NEWS; MIDDLE EAST DISCUSSION AT UNIVERSITY

The conflict is by no means new, and people are entrenched on both sides of the ideological spectrum, but Wednesday, the crowd attending the lecture by Zachary Lockman, Professor of Middle East Studies at New York University, was primarily one-sided.

The University’s new Center for Civic Engagement, alongside with The Long Island Alliance for Peaceful Alternatives and the Long Island Teachers for Human Rights has sponsored a series of lectures on the International Scene. Lockman spoke at the Gubhardt Cultural Center Theatre Wednesday on “The Israel/Palestinian Conflict.”

The Professor spoke to a near-capacity crowd at the Theatre. “I’m sure we could not get anything near a crowd of this size at NYU in the middle of a school day,” he said.

Lockman spoke from what audience members saw as a “pro-Palestinian” perspective, much to their dismay. Lockman’s speech focused mostly on historical context for current relations. “I think it is fair to say, without too much exaggeration, at this moment in time, relations between Israelis and Palestinians are in one of the worst states that they have been in quite a long time,” he said. “There have been few periods that have been more difficult than the present.”

After the lecture, there was time for questions, which most used as time for comments and speeches, with one person even accusing the University of bias because there was not an opposing voice onstage. “Why not have someone here debate this gentleman’s obvious pro-Palestinian biased presentation?” he asked.

University professors responded. “The University is a place for a variety of different points of view,” one said. “You should listen here respectfully.”

Lockman said the Arabs see hypocrisy in US-Israeli policy concerning the Palestinians, and by extension, Iran. “The US and Israel have said there are preconditions: you have to do x, y and z,” he said. “The Palestinians don’t get to impose preconditions on Israel; they don’t get to say, ‘I’m sorry, we won’t negotiate with you until you recognize the right to a Palestinian state and you let all the refugees back.’”

"To impose preconditions on one side, and not the other side, seems to me a recipe for continued violence,” Lockman said.

Lockman saw more hypocrisy in a boycott of talks by Israelis. “This boycott has been justified on the grounds that Hamas refuses to recognize Israel, and refuses to renounce the use of violence against Israel,” he said. “There is a little bit of an irony here…because Israel has refused to recognize the right of the Palestinians to a state of their own, and Israel has certainly never renounced violence.”

Lockman attributed this phenomenon part of the reason for Hamas’ electoral success in the most recent Palestinian legislative elections. “Hamas is an Islamist party, it advocates a properly Muslim state in Palestine,” he said. “A lot of Palestinians voted for it who didn’t share its view of religion in politics…Hamas said we will negotiate, but only as equals.”

Lockman sees the impending death of the moderate Kadima party, a coalition of officials from the Labor and Likud parties, which former Prime Minister Sharon founded before a stroke left him in a coma. “There is a sense of real unhappiness of the political class,” he said. “With [Sharon] gone, with much less competent politicians in charge and with the, sort of, collapse of [the platform of ‘unilateral disengagement,’] what is the basis for this party?"