Last week I posted an event on Wesleying which read: ”Come to the inaugural meeting of Wesleyan’s Pro-Israel Advocacy Organization! We are a group based on issues including: support of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, commitment to the two-state solution, and calling out blatant media biases. Come brainstorm how to proceed! All are welcome.”
After just a few hours, I received an email from a friend abroad saying he had seen my post and that he was “sorry about all the comments…How you holding up?” I immediately rushed to a computer to find 17 (which eventually became 24) anonymous comments in response to my posting.
Most of these comments attacked the group’s basic tenets. Putting forth some historical inaccuracies and harping on loaded buzzwords, these comments screamed at the Pro-Israel Advocacy group for supporting an occupier, a state that commits war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and racial hierarchies. Some comments, though, went so far as to attack the group’s legitimacy in general, wondering how “such a prestigious and liberal
school full of smart people” could host students with these opinions. One comment offered an outraged reaction to those of us who might think this way, asking us to “please go fuck yourself and die.”
I was immediately disheartened and disillusioned. This violent rhetoric is exactly why I have avoided discussing my opinions on the conflict for my first three years at Wesleyan. I second Jared Gimbel’s ’11 response on Weselying, where he writes, “outright flames in this manner have made me afraid to go asleep at night and voice anything concerning Israel in public”.
My disappointment to these reactions is tempered only by this: the lack of voices in response to this one-sided hatred is exactly why Matt Nestler ’10 and I created the Pro Israel Advocacy group in the first place.
In my three years at Wesleyan, there has only been one student-group on campus addressing the conflict in Israel/Palestine. This group is called ADAPT, which stands for Awareness and Dialogue About Palestine/Israel Today. Hoping that this title suggested campus-wide education and discussion about both sides of the issue, I quickly realized that ADAPT is biased towards the Palestinian cause and does not represent a balanced
dialogue between the two perspectives. Which is fine. While I do not agree with ADAPT’s standpoints and do not attend their meetings, I adamantly respect the events they host on campus and their commitment to sharing their beliefs with Wesleyan’s student body. However, the limited scope of activism on this issue on campus creates an imbalanced conversation. Having only one group on campus means reinforcing pre established opinions and alienating those who might disagree. The Pro-Israel Advocacy group hopes to fill this hole on campus in order to promote helpful conversation for all those interested.
We know that the Israeli government is not perfect and we do not pretend to offer a group where everyone will agree with each other. But in order for fruitful discussion to really happen on this campus, shouldn’t we be allowed the freedom to express our opinions without being immediately attacked? Wesleying is not a productive medium to discuss these emotion-filled political disagreements, especially when those who comment leave their messages anonymously. If you feel passionately about these issues, please attend either our meeting or ADAPT’s—or both—so that Wesleyan can boast of a campus where these two equally legitimate opinions can be criticized, analyzed and studied productively and openly. If two student groups with differing opinions cannot be tolerated on our campus, how could we ever expect progress to be made in the Middle East?
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