March 7, 2011: It’s that time of year again on campuses

By Michael Regenstreif

I wrote in this space last issue about the protests in Egypt that ended the 30-year dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak. International news in 2011 has been dominated by the human rights and pro-democracy protests and revolutions that have been sweeping through the tyrannical, repressive regimes that dominate most of the Middle East.

As I write – on February 25 – the whole world is watching for the imminent fall of Moammar Gadhafi, the dictator of Libya and self-declared “King of Kings,” who seized power 42 years ago.

Unlike Mubarak, who finally realized the jig was up, Gadhafi, in a bizarre speech, February 22, which German Chancellor Angela Merkel characterized as a declaration of war on his own people, vowed to fight to the death. It may well come to that (if it hasn’t already by the time you read this).

Libya is currently in a state of chaos, if not civil war. Gadhafi’s forces – and, reportedly, foreign mercenaries – have killed thousands of protesters. Meanwhile, protesters have gained control of parts of the country and Libyan officials, including much of its diplomatic corps, are deserting Gadhafi like rats from a sinking ship.

With the world’s attention lately focused on the grassroots demands for democracy and freedom sweeping through Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Bahrain, Iran and other Middle Eastern and North African countries this year, campus true-believers in numerous cities around the world – including Ottawa – have been gearing up for their annual assault on what they regard as the real root of all evil in the Middle East.

Yes, it’s time again for Israel Apartheid Week (IAW).

Carleton University may have had a preview of IAW, February 17, when the CUSA (Carleton University Students Association) Council dealt with a motion in support of the international BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) movement attempting to delegitimize Israel. Specifically, the motion was a demand that the university divest from four companies involved in the Israeli economy.

According to various reports, Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA) at Carleton mobilized a group of about 100 supporters to demonstrate outside the meeting room, while the Israel Awareness Committee (IAC) sent a smaller group of about 40 students.

To make a long story short, the CUSA Council rejected the specifically anti-Israel motion in favour of another calling for the university to invest its funds ethically. When SAIA proposed an amendment calling for the divestment from firms doing business with Israel, it was ruled out of order.

That turn of events did not sit well with the SAIA demonstrators.

In a detailed account of the evening’s events posted on Facebook, IAC member Emile Scheffel wrote: “SAIA’s supporters began knocking with their fists on the doors and the walls, chanting ‘Shame’ and other indistinct slogans.

“The activists inside the room began berating CUSA executive and councillors, while those of us opposed to the SAIA motion remained relatively calm and collected … SAIA’s supporters in the hallway raised their volume and further escalated the situation.

“For a tense period of time, those who were there to oppose the SAIA motion did not feel safe leaving the room to face a screaming mob of anti-Israel activists.”

IAW is an obnoxious, wrong-headed event and is counter-productive to the efforts all people – on both sides of the Israeli/Palestinian divide – who strive and work for a peaceful, two-state solution. It’s important to counter IAW propaganda with rational arguments and truth.

We should also bear in mind that, although SAIA and other IAW groups are loud, their supporters form a tiny minority on campus.

The SAIA website, for example, proclaimed last year’s IAW in Ottawa “a huge success with more than 80 people in attendance at each of our events.” Given the number of IAW events last year, those attendance figures account for just a fraction of one per cent of the students at uOttawa and Carleton. Well over 99 per cent of this city’s university students completely ignored IAW.

In a Huffington Post blog – tinyurl.com/dershowitz-IAW – last year at IAW time, Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz debunks the myths of Israeli apartheid and suggests a Middle East Apartheid Week on university campuses that would focus on the truly apartheid-like regimes that exist in places like Saudi Arabia, Gaza, and virtually every other Arab and Muslim country in the region.

February 21, 2011: Will Egypt rise to democracy or fall to Islamism?

By Michael Regenstreif

Like most news junkies, I’ve watched many hours of television coverage and read countless news articles and commentaries about the situation that has been unfolding in Egypt since January 25, when mass protesters clamouring for democracy, and for the immediate end to President Hosni Mubarak’s three-decade-long grip on power, began to assemble in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.

Early in the protests, Mubarak vowed to finish his current term in office, but agreed not to stand for re-election in September.

This was not enough for the protesters, who remained determined not to give up as long as Mubarak remained in power. Friday, February 4 was promoted by protest organizers as Mubarak’s Day of Departure and, indeed, many media outlets that morning were predicting Mubarak would be gone by day’s end. He wasn’t.

It was widely expected that Mubarak would step down on February 10. Instead, he went on television and made a long speech in which he defiantly promised to finish his term. Suddenly, the next day, his resignation was announced, the army had assumed transitional power, and the protests in Tahrir Square, and throughout the country, turned into celebrations.

Hopefully, the process of real democratization will now begin in Egypt.

It was hard not to sympathize with the Egyptian protesters.

Mubarak was a brutal dictator these past 30 years. All of the freedoms and rights we enjoy in Western democracies like Canada, the United States and Israel were denied the Egyptians.

There was no free press, there was no free vote in elections, people faced torture and imprisonment without trial, and corruption was rampant. In a country where poverty is the norm, the Mubarak family is worth, according to estimates, upwards of $70 billion.

According to many security experts, the best hope for a positive outcome – a transition to democracy – was Mubarak’s early departure. And now that that has happened, we will watch anxiously to see how the situation develops.

The Egyptian people demonstrating in Tahrir Square seemed anxious for real democracy. Their movement did not seem to have been motivated by Islamism or anti-Zionism.

A democratic Egypt would be in Israel’s best interest and would likely maintain the state of peace – as cold as it may be – that has endured since Mubarak’s predecessor, Anwar Sadat, and Israel’s then-prime minister, Menachem Begin, signed the first Arab-Israeli peace treaty in 1979.

Israelis recognize that.

Sallai Meridor, Israel’s former ambassador to the United States, wrote in a February 10 Washington Post op-ed, “If a real democracy, committed to the values of freedom and peace, were to emerge in Egypt, Israelis would overwhelmingly support it.”

But, as I’ve written before, nothing is simple in the Middle East.

While U.S. President Barack Obama has promised the Americans will stand by Egypt as it transitions to democracy, many Israeli pundits and pro-Israel advocates have expressed deep fears that the democracy movement in Egypt could well fail and lead to a takeover by the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood.

Almost certainly, such an outcome would be disastrous for Israel and for the peace process. And, if history is any indicator, it would also be disastrous for the Egyptian people, as an Islamist regime – witness Iran since 1979 – would be undoubtedly as brutal, if not more so, as Mubarak’s long reign has been.

It is often pointed out that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. As I continue to watch the events in Egypt unfold, it is with the hope that, soon, this will no longer be the case.

Iranium revisited

The threatened protests that caused Library and Archives Canada officials to cancel the Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium on January 18 did not materialize when the film finally was shown to a sold-out audience on February 6; a much larger audience, no doubt, than the film would have attracted before the Iranian Embassy turned the screening into a major media event.

If you missed the screening, Iranium is being shown for “free online for a limited time,” at iraniumthemovie.com. Not only is it a stark reminder of the threats posed by a nuclear Iran, given the unfolding events in Egypt, it is also a warning of what can happen when a democracy movement fails.