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Sun 12 May 2002 14:58
by Kevin McGehee
in Coweta County, GA
[Media Ochre]
[Flyover Blogdom]
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Flyover recently included an item about a campaign on Ivy League campuses for divestment from Israel, but an indignant Harvard student has lashed out at Fox News Channel for what she describes as unbalanced coverage intent on making Harvard look bad.
In retrospect, the news item should indeed have mentioned the existence of organized opposition to the divestment campaign. Since (a) I included the item and (b) I was included on the blind-copy list of the student’s e-mail criticizing Fox News, and (c) the counter-activism described in the message is a very good sign, I include the message here. However, without being able to verify the identity and e-mail address of the sender, I’ll leave that off the blog for now—the URLs included in the message will be live and they’re what’s most important here.
Dear Fox News Channel,
I was appalled by your coverage several minutes ago of the divestment campaign at Harvard. For one thing, your report lacked even a basic notion balance.
You did not give adequate coverage to the HARVARD-MIT campaign AGAINST divestment. Why not look at Harvard-MIT justice webpage, http://harvardmitjustice.org where over 1500 (yes, one thousand five hundred) individuals affiliated with Harvard and MIT signed a petition against divestment. That includes over 154 faculty signatures. Only 117 faculty have signed on to the petition to divest (with a total of around 350 signing overall). http://harvardmitdivest.org.
As a Harvard student, and a member of the group Harvard Students for Israel (HSI), I can tell you that the campaign being waged by pro-Palestinians on this campus is miniscule compared to the number of people supporting Israel. Last week, HSI held an outdoor rally on Harvard’s campus that attracted over 300 participants. We have also gained the support of dozens of faculty members in solidarity with Israel including Alan Dershowitz, a professor at Harvard Law School. See our petition and pictures of the event at:
http://hcs.harvard.edu/~hsi/events.html
This was never covered in your report. Nor was the fact that “The Crimson,“ the Harvard University Daily, came out the day after the teach-in against the divestment campaign. http://thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=214642 You also neglected to cover the fact that the main organizers of the Noam Chomsky teach-in were located at MIT, not at Harvard. It is unfair to use the Harvard name to play up something that is not even happening at Harvard’s campus.
What would be nice of you to cover is the Op-Ed article in The Crimson written by the pro-Palestinian law student who started the divestment campaign, Faisal Chaudhry. It is a highly ignorant piece that tries to make it seem that the reason that Palestinians and Israelis do not get along is because Palestinians are “brown” and Israeli’s are “white.“ Anyone who has been to Israel recognizes that Israelis come in all colors—white Europeans, dark Middle Easterners, and black Ethiopians. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not about color!! Her Op-Ed (as is this entire divestment campaign) is just another instance of pro-Palestinian groups using rhetoric and lies to try to entice the American public. http://thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=204991.
I am sickened that your news channel, which is supposed to be fair and balanced, is so blatantly one-sided. If this is not rectified I promise to make sure that everyone I know, and everyone that is affiliated with this campus, ceases to watch your news programs, which blatantly do not live up to its promises.
I hope Fox News will apologize or otherwise make it right.
[UPDATE] On subsequent reading, the Fox News article I linked to about the divestment campaign does specifically state that the Chomsky rally was at MIT. Whether that was how it was originally or is in response to this complaint, I couldn’t say.
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