From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Nicole Colson | The Socialist Worker, Page 2 | 10 June 2005 After more than two years in prison--much of it spent in solitary confinement--former University of South Florida professor and political activist Sami Al-Arian finally went on trial in Tampa, Fla., this week. There's little chance, however, that Al-Arian will be able to get a fair trial. Al-Arian faces counts of racketeering, conspiracy, materially aiding terrorists and dozens of other charges, along with eight co-defendants--Sameeh Hammoudeh, Hatem Fariz and Ghassan Ballut, as well as five others who are being charged in absentia--in a case that began more than a decade ago.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Joseph Massad | CounterPunch | 03 June 2005 Targeting the university is the latest mission of right-wing forces who have hijacked not only political power and political discourse in the United States but also the very vocabulary that can be used against them. The campaign of the last three years or so to attack US universities as the last bastion where a measure of freedom of thought is still protected is engineered to cancel out such freedom and ensure that scholars will not subvert the received political wisdom of the day.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Phil Baty | Times Higher Education Supplement | 03 June 2005 Moves by the US intelligence agency to place trainee spies secretly in university anthropology departments have sparked an international outcry in the discipline, writes Phil Baty. Anthropologists in the UK and elsewhere fear that the exercise by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) could damage the integrity of the discipline irreparably and even put anthropologists in the field at risk of physical harm as they lose the trust of the communities they study.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) David Green | Znet | 15 May 2005 It has become obvious during the course of this academic year (2004-05)—if it was not already—that campus advocacy of Zionist ideology and Israeli state interests is shamelessly repressive of open and respectful discourse based on high standards of evidence, argument, and morality. This repression targets basic 1st Amendment freedoms of speech, assembly, and press; academic and more general intellectual freedoms; and—most crucially—the political freedom to translate well-documented truths and carefully considered moral judgments into advocacy and activism.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Vinay Lal | Economic and Political Weekly | 7 May 2005 One element of the present dominant conservative consensus in America is aimed at rescuing the university from the nay-sayers, radicals, communists and relativists who are alleged to have taken over the American university and subverted its charter of academic freedom. There is already a movement afoot to create a 'student bill of rights' and Florida has introduced a legislation that would give students the right to sue professors who persistently introduce 'controversial matter' into the classroom.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) John Sutherland | The Guardian | 11 May 2005 Sue Blackwell is the scholar behind the AUT's academic boycott of two Israeli universities. When not draping herself in the Palestinian flag she works in the little-known field of corpus studies. But is her research any good, asks John Sutherland Fame, as Eng-Lit academics will tell you, does not go with the territory. Probably more Guardian readers can identify the drummer in Franz Ferdinand than can come up with a brace of 'world famous' Brit-lit-crit academics (Germaine Greer doesn't count).
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Ben-Dror Yemini (translated from Hebrew original) | Ma'ariv | 29 April 2005 Who was the author of the following: “Transfer is the official policy of an Israeli academic institution… transfer appeared as a proposed strategy submitted to the government by senior Labour Party ministers… transfer is openly supported by professors and media commentators. Few in Israel dare to condemn transfer.” Needless to say there is no academic institution that submitted a proposal of transfer, there are no Labour Party ministers who submitted a transfer proposal to the government and there is not one known commentator in the leading Israeli papers who supports transfer.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Meron Rapoport (interview with Ilan Pappe) | Haaretz | 6 May 2005 The shock wave that hit Israeli academia last week, in wake of the boycott declared by Britain's Association of University Teachers (AUT) against Haifa and Bar-Ilan Universities, found Dr. Ilan Pappe, the Israeli protagonist in the whole uproar, on a trip to Thailand. With his wife and two children, Pappe was climbing mountains, riding elephants and whitewater rafting.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Ariel Segal Ma’ariv (translated from the Hebrew original) | Maariv | 29 April 2005 Every year, on the eve of Passover, a cloud would hang over the festivities of the house of Israel in all its dispersions. Lunacy, cruelty comprised of the basest human drives found vent in the blood libels woven against our people. Dark abysses, rivers of blood, humiliation and torture, murder, martyrdom and expulsion.
From the www.monabaker.com archive (legacy material) Yuval Yonai, lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Haifa University | May 2005 To: Professor Ben-Arzi, University Rector Haifa University Staff Re: Severe Inaccuracies in the University’s Response to the AUT Decision Dear Ms. Whintman, I wish to protest on the many inaccuracies that have been inserted into the university’s position in regard to the AUT boycott decision. Regardless of my sympathy with the criticism of the decision, and perhaps for this very reason, I find it disturbing that the university has been carried away to demonize one of its lecturers and has twisted significant facts regarding Mr.