Right-wing pundit David Horowitz was
in rare form during a tightly controlled "public speech" at the George Washington University
last Thursday night, decrying the U.S. academic Left as a hateful "lynch mob" who act as
apologists for the impending threat of the "Islamo-fascist" jihad.
As bodyguards and police loomed on stage and in the aisles, Horowitz launched into an unscripted two-hour
tirade that meandered between selective (and dubious) readings of Middle East history and pointed attacks
against those who criticized his efforts.
It was the latest permutation of Horowitz's long march as the harbinger of revolutionary knowledge
in the face of public opprobrium. And as usual, he offered up a sensational and bizarre spectacle that
appeared better suited for the U.S. tabloid talk show circuit than a forum of legitimate public debate.
During his speech, sponsored by the conservative student group Young America Foundation, Horowitz
condemned the "oppression of women in Islam," and what he perceived as the endemic "genocidal
Jew hatred" throughout the Middle East. He took aim at the "juvenile delinquents"—GWU
students—who had satirized his efforts, and said that Palestinians, through their actions, showed that
they did not want a state of their own. Horowitz also alleged that the Muslim Students Association,
which has chapters at universities across the nation, is a creation of the "Islamo-fascist jihad."
He called Lebanese Hezbollah a "Nazi party," and warned that Turkey was teetering on the
edge of becoming an Islamo-fascist state. And he described Iran as the archetype of this phenomenon.
"There is an intellectual terror in this country, which you have all seen. The president [George
W. Bush] is intimidated from using the term Islamo-fascism because it is supposed to be racist," he
told an audience of students, a majority of whom applauded his words.
"Why the term fascism? The analytical reason is simple," he said. "Probably Islamo-Nazism
is a more appropriate term."
Horowitz's conservative Freedom Center designated last week as the first "Islamo-Fascism Awareness
Week"—a time to refute "the two big lies of the political Left: that George Bush created
the war on terror and that global warming is a greater danger to Americans than the terrorist threat."
The program consisted of more than 30 events at 26 universities across the nation. Conservative pundits,
politicians, and academic and think-tank experts—including former Sen. Rick
Santorum, conservative icon Ann Coulter, and Daniel
Pipes of the Middle East Forum—delivered
speeches and spoke on panels.
Pipes is among a small group of neoconservatives who advise Republican presidential candidate Rudy
Giuliani on Middle East affairs.
College students were urged to stage sit-ins outside women's studies departments, and to distribute
pamphlets, including titles such as "Jimmy Carter's War Against the Jews." Films screened
included Islam: What the West Needs to Know. According to its description, the film "reveals
the violent, expansionary ideology of the so-called 'religion of peace' that seeks the destruction
or subjugation of other faiths, cultures, and systems of government."
But Horowitz's speech last Thursday did not reflect a coherent policy toward the perceived threat.
Instead, it overflowed with insults, sweeping generalizations, and hyperboles that were aimed at smearing
his political enemies—mostly liberals, whom he described as "leftists"—giving him ammunition
for his fundraising drives.
Horowitz focused much of his speech on the personal attacks he had received, repeatedly alluding to
violent threats, and describing the fiasco as a "national hate campaign" against him, as
if a "target had been placed on" his back.
The day earlier, he said, he was shouted down and was unable to finish a planned speech at Emory University
in Georgia. Horowitz's website, FrontPageMag.com, called the students "brownshirts," an allusion
to a Nazi paramilitary group in fascist Germany.
Horowitz sent a solicitation email to Freedom Center supporters in anticipation of the week asking
for additional contributions "toward the expenses of providing security" for speakers. Donors
of $50 or more receive two booklets—"What Americans Need to Know About Jihad," by Robert
Spencer, and "The Violent Oppression of Women in Islam," by Robert Spencer and Phyllis Chesler.
On Thursday, he appeared on stage with a large bodyguard constantly scanning the crowd. Journalists
were barred from asking any questions.
One protestor who had sneaked a banner into the theater was removed quickly by security as soon as
he stood up and unfurled it. Several heated discussions occurred in the lobby and outside the building
shortly after the event ended.
The publicity provided by the extreme rhetoric and protest incidents gets the attention of a cabal
of wealthy and powerful conservatives who in turn fund Horowitz's activities through foundations.
The Freedom Center has received more than $15 million in grants from conservative donors, according
a report from Media Transparency, an organization that monitors contributions to conservative media.
Major contributors include the John M. Olin Foundation,
a New York-based think-tank that closed its doors in 2005, and which funded major right-wing think
tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute, Heritage
Foundation, and the Hoover Institution.
Prominent conservative billionaire Richard Mellon
Scaife has poured $4.2 million into Horowitz's activities through the Sarah Scaife
Foundation, the Carthage Foundation, and the Allegheny Foundation.
Horowitz also received $6.1 million from the Lynde and Harry Bradley
Foundation, considered the country's largest and most influential right-wing foundation.
By the end of the week, "Islamo-fascism awareness" had descended into a publicity circus.
According to independent journalist Max Blumenthal, who attended Horowitz's talk on Friday at Columbia
University, Horowitz was surrounded by a group of bodyguards who almost outnumbered the amount of people
there to protest his speech. Columbia security subsequently removed the protesters from the campus.
Horowitz went on a bizarre rant—claiming that there "will never be social justice"—and launched
into a tirade about the threats from the guests on the Jerry Springer Show. He also compared
his own father, a Communist Queens schoolteacher, to Mohamed Atta, the operational leader of the 9/11
attacks.
"It was like listening to the ravings of a lunatic on a subway car," said Blumenthal. "The
only difference was that on the subway the police are there to remove the lunatic and here they were
there to protect the lunatic."
Khody Akhavi and Ali Gharib write for the Inter Press Service.
