On the same late September day that Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, a self-declared anti-Semite, spoke before a packed and supportive audience at Columbia University and questioned the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust, a subtler but equally pernicious anti-Semitic event was taking place on the other side of town. Titled “On Comparative Settler Colonialism,” the panel discussion at New York University (NYU) featured Wesleyan University Professor J. Kēhaulani Kauanui and Birzeit University Professor Rana Barakat. It was presented by the American Studies Program in the Department of Social Cultural Analysis and co-sponsored by the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU and the NYU Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality.
Moderated by Rutgers University Professor Jasbir Puar, infamous for resurrecting classic anti-Semitic tropes such as the medieval blood libel, participants reveled in bigotry and pseudo-intellectualism. In the spirit of classic anti-Semitism, the panelists advocated stripping the Jewish people of their indigenous history and bond to the land of Israel — leaving them, yet again, without a home. By cleverly manipulating concepts of indigeneity, sovereignty, occupation, and colonialism to fit a politicized, one-dimensional narrative based on a self-declared “anarchist” worldview, panelists distorted the region’s distant past and contemporary events alike.
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