Boston's Decision to Ban Political Ads Is Bad for Palestinians and Israelis Alike

Opposition to Palestine Advocacy Projects advertising reflects a common misunderstanding that criticism of Israel is driven by ideology and even anti-Semitism rather than legitimate concerns about the Israeli government's policies.
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The Palestinian state flag waves in the wind with blue sky background.
The Palestinian state flag waves in the wind with blue sky background.

Last month, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) voted to ban all political advertising on Boston's public transportation system. Its decision followed a tense public meeting of the MBTA Control Board regarding an advertisement critical of Israel that Palestine Advocacy Project, of which I am president, ran in Davis Square subway station.

The MBTA had accepted and then removed a similar ad along with two others in June 2014, but agreed to restore them after the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts intervened on our behalf. The ad we chose to run in Davis Square this past month highlighted the number of Palestinian children killed by the Israeli military since 2000. This angered a number of Zionist organizations in the Boston area.

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The controversy came to a head last week at the MBTA Control Board meeting. Zionist group members insisted that the ad again be removed, claiming that the MBTA "posted on public transit a message that can incite Bostonians to hate Boston's Jews," and that it was "putting the community in danger." Some of their supporters called us self-hating Jews, anti-Semites, and ISIS supporters. The ads, we explained, are based on statistics from the United Nations and a respected Israeli human rights organization, and they criticize government institutions and their policies, not individuals or identity groups.

Opposition to Palestine Advocacy Project's advertising reflects a common misunderstanding that criticism of Israel is driven by ideology and even anti-Semitism rather than legitimate concerns about the Israeli government's policies. Israel's decades-long military occupation has had a devastating impact on Palestinians. Israel regularly demolishes the homes of Palestinians living in territory it directly controls, arrests thousands of Palestinian children each year, and permits Israeli extremists to attack Palestinian civilians. It detains Palestinians for years at a time without due process, restricts their movement within their own country, and limits their access to resources as basic as water.

This reality explains why Palestinians are so angry. Israeli intelligence agencies have concluded that despair and hopelessness over the political situation motivated many of the horrible attacks that have been reported over the last two months, according to Maj. General Herzl Halevi, head of Israeli military intelligence. Palestine Advocacy Project believes that if more Americans knew this, they would understand why continuing the occupation denies both Palestinians and Jews a peaceful future.

"Imagine that, god forbid, Tel Aviv was surrounded by a massive military power," a Palestinian friend recently said to me. "Imagine that this military built a concrete wall around the city, that it controlled all the food, medicine and building materials that entered. How long do you think it would be before the people of Tel Aviv started firing rockets at anything they could hit outside the wall?"

The ads Palestine Advocacy Project has carry particular significance for its Jewish members. We grew up as the comfortable children of Holocaust refugees and civil rights activists. We live at the awkward nexus between privilege and otherness. Our history taught us about the cunning of xenophobic nationalism, but we do not suffer from it ourselves, so we look for who does.

"Imagine," my friend continued, "if that military surrounding Tel Aviv responded to these rockets by unloading massive fire power on the people living there. I know that I would be against that," He said sadly. "I hope I would speak up."

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