Proclaim you're all for free speech...as long as its the free speech you want to hear. Surprisingly, Haaretz reported this: (perhaps they didn't want to get scooped by the Jerusalem Post?)
Tel Aviv University students are hesitant to express their political views in class, lest lecturers perceived to have left-wing political views penalize them with lower grades, the head of TAU's Department of Curriculum and Instruction wrote in an internal memorandum last month. Prof. Nira Hativa's comment in the faculty memo ignited controversy among professors, with some declaring that her sentiments should not be made public.Faculty watchdog website, IsraCampus has the following to say about TAU:
Hativa wrote: "There are no small number of students of lecturers with left-wing views who complain bitterly that they are extremely offended by the presentation of materials that oppose their views, but are fearful of expressing contrary viewpoints in class, lest it harm their grades."
There is no doubt that some departments at Tel Aviv University have a disproportionate number of academics with very harsh and strong words to say about and against Israel. TAU's faculty excel in signing petitions. One of the more benign was devoted to "Academic Freedom," where Israel was condemned for its system of "checkpoints, blockades, walls and fences [that] prevent thousands of students and teachers from leading a normal academic life" in the "occupied Palestinian territories."Leftists academics dish out everything they want...from bashing the State of Israel, calling for its nullification, and demeaning the IDF soldiers who defend it. They get funding from the State of Israel in the name of free academic thought, yet TAU refuses to let anyone dare formulate and express an opinion to the right of their virulent own.
Three out of the four organizers of the petition were from TAU. Furthermore all three of them were members of the Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas. This single "institute" has all of 13 faculty and all but two of them signed this petition. Another more radical petition supporting Israelis who dodge military service garnered 9 of 13 of the members' signature. Diversity of ideology and thought is not something promoted at Tel Aviv University's Cohn Institute.
Broadening the examination of Tel Aviv University to include the Philosophy Department as a whole, whose radical Israel critique is led by Anat Matar and Anat Biletzky, will be part of this study. In addition attention will be placed on the TAU Political Science Department, whose Yoav Peled is an outspoken critic of Israel and signer of anti-Israel petitions. Peled is worth a special examination. He passes himself off as a mere critic of civil society in Israel but has claimed, "The obvious model for the transformation of the Israeli control system into a secular, democratic state is the transition experienced by South Africa." The Second Intifada, in which more than 950 Israeli civilians were killed, was an "armed rebellion." No human rights violations there. He calls Zionism a movement that was "from the 1880s to the birth of the Israeli state in 1948 was a variation of the European colonial movement." Peled also happens to be a leading member in Israel's communist party, HADASH. Peled is also a supporter of the "One-State Solution," in which Israel would cease to exist
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