The College Fix

Steven Salaita’s virulent tweets that seemingly cheer for the murder of Jews probably got his job offer yanked by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

You can argue over whether what UI did violated academic freedom, as feared by the American Association of University Professors, or protected students from an educator who showed himself unable to fairly grade students of different views, or recognized that he was simply unqualified to teach American Indian studies.

What seems beyond dispute to me is that the Israeli professor who calls himself “Israel’s Salaita” is anything like the foul-mouthed American academic.

In an interview with Inside Higher Ed, communications professor Amir Hetsroni recounts his perspective on how he got fired from Ariel University, “the only Israeli university in the occupied Palestinian territories,” and it’s not what you’re thinking:

The university has said that he was fired for posting comments on Facebook that questioned the university’s process for handling complaints of sexual harassment. The university maintains that his comments — which questioned whether allegations were always accurate — were insulting to women and inappropriate for a professor.

So right off the bat, Hetsroni sounds more like an American civil libertarian than a “blood bucket challenge” zealot.

But Hetsroni said his dismissal quickly followed two of his articles in Haaretz last month that were “highly critical of Ariel University and the government’s treatment of Palestinians” – views that he actually came to in just the past few years:

“When I started working there I was by all means not infatuated with the occupation but I did not see it as a severe problem,” he said. “My view changed because driving to work through Palestinian villages can yield only one conclusion. … We must leave these territories that are heavily populated by another nation that wants and deserves to be independent.”

Hetsroni actually sounds like a measured and thoughtful advocate for his views:

The op-eds that Hetsroni wrote (behind the Haaretz paywall) are strongly worded, in the model that one would find from American and Israeli professors with a range of views. His op-eds, however, lack the invective of Salaita’s Twitter feed. (Hetsroni is not on Twitter.) 

So why the heck is he comparing himself to a stateside academic who sounds like a bloody pagan warlord in Game of Thrones?

He said that his tone is indeed different, but that he is embracing the title of “Israel’s Salaita” because of the American professor’s fame and because “both of us are discriminated against because of our political views.”

If Hetsroni were to probe more deeply into Salaita’s situation or talk to his critics, he might hesitate to compare the situation.

It’s hard to think of any academic in America who has been fired or denied tenure for vehemently opposing Israeli policy in Palestine. It’s simply too mainstream a position in the academy. It takes a truly boneheaded gutter-mouth like Salaita to get in trouble for expressing anti-Israel views.

As The College Fix‘s Dave Huber, himself an educator, wrote:

There’s a substantial difference between having a political opinion … and gross inappropriateness. Salaita’s feelings about Israel and Jews could have been offered in a much more seemly manner; indeed they should have been, given his position.

“Tone” is not something to be treated lightly, as Hetsroni does. Tone may be the difference between telling a student she made a weak case for her argument and telling her she’s an “awful human being” solely for her political views (that’s from a real Salaita tweet).

Here’s a personal example. I got called on the carpet for a poorly made argument in a high school term paper where I defended a political position. My teacher, who by every appearance was my political opposite, correctly pointed out that my reasoning in the second half of the paper contradicted my reasoning in the first. It was an astute analysis, delivered coolly and respectfully, adult to (young) adult, and I appreciated it.

Perhaps Salaita was denied a fair hearing by the UI board last week. Maybe subjecting tweets to such scrutiny really is too close to blacklisting professors who have shown no hostility toward students of opposing views (the case of conservative Christian criminology professor Mike Adams comes to mind).

But Professor Hetsroni, if you’re reading this, please don’t sell yourself short by comparing yourself to a man who is clearly beneath your maturity level.

Greg Piper is an assistant editor at The College Fix. (@GregPiper)

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