JANINE ALI, JENIN YOUNES, [email protected], @
Drop Site News reports: “Court Rejects MIT Lawsuit Over Gaza Protests, Affirms Campus Free Speech.” The outlet reported that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled that “Forcing MIT to punish anti-Zionist expression would violate the First Amendment and ‘compel adherence to a preferred political viewpoint.’” The court also explicitly declined to use the much criticized International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism.
Younes is national legal director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. She is representing Janine Ali, a 73-year-old grandmother who is a “target of lawfare,” said Younes. See: “ADC to court: the Israeli flag is a political symbol, not a religious one.”
She said today: “There are differences, but the MIT case involves many of the same concepts as Ali’s case. In both, the plaintiffs are trying to use the courts to weaponize the law to attack protected speech. They are trying to prohibit protests against Israel’s actions using civil rights law. They are using different statutes, but both rely on much the same type of manipulations.”
Ali was meeting political allies including members of Jewish Voice for Peace, If Not Now and others at the Capitol when she was arrested.
Ali and Younes were recently on the Katie Halper Show. The case against Ali is being propelled by the Zionist group Betar. Halper noted that members of Betar have handed pro-Palestinian activists pagers in reference to the Israeli terrorist attack in Lebanon, she also noted that they are designated a hate group — even by the pro-Israeli ADL.
Still, Younes notes: “The Trump administration takes their cues from Betar. They have actual political power, The administration is actually taking their cues on who to target for deportation from this group.”
Ali says she was falsely accused of ripping an Israeli flag away from a member of Betar at the Capitol.
Younes — who was recently profiled for her consistent work on the First Amendment in the Washington Post — said: “This is a quintessential example of lawfare. I believe Ali will be vindicated ultimately. What this is essentially doing is trying to silence pro-Palestinian activism.”
Ali said she is “terribly worried about her family” in the West Bank, citing attacks, land grabs, mass arrests and Palestinians being driven from their homes.