Articles


Betar, Hasbarah launch Islamic State Apartheid Week

Posted On 02/12/08
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By Atara Beck
Tribune Staff Writer

TORONTO – A growing number of local university students, under the leadership of Betar Canada and Hasbarah Fellowships, have decided that enough is enough with the ongoing Israel-bashing on campuses. They launched Islamic State Apartheid Week last Tuesday at York University. Within hours, Zionist student activist Sammy Katz had received numerous death threats via e-mail.

The goal of Islamic State Apartheid Week, according to Ben Feferman, senior campus coordinator of Hasbarah’s Canadian branch, is “to create awareness about the apartheid and human rights abuses in Islamic states. Through visual posters, videos and other interactive displays we will clearly expose the horrendous abuses that Islamic states are forcing upon their people.”

“It is reality time,” said Anita Bromberg, legal director of B’nai Brith Canada. “The distortions put forward by those supporting the anti-Israel activities on campus must be countered by the true picture of human right abuses going on throughout the Arabic Middle East. This is these activist students have had the courage to do.

The three-day event – sponsored by Betar Tagar, Hasbarah Fellowships, B’nai Brith Canada and standwithus.com – was held during the fourth annual Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) specifically to counter the extensive negative propaganda and misinformation concerning the Jewish state. The literature on Islamic apartheid was divided into four categories: Gender, sexual, political and religious.

The atmosphere was heated. Nonetheless, York security managed to prevent the situation from boiling over.

The animosity wasn’t limited to Jews and Israel. At one point, in response to the literature on display, one woman, a York student, stood on a chair and loudly proclaimed, “the reason why Islamic states don’t want gays is because they spread aids.”

In a classic they-can-dish-it-out-but-they-can’t-take-it scene, the right exercised by the Zionist students to create a table of brochures about what they perceive to be human-rights abuses in countries ruled by Islamic law didn’t sit well with the anti-Israel crowd. A couple of hundred students in support of Israeli Apartheid Week were furious, claiming the counter-display was racist and done without permission from the administration. They created a petition, encouraging students to show their “disapproval and dismay that such a blatant display of religious hatred could be allowed to take place on campus,” and stating, “this is a deliberate attempt to spew hatred and religious intolerance.”

They seemed to ignore the fact that the conspicuous anti-Israel display that recently stood for two weeks in the centre of York University’s Vari Hall was erected without the university’s permission by the Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid (CAIA), who were told to take it down and continued putting it back up in contempt of university policy (Jewish Tribune, Jan. 31, 2008).

The fact that so many Jewish students had been feeling more and more marginalized due to the numerous anti-Israel programs throughout the year, and especially last week during IAW at all three Toronto universities, didn’t seem worthy of consideration to those who continually propagandize against Israel and defend their actions by citing the principle of freedom of speech.

Some of the protestors against the Islamic State Apartheid Week display argued the facts and expressed horror that, as they saw it, the Islamic religion was under attack. Others, however, weren’t quite as civilized, including one well-known anti-Israel activist who, as usual, recognized and lashed out at this reporter, shouting obscenities.

Another person in the crowd told his friend: “I really hope things get rowdy, so I can join in and kick some of the Zionists.”

And let’s not forget the death threats.

Student Najjah Magoon was angry about the program, saying it should have targetted all human rights-abusing countries, not just Islamic ones.

“Are they pro-Burma? Are they pro-Zimbabwe?”

Regarding the anti-Islamic state display and Israeli apartheid week, he said, “Both are wrong. Targetting only Israel is also wrong.”

However, he didn’t protest at the anti-Israel display, “because I’m a Moslem. This table offends me. It’s personal to me.”

Indeed, a common complaint was that while IAW targets a nation and its policies, not a religion, the event against Islamic states targets the Islamic religion.

“We would never target Judaism,” one student asserted. Nevertheless, walking among the crowd, one could often hear statements against “the Jews.” In fact, in one e-mail Katz received stating “Death to Israel,” the sender’s address was “F**k the Jews.”
Another e-mail stated, “Death to Big Nose Israel.”

The students manning the table against the Islamic states responded that the event was not an affront to Moslems; rather, it was in protest against Islamic states that perpetuate atrocities in the name of religion.

Opinion was mixed as to the efficacy of the event. Some students felt that the only people attracted to these events are those who already have strong opinions one way or the other and that there are very few impartial spectators.

Marty Williams, an onlooker, said: “If what you wanted to do was not draw attention to the other side, it’s better not to create a scene. Very few people there were really looking for more information.”

According to the Islamic State Apartheid Week organizers, many students said they had no idea about the human rights abuses in Islamic countries and appreciated the literature.
In fact, a member of Iranian Students for Human Rights, a brand-new, grassroots group at York, said she was happy about the event and her organization would participate the next time; had she known about it earlier, she could have provided even more facts about the situation in Iran.

Orna Hollander, executive director of Betar Canada, said there’d be plenty of opportunity for that, because more of these “awareness” programs will be taking place in a few weeks.

According to Feferman, “many Jewish students told us they felt their dignity had been restored. They were tired of being the victims, of always having to defend themselves because of fear and intimidation. They were happy to be on the offence, for once. At the end of the day, we succeeded in sending out a clear message that we won’t take any more of this sitting down.”