Palestinians, as well as some left-wing Jews, are being suspended from studies, fired from jobs, or arrested at night — all because of social media posts.
That article isn’t very specific about how exactly they “expressed support” so it’s really hard to say if they were expressing a gross political view or actively inciting violence. I certainly don’t think saying “I support Hamas” should be illegal any more illegal than saying “I support Russia” or even “I support Israel”, but it crosses a line if they tell people to commit acts of terrorism or give material support to Hamas.
I suspect they were removed based on a violation of a student code of conduct, which I think is the right way to deal with high-profile assholes at universities, just as employment agreements are an appropriate way for employers to deal with conduct that’s obnoxious but not illegal.
At any rate, I’m certain Israel already has laws against incitement to violence that were written at a time when people were a bit more level headed. I can’t see an attempt to further criminalize speech as anything but an attempt to stifle political speech that specifically does not incite violence.
First of all, I’m an Israeli, so take everything I say with a grain of salt, and I’ll try to be as unbiased as I can. Hamas, as opposed to Russia (I don’t say Israel because a lot will disagree), is an internationaly recognized terrorist group, which was elected* by the people of Gaza after Israel pulled all civilians and military from the Gaza strip, Hamas has made it very clear that their sole mission was to eradicate all the jews (not Israelis or zionists) from Palestine (and I’m not sure about that - also the world). So an Israeli supporting Hamas would be very problematic, Imagine an american supporting Al qaeda right after 9/11. And I just want to emphasize, supporting Hamas is not necessarily supporting Palestine and vice versa, myself I think that any hamas operative deserve to die, but I really hope and dream for the day that the Palestinians would be our peaceful neighbours. *elected technically, as they drove fatah, their main competitor and more moderate towards israel.
I think we may just have a different idea of what counts as incitement. I’m an American and I can tell you that openly expressing support for Al Qaeda would have made you very, very unpopular here, but it would not be illegal. There are cases where I think the American version of free speech goes too far (in that it protects things like dangerous misinformation and foreign propaganda), but I don’t think this is one of those cases. The social consequences of supporting terrorists are already harsh enough to keep those views mostly suppressed. People can, of course, find like-minded people and express their opinions in private without fear, but even then, if the conversation goes beyond expressing opinions and moves on to making plans to commit a crime, that’s considered a conspiracy, which is illegal. We have counter-terrorism units that actively try to infiltrate extremist groups specifically so they can shut down conspiracies.
I don’t think Israel (or any country) should allow speech that directly puts anyone in danger, but given the right-wing nature of Israel’s government and the tendency of right-wing governments in general to suppress speech they disapprove of, I strongly suspect that any new law will inevitably be used to suppress legitimate criticism of the government.
I try to keep my ideas and opinions out of this conversation to keep it unbiased, but the reality I see, living in Israel my whole life is that support for a terrorist organization is directly related to terrorist activity, for example we’ve seen it in 95 when support for a radical right wing Jewish terrorist group quickly ended in the assassination of the prime minister Itzhak Rabin, and Hezbolla supporters are easily recruited by Hezbolla to report where Hezbolla missile hits so Hezbolla can correct they’re aiming. As much as I understand,just supporting hamas’ actions, as vile and horrible as it is is free speech, but the road from there to actively take action in aiding Hamas is extremely short.
