Censorship on Quora: A Palestine Case Study

For the past several weeks I have been co-administering with Rima Najjar, who is currently banned from Quora, two “Spaces” on Quora: “Solidarity Song,” devoted to news, information and analysis about groups in solidarity with Palestine, and “One Km to Palestine”, which covers Palestinian political, social and cultural issues. Both Spaces are dedicated to making sure that there is a Palestinian perspective to counter the Zionist voice which dominates Quora.

While I have enjoyed so much being part of this project, it has been an uphill battle.

It appears that there are several issues that converge to make it very difficult for a Palestinian voice such as Najjar’s — strong, intelligent, informed — to be heard. There is really very little “listening” on the part of the Zionist presence on Quora, but much advice about how she should moderate her opinions so that she does not offend Zionist Quorans.

On March 15, I wrote this in response to what I felt was censoring Rima’s words:

Last night 49 people died because of inflammatory speech. I’m Jewish, by the way. I am not sure how to convey facts, like ethnic cleansing, without saying the word. We have no problem saying “Holocaust,” but not ethnic cleansing. I think that all of us — businesses, educational institutions (and I am a retired professor) have a responsibility because this is not just words, but words that have led to actions. It seems to me that some messages do not get collapsed. I’ve also seen some fairly anti-Semitic, racist, and sexist answers that do not get collapsed. It is impossible to convey 49 deaths by a white supremacist in neutral language. Howard Zinn, the late historian, said that you can’t be neutral on a moving train. We all have a message, but I think sometimes some messages are more acceptable than others.

In return I got this response from Jennifer Edeburn, a “Top Writer” on Quora:

I am also Jewish, but not Zionist. And I agree that sometimes some messages are more acceptable than others. But you note that I referenced the Overton window. My point is that it is not Quora that is defining that speech as being more or less acceptable than others, but society as a whole right now. That is why it is acceptable to speak of the Holocaust as ethnic cleansing, but not to use those words in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Everyone knows that history is written by the winners. What will people say in 2000 years? We can’t know. But it’s possible, now, to express disagreement with Israel’s policies — even on Quora — in such a way that those views are heard. Other people do it.

I know that it might not sound that way, but I am truly trying to be helpful. If Rima wants to write and wants her answers to stay up, those answers must be written from the desire to help the reader understand, and not a desire to portray a certain message. They must be written using language that is as neutral as possible. If she wants to call something ethnic cleansing and expect it to stay up, then she had better find a definition of ethnic cleansing from a reputable source and show uncontestably how those actions fit the definition. To make a strong negative statement, especially against a group, it must either be the generally accepted position or it must be carefully and completely supported. Otherwise, it is a BNBR violation..

So basically what this exchange encapsulates is that Rima Najjar is being told that she cannot report facts that are going to offend Zionist writers, even if they are true. Moreover, her writing should be at such a low bar that no one has to do any research at all to figure out what she is talking about. The term “ethnic cleansing” is used often by reputable scholars such as Ilan Pappe to describe what has happened in Palestine since 1948. What is most troublesome, though, is that Najjar is also being advised to use a “neutral” voice. I am not sure how one can put a neutral spin on genocide, especially when it is happening to her people. Her story, her emotions, and her history are essentially being erased.

Below is Rima Najjar in her own words, describing why she writes on Quora:

I write on Quora because I have a strong desire to integrate Palestinian rights into the Quora universe, based on universal rights and the need for justice, equality and freedom for all people.

I sit in my corner of Quora continuously fending off a specific set of attacks and demands meant to silence my Palestinian voice.

The attacks come in the form of verbal assaults on me personally with false accusations of anti-Semitism, because Israel’s PR deliberately conflates anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism. [See: Benay Blend’s answer to What picture about Palestinians emerges on Quora from the mostly Zionist writers who dominate the list of “Most Viewed Writers in Palestinians”? ]

Then there is the stream of responses to questions that deny both my identity and my homeland; Zionists are still outrageously claiming here on Quora that there is no and never has been a Palestine and that therefore there are no Palestinians. Not only are these claims historically false, they are or ought to be considered harassment under BNBR rules on a par with denial of the Holocaust.

The demand is this: that I use the language of symmetry to describe the tragedy that has befallen me and millions of Palestinians.

To me, the demand that Najjar use “the language of symmetry” when no symmetry is inherent in the situation is the most troubling aspect of what has really amounted to censorship of the Palestinian voice on Quora, along with that of many of their supporters. For example, I am now on an “edit block” on Quora myself. The Be Nice, Be Respectful (BNBR) policy often throws out the baby with the bath water. It is also deliberately weaponized by Zionists on Quora to silence Palestinian speech, through the deployment of malicious reporting.

The result is outright erasure, as in Zionists repeating the line that Palestine does not exist (and with that saying that Najjar herself, too, does not exist or that her personal history is falsified), or it is more personal such as comments implying that she somehow misunderstands her own history, as in: “I think Rima describes it [her family’s experience] quite extensively and often in her posts. Whether what she was told, or her recollections are accurate, is another story, but at least she is polite about it.”

These comments fall precisely within the context of standard Israeli propaganda. For example, there is the persistent sophistry that there was no such thing as Palestine in 1948. And there is the insistence that the indigenous inhabitants of Palestine left their homeland voluntarily and, by that action, somehow forfeited it. Indeed, on the Space “Palestine Today”, Rebecca Sealfon describes diaspora Palestinians as “expats”. No, expats are individuals like Hemmingway, who left the United States in search of a more hospitable home in Paris. Palestinians are no more expats than slaves were immigrants; the former were forced to flee their homes, the latter were kidnapped from their homes and forced into slavery. But when this Zionist voice prevails, that is the information that is imparted to anyone who googles a question on Palestine. It’s a story that totally erases Palestinians’ suffering for the past 70 years.

As a Jewish person whose family had numbers on their arms, and as a human being, I deplore this kind of revisionist history. It is just as offensive to me as Holocaust denial. Each comes from the same place, the desire to erase the history of the other, so that they no longer exist.

It is unfortunate that the skewed and bigoted view that will most likely prevail if both Rima Najjar, whose account is now banned as she details here, and I, who am currently edit-blocked, are prevented from contributing to Quora or, more precisely, are censored from countering the view that erases an entire people or from criticizing the State of Israel except within parameters of “legitimacy” defined by the oppressor, rather than the oppressed.

“Kamal Boullata originally designed the logo and layout seen in this poster in 1977 for use as a bumper sticker. It was subsequently reworked by parties unknown into a poster. His original design did not include any Hebrew text.” Palestine Poster Project