There is no indication in this article about what Morris actually said that was so offensive, or whether or not it was true. Actually, it probably was true: as in the Wilders trial, as Pat Condell has said, "Fear of free speech is the symptom of a profoundly neurotic and dishonest society." The jihadist thugs and their Leftist dupes only try to silence people who speak truths they would rather not be known.
Free Speech Death Watch Alert: "Benny Morris talk stirs uproar at Cambridge," by Jonny Paul in the Jerusalem Post, February 7 (thanks to all who sent this in):
LONDON - The Israel Society at Cambridge University has succumbed to pressure and canceled a talk by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev historian Benny Morris after protesters accused him of "Islamophobia" and "racism."Morris was scheduled to speak to students at the university on Thursday, but following a campaign led by anti-Israel activist Ben White the Israel Society canceled the talk. Instead Morris was invited to speak at an event hosted by the university's Department of Political and International Studies.
White, who graduated from the university in 2005 and authored the book Israeli Apartheid: A Beginners Guide, set up a protest page on Facebook in which he claimed that "on different occasions, Morris has expressed Islamophobic and racist sentiments towards Arabs and Muslims."
He added: "We find it offensive and appalling that an official student society would want to invite such an individual."
Following the Facebook protest, a letter was sent to the student union by the university's Islamic Society, other students and two staff members from the English Department asking it to take a stand and show it is serious "in opposing bigotry and Islamophobia." The 15 signatories said Morris's views were "abhorrent and offensive.
"The issue is hate speech, and the impact of a visit by this individual on the campus' atmosphere for the student body's minority groups... His visit is insulting, threatening to Arab and Muslim students in particular and also goes against the spirit of the student union's stated anti-Islamophobia policy," the letter read.
Last year, Cambridge's Palestine Society hosted Abd al-Bari Atwan, editor-in-chief of the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper. In 2008, Atwan said the terrorist attack on Jerusalem's Mercaz Harav yeshiva, in which eight students were killed and 15 were wounded, was "justified" as the school was responsible for "hatching Israeli extremists and fundamentalists." [...]
Jake Witzenfeld, president of Cambridge University's Israel Society, canceled the Morris talk, apologizing for any "unintended offense."
"I decided to cancel for fear of the Israel Society being portrayed as a mouthpiece of Islamophobia," he said. "We understand that whilst Professor Benny Morris' contribution to history is highly respectable and significant, his personal views are, regrettably, deeply offensive to many."...
A Muslim group accused of publishing anti-Semitic material congratulated the Islamic Society for the cancelation [sic] of Morris's talk.
"Muslim Public Affairs Committee congratulated Cambridge's Islam Society on the success of their campaign and lobbying to stop the Islamophobe Benny Morris giving a speech at their university... A simple Facebook group and a well written letter is all that it takes to defend your religion," the group said.
The 2006 All-Party Parliamentary Report into Anti-Semitism alleged that the anti-Israel Muslim Public Affairs Committee has used material from Holocaust denial and neo-Nazi publications, uses the word "Zionist" as a replacement for "Jew" and engages in the spread of conspiracy theories about Jews. In 2006, it was discovered that MPAC founder Asghar Bukhari make a donation to convicted Holocaust denier David Irving....
“While Prof Morris’ contribution to history is highly respectable, his personal views are, regrettably, offensive to many. Ultimately, we place respect for those who have been offended above the importance of hosting this speaker.”
-- statement of Jake Witzenfeld, president of Cambridge University's Israel Society,
Why does he, or the royal we for he, place "respect for those who have been offended" above "the importance of hosting this speaker"? How have "they" (who are "they") been offended? Professor Morris hadn't yet spoken. How do they know what he was going to say? What is it that proleptically offends them, those people for whom at-his-wit's-end Witzenfeld claims he has such "respect"? What have they done to earn that "respect"? Breathe? Is that enough? To be alive, is to have earned "respect"?
In the end, Morris did speak, but among grownups, in
It's time for Cambridge University, and other universities in England, to start expelling those who create an atmosphere of fear, and to mock those who give in to the idea of "Respect" -- the kind of "respect" in the "Respect Party" of that crook and stooge of every Muslim cause, George Galloway.
Errata Sheet:
For "In the end, Morris did speak, but among grownups, in"
Read "In the end, Morris did speak, but among grownups, in the Department of Politics and International Relations"
Cambridge's Palestine Society hosted Abd al-Bari Atwan, editor-in-chief of the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper.
Why is that lying and bigoted scumbag still here? Why wasn't he thrown out long ago?
Jake Witzenfeld, president of Cambridge University's Israel Society, canceled the Morris talk, apologizing for any "unintended offense,"... [and said]: "We understand that whilst Professor Benny Morris' contribution to history is highly respectable and significant, his personal views are, regrettably, deeply offensive to many."...
So was Prof. Morris being invited to speak about his personal views or about some historical subject? If the latter, what do his personal views matter?
Melanie Phillips wrote this exactly one year ago (includes mention, dishonourable, of elements of Cambridge Univ.):
"The jihad against Britain's jews"
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/3329296/the-jihad-against-britains-jews.thtml
Apology not accepted. I am deeply offended by Jake Witzenfeld's audacity to think he knows what offends anyone, everyone,me.
"We find it offensive ..."
I don't care. No one has the right not to be offended. It is such a ridiculous argument. How anyone can really think that hurt feelings justifies censorship is staggering.
They should have invited me to speak. Then he would have had a real justification to be offended.
It won't be until someone like Pat Condell is invited to speak at Cambridge, does, draws a very large audience and gets a standing ovation at the end of his talk that we'll know the tide has really been turned in favor of the good guys. For now, chalk up another win for the bad guys and the meek.
"I decided to cancel for fear..."
He could have stopped right there.
Quite right, Abscedere. That was all that need be said.
All grist for the anti-Israel mill:
"Major new study shows blatant anti-Israel agenda at the 'Financial Times'"
(by Robin Shepherd)
http://www.robinshepherdonline.com/major-new-study-shows-blatant-anti-israel-agenda-at-the-financial-times/
"I decided to cancel for fear of the Israel Society being portrayed as a mouthpiece of Islamophobia,"
What an incredibly wimpy rationalization. Canceled out of just fear that the Israel Society might be portrayed as encouraging Islamophobia. So what? Any enemy can portray something falsely that doesn't mean it will be believed or that it should justify a complete cave in. He is also endorsing the absurd principle that if some Muslims claim they will be offended by something (O horrors!) then that something must be forbidden.
When did freedom from "offense" become a Muslim (and only a Muslim's) constitutional right?
This guy has no backbone or shame. If the Brits & Europeans allow themselves to be kicked around like this then they deserve their chains.
Hugh; The Victorian Government has decided we need a "Department of Respect". More money down the drain, more bullying from our moral superiors - and no doubt there will be something in it for Muslims, who never miss an opportunity to exploit our stupidity.
Robert,
So you don't know what Morris said however, in your opinion it 'probably was true',seems like double standards to me.
Well, has Morris expressed "racist sentiments towards Arabs..."? Or doesn't that matter?
In England, even the "Israel society" is too cowardly to let a formerly leftist, and still relatively liberal Israeli historian to speak.
Is there anything about England that is not phony?
Ruslan Tokhchukov, EnragedSince1999.
There is a Muhammaden society in that school that reads from Muhammaden source material and preaches this 'most offensive and appalling' language and intent on the planet. This source material not only hurts the feelings of Non-Muhammadens, it takes their lives, liberty, creativity, resources and peace. Why is this society still in place?
In any argument about hate speech, offense and impact on a people, Muhammadenism loses very easily in comparison.
This comparison between muhammaden 'hate speech' and someone sounding the sharia creep alarm is no contest when openly exposed.
Precisely WHAT Benny Morris said or would have saidthat was "Islamophobic" was unclear-clearly "Islamophobia" is the modern equivalent of medieval heresy- simply being accused of it is the same as being guilty!!!
Terry
I have Islamophobia! You have Islamophobia! We all have Islamophobia!
Will some PC MC Islamic apologist please read the Qur'an and tell me why I should NOT be afraid of Islam?
Benny Morris certainly should be able to speak, though he has, at times, said some harsh things about Palestinians.
Though perhaps lost on many or most folks here, it is incredibly ironic that Morris is the subject of such ire from Arab and Islamic precincts, as he is considered one of the leading 'New Historians' of Israel who has rather bravely and candidly catalogued the facts and quotes of the Zionist movement up through the 1948-49 war, and has engendered quite a bit of animosity from Israeli conservatives.