Speaker Flaps in Greenwich & BC

In Greenwich, CT, the library reversed its decision to cancel two mid-February talks by pro-Palestinian speaker Alison Weir. The Greenwich Library's meeting room was booked by a local resident who belongs to the group If Americans Knew, which argues that the U.S. media and foreign policy are unfairly tilted toward Israel.

After an advertisement promoting Weir's presentations was published February 8 in the Greenwich Time, some residents complained, Board of Trustees president Roberta Denning told the newspaper, adding that the board and the administration agreed that the two talks would be “offensive to public sensitivity.”

On February 12, supporters of Weir placed an advertisement in the Time, charging, “Greenwich Library Censors Free Speech.” The next day Weir met with library officials, and, on the advice of lawyers, the library decided to reverse course.

Given the local controversy, Weir's presentations were moved from a meeting room that holds about 80 people to the 368-seat Cole Auditorium. Indeed, the first session drew a large crowd. While “the presentation began on a cordial note, by the time she finished, discord began bubbling in the room,” the Time reported, noting that several audience members loudly disputed her account of the conflict in the Middle East. New York Times columnist Peter Applebome called it “a skilled presentation” that “mixed fact, purported fact, and advocacy.”

Depending on whom you ask, the Vancouver Public Library (VPL), BC, has been taking freedom of expression seriously by welcoming a harsh critic of Israel or giving an undeserved platform to an author who calls Israel's actions “a war crime on a par with the Nazi persecution of Jews.” On February 25, VPL's central library was to have held an event in conjunction with Freedom To Read week, hosting local journalist and commentator Greg Felton, author of The Host and the Parasite: How Israel's Fifth Column Consumed America (Dandelion, 2007).

The book was not reviewed by any mainstream media and, according to WorldCat, was held by only five libraries in the United States and none in Canada, though VPL had five on order. The controversy was fueled by a February 12 op-ed piece in the Vancouver Sun by local author Terry Glavin, headlined, “Does our library know there's another word for anti-Semitism?” Glavin asked, “What is the right word for Felton's thesis, which is that a Zionist 'junta' was at work on Sept. 11, 2001...?”

City librarian Paul Whitney responded to the piece in a letter to the Sun: “In reviewing Felton's request to read at the library, it appeared to us that his book was provocative...[but not] subject to any legal action.... The role of the public library, however, is to provide a forum for an open and public exchange of contradictory views and to make materials available that represent a wide range of views, including those that may be considered unconventional, unpopular or unacceptable.”

Library spokeswoman Jean Kavanagh told LJ the library has spoken to groups requesting the opportunity to present a different perspective. “We have told them we are happy to schedule additional programming.”