When is free speech not free?

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Few rights are dearer to the American people than freedom of speech and freedom of peaceful assembly. But there are legal and rational limits to these rights.

Incitement to violence, to unlawful activity, or to the violent overthrow of the American government are not protected as free speech. Slander and defamation are not protected as free speech. These are legal limitations to free speech.

Neither does free speech mean that one can stand up in a crowded movie theater and shout “fire.” Our laws protecting free speech do not require that anyone listen; nor do they require that any specific institution or person provide a podium for a speaker whose speech the host finds objectionable. These are rational limitations on free speech.

There is also a fairly obvious, almost instinctual, limitation to free speech which can be described as moral. Our commitment to freedom of speech does not extend to persons or organizations that exploit that freedom to interfere with the free speech of others.

I had the unpleasant experience of witnessing that interference, well-organized, vociferous, determined, pre-choreographed, and effective, at San Jose State University (California) at a university event on February 5, 2009. The guest speaker was Israeli Consul-General Akiva Tor. His topic was the Israeli elections and an update on the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip. The event was open to the public, as many university events are.

I entered the lecture hall at 5:15 pm. I was surprised to see that the hall was already almost full of people. They were identifiable as Muslims or supporters of the Palestinians because many of the men were wearing Hamas kafiyehs (neck scarves) and many of the women wore Muslim religious head coverings. There were many more individuals with kafiyehs or Muslim head coverings outside waiting to get in. Happily, the event organizers were able to procure a bigger hall, and everyone moved there. Most of the people identifiable as Muslims or as Hamas supporters sat together. Several of these people held placard, posters and Palestinian flags on their laps. I estimate that this group made up more than half of the audience….i.e., about 100 out of a c. 150 people. A number of people from this group distributed hand-outs demonizing Israel and supporting Hamas.

At the onset of the event, the moderator, a professor of political science, asked the audience to hold questions and comments until the end of the Consul-General’s presentation. She indicated that all questions would be answered because Mr. Tor had generously agreed to remain late.

None the less, a tall gentleman stood up mid-way through his presentation and began to shout that he was presenting lies. The moderator reminded the agitator of her earlier request, and he sat down. There were several more such interruptions but they were short-lived, since the moderator admonished each of them. However, when the Consul-General had finished his presentation and attempted to answer the first question, he was vociferously interrupted by numerous people in the audience (some of whom wore Hamas kafiyehs or Muslim female head coverings, and some of whom did not) who called him a liar and screamed that they did not want to hear lies.

At this point the unruly elements in the audience were no longer amenable to the moderator’s admonitions. The identifiable Muslims or Hamas-supporters in the audience broke into jeers, shaking fists in the air, calling him “liar” and other insulting names, and screaming out insults directed to him and to the state of Israel.

One young Muslim girl was given the microphone to ask a question, and instead she read a series accusations against Israel from one of the hand-outs noted above. She had no question. She simply used the opportunity to state her objections to the existence of the state of Israel. At the end of her performance, a man came forward, took the microphone and used it in a similar fashion, spewing accusatory statements condemning Israel and the Consul-General. He was not willing to relinquish his hold on the microphone, despite the moderator’s requests, until he had finished his obviously pre-prepared speech.

It became clear to me at that point that the people disrupting the event had come with the express purpose of interfering with the Consul-General’s presentation.

Mr. Tor attempted to reason with the disruptors with questions such as: “if you are not willing to listen to an interpretation different from yours, then why are you at this event?” and “if you declare that anything with which you disagree is a lie, then how can we ever have any dialogue?” His sincere, polite efforts were rewarded with more jeers and hoots and insults.

At this point it was obvious that the segment of the audience which was identifiably Muslims or Hamas supporters had hijacked the event and turned it into a podium from which to advertise their anti-Israel ideology and to aggressively air their anti-Israel accusations. The insults and screams and accusations of lying were not a product of what the Consul-General was saying, but were instead part of a pre-choreographed plan to insult the speaker and prevent him speaking.

Having lost all control of situation, the moderator declared that the event had to be terminated and that the Consul-General would leave. At that point, many of the Hamas-supporters and Muslims in the audience got up and approached the stage, shouting insults and Hamas slogans. Before the Consul-General could step away from the stage, a well-dressed young woman in a brown pants suit jumped onto the stage with impressive agility and ran toward him. Before she could reach him, a very large man standing next to Mr. Tor stepped forward, grabbed her around the waist, picked her up, and carefully, without causing her any injury, placed her on the floor in front of the stage. She did not attempt again to mount the stage. The half-dozen campus police who had been invited to the event were reluctant to remove anyone, because they were concerned that doing so would likely instigate a riot.

After the Consul-General had been escorted out, most of the audience who had not engaged in the disruptive activities left the lecture hall. The vastly outnumbered pro-Israel students, visibly shaken and, in some cases, emotionally traumatized, left the building. Others who were not aligned with one side or the other, but who had come to the event to learn about Israeli elections and the issues in Gaza, hurriedly made for the exits.

Most of the pro-Hamas audience remained, raised their banners and placards, unfurled their flags, and stood before the university’s student TV channel camera, shouting Hamas slogans and waving clenched fists in the air. Only after the police demanded that they leave the hall did they do so. They stood in the corridor of the student union’s 2nd floor, continuing to shout their slogans until the police moved them out. One of my colleagues, who remained in order to help bring order, was verbally threatened by one of the demonstrators.

San Jose State is not the only campus to have suffered such egregious behavior by Muslims or Hamas supporters. Campus demonstrations by Muslim groups supporting Hamas and other terrorist groups have been in the news for years. On a number of occasions these demonstrations have made it impossible for Israeli or pro-Israel speakers to appear. Some such demonstrations have become violent and dangerous.

When such groups succeed in hijacking university events, intimidating moderators, silencing speakers, and using the venue as a springboard from which to promote their anti-Israel ideology to the captive audience and whatever media may be present, they are exploiting and abusing their right of free speech in order to interfere with the free speech of others.

Such behavior is antithetical to any semblance of civil dialogue, and the antithesis of free speech. It is also a clear indication of the intentions of those who promote such behavior: to prevent any productive dialogue, and to shut down any attempt to present a pro-Israel point of view.

I believe that university governance across the entire country should deem this to be an issue of considerable importance, and should place a high priority on the need to develop strategies to enforce limitations on free speech when this freedom is abused and exploited as a means to violate the free speech of others.

Such strategies may include:

a) campus governance announcing the prohibition of co-sponsorships by university departments or faculty of events organized by groups related to, or supporting, those who perpetrate such disturbances.

b) regulations prohibiting posters and flags in lecture halls, and inviting the demonstrators to mount their demonstrations in a public area outside, where there will be no interference with the event.

c) notice given to audiences that security forces will be asked to physically remove from the event venue any disruptors who do not follow the rules of civil discourse and the directions of the moderator.

University administrations may be reluctant to enforce such strategies because the enforcement of such regulations, and the eviction of disruptors, may create the danger anticipated by the SJSU campus police: such actions may elicit a violent response from those in the audience who are in attendance precisely in order to hijack the event.

I suggest that university governance must choose whichever they deem the lesser of two evils: either the university will take actions which may cause a disturbance that will need to be quelled by adequate police and security forces making arrests, and perhaps followed by lawsuits leveled by the university against the offenders; or the university will stand idly by as the pro-Hamas forces in our communities throughout the country hijack our universities and impose their will upon anyone brazen enough to stage an event which might arouse their ire

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Editor’s note:

To read the online reportage and the anti-Semitic comments that follow them click the following links:

When is free speech not free?

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AUTHOR

David Meir-Levi


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