Global Journal of Human Social Science, G: Linguistics and Education, Volume 21 Issue 14

someone possessing a Phd – should be able to see that Word Crimes had nothing to do with elections in either Israel or the United States or with government policies formed in either country. Not to put too fine a point on all of the allegations undergirding this controversy, they are as false as they are hollow. The problem of narratives about Israel and the Conflict is that they angrily feed off one another, as symbols grasped by partisans for one cause or another. Word Crimes argues for an alternative–not a consensus on causes or resolutions–but rather for a reasoned dialogue about these differences and a serious probing of concrete evidence. Imagine, if you can, a response to the publication offering an analysis of the conceptual or empirical flaws of the overall argument or of one or another of the specific essays instead of the assault on the academic status of the Journal and on the intellectual integrity of those involved in this special issue. Needless to say, a more cordial exchange could have produced a more reasoned testing of arguments. In a genuine academic community, intellectuals do not try to silence or ‘troll’ one another but rather to talk despite their differences even with no other aim than to display the grounds of their diversity. IV. C onclusion If Word Crimes is so obviously a flawed project, it could easily have been ignored or criticised. Instead it has been cast into what Gershon Shafir calls ‘the current Israeli context in which academic and artistic freedom are besieged … . [and where] Israel today is on an accelerating course of undermining the protections of its democracy within the Green Line and is one of the many countries turning into illiberal democracies.’ Shafir goes on to argue that ‘the term “word crimes” doesn’t stand alone but is of a piece with the proposed code of ethics and law for loyalty in culture .’ 13 There is every reason to believe Gershon Shafir represents the views of the people who resigned from the Journal’s Editorial Board since they were happy to accept his offer to edit another Special Issue of Israel Studies devoted to a critique of Word Crimes . But if Word Crimes can only be grasped in the context of political developments in Israel, then it seems only fair to mention that the past two presidents of the Association for Israel Studies [and coincidentally one general editor of the Journal and one of the Special Issue] wrote letters raising objections to the passage of the Ethics Code and the Entry Law. Leaving aside the uncomfortable fact that there is no material connection between Word Crimes contributors and these particular policies, we must ask what is achieved by joining them together and explaining one as a manifestation of the larger forces animating the other? At the very least, to assume everything a function of politics clarifies the stakes for the academy. On the one hand, there is an orthodoxy on politics as well as on language illustrated by Gershon Shafir’s critique, and on the other, as demonstrated in Word Crimes , a commitment to open inquiry with nothing above or outside of the range for investigation and where no vocabulary is absolutely sovereign. Words can always be tested to determine whether they expand or contract knowledge? And while the feelings stirred up by the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis are so deeply held that, examining it without taking sides is difficult, if the terrible toll exacted by this hundred years’ war commands only political advocacy, then the academy, itself, is likely to become one of its casualties. Disclosure statement No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s). N otes 1. The online Journal Fathom stands as an exception publishing a long review of the issue by Cary Nelson [May 2019] followed by a symposium including an essay by Gershon Shafir explaining his objects and responses from editors and contributors to Shafir’s essay [July 2019]. Tobin’s article, “Is There Room In The Academy for Honest Scholarship on Israel?”, in Jewish News Service on May 17, 2019 is also an example of reporting that shows understanding of the academic process. 2. See Plato, Republic , Book VIII; Arendt, Origins of Totalitarianism ; and Orwell, 1984 . 3. Later repeated in newspaper articles. See Jonathan Tobin, op. cit. 4. Shafir, Land, Labour and The Origins of the Israeli- Palestinian . 5. Moses, ed., Empire, Colony, and Subaltern Resistance . 6. Arie Dubnov, Max Ticktin Chair of Israel Studies, Associate Professor of History, The George Washington University, ventilated many of the concerns about the Special Issue in emails and on his Facebook page where he provided links to the petitions and stoked the anger while spreading misinformation. In one of his emails, he wrote that because of the damage done by the Special Issue ‘to the institutional reputation of the AIS and even to the field of Israel Studies more generally,’ he decided to reject the Young Scholar Award – a joint AIS-Israel Institute prize. He apparently never gave much thought to the collateral damage such a public rejection might inflict on future funding for other academicians. He also refused an invitation to serve on AIS’s Board because of what he incorrectly called the organisation’s ‘sponsorship’ of the Journal. Claiming to be a firm believer in rigorous empirically based scholarship, he went on to accuse the past and current AIS Presidents of some sort of cabal in service of Israeli propaganda © 2021 Global Journals Volume XXI Issue XIV Version I 42 ( G ) Global Journal of Human Social Science - Year 2021 The Gatekeepers