American journalist Nathan Robinson, the founder and editor of "Current Affairs," confirmed that The Guardian's U.S. edition severed ties with him as a columnist after he posted a tweet criticizing the military aid provided by the U.S. to Israel.
In an article on his magazine titled "How the Media Suppresses Critics of Israel," Robinson explained that he was arbitrarily fired from his position as a columnist for "The Guardian US," where he had been writing since 2017. This action was taken after he published two tweets mocking Congress's approval of $500 million in military aid to Israel, despite the deteriorating economic conditions in the U.S. due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Robinson pointed out that in one of the tweets, he sarcastically stated, "Did you know that Congress does not actually allow any new spending unless part of it is designated for purchasing weapons for Israel… that's the law." He received an email on the same day from Jon Mulholland, editor of "The Guardian US," stating "Confidential" and telling him that as long as he kept quiet and did not mention Israel on Twitter, The Guardian would continue to publish his articles on other topics.
Robinson noted that Congress was in the process of approving a new COVID-19 relief package at the end of December, while simultaneously approving an additional $500 million in military aid to Israel, which has long been a major beneficiary of U.S. military assistance, constituting about twenty percent of Israel's military budget. He added that it is depressing to see that while Congress provided very little or even crumbs in aid to the American public to alleviate the COVID-19 pandemic, it was also giving more money to Israel, a nuclear-armed power.
Robinson highlighted that this support is clearly reflected in the statements of American officials. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi once remarked, "If Washington fell and collapsed, the last thing to remain would be our support for Israel," while President Joe Biden stated that "if there were no Israel, the United States would have to invent one to protect its interests."
He continued by observing that many who pretend to defend free speech have little to say when critics of Israel are harmed or when Palestinians are subjected to all kinds of harm due to Israeli military aggression. The problem is that this allows the Israeli occupying government to continue killing Palestinians and maintain the blockade imposed on the Palestinian people, which the United Nations confirms violates basic human rights and principles of international law, amounting to collective punishment.
Robinson emphasized that it is widely recognized in the United States and the West that those who criticize Israel are regularly punished by both public and private institutions for exercising their freedom of expression. The American Civil Liberties Union has documented the typical approach used to silence those who attempt to protest against, boycott, or criticize Israel.
He explained that the Center for Constitutional Rights in the U.S. highlighted how pro-Israel organizations, universities, government officials, and others target activists advocating for Palestine in various ways, including preventing them from carrying out activities in support of the Palestinian people, filing baseless complaints against them, imposing disciplinary measures, and sometimes firing them, in addition to the regular accusation of "terrorism." The situation can be summarized in one sentence: "Palestine is excluded from free speech."
Robinson pointed out that methods for silencing critics of the Israeli regime have reached the point of explicit government actions, such as criminalizing any speech that includes criticism of Israel, leading to job offers being rescinded from academics who criticized Israel or preventing them from teaching. He noted that CNN fired academic Marc Lamont Hill for calling for a "Free Palestine." He remarked that in Britain, there was a ridiculous year-long campaign to smear former Labour Party leader and critic of Israeli government policy, Jeremy Corbyn. Robinson indicated that U.S. administrations have not even spared international human rights organizations from these accusations, including Amnesty International and Oxfam, simply for revealing Israel's poor human rights record.
