After the Riverdale-Yonkers Ethical Culture Society cancelled a talk by New York University Professor Tony Judt, at left, a trio of Riverdalians questions whether some are trying to suppress dialogue on a controversial topic: the right of Israel to exist.

By Florence Gold,
Samuel Goldman
and Steve Siegelbaum

There is a sore and festering wound in Riverdale. Its toxicity endangers us all and thus immediate treatment is called for. It is the infection wrought by a group of self-appointed gatekeepers demanding ideological conformity on the subject of the Middle East. Its intended and immediate results, both direct and indirect, are a stifling of free and open discourse and the restriction of the exchange of ideas. It is, in short, a cynical affront to democracy itself. The only antidote for such a societal disease is, therefore, more free speech, more democracy.

About a year and a half ago The Riverdale Press ran a story which elicited a number of highly contentious responses. The topic, it should come as no surprise to anyone, was New York University Professor Tony Judt's withdrawal from his speaking engagement at Manhattan College's Holocaust Resource Center.

This action followed by several months an appearance by Mr. Judt at the Fieldston School which brought out in a few of Riverdale's self-appointed guardians of the party line on Israel, such as rabbis Avi Weiss and Steven Burton, in protest. Mr. Judt, you see, had dared to violate the 11th Commandment: "Thou shalt not criticize Israeli government policy."

In a Point of View column in The Riverdale Press, Andrew Meyers, chairman of the Fieldston School history department, stated that Mr. Judt's appearance was part of "one of the most impressive days of learning I have seen in 20 years of teaching." He went on to write, "Take my word for it - I was there. No one could oppose Professor Judt's appearance at (Manhattan College) on the basis of what he said at Fieldston last spring."

Mr. Judt's stated reason for deciding against speaking at the Holocaust Resource Center was that he was made to feel unwelcome as a guest presenter.