Friday, April 30, 2010

Kooky Israel-Trashing Jewish Prof Gets OHRT Smackdown

David (ig)Noble, one of York U's nuttier nutjobs (and that's saying something), has lost his bid to punish his employer for being in thrall to the spectral and insidious Zionist lobby. Shalom Toronto reports that
The Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario has thrown out a case brought by a York University history professor alleging that the university targeted him for protesting its policy of cancelling classes on the High Holidays.
David Noble, a professor who teaches in the Department of Social and Political Thought at York, claimed that the university had purposely given him sparsely attended Friday afternoon classes in retaliation after he criticized its policy of not holding classes during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Noble, who is Jewish, had threatened to hold classes on Jewish holidays in protest. He eventually cancelled classes on all Muslim holidays instead. In 2006, he initiated a human rights complaint over the issue.

Last fall, York reversed its High Holidays policy, which had been in place since 1974. Classes now go on as scheduled.

On Friday, adjudicator Michael Gottheil released a 32-page decision. He concluded that he could not find any evidence to back up Noble’s claims that the university was purposely ostracizing him by forcing him to teach unpopular Friday classes...

The adjudicator also threw out Noble’s claim that in 2005 York told the professor they would retaliate against him if he held classes on Jewish holidays.

Gottheil ruled that York was not acting maliciously when it did not intercede following a disruption in Noble’s class caused by a student protesting his opposition to the university’s High Holidays statute.

Likewise, Gottheil concluded that he could find no validity to Noble’s charge that York struck back at the professor by issuing a press release defending itself against a controversial pamphlet Noble distributed at a campus event. The pamphlet, entitled "The York University Foundation: The Tail That Wags the Dog (Suggestions for Further Research),"attacked the influence of what Noble termed the “Israeli lobby” on the fundraising of York’s foundation, which he called the “tail”. In the flyer, Noble claimed that a “pro-Zionist” influence drove the political direction of York officials, who had the ability to “wag the dog.”...
Anyone who could claim that Salman Hossain's latest alma mater is "pro-Zionist" ought to have his head examined (but not by a "human rights" judge, since we the taxpayers are forced to shoulder the cost of such judgements).

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