So UMBC, where I go to school, now features Israeli propaganda in the main corridor of its Commons (student union).
It takes the form of a display described by the organizers as follows:
"Inside Terrorism: The X-Ray Project is an art installation that exhibits x-rays of terror victims together with their medical accounts and personal stories; the x-rays come from two major Israeli hospitals. The exhibition personalizes and universalizes the issue of terrorism and urges the understanding that terrorism is not a legitimate tool, that it must be strongly condemned."
Funded by the David Project for Jewish Leadership and sponsored by Hillel, the project appears to exploit students' fascination with technology as well as their susceptibility to the corporate media version of events in Occupied Palestine.
A complete description of the project is here.
The David Project claims its mission is "to promote a fair and honest understanding of the Arab-Israeli conflict."
However, the 5,050 Palestinian men, women and children killed by Israeli state terror in the last few years are not represented in the exhibit. Ditto for the 49,760 wounded, and the 10,4000 detained during the same time period (source: Palestinian State Information Service). Nor is there any mention of the fact that the Israeli victims were killed in an internationally recognized liberation struggle against occupation.
The net effect is a one-sided and racist portrayal of loss as unique to Israeli side, reminescent of the slavery-era treatment of black people, whose deaths were dismissed because they were thought to be "soul-less."
An excellent letter of protest written by a good friend to the Retriever Weekly (UMBC's student newspaper), may be seen here.
I just sent my own brief letter of protest to the Retriever, and encourage others to write as well.
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