Professors irrational criticism of Jews crosses the line

Galtung's previous commentary on Israel was indistinguishable from the general line followed by CPACS and other academics in the dubious "peace and conflict studies" discipline that he is credited with founding.

He saw no double standards whatsoever in rattling off a litany of alleged "crimes" by the Israelis -- throwing around baseless epithets such as "apartheid" to compare Israel with whatever regime is considered the most evil of its day -- while dismissing all Palestinian wrongs as "colossal mistakes" of people who are "pressed against a wall".

He gave no credence to the right of the Jewish people to self-determination, calling for a bi-national Israeli-Palestinian state. These views cross the "red lines" often cited when distinguishing between criticism of Israel that is legitimate and criticism that amounts to racial prejudice.

For example, the working definition of "anti-Semitism" from the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights provides that the ways "anti-Semitism manifests itself with regard to the state of Israel could include inter alia: denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, eg, by claiming that the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour"; "applying double standards by requiring of it a behaviour not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation"; and "drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis".

Galtung's views were in some ways less extreme than his Australian colleagues. Jake Lynch, the CPACS director with whom Galtung co-authored a book, has been working for years to prevent any of his fellow Australian academics from speaking to or interacting with any Israelis in any capacity whatsoever.

Galtung at least paid lip service to "dialogue".

Nevertheless, he has now been exposed by Norwegian journal The Humanist and Israeli newspaper Haaretz for making remarks reflecting a more "classic" variety of anti-Semitism that was prevalent long before the state of Israel came into being.

For example, Galtung made the claim that "six Jewish companies control 96 per cent of the media" in the US, including Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. While Murdoch is not Jewish, Galtung justified this with the claim that "many of the people under him are".

The 96 per cent figure is, according to Galtung, lifted from an article written by William Luther Pierce, founder of neo-Nazi group the National Alliance and one of the inspirations behind Oklahoma bomber Timothy McVeigh.

Galtung claimed that Israeli intelligence might have been behind Anders Breivik's murderous rampage last year and said it was "not a coincidence" that Jews held "influential positions" over German society when Germany was defeated in World War I and this led to "understandable" sentiment towards Jews in Nazi Germany.

He also held a seminar on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

He cited Erik Rudstrom, a Norwegian white supremacist cum conspiracy theorist, as his source to reject the established fact that the Protocols were no more than a forgery, created by Russian secret police to support 19th-century pogroms. He claimed they could be used to explain the world today.

It is incredible that Galtung could have a distinguished academic career and be awarded dozens of accolades and prizes for his work "promoting peace" while harbouring views taken directly from neo-Nazi crackpots.

It speaks volumes that he could be embraced by the "academic Left" for promoting anti-Zionist views inspired by white supremacists on the extreme Right.

Galtung is not the only person calling for an end to Israel's existence in the language of "peace" and "human rights" in a world where more explicit denial of Jewish self-determination would not be acceptable to a mainstream audience.

This is not to say that Lynch and the rest of CPACS shared Galtung's opinion about Jews; they may have naively taken Galtung at his word and been unaware of his true views.

Hopefully, these recent revelations will cause them to reflect on what exactly they have been teaching to Australian students.

Daniel Meyerowitz-Katz is a policy analyst and social media co-ordinator for the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council.