By Bruce S. Ticker
PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania — Former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan and Columbia Law School professor Katherine Franke, both supporters of the Palestinian cause, experienced their own how-does-it-feel moments.
When a debate on CNN heated up last week, commentator Ryan James Girdusky warned Hasan, “Yeah, well, I hope your beeper doesn’t go off” – most likely a reference to the Israeli operation that triggered explosions of hundreds of pagers in Lebanon which members of Hezbollah carried.
Franke retained a law firm after Columbia informed her that she was being investigated for her comments about Israeli exchange students in late January. On July 12, the law firm dropped her as a client, sparking a legal ethics complaint.
These pro-Israel actions may be objectionable, but why not? The anti-Israel crowd has been employing crude and even criminal tactics for years, long before Hamas terrorists slaughtered 1,200 people in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The afore-mentioned acts are among the weapons that supporters of Israel have in their arsenal, not that they are necessary.
Especially intriguing are Hasan and Franke’s reactions.
What Girdusky did to Hasan on the Oct. 28 episode of “NewsNight With Abby Phillips” was obnoxious and reprehensible. I just happened to tune in to the panel discussion as the pair parried over whether Girdusky had referred to Hasan as antisemitic in the past. Girdusky said he had not, and Hasan, who is a Muslim, said he was habitually called an antisemite because “I’m a supporter of the Palestinians, so I’m used to it.”
Then Girdusky dropped the bomb: “Yeah, well, I hope your beeper doesn’t go off.” Hasan replied, “Did you just say I should die? Did you just say I should be killed live on CNN?”
Girdusky hardly helped other supporters of Israel. His disgusting conduct reflects on all of us. A contentious issue requires rational discussion, and Girdusky proved that he does not qualify to participate. After the commercial break, Phillips announced that Girdusky had left the set and “will not be welcomed back…There is a line that was crossed there, and it’s not acceptable to me,” according to The New York Times. Hasan also left the set, and Phillips said that he is allowed to return.
Hasan, who recently hosted “The Mehdi Hasan Show” on MSNBC, missed an opportunity to remain above the fray when he responded. Girdusky did not say he should die nor that he “be killed live on CNN,” as Hasan questioned. Despite the stupidity of his remark, Girdusky in fact said he hoped his “beeper doesn’t go off,” so how can he want him killed on CNN?
Hasan overplayed his hand. He came close to claiming the high moral ground until he lowered himself to Girdusky’s level.
This past winter, Franke was informed by Columbia’s Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action that she was being investigated for comments she made in a television appearance. In reference to a pro-Palestinian rally, Franke said in late January that she was concerned about older Israeli exchange students “coming right out of their military service” because they had been known to “harass” Palestinian students and others on campus.
Recounting Franke’s situation, New York Times columnist Ginia Bellafante wrote that her words served “to illuminate some of the extreme steps that elite law firms have taken since the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel by Hamas to distance themselves from Palestinian sympathies.” Franke said her remarks were misconstrued and told Bellafante, “I just think it’s a tough transition from the programming you need to be a good soldier to the deprogramming you need to be a good student.”
Franke retained Outten & Golden, which focuses on worker grievances, and in February veteran partner Kathleen Peratis represented Franke on a pro bono basis. In the spring, the firm enacted a policy to cease representing clients on either side of the Middle East situation, setting off a series of confrontations between Peratis and the law firm’s management.
At one point, Peratis said, “It was cowardly, and I would not be complicit in the cowardice.”
The firm sent a letter on July 12 to Franke stating that they were dropping her as a client on the same day that The Intercept reported on Franke’s conflict with Columbia, and a spokesman for the firm said the letter’s timing was “purely coincidental,” according to Bellafante’s Times piece.
Peratis resigned a few weeks later. In September, Franke filed a complaint with the Attorney Grievance Committees of the New York State Supreme Court’s appellate division in which she accused the firm of ethical violations when “it abruptly and without cause” ceased representing her. Managing partner Adam Klein dubbed the complaint “frivolous.”
Bellafante writes, “Law firms are free to reject any case that comes to them, at the outset…but it is very unusual for a firm to drop a client midstream for reasons beyond some of the most significant ones allowed by the ethics codes governing the profession.”
Abbe Smith, Georgetown University professor and co-author of a textbook on ethics, told Bellafante,
“We understand that loyalty to clients is key. Nowhere in the rules does it say that the minute you realize a case is a hot potato you can fire the client. That’s not how it goes.”
Cowardice. Unethical. Hot potato. Infamous last words.
Unethical as in trapping students inside a classroom at the University of Calgary in Canada. This was the latest threatening incident in North America where anti-Israel demonstrators harassed Jewish students.
The mob blocked the main entrance to the classroom last Thursday during a talk by Eylon Levy, a former spokesman for Israel. It was the third time I can recall such an incident occurring in recent years, one in New York City and another elsewhere in Canada. Security guards ushered Levy and the students out a back entrance onto a loading dock, The Canadian Jewish News reports.
Then there are all the highway blockades, illegal encampments and building occupations. But how Franke suffered when she lost her legal representation. At least the Zionist students at U. of Calgary and those others badgered and terrorized in dozens of volatile incidents were never forced to file a legal ethics complaint.
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Bruce Ticker is a Philadelphia-based columnist.