[Imc-radio] Response to Anti-Semitism interview

[Al Kagan]

Unfortunately, I did not have the correct e-mail address for the IMC 
Radio group until now. So I originally sent this response to Clint 
and asked him to forward it to the group.  I am now sending it again 
in its entirety just in case you haven't seen it before in its 
original form (not just Clint's extracts and his responses).  I ask 
that the entire Radio Group consider what I wrote below and respond. 
I would be happy to meet with you, and I expect David Green would 
also like to do that.  Thanks for engaging this discussion.


To the IMC Radio Group:

I imagine you have all heard about the controversy about the 
anti-Semitism segment that aired on the IMC radio program tonight. 
You have probably heard how angry I was about the way it was 
conducted and about the assumptions behind the interview. 
Fortunately, I was able to restrain myself from writing anything 
immediately, and I have now calmed down. It  would be good if you 
would read what I have to say and discuss it at one of your meetings.

I had a long talk with David Green tonight, but unfortunately he was 
not able to listen to the radio tonight.  He will get the program off 
the website.  I am also sending this message to David, and I am sure 
that both of us would be interested in further discussing these 
issues with your group at one of your meetings or in some other way.

You may know that I have advocated more news and public affairs shows 
on WEFT for a long time. I arranged an alternative media day a couple 
of years ago (with Bob McChesney's help) at the IMC where we brought 
down folks from Madison to tell us how they did it good.  I hope some 
of you were involved in that discussion.  WEFT has made some progress 
since then, and the IMC has certainly helped push the station in a 
better direction.  You will see some further brief comments on this 
in my short piece in the upcoming Public i.  I addressed the need for 
more emphasis on "alternative" as well as "community" radio. 

Sorry for the long introduction, but I wanted you to know that I have 
thought a lot about these issues.  I have always liked the 
introduction to the IMC radio program.  It makes the point very well 
that this program provides progressive alternative as well as 
community viewpoints.  One speaker goes as far as advocating 
revolution and one speaker notes the spectrum of ideas from "the top 
to the bottom."  Of course, this implies that the ideas from "the 
top" are mainstream corporate media and the ideas from "the bottom" 
are alternative viewpoints.  Because of my work schedule, I have not 
been able to listen to the program as often as I would like, but 
every time I have listened to it I have been happy to hear 
alternative progressive viewpoints. 

When I was asked to be interviewed for the anti-Semitism piece, I 
naturally assumed that there would be a progressive interviewer and 
that there would be an easy camaraderie and style in doing it.  In 
fact, I had recently been interviewed by Amy Goodman at a meeting of 
the American Library Association a couple of weeks before the IMC 
interview.  She hasn't aired that yet, and I don't know if she will. 
She interviewed several of us about pressing issues including the USA 
Patriot Act, a resolution we had put forward against the Iraq war, 
and the work we had been doing to try to  halt the destruction of 
Palestinian libraries, archives and records.  I sat and talked with 
Amy for some time before the interview about what issues she would 
raise and how we would do the interview.  So there were no surprises, 
and I felt exceedingly good about the way it came off.  I think I 
must have unconsciously thought this would be a similar experience. 
To my and David's great surprise, Ondine Gross did not follow Amy's 
method.  She refused to tell us the questions before we started. 
Ondine's first words made it clear that we were not going to agree on 
the topic at hand. Clint was doing the engineering, and he made it 
clear to us that he never said that we would be likeminded in his 
initial message asking us to do the interview.  So we started out 
with a great deal of tension, or let me say anger.  At that point I 
almost walked out but I decided not to leave David there alone in the 
lurch.  Whether or not this is justified, I felt that I had been 
mislead, and I didn't appreciate it.

After the disagreement became clear I said that my main point was 
going to be that criticizing Israel was not the same as 
anti-Semitism. It seems that Ondine refused to hear that. In my 
opinion, the point of the segment should have been to address the 
context of the anti-Semitism discussion. It is impossible to address 
anti-Semitism in the context of the peace movement unless one 
explains how the worldwide progressive movement, including in the US, 
recognizes the oppression of the Palestinian people and the need for 
a just peace in the Middle East.  And it is critical to address full 
US government support for all Israeli governments to the tune of 
billions of dollars per year to fund this oppression.  We must be 
able to explain that the problem begins in Washington and that we 
must change US foreign policy towards Israel in order to change the 
actions of the Israeli Government, and finally have a chance for a 
just solution for the Palestinian people.  It is only from this 
context, that we can describe how criticism of the government of 
Israel is not anti-Semitic.  And furthermore, criticizing these 
policies is not even anti-Israel because only a just settlement will 
secure the quality of life of all the people who live in Israel.  It 
is in fact pro-Israel to demand a just peace, and there is an Israeli 
peace movement that does just that. I support the Israeli peace 
movement whose members are recently finding themselves in jail more 
often.  The major problem with the interview was that none of this 
got expressed!

The interview went well over an hour, and I think David talked for 
more than half the time about the history of Israel and Palestine and 
the policies of the various governments.  None of this got on the 
air.  Ondine was not able to understand the critical need for this 
background information and the necessity of laying out the context of 
the discussion.

There are a couple of smaller points about the way the piece actually 
aired that I also want to mention. Alan Potash noted the virulent 
anti-Semitic letter in the Daily Illini this year.  It would have 
been nice if Ondine had also noted that I had said that the DI had no 
idea of responsible journalism and that they should never had printed 
that letter.  I had told her that I wrote a letter in response to it 
that was rejected by the DI editors.

The second point is more serious.  Ondine reads off a number of 
clearly anti-Semitic slogans found at anti-war demonstrations and 
then says that she wanted David and me to say that they had no place 
in the peace movement.  If she would have clearly asked us that 
question, we would have agreed with her.  I think this is a cheap 
shot.  Perhaps it was the adversarial nature of the interview that 
got in the way of asking clear questions and understanding the nature 
of the answers.  Instead of asking short clear questions, Ondine read 
long statements with all sorts of aspects that could have been 
addressed.  David and I found that technique untenable.  After one 
such long statement, I remember David and I looking at each other in 
frustration and then David saying that it was difficult to know where 
to start. 

So from my point of view, there was plenty wrong with this interview. 
Maybe you can discuss groundrules for future projects.  I would hope 
you would try to emulate Amy Goodman's approach. Furthermore, I hope 
that you will pick interviewers who better understand the context of 
the issues being discussed, from a point-of-view from within the 
progressive movement.  The reason that Ondine and Alan Potash are 
uncomfortable with the anti-war movement and can't find a place 
within it is because they don't understand the fundamental criticism 
of US policy towards Israel and Israel's policy towards the 
Palestinians.  They will only be able to understand the anti-war 
movement if they are ready to confront their emotional ties to 
Israel.  Only by exposing these policies will they finally realize 
that criticizing Israel is not anti-Semitic.

David and I agree that we need another IMC radio program on these 
more fundamental issues around US policy towards the Middle East and 
Israel's role in the repression of Palestinian life.  We hope you 
will agree to do one.

If we get the context right, it will be much easier to address why 
there are sometimes anti-Semitic signs at peace rallies (although I 
haven't seen one myself).  We could also then address the solutions. 
Let me add that Alan Potash's idea of creating a dialog without 
changing the fundamental policies is doomed to failure.

Many thanks,

Al Kagan

-- 


Al Kagan
African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
Africana Unit, Room 328
University of Illinois Library
1408 W. Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801, USA

tel. 217-333-6519
fax. 217-333-2214
e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu
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