You Gotta Fight For Your Right to Celebrate the Mass Murder of Jews
You Gotta Fight For Your Right to Celebrate the Mass Murder of Jews
A federal judge has reversed the University of Maryland’s attempt to sideline a pro-Hamas rally on the anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 massacre. That’s not surprising. Having first approved the Students for Justice in Palestine event, the school left itself open to the accusation that the cancellation was viewpoint-based, not rules-based—and since the event is taking place at a public university, constitutional free-speech protections come into play in a way they would not at a private institution.
Ironically, the judge, Peter Messitte, did everyone a favor in his written decision simply by describing the plans of Students for Justice in Palestine and its supporters. They come off as despicable gremlins.
Messitte wrote that “even if pro-Israel groups see October 7 as somehow sacrosanct, it is at least fair argument for pro-Palestine groups to see the date as sacrosanct as well, symbolic of what they believe is Palestine’s longstanding fight for the liberation of Gaza.”
Indeed: Oct. 7 was the day of the pogrom-style barbarism against Israelis—and that is why it has become an important marker for anti-Zionists. They want to commemorate, indeed celebrate, the Palestinian attack on Israel (“fight for the liberation”).
The University of Maryland had initially tried to clear that day of all student rallies and said the Klan-like march could take place any other day. But the judge agreed with SJP’s argument that Oct. 7 was the only appropriate date for the specific message SJP wanted to deliver: “No other date, as SJP sees it, can make the point of their mission quite as forcefully as October 7.”
The judge also acknowledges that the date chosen “is in effect, in the view of many, a deliberate misappropriation of a date of deep tragedy for Israel.” To that end, he bolsters his ruling in favor of SJP with an appropriate precedent: the Westboro Baptist Church.
WBC was the hate group that picketed the funerals of US soldiers and even the victims of school shootings on the conceit that the deaths were punishment from God for this country’s toleration of gay people and other supposed moral infractions. In 2006 the group protested at the funeral of a Marine named Matthew Snyder. Among the signs held by group members at the demonstration: “Thank God for 9/11”; “Thank God for IEDs”; “Priests Rape Boys”; and the group’s most infamous, “God Hates F-gs.”
Snyder’s family sued Phelps in a Maryland court and won $10 million in damages. But the judgment didn’t stand. “Despite the outrageous words in that case,” Messitte explained, “the Fourth Circuit reversed the trial court’s judgment” and that reversal was upheld by the US Supreme Court.
It isn’t a perfect comparison, of course: though the anti-Americanism and homophobia are also foundational views of Hamas, the Westboro Baptist Church is far smaller and less inclined to violent confrontation than the constellation of vile campus freaks titillated by the murder and sexual torture of Jews.
And that’s the most important lesson of this whole affair. American universities are full of psychopaths both in the student body and often in the professoriate (and sometimes administration). These psychopaths have rights, and the court believes the school is violating those rights. And the judge found that the violation of their rights happened not to protect Jews but to protect the school.
He notes that the school admitted it possesses the resources to uphold a reasonable expectation of safety for all students on the day of the rally. Which means Maryland can protect its Jewish students whether the rally goes forth or not. We’ll find out whether it choosesto protect those students soon enough.
According to reports, there were seven protesters at the Westboro Baptist Church’s picketing of Snyder’s funeral. The attendance at SJP events vary, but all of them are way more popular than that. And, of course, SJP isn’t the only group that rabidly demonstrates in favor of Jew-killers.
The problem these universities face can’t be solved by a federal judge. They attract evil people by the thousands. SJP wants to hold this rally not despite the pain it causes Jews on campus but because of that pain. Its leaders don’t want to wait a day to hold the rally because while any other day could mark the war, no other day could mark the murder and mayhem of Oct. 7. The day is important to them because the massacre of Jews is important to them. And they are willing to fight for their right to make that abundantly clear to everyone.
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