It has recently come to my attention that the editors of The Amherst Student refused to print a commissioned article on the “Apartheid from South Africa to Israel/Palestine” event organized by Students for Justice in Palestine. The article was not printed, not because of anything it said, but because the status of the article’s author, Louis Sallerson ’11, as co-president of the board of Amherst College Hillel, would constitute a “conflict of interest.” I find this notion to be insulting to the Hillel board, of which I am a longtime member, the entire Amherst Hillel organization and every Jewish student on campus.

Hillel is a religious and cultural organization, not a political one. Committed as it is to the idea that students should be able to participate in religious and cultural activities without discrimination, the organization specifically avoids adopting any position on any political issue, including the Israel-Palestine conflict. Hillel has sponsored events related to Israel, including events exploring the relationship between Israel and Palestine, in an effort to promote dialogue and understanding, like the recent co-sponsorship of the speech by Ambassador Dennis Ross on the present situation in the Middle East. Even though some of these events may have a political context, they have always been explicitly non-partisan. Hillel has always made sure to clarify that the views of any speaker that it brings in are not the views of the organization as a whole.

Mr. Sallerson was writing his article not as the Hillel co-president, but as a reporter for The Student. If The Student refuses to print his article about a political event because of his membership in a religious organization, I do not see how this could not be considered a blatant case of discrimination. Joke as it might about the Jewish make-up of its editorial staff during last year’s April Fools issue, The Student is clearly unable to disabuse itself of the notion that Jews, especially practicing ones, are universally pro-Israel in their political persuasions. As a Jew and member of the Hillel board who would not describe himself as being in full support of Israel, or even as a Zionist, I am personally offended.

In my opinion, Mr. Sallerson is owed a full apology from The Amherst Student, and his article, which I have not even read, should be printed.

-Michael Chernicoff ’09