Lawyer and Democratic commentator Alan Dershowitz’s lecture at Columbia University is expected to be disrupted by protesters this week, according to student organizers.
Dershowitz, a self-described centrist liberal known for his political commentary, will be hosted Wednesday by campus group Students Supporting Israel at Columbia University. His lecture is slated to address the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, free speech, and constitutional rights and limitations, among other topics.
SSI media coordinator Ofir Dayan said tickets have been reserved by students affiliated with Justice in Palestine, Columbia University Apartheid Divest, and Jewish Voice for Peace, according to a report in the Washington Free Beacon. “They sign up in large numbers so that they can protest… [They] have an anti-normalization policy, which means they do not engage or discuss with anyone who has a different opinion,” Dayan explained.
“I am a centrist liberal who supports a two state solution,” Dershowitz, who is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog, wrote in an email to the Free Beacon. “If protesters try to stop students from hearing my centrist views it shows how afraid they are of differing perspectives. I’m confident that Columbia University will assure my physical safety and allow the students to listen to me. I invite protesters to ask me hard questions but I will not be silenced by intolerant censors, either of the extreme left or extreme right.”
In a column for the New York Daily News, Dershowitz added, “I expect that my speech will be protested not only by anti-Israel and anti-Semitic students and outsiders, but also by some radical feminists, gay rights activists, Black Lives Matter supporters and others who, under the false banner of ‘intersectionality,’ believe they must stand together against their common oppressors.”
He’s right. It’s not as though leftist student activists only protest speakers from the extreme Right. That they are increasingly motivated to disrupt, rather than engage with speakers from centrist or liberal backgrounds (such as Dershowitz or Christina Hoff Sommers) in addition to just about any mainstream conservative, shows that their tolerance stops at the boundaries of their own worldviews.
“I will defend the right of protesters to hold signs, distribute literature and communicate their disagreement with my views by brief boos or other manifestations of displeasure,” Dershowitz wrote ahead of the event. “But I will not be shouted down, silenced or frightened away.”
Emily Jashinsky is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
