Zionist Conspiracy

The New Republic is a liberal American political weekly, highly
resepected. Its publisher is Martin Peretz. Peretz this week writes
about Neve Gordon's guru Norman Finkelstein.
It is here: http://www.tnr.com/blog/spine?pid=46853

Among other things, Peretz writes:

"Norman Finkelstein who, a quarter century after getting his PhD and after
having taught at Hunter and Brooklyn Colleges and New York University, is
not an assistant professor of political science at DePaul. This is a
stunning instance of downward mobility. Richly deserved. But no students
deserve to be under the tutelage of Finkelstein. His initial appointment
and now his pending designation as tenured professor have been supported
on the grounds of academic freedom. This makes an at best flawed
process--forgive the Catholic terminology--the equivalent of a papal bull.
In fact, a papal bull would encounter more discussion and objections among
faithful Catholics then Finkelstein's supporters would permit his
scholarly critics. The fact is that Finkelstein is not a scholar. He is a
nut case. There are many contentious issues in Holocaust history. But he
is a Holocaust denier. That is like denying that slavery existed in
America and that the economy of the South was based on slavery. Someone
who denied this would not get a faculty appointment, and, if he did, one
would think it much more than odd and the academics who made the
appointment either stupid or malevolent. This would not be a process that
could or should be defended on the grounds of academic freedom. An
appointment certified by a department chair and a university president may
still be intellectually preposterous. If you want to get more information
on both the Klocek and Finkelstein cases just search for them on Google,
14,000 and 900,000 citations, respectively.

Finkelstein has his own website: normanfinkelstein.com. On it he posts
vicious cartoons by Carlos Latuff. Here is one called "Dershowitz Hard at
Work...." In it, Alan Dershowitz, professor of law at Harvard, is shown
masturbating before a cartoon TV visual of destruction in Beirut, Lebanon.
This is the kind of scholarship that Finkelstein produces and with which
he associates.

I don't want to make too much of this. But I've scanned the DePaul
website. There's no one on the faculty of whom I've heard. Maybe that is a
failing of mine. Maybe there are wonderful scholars in the woodwork of the
place, so to speak. But I have heard of Norman Finkelstein, this assistant
professor at 53, and he fills me with disgust. Anyway, why do you think no
other academic institution is considering him for tenure? After all, he
has got lots of books to his name. They are junk, that's why."

Meanwhile, Norman Finkelstein is issuing new death threats to people he
dislikes on his web site. He writes:

"Isn't it time to send over Hitchens, George Packer, Tom Friiedman, Paul
Berman and all the rest of those top guns in the rear? Personally, I
hope they end up among the dead, but if it has to be among the wounded,
let's hope all their limbs (and tongues) will be amputated.
http://normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11&ar=571

Giving Yentas a Bad Name
Editor's Note: Melanie Phillips is the Phyllis Chesler of British
Zionism. Not surprisingly, this genetically-modified bovine was
prominently quoted in the recent British comic strip on
"anti-Semitism."
http://normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11&ar=565

Please write the offiecers of DePaul University, where Finkelstein is
employed, and demand that they act against this resident pseudo-academic
neo-nazi. Their names and emails appear here:
http://directory.depaul.edu/executive_officers/index.asp
SInce Finkelstein is now up for tenure, it is important that you do so at
once!

2. Leibler on the Pope:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1159193406263&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

3. Glick on Appeasement:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1159193406263&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

# posted by Steven Plaut : 6:33 AM