I am a liberal. I support selfdeterminationfor the Palestinians.I support a two-state solution.

And I support a withdrawalof Israeli settlements to pre-1967borders.

I am also a Zionist. And, from2002 to 2005, I served in an airborneinfantry unit in the IsraeliDefense Forces. As such, I wasboth saddened and offendedby the demonstration held lastTuesday by the Muslim StudentsAssociation. In it, a mock Israelicheckpoint was set up in theMain Quad, and MSA members,dressed in Israeli fatigues, brutalized,humiliated and assaultedother students acting as Palestiniancivilians.

The question that immediatelycame to my mind was, “Howmany checkpoints have thesestudents been through, or evenseen, that they feel qualified toportray them for the public?” Ihave been through, staffed andcommanded hundreds. Simplyput, Tuesday’s demonstrationwas pure fiction.

Do human rights abuses occur?Yes. But they are the rareexception, not the rule. Whenthey do occur, they hardly approachthe cartoonish brutalityportrayed by the MSA, and thoseresponsible are swiftly and severelypunished.

I have no problem with harshcriticism of Israeli policies, norwith fervent protest. But I dotake objection when a group ofstudents publicly slanders theyoung, conscientious soldiersthat I served with and commanded.

It is this same type of lowbrowstereotyping, sophistry,and propaganda that lies at theheart of hate speech. Yes, someMuslims are terrorists, but howwould the MSA respond if a DeAnza club held a demonstrationwhere caricatured Muslims wereportrayed laughing as they blewup innocent civilians? They’d beoutraged, and rightfully so.

These demonstrations onlyserve a negative purpose, widening the chasm betweenJews and Muslims. Instead, we should all worktowards bridging it.

Some might say that this is just street theater andthat I’m taking it too seriously. But that position is bothnaive and ignorant: “street theater” led to the assassinationof Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995,not by a Palestinian, but by a Jewish right-wing extremist.

Fifteen years earlier, Anwar Sadat of Egyptwas assassinated by a right-wing Arab for similarreasons. To stage such a demonstration without havingcompetent knowledge regarding this issue is irresponsible.

It convinces the layperson that the behaviorportrayed is common. Even the flier MSA printedto promote the demonstration referred to it as “a dayin the life” portrayal. One student said he believed thebehavior portrayed occurs 25 percent of the time – anastronomically inaccurate figure by anyone’s account,including the UN’s.

This demonstration was an insult to anyone workingto elevate the public discourse and bring aboutunderstanding and compromise, rather than fear andhate.