vocal supporter of ethnic cleansing (a war crime) within Greater Israel, Netanyahu has called for "mass deportations of Arabs from the territories" and gained notoriety for his extra-judicial killings of "suspected militants" with missiles from helicopter gun-ships in populated areas. Under his leadership more than 2500 Palestinian prisoners were tortured (several died), more than 250 Palestinian homes were demolished, 6500 housing units were established in illegal settlements within occupied Palestinian territory - in total, the number of illegal settlers increased 9 per cent, in direct violation of the 4th Geneva Convention and key UN Resolutions, including 242 and 338. All in less than three years as Prime Minister from 1996-1999.
Netanyahu's speaking tour was sponsored by the Asper Foundation, and so it is of little surprise that the Asper's rag, The National Post, provided sufficient misrepresentation of the demonstration in reducing the issue to racist polemics and the censoring of free speech in Canada. One columnist, Jonathan Kay, was so pious as to title his piece "Netanyahu is the Victim."
But of course, in these troubling times, free speech is such a slippery little fish: Is censorship to be found only in Netanyahu's being forced to give the gist of his talk at a press conference (for international broadcast) instead of to an exclusive group within the university auditorium? Could the corporate media's dubious reporting of violations of Palestinian human rights, or the pundits' dismissal of legitimate dissent and necessary resistance to an occupying army as "anti-Semitic" not also be censorship?
In fact, Netanyahu was "pleased" with the demonstration, and used it to buttress his claims of "mad zealotry run amok" the theme of his scheduled talk on "combating terrorism."
"They're supporting Saddam Hussein, they're supporting Arafat, they're supporting bin Laden," Netanyahu told reporters (presumably with a straight face), referring to the largely student-based group that shut down his talk.
Netanyahu's bombast aside, once again it is students playing a crucial role in resistance to political domination, intellectual stagnation and an uncritical complicity to imperialism. We must reject the reactionary and simplistic agenda of the media monopolies in Canada and understand the protest against Netanyahu at Concordia, and elsewhere, as the manifestation of legitimate outrage at the ongoing crimes of Israel in the West Bank and Gaza, and targeted at those who are responsible.
Letters to the Editor:
Joanna Grossman, Atlantic Jewish Students Association
Elbaz, Litman and Krashinsky
Read Elmer's response: The Netanyahu Riot, Part II