Collins’ One-Sided Viewpoint On The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

To the Editor:

I am puzzled over William A. Collins’s recent piece (“If It’s Not Censorship, Then What Is It?” The Bee, May 9, 2008) in which he describes a situation in which a group of Greenwich citizens persuaded the “poor library board” to cancel a talk presenting a one-sided viewpoint on the controversial Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Due to pressure from another group of citizens, the talk was rescheduled. What is puzzling is why this classifies as censorship. When interest groups argue their case and the majority rules, this is democracy in action. Mr Collins seems to believe that censorship has taken place and, from his beginning quote and the tenor of his piece, he seems to attribute it to the “Israeli press.” I began to wonder if Mr Collins was channeling Nixon’s infamous tapes accusing Jews of controlling the media.

“The press” is a term oft used today. There are problems about what “the press” feeds us. While there may be Jews who are influential in disseminating information, several influential and powerful names, none of them Jewish, come to mind when free-associating the term “the press”, including Rupert Murdoch of Fox News, Reuters (now Thomson Reuters), a large company publicly traded on the stock exchanges and answerable to hundreds of thousand of stockholders, Warren Buffet (Disney’s largest investor), or Bill Gates (an investor in DreamWorks and MSNBC.)

I recall several recent media pieces that have been critical of Israel. The British press, particularly the BBC and the Guardian newspaper, seem to publish more pieces favorable to the Palestinians than the Israelis. This, by the way, does not prompt me to posit a conspiracy or to say that the Palestinians control the media! Accusing someone who disagrees with you of campaigning against you leads to carrying out a campaign oneself, as Mr Collins seems to have decided to do.

The situation in Israel is complex and, although I have visited the country several times and met with both Israeli Arabs and Jews and also with an inter-ministerial panel on a subject other that religion or territory, I would not presume to offer in print an analysis of the political and human situation. Mr Collins on the other hand seems quite comfortable making the reductio ad absurdum that a group of Israelis has got together to control what the entire world hears about the area. This is frighteningly reminiscent of what Hitler was fond of saying leading up to World War II.

Mr Collins’s suggestion that the result of this supposed censorship of the press by Israel is “to invade” and put “horrid Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims, Iraqis, Shiites, Sunnis, and Iranians” “in their place” is scurrilous. Whether we should or should not have invaded Iraq is a question for another day, but to blame Israel for it is downright dishonest and inflammatory.

Fortunately there are reasonable people on both sides of this divide working together for peace. Mr Collins would do well to get out of the way and let them do just that.

Marjorie Cramer, MD

38 Huntingtown Road, Newtown                                   May 14, 2008