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Organizers try to keep debate temperature low

By: Adam Wazny

Posted: 03/10/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

On the front lines, the conversation is filled with persecution and hate, underlined with a deep-rooted passion in separate beliefs of what is fair and balanced.That's what makes dissecting Israel as an apartheid state such a delicate topic in Canada, as that same passion bubbles to the surface on both sides of the debate.

Loose understandings of anti-Semitism get thrown around. The pro-Palestinian faction fights that fire with accusations of their own. Suddenly, like a missile attack on an unsuspecting neighbourhood on either side of the boundary, the conversation crumbles into a fiery series of insults and rhetoric.

It was that scenario organizers of Israel Apartheid Week were trying to avoid at the University of Manitoba on Tuesday.

"There are some deeply held opinions and a lot of deep identifications, so even if people start to see issues they may never have acknowledged before, it's tough to move past those (previous) assumptions," said IAW organizer Brian Latour.

"Some people get defensive, some people get angry... and that's when things start to deteriorate."

That's not to say Tuesday's panel discussion on Israel and where it falls into the definition of apartheid wasn't without the emotion that's often associated with the Israeli-Palestinian dichotomy.

Looking past apartheid as a "negative buzz word," presenters said they tried to get their message across without banging their fists on the table.

"I wanted to look at the definition objectively and not use it to incite emotions or use it as an insult," panelist Omar Zulfi said. "I want people to take a look at what apartheid was according to the international community and if it could actually fit in terms of Israel and Palestine.

"I just hoped the talk opened some eyes on both sides."

Once the panel, which consisted of Zulfi, Bassam Hozaima and Mordecai Briemberg, gave their presentations, a few of the 70 people on hand expressed differing opinions on the issue. Their voices were met with an honest response from the panel, who tried to maintain a semblance of decorum when things escalated slightly.

"We did not try to create arguments, we hoped to start the discussion," Hozaima said.

Organizers say IAW promotes both boycotts of, and sanctions against, Israel, accusing it of being an apartheid state, but they do not target Israeli citizens or Jewish people as individuals.

adam.wazny@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition March 10, 2010 B2

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