Censorship attempt at LUU sets dangerous precedent

I am beginning to wonder when those, the world over, who seek to curb free speech will ever learn that the best way, the very best way, to give prominence to a point of view is to try and suppress it. They really are shooting themselves in the foot.

Last week’s issue of Leeds Student has been the most talked about in years. The one little molehill of a line that has conjured this unwieldy mountain of comment, opinion and emotion, has probably been read more times by more eyes than anything we’ve printed since the Frank Ellis controversy of 2006.
That controversy involved an interview with a Leeds lecturer who expressed unambiguously racist sentiments. He said he was convinced “beyond any reasonable doubt there is a persistent gap in average black and white average [sic] intelligence”. No one needs to be told that this is a false and racist opinion. The issue that carried that interview was not censored and no one in any position of responsibility seriously thought it should be. The opinion was quite obviously that of an individual that the newspaper was interviewing, not an editorial stance of the newspaper. That racist individual was exposed by the interview and rightly made to resign. He had a right under free speech laws to express his ungrounded, repulsive opinion, but not to teach at a University that upholds values of equality, learning and decency.

Today’s controversy concerns interviewee Sameh Habeeb, editor of the The Palestine Telegraph, an independent newspaper founded on the back of his efforts as a citizen reporter during last year’s Gaza War. When asked whether mainstream news media outlets might have ‘a hidden agenda’, Habeeb replied: “They are certainly pro-Israeli. I think you have to ask yourself who controls the media.”

Having read this comment on Friday afternoon, LUU Communications and Internal Affairs Officer Jak Codd saw fit to order the removal of every single copy of the student newspaper from the shelves in the Union and they were not returned till Tuesday morning. He claims he was making a stand against racism.

Let us begin with the bottom line. Like Frank Ellis’ comment, Habeeb’s remark was made in an interview and is not, nor was it represented as, an editorial stance of the Leeds Student. He could have said anything within free speech laws and there would have still been no grounds for censorship. But there is so much more that was wrong with Codd’s attempt at censorship.
It’s not my place to apologise for Habeeb’s opinions. He has a right to them, and this newspaper has a right to publish them, whatever they are, as long as we make it clear that they are his individually, which we did. But it cannot have avoided people’s attention, that his comment is not actually racist. What he implied was that pro-Israeli elements – Jewish people or non-Jewish people – have a strong hand in the media.

If this is what he thinks, he thinks rightly. The pro-Israeli lobby carries a great deal of influence over global media. The American Israeli Public Affairs Committee in the USA proudly announces how it “assists the media with frequently updated briefs on important issues affecting the Middle East”. Matt Kennard, the former Leeds Student journalist who carried out the Frank Ellis interview, now a professional journalist working in America says that the pro-Israeli influence on the media is a “big, catalogued industry of lobbying that any journalist working in the area is aware of”. So far so uncontroversial.
But Jak Codd says he found the comment anti-Semitic, and some have agreed with him. This is their interpretation and they are entitled to it. In my view it is an interpretation that depends on a reading of ‘pro-Israel’, as being synonymous with ‘Jewish’; a false and dangerous reading. If the line is blurred, fewer and fewer people will be willing to make legitimate criticisms of Israeli government policy for fear of being branded anti-Semitic. No state should be sheltered from criticism and accountability. The United Nations considers Israel to be occupying Palestinian territories in Gaza and the West Bank illegally. Does that make the UN institutionally anti-Semitic?

Like all racism, anti-Semitism is loathsome and indefensible. One of the worst things about this week has been allegations, from Codd and from LUU Education Officer Mike Gladstone, that the Leeds Student has an anti-Semitic agenda, that we are “peddling anti-Semitism” to directly quote Gladstone. The allegation is so absurd that it barely merits a response, but our hand has been forced. I and everyone involved with this newspaper (and we are proud to be involved with this newspaper) regard the allegation of anti-Semitism against us as false and grossly insulting.

If you choose to interpret Mr Habeeb’s comments as anti-Semitic that is your right, though I think you are wrong. We can argue and argue and argue about it: that is what freedom of speech means. But on Friday, Jak Codd stepped in and attempted to make arguments stop by removing their forum. I think he was wrong. I think his action was an abuse of authority and a partisan attempt to silence an implied criticism of the state of Israel. I think his actions cast serious doubt over his fitness to represent all Leeds students. If you disagree with me, please say so – you’ve got a right to. Hopefully no one will try to silence you. They have no right to.

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