Anti-Israel speaker challenged at library

A first person account

By Michael Orbach

Issue of March 20, 2009 / 24 Adar 5769

Only during the question-and-answer session that followed an otherwise unimpressive anti-Israel lecture at the Hewlett-Woodmere Public Library did things get interesting — so much so that the president of the library’s board of trustees, Ben Eilbott, who had held his head in his hands for most of the lecture, threatened to shut down the auditorium.

The speaker was Mindy Gershon, a member of United for Peace and Justice, a fringe left-wing coalition whose mission statement includes “Ending apartheid and apartheid policies in Israel.” She was invited by the Five Towns Forum, which bills itself as the oldest progressive organization on Long Island.

As speakers go, Gershon was poor fare. She stumbled through a presentation of rote anti-Israel propaganda that was peppered with terms like “colonizers” and “apartheid,” and marred by technical glitches. Offering little in the way of coherent arguments or proposed solutions, she instead relied on virulent tropes and clips from Al Jazeera (in one memorable YouTube clip showcasing non-violent Palestinian tactics, a non-violent protestor used a slingshot on a civilian).

There was an easy distinction between the two different groups of people in the audience: Pro-Palestinian senior citizens with either long hair or no hair, and 20 or so very angry observant Jews jumping out of their seats. During the Q and A, Gershon was struck with a barrage of questions from audience members who gleefully pointed out her errors. In the best sequence of the evening a series of particularly large factual errors was uncovered and Gershon admitted that she “was not a historian.”

“Then why are you here?” someone yelled from the back.

Alan Dorfman, president of the Five Towns Forum, struggled to maintain control of the crowd, pleading in Yiddish to no avail for people to “hold their horses,” as an angry debate flared between audience members. Earlier in the evening, Dorfman shoved a reporter and used an expletive to tell him to leave. He apologized after the event; when asked for his thoughts he said the evening “could have gone better.”

Earlier in the day the event itself generated some minor outrage with calls for a protest intended to force its cancellation.

Susan de Sciora, the library director, explained outside the lecture hall that she was in a difficult position.

“We don’t support their view, but we are a public forum to meet and we don’t censor,” she said, adding that as an individual she thought that Gershon’s opinion was one sided and that any cancellation would only “give prominence to those views.”

The sentiment of the observant Jews who attended Gershon’s presentation was one of unanimous disgust.

“It was a disgrace,” said Carol Feinerman.

Ellen Duncan, a Five Towns Forum board member with an Irish accent said she was exceedingly happy to have invited Gershon, despite the controversy.

“We are in America, we have much more in common than our difference of opinion,” she asserted.

However, another view was present as well.

“You’re Jewish,” an 87-year-old woman who refused to give her name informed The Jewish Star’s star correspondent, “and you think you’re better than us.”

No ma’am, just you.