Norman Finkelstein: DePaul University denies tenure to outspoken Holocaust academic
One of the most rancorous disputes in American academia has ended with a prominent political scientist with controversial views on Israel and anti-semitism being denied tenure at one of the country's top 10 private universities.
Norman Finkelstein, author of The Holocaust Industry, now has less than a year remaining on his contract with the political sciences department of DePaul University in Chicago. He lost his bid for a lifelong post after a four to three vote of the promotions and tenure board.
The decision came at the end of several months of wrangling, both within the Catholic university and within the wider academic and Jewish communities in the US. Mr Finkelstein has argued in his books that claims of anti-semitism are used to dampen down criticism of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians and that the Holocaust is exploited by some Jewish institutions for their own gain.
His position as a Jewish intellectual critical of Israel and of some elites within the Jewish community has prompted passionate debate on both sides.
Intellectuals such as the prolific writer Noam Chomsky and the Oxford historian Avi Shlaim have spoken out in Mr Finkelstein's favour, but others have decried him in equal measure as giving succour to anti-semitism. His most bitter opponent is Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor, who campaigned heavily to prevent tenure being granted. Soon after Mr Finkelstein applied for it, Mr Dershowitz sent DePaul faculty members a dossier of what he categorised as the "most egregious academic sins, outright lies, misquotations, and distortions" of the political scientist...
Read entire article at The Guardian
Norman Finkelstein, author of The Holocaust Industry, now has less than a year remaining on his contract with the political sciences department of DePaul University in Chicago. He lost his bid for a lifelong post after a four to three vote of the promotions and tenure board.
The decision came at the end of several months of wrangling, both within the Catholic university and within the wider academic and Jewish communities in the US. Mr Finkelstein has argued in his books that claims of anti-semitism are used to dampen down criticism of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians and that the Holocaust is exploited by some Jewish institutions for their own gain.
His position as a Jewish intellectual critical of Israel and of some elites within the Jewish community has prompted passionate debate on both sides.
Intellectuals such as the prolific writer Noam Chomsky and the Oxford historian Avi Shlaim have spoken out in Mr Finkelstein's favour, but others have decried him in equal measure as giving succour to anti-semitism. His most bitter opponent is Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor, who campaigned heavily to prevent tenure being granted. Soon after Mr Finkelstein applied for it, Mr Dershowitz sent DePaul faculty members a dossier of what he categorised as the "most egregious academic sins, outright lies, misquotations, and distortions" of the political scientist...