Dear Jeff:

I just finished reading your critique of Noam Chomsky's positions in an e mail sent to me by Tony Saidy.

I had never paid much attention to Chomsky's writings, as I had all along assumed that he was correct and proper in his position on the Arab-Israeli conflict.

But now, upon learning that his first assumption is that Israel is simply doing what the imperial leaders in the U.S. wants them to do, I concur with you that this assumption is completely wrong.

I can tell you from personal experience that, at least in the Congress, the support Israel has in that body is based completely on political fear--fear of defeat by anyone who does not do what Israel wants done. I can also tell you that very few members of Congress--at least when I served there--have any affection for Israel or for its Lobby. What they have is contempt, but it is silenced by fear of being found out exactly how they feel. I've heard too many cloakroom conversations in which members of the Senate will voice their bitter feelings about how they're pushed around by the Lobby to think otherwise. In private one hears the dislike of Israel and the tactics of the Lobby, but not one of them is willing to risk the Lobby's animosity by making their feelings public.

Thus, I see no desire on the part of Members of Congress to further any U.S. imperial dreams by using Israel as their pit bull. The only exceptions to that rule are the feelings of Jewish members, whom, I believe, are sincere in their efforts to keep U.S. money flowing to Israel. But that minority does not a U.S. imperial policy make.

Secondly, the Lobby is quite clear in its efforts to suppress any congressional dissent from the policy of complete support for Israel which might hurt annual appropriations. Even one voice is attacked, as I was, on grounds that if Congress is completely silent on the issue, the press will have no one to quote, which effectively silences the press as well. Any journalists or editors who step out of line are quickly brought under control by well organized economic pressure against the newspaper caught sinning.

I once made a trip through the Middle East, taking with me a reporter friend who wrote for Knight-Ridder newspapers. He was writing honestly about what he saw with respect to the Palestinians and other countries bordering on Israel. The St. Paul Pioneer press executives received threats from several of their large advertisers that their advertising would be terminated if they continued publishing the journalist's articles. It's a lesson quickly learned by those who controlled the paper.

With respect to the positions of several administrations on the question of Israel, there are two things that bring them into line: One is pressure from members of Congress who bring that pressure resulting in the demands of AIPAC, and the other is the desire on the part of the President and his advisers to keep their respective political parties from crumbling under that pressure. I do not recall a single instance where any administration saw the need for Israel's military power to advance U.S. Imperial interests. In fact, as we saw in the Gulf War, Israel's involvement was detrimental to what Bush, Sr. wanted to accomplish in that war. They had, as you might remember, to suppress any Israeli assistance so that the coalition would not be destroyed by their involvement.

So far as the argument that we need to use Israel as a base for U.S. operations, I'm not aware of any U.S. bases there of any kind. The U.S. has enough military bases, and fleets, in the area to be able to handle any kind of military needs without using Israel. In fact I can't think of an instance where the U.S. would want to involve Israel militarily for fear of upsetting the current allies the U.S. has, i.e., Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. The public in those countries would not allow the monarchies to continue their alliance with the U.S. should Israel become involved.

I suppose one could argue that Bush's encouragement of Israel in the Lebanon war this summer was the result of some imperial urge, but it was merely an extension of the U.S. policy of helping Israel because of the Lobby's continual pressure. In fact, I heard not one voice of opposition to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon this summer (except Chuck Hagel). Lebanon always has been a "throw away" country so far as the congress is concerned, that is, what happens there has no effect on U.S. interests. There is no Lebanon Lobby. The same was true in 1982, when the Congress fell completely silent over the invasion that year.

I think in the heart of hearts of both members of congress and of the administrations they would prefer not to have Israel fouling things up for U.S. foreign policy, which is to keep oil flowing to the Western world to prevent an economic depression. But what our policy makers do is to juggle the Lobby's pressure on them to support Israel with keeping the oil countries from cutting off oil to the western nations. So far they've been able to do that. With the exception of King Feisal and his oil embargo, there hasn't been a Saudi leader able to stand up to U.S. policy.

So I believe that divestment, and especially cutting off U.S. aid to Israel would immediately result in Israel's giving up the West Bank and leaving the Gaza to the Palestinians. Such pressure would work, I think, because the Israeli public would be able to determine what is causing their misery and would demand that an immediate peace agreement be made with the Palestinians. It would work because of the democracy there, unlike sanctions against a dictatorship where the public could do little about changing their leaders' minds. One need only look at the objectives of the Israeli Lobby to determine how to best change their minds. The Lobby's principal objectives are to keep money flowing from the U.S. treasury to Israel, requiring a docile congress and a compliant administration. As Willie Sutton once said, "That's where the money is."

Jim Abourezk

The education foundation is a nonprofit arm of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee -- AIPAC, one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington. A 2005 National Journal survey of congressional insiders ranked AIPAC second most influential lobbying group among Democratic lawmakers and fourth among Republicans.

The pro-Israel organization made headlines in August when two of its former lobbyists were charged with conspiring to pass on national defense information to the Israeli government.

AIPAC's education foundation is the third largest private sponsor of congressional travel, having spent more than $1.5 million sending lawmakers and their staffers on trips since Jan. 1, 2000, according to a Medill News Service analysis of travel disclosure forms from 2000 through mid-August 2006. Most of the trips -- worth nearly $1.4 million -- were to Israel.

"Being on the ground in Israel, seeing the terrain, being there in person provides the perspective that one can't get from being in classrooms and reading media coverage," AIPAC spokesman Josh Block said.

Block declined to provide a full itinerary for any trip, saying AIPAC does not customarily release such agendas to the public. But he said a typical trip would include meetings with Israeli and Palestinian elected officials, academicians and journalists.

A trip three years ago included an afternoon at a Holocaust Memorial and visits with then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, then-Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and the U.S. ambassador to Israel, according to Block.

Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., who went on the trip, said that new members of Congress who accompanied him were shocked by Israel's small size.

"Many realized for the first time that their districts were bigger" than Israel, he said. "Why would Israel [ever] want to give up land? They could never see that unless they went."

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee urges lawmakers to go see what life is like for Palestinians, but generally can't afford to pay for the congressional trips, said spokesman Tony Kutayli.

"(They) are trying to frogmarch not just the whole Jewish community but the whole community in general into supporting a government which not all Israelis support, let's face it," said Vincent, who heads the university's Centre for Middle East Studies, on SBS's Dateline program last month.

This dispute over academic balance in relation to Israel has been simmering for years on Australian campuses but it is the war in Lebanon that has brought it to a flashpoint. It is a clash that raises raw and sensitive questions about the freedoms and the responsibilities of academe as well as the power of the pro-Israel lobby.

"Because of public commentaries about Israel's war in Lebanon in July, a lot of Israel's supporters thought that Israel was being unfairly attacked," Vincent tells Inquirer. "So they circled the wagons and attacked the attackers."

Danby entered the fray in August after hearing a radio interview in which Vincent called on Prime Minister John Howard to de-list Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation. It was a provocative comment to make in the heat of the Lebanon war and one that was sharply at odds with both sides of Australian politics at the time.

So Danby stood up in federal parliament and let rip: "I grieve for the state of Middle Eastern studies in Australia, and the effect that some poor judgments and poor teaching have had on policy decisions as it affects decision-making in Australia." He was joined by conservative analyst Ted Lapkin of the Australia/Israel Jewish Affairs Council, who wrote a scathing piece in Quadrant magazine saying that Australian academe was a "rogue's gallery of anti-Zionists".

This ideological row might be dismissed as an academic storm in a teacup, except Danby and Lapkin believe it could have very real implications for Australian policy in the years ahead. Danby says Australian universities are guilty of producing "endless one-sided propaganda" that "produces graduates who move into the Department of Foreign Affairs and other organs of government with a one-sided view of the conflict in the Middle East".

Lapkin is more blunt, warning: "The best and brightest of Australia's youth are exposed to virulent anti-Zionism throughout their university years. It remains to be seen what effect this indoctrination will have on the next generation of Australian leaders."

But what precisely is the basis for these claims that universities are running courses that are pro-Arab and anti-Israeli?

Danby's and Lapkin's criticisms are focused largely on the two best known Middle East study courses in the country: Vincent's Centre for Middle Eastern Studies at Macquarie and the Australian National University's Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies, directed by Amin Saikal.

Lapkin accuses Saikal of pursuing an "anti-Zionist agenda" that decrees that "Israel can do no right and the Palestinians can do no wrong". Among other things, Saikal is said to be highly critical of Israel's conduct in Lebanon while praising aspects of Iranian democracy in an Islamic context. Saikal does not dispute this, but says his criticisms of Israel in Lebanon are not unreasonable and they do not mean he is anti-Israeli.

"Most of the things we have said in terms of criticising Israel have been voiced by Israelis themselves inside Israel," he says. "But the (pro-Israel) lobby group here cannot tolerate any form of criticism whatsoever. They don't want an objective assessment of Israel in this country and if you make one then they attack you and call you anti-Semitic or anti-Zionist.

"I think at times, particularly in the wake of the Lebanese crisis, they have said some things which could be interpreted as crossing the line."

Saikal and Vincent say hostile emails have been sent to their respective university vice-chancellors calling for them to be sacked.

However, ANU vice-chancellor Ian Chubb defends Saikal, saying he has been "attacked personally ... because (his) views are unsavoury to others who have closed their mind. This is a fragile period in world relations, the very time when understanding and reason are needed to prevail over prejudice and ideology."

Danby strongly disputes suggestions that he or other pro-Israel advocates are trying to stifle free speech or otherwise censor debate on Israel and the Middle East.

"I encourage debate," he says. "It is through criticism of these courses that the public will arrive at a judgment themselves about their worth. My concern is that you are not getting a full range of opinions on campus, you are not getting a wide range of views."

Danby says undergraduate students are frustrated by what they see as a pro-Arab bias in these courses. "Undergraduates feel very disadvantaged, their lectures are often very anti-Israel and very anti-American," he says.

Vincent questions this, saying he has not received any complaints from his students about bias despite having many Jewish students in his course.

Australia's Jewish community is politically conservative - often more so than in Israel - and it has long been frustrated with the inherently left-wing bias perceived in Australian universities. It hopes that this public challenge to the nation's universities will ultimately lead to less strident criticism of Israel in academe.

But the pro-Israel lobby also risks overplaying its hand and being perceived as using bullying to impose its own agenda. Their complaints inevitably will be interpreted by some as an attempt to muzzle academic debate rather than simply encourage greater diversity of ideas on campus.

Regardless of one's views on the war in Lebanon, which ended in August, the reality is that the conflict has done great harm to Israel's international image. This will naturally be reflected in academic studies, just as it has in the media and in mainstream public opinion.

The question is to determine when such views go beyond reasoned argument and into the realm of anti-Israeli bias. The answer, like so many Middle Eastern issues, lies squarely in the eyes of the beholder.

Danby accuses Vincent of selectively inviting guest lecturers who are pro-Arab and anti-Israel. "Speakers at Macquarie University this year have included the Syrian ambassador, (left-wing journalist and author) Robert Fisk, former Australian ambassador Peter Rogers and a United Arab Emirates minister, Sheikha Lubna al-Qassimi," Danby says. "All of these people seem to be putting only one side of the debate."

Vincent argues that his speakers have included "a variety of Israelis who are very much in tune with current Israeli thinking". He says that earlier this year he invited Israeli's ambassador in Canberra to speak but the offer was never taken up.

But Vincent has been under growing pressure since NSW schools last year dropped a simulation exercise devised by his centre after parents complained it was creating racial tension and painted terrorists in a sympathetic light. Parents alleged the exercise, in which students played Arabs and Israelis, gave positive descriptions of groups such as Hamas's Qassam Brigades and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad without telling students that the groups were listed terrorist organisations.

Tertiary students who take Vincent's course Introduction to Middle East Politics are also asked questions that some may consider loaded against Israeli and US policy in the Middle East. These include: "Israel is sometimes accused of intransigence, why is this?"; "Should local opposition to (a democratic Iraq) be dismissed as terrorism?"; and "What is the neo-conservative agenda, and is it still in place in President Bush's second term?"

Yet the same questionnaire also asks: "Do the governments of the Arab world lack legitimacy? Why?"

Vincent fears that this debate, if unchecked, could take Australia down the path of the US, where an aggressive website called Campus Watch asks students to expose academics who they believe are anti-Israel.

The website, run by influential Israel supporter Daniel Pipes, admits that it pays special attention to those academics who are up for tenure or promotion. "Campus Watch is frightening," Vincent says. "I am sure some people in Australia would like to have Campus Watch here."

But Danby distances himself from Campus Watch, saying there is no parallel with that organisation and the present debate in Australia. "We need to have a balanced view on the issue of the Middle East. As pressure has been on the ABC (not to show bias), so should it be on these faculties of Middle Eastern studies."

More than 800 people attended the Summit, Jews and non-Jews, including 100 student activists and several state and national legislators.

Featured speakers included Jerusalem Post Editor David Horovitz, David Makovsky of the Washington Institute's Project on the Middle East Peace Process, The New Republic Contributing Editor and Shalem Center Fellow Michael Oren, Columbia University political science professor Jonathan Adelman, and AIPAC Director of Research and Information Rafi Danziger.

Political strategists taking part in the Summit included Dan Senor, a former senior advisor to L. Paul Bremer III when he was the U.S. presidential envoy in Iraq, and Washington Institute Executive Director Robert Satloff, an expert on Arab and Islamic politics and U.S. Middle East policy.

Top Israeli military leaders also took part in the AIPAC Summit. They included Baruch Spiegel, a retired Israel Defense Force reserve brigadier general, and Maj. Gen. (Res.) Eitan Ben-Eliahu, former commander of the Israeli Air Force.

Among such stimulating company, it was no less exciting for me to learn alongside Rosenberg and his activist student community.

Describing his experience at the Summit, the University of Oregon junior who is majoring in political science and music said, "It was inspiring to see so many concerned community activists with full-time jobs, families and massive responsibilities who dedicate so much of their energy and resources to insure that the U.S.-Israel relationship is strong."

Rosenberg, the son of former Congregation Shaarie Torah Rabbi David Rosenberg, calls Portland his hometown and describes himself as a pro-Israel activist on the UO campus where he is a member of the student Senate. He worked as an AIPAC intern last summer. He said that the Israel lobby "consistently invests and trains the next generation of campaigners and leaders."

Rosenberg, who currently also works as the Harold Grinspoon Foundation intern at Oregon Hillel on the UO campus, said he was impressed by AIPAC's broadly diverse character.

"University student body presidents, dedicated Jewish and non-Jewish activists, students from historically black colleges and conservative Christian schools-AIPAC is strictly bipartisan," said Rosenberg, "appealing equally to Democratic, Republican and independent activists."

There were dozens of panel discussions and forums addressing a wide array of U.S.-Israel issues from which participants could choose. Topics included Israel's war on terror, Syria and Iran's role in fostering instability in the Middle East, Iran's pursuit of a nuclear bomb, and the future of Israeli-Palestinian Relations.

The Summit's strategic message was punctuated by voices of courage and resistance.

Haifa's police chief recounted the coordination of 1,000 emergency responders during the recent 33 days of Hezbollah rocket attacks against northern Israel.

The chief shared a haunting memory from the war with Hezbollah. He watched, he said, as a woman in a car in front of him stopped and leapt from her vehicle with her baby in her arms. She lay flat on the pavement over her infant to protect it from the rockets.

Participants from all across the political spectrum and from all walks of life were told of the everyday heroism of Israelis and of the one million of them who were forced to flee south, away from this summer's fighting and into the welcoming arms and homes of fellow Israelis.

I will never forget Jonathan Freedland's address. An American attorney living in Israel, he spoke of Haifa as the jewel of Arab-Israeli coexistence, a hopeful band which Hezbollah's relentless barrage of rockets this summer could not destroy.

Freedland's closing comments still echo in my head, "Haifa," he said, "is one place where Jews and Arabs succeeded together."

As AIPAC teaches and trains activists for the future, it fortifies the strategic partnership between the United States and Israel. The counterpoint here is that Hezbollah will never be allowed to tear apart the fabric of this threaded, pluralistic relationship in Israel.

In a final prophetic statement Freedland said, "Haifa survived once again. And never forget, America, that this war was for all of us; and Israel is the front line. Remember that Israel is showing you now where the rocks and shoals lie."

I hope that many others will join Jonathan and me in this fascinating and vitally necessary endeavor to keep Israel safe.

Doing this will sustain our homeland's beacon of freedom and democracy for our children and ourselves. This is AIPAC's steadfast commitment and mission.

Sharon Ungerleider is a writer in Eugene.

At issue are two key congressional perks, targeted for elimination, that Jewish organizations rely on to achieve community goals: overseas junkets, including dozens of trips to Israel each year, funded by Jewish organizations; and an estimated $25 million a year in earmarked funds for Jewish communal projects. Both the trips and the earmarked funding face possible elimination as part of the Democrats' pledge to fight corruption on Capitol Hill.

Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi has said she plans to bring up the ethics reform legislation "within the first 100 hours of the 110th Congress," which will begin its session in January 2007. Activists with several Jewish and pro-Israel groups said they will be working in the coming weeks to head off or soften the specific measures they fear most.

With 41% of voters pointing in exit polls to corruption and scandals as an "extremely important" factor in how they voted last month, the Democratic victory is widely seen as a call for an overhaul of congressional ethical standards.

Most of the ethics reform measures being considered are described as lessons learned from the investigation of disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, which revealed a widespread culture of lawmakers accepting free gifts, lavish tours and personal favors in return for their votes.

Democrats are now debating the exact language of ethics reform legislation. The most sweeping proposals call for the establishment of an independent committee to oversee congressional ethics issues. More modest versions would seek only minor changes in the existing rules. Congressional sources predicted this week that in either case, the legislation will include curbs on gifts and trips sponsored by lobbying groups, limitations on earmarked spending and greater transparency in campaign finance.

Jewish groups, though supportive of most measures, are concerned about two aspects of the reform: the ban on privately funded congressional travel, and the limitations on earmarks. Both measures might - depending on the final language adopted - restrict actions of Jewish and pro-Israel groups on Capitol Hill.

All-expense-paid tours to Israel are among the most common overseas trips made by members of Congress and their aides. Watchdog groups, using data from congressional filings, have reported that Israel is the leading destination for privately sponsored congressional trips. In the years 2000 to 2005, 164 of the 1,922 overseas congressional visits were to Israel. In the past year, 62 Congress members and staffers visited Israel on trips funded by pro-Israel and Jewish groups. Most of the junkets are sponsored by the main pro-Israel lobbying group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, through its sister organization, the American Israel Education Foundation. The foundation is the second-largest sponsor of overseas trips.

Other Jewish groups sending lawmakers and their aides to Israel include United Jewish Communities, the national association of federated Jewish philanthropies. UJC operates through local federations and their affiliated community-relations committees.

The best-known political visit to Israel is probably that of President Bush in 1998, while he was governor of Texas. During the visit, which was funded by the Republican Jewish Coalition, Bush was taken on a helicopter ride over Israel and the West Bank with Ariel Sharon as his tour guide. The president has since mentioned this visit in many speeches on Middle East policy and in meetings with the Jewish community.

Jewish groups are now lobbying Congress to make sure that educational trips, such as those to Israel, be allowed to continue even under the new restrictions being considered. "Trips to Israel sponsored by the American Israel Education Foundation have long been considered among the most substantive, educational and valuable trips available for members of Congress," Aipac spokesman Josh Block said. "While in Israel, members have the opportunity to meet with both Israeli and Palestinian officials, academics, journalists, elected officials, hearing from speakers representing diverse views across the political spectrum, and get a personal, firsthand view of issues of great importance to American policy in the Middle East."

Aipac is one of the few lobbying groups that had enacted full disclosure of trip information even before Congress made this disclosure mandatory.

Officials from several Jewish organizations have been holding intense talks with Democratic staffers over the past week to ensure that Israel educational trips will be exempt from the new restrictions, but several sources said it is too early to determine where the Democrats are heading with the legislation. "I believe that we can draft some language that keeps bona fide educational trips kosher and makes boondoggles trayf," said William Daroff, chief Washington representative of UJC.

But for UJC, the travel limitations are only a side issue. The charity network is more worried about another part of the ethics reform legislation, directed at congressional earmarks. These are items that lawmakers are allowed to insert into spending bills to direct federal funds toward specific projects in their districts. The earmark system has been criticized as a backdoor for pouring billions of taxpayer dollars into so-called pork-barrel projects to strengthen lawmakers' popularity among home voters, or big donors.

From an estimated $64 billion spent annually through earmarks, Jewish institutions enjoy no more than $25 million. Most of that goes to a UJC program, Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities. The program is designed to deal with graying neighborhoods or apartment complexes by financing on-site social service programs that allow elderly residents to remain in their homes.

This past year, UJC managed to get NORCs included in the Older Americans Act reauthorization bill, which could pave the way for funding the program without the need for earmarks. For now, however, a ban on earmarks will do away with funding for the program, which operates in 41 cities around the country.

Congressional sources stressed this week that a total ban on earmarks does not seem likely, due to the heavy reliance of lawmakers from both parties on them as a political vehicle. The ethics reform, however, is expected to include requirements that each earmark have the name of its individual sponsoring lawmaker attached. Drafters of this version hope that abuse of earmarks will be reduced if funding perceived as corrupt bears the name of its sponsor.

At Barnard College, Nadia Abu El-Haj, an anthropologist who is coming up for tenure, is under attack by some alumnae and pro-Israel groups for a book, published by the University of Chicago Press, that was critical of Israeli archaeology and its use in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. At Wayne State University, similar groups are pushing the university not to hire Wadie Said for a faculty position in the law school. In that case, critics of Said are attacking him and his late father, the literary theorist Edward Said, saying that both Saids' activism on behalf of the Palestinian cause has amounted to support for violent groups.

These debates follow the cancellation last month of a lecture by Tony Judt, a professor at New York University, at the Polish consulate in New York City, amid charges that the Anti-Defamation League had encouraged Polish officials to call off the talk. And in June, Yale University turned down Juan Cole, a University of Michigan professor who is a leading figure in Middle Eastern studies, for a position - after a lengthy period in which critics of Cole argued that he was not a suitable choice for the position, in part because of his criticism of Israel. And Princeton University has faced criticism over a possible hire as well.

This weekend, the Middle East Studies Association, of which Cole is the president, voted to expand the work of its academic freedom committee - which has focused on helping scholars in the Middle East - to engage in efforts on behalf of colleagues in the United States.

"The subtext of these controversies is whether it is going to be allowed for Palestinians to hold positions in academe in the United States. Is it going to be allowed for people who are not Zionists to hold positions? Is there a Zionist litmus test in the United States?" said Cole in an interview Monday. He characterized the pro-Israel groups' activities as "the privatization of McCarthyism" and said that they represented the most serious threat today to academic freedom in the United States.

Winfield Myers, director of Campus Watch, a pro-Israel group that publicizes information about professors who are critical of Israel, said that Cole and others in Middle Eastern studies are distorting what is going on and that his group respects the right of faculty members to decide academic appointments. Myers said, however, that non-academics have every right to make their views known and that Middle Eastern studies professors are trying to prevent that from happening. "It is ultimately for faculty to decide. We're not saying 'approve this guy and turn this other fellow down,' " Myers said. But he said that academics do not have the right to make these decisions in a "cocoon of silence" in which information about scholars' "politicized work" isn't well known.

The professors who are being criticized were not available for comment on the criticism, much of which is taking the form of e-mail campaigns urging alumni and others to weigh in against them with senior administrators. In the case of El-Haj, much of the criticism concerns her book Facts on the Ground: Archaeological Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society.

Material published on Campus Watch states that the book's aim is to undermine the historic connection between the Jewish people and Israel, that the critique of Israeli archaeology is poorly researched and written, and that the author's anti-Israel bias undercuts her work. The material also questions whether El-Haj knows enough about Israel and has enough mastery of Hebrew to conduct any anthropological work about Israeli society. The material includes Barnard President Judith Shapiro's e-mail address and phone number.

Wayne State President Irvin Reid has had his contact info - as well as that of Frank H. Wu, the law dean - widely distributed by those seeking to prevent Said's appointment. The Web site of the pro-Israel group Stand With Us states that Said "shares his father's views" and is "supportive of his father's legacy of 'post-colonial,' 'Orientalist' slander against Israel." Said is also criticized for his participation in the defense team of Sami Al-Arian, the former University of South Florida professor who reached a plea agreement with the government on various charges against him after a jury rejected some charges and was divided on others.

David Horowitz's magazine is also coming out against Said. (Defenders of El-Haj and Said make much of the tone of the Web sites attacking them, but some of the Web sites defending them aren't exactly subtle in their tones either. One site defending Said says "the Negro President of WSU Irvin Reid is a staunch supporter of the racist state of Israel" and that because of his "unconditional support for the settler-colonial state of Zionist Israel," he has no business running a university in Detroit, home to a large Arab-American population.)

It is unclear what impact the campaigns will have. The academic job market is tough enough that when someone doesn't get a position, there are any number of reasons that could explain that decision. Winning tenure at Barnard or a faculty position at Yale aren't easy things to do regardless of whether one is being criticized on pro-Israel Web sites. At the same time, some of those who have lost their shot at jobs - like Cole at Yale - had strong faculty backing and appeared well positioned to gain certain positions prior to the lobbying campaigns.

Wu, the law dean at Wayne State, said that lobbying administrators there will have no impact. He said that the tradition at the law school - which he supports - is that job offers come only after two-thirds of the faculty agree. Wu said he has never tried to influence the faculty vote, and would never do so - or attempt to block a candidate who gained that level of support. Wu said he feels so strongly about this principle that he does not even vote as a faculty member. "We have a celebrated tradition of shared governance and academic freedom," he said. Sending him an e-mail about Said's candidacy would have about as much impact, he said, as sending an e-mail about Said to the dean of Harvard Law School, where Said is not a candidate for anything.

If the pro-Israel groups start lobbying professors, Wu warned that the effort might backfire. He said that his faculty holds a range of views politically and that professors likely don't all agree on whether it's appropriate for members of the public to seek to influence their hiring decisions. "Some might welcome [the e-mails]. Some might be offended. Some might be so turned off by the e-mail coming in that they may be persuaded to take a position that they might not have otherwise," Wu said

Roger Bowen, general secretary of the American Association of University Professors, said flatly that outside groups do not have a role in these hiring and tenure decisions. "Non-academics and external advocacy groups should not be permitted to intrude in hiring and tenure cases in the academy, he said. "Academic freedom also requires recognition that scholars alone have the right to pass judgment on the quality of a professor's credentials. No scholar should have to be subjected to political litmus tests conjured up by partisan groups."

A Barnard spokeswoman said that the college has received around 25 letters and e-mail messages from alumnae about El-Haj. The spokeswoman said that the college would never comment on the status of a tenure review. Judith Shapiro, Barnard's president, has posted on the alumnae Web site a letter about the dispute. In her letter, Shapiro noted that a review of El-Haj's work would include outside evaluations, by experts in the field. Shapiro - a cultural anthropologist herself - did not offer an opinion on El-Haj's work. But she defended the type of work done, saying that "it is a legitimate cultural anthropological enterprise to show how archaeological research can be used for political and ideological purposes," and noted that such critiques are not unique to the Middle East.

And while Shapiro said she welcomed feedback from alumnae, she also said she wanted to share "my concern about communications and letter-writing campaigns orchestrated by people who are not as familiar with Barnard as you are, and who may not be in the best position to judge the matter at hand."

Cole said that in both the Barnard and Wayne State disputes, good scholars are having their careers unfairly maligned. (In both cases, he said that he knows their work, but isn't a personal friend.)

El-Haj is "very well respected" and the issues she raises in her work are important ones, Cole said. A long-standing concern of Palestinians, he said, is that Israeli archaeologists dig through materials that cover centuries of key developments in the region to focus on the period of ancient Israel. "Getting rid of this professor would be like replicating what she is writing about in terms of what was done on the ground," he said.

And while Cole is no critic of Edward Said, he also said it was unfair and inappropriate for people who didn't like his ideas to take that out on his son. "This shows that it's a blood feud," he said.

Ari Drissman, president of the Wayne State chapter of Students for Israel, said that there were legitimate reasons to oppose Said's appointment. Drissman said that the environment at the university is "very tense" for students who support Israel, who are barraged with anti-Israel leaflets that are "without any facts." He characterized the publicity being given to Said's background as similar to a background check done by a business before hiring a new employee.

And Myers of Campus Watch used similar language. He stressed that all the groups are doing is publicizing information, not trying to intrude on actual decisions. As for his opinion, he said that El-Haj's work is "part of an ongoing effort to delegitimize the modern Israeli state," and that Said has "some rather radical politics."

In getting out the word about these people, Myers said, his group "is not part of some effort to silence the Arab voice." Rather, he said, his group is trying to open up debate. If Middle Eastern studies scholars are offended by the work of Campus Watch, Myers said, "they aren't used to getting criticism," adding that information put out by all groups - his own included - should be open for critique.

- Scott Jaschik