The piece in question was written by UO faculty member Mohamed Jemmali and mainly criticized the role of the U.S. in supporting Israeli acts of provocation.

Jemmali wrote: “I know that my taxes are supporting American weapons given to Israel to kill Palestinians, occupy their land and destroy their homes. I know America is the only supporter of Israel in the U.N. I know these are the primary causes of promoting hatred among Arabs against Americans.”

Though the tone of the opinion piece was indeed inflammatory and Mr. Jemmali’s politics bled right through, nothing in the piece advocated hate.  Weismann states that such a “volatile” article should not have been run and says,”If you insist on publishing an article laced with unsupported judgment, the appropriate measure would have been to place an article arguing the opposing point of view right next to Jemmali’s article.”

I agree that it’s always nice to see opposing points of view on the opinion page and it would benefit many newspapers if they ran point-counterpoint features on hot-button issues.  It also would have aided Jemmali’s article if he had substantiated his claims better.  But, the suggestion that newspapers should pull volatile content off the opinion page is flat wrong.

I can think of no better exercise in dialogue than two writers presenting different perspectives on an issue, which is what, by printing Weismman’s article, the ODE provided.  Though she alleged Jemmali’s claims were inaccurate, she provided no evidence.  She also showed a passionate bias herself, strongly identifying with the Jewish state and admitting that she took “personal offense” at some of the comments made.

The opinion page should be a medium for intelligent discourse and dissent.  Newspapers have a responsibility to make sure there is factual accuracy in their content, but just because a writer shows bias or aggression or writes in an inflammatory way doesn’ t mean their voice should be removed.  If we abandon hot-button issues and strong opinions in editorial journalism, we gut its most fundamental components.  Then, what’s the point of having an opinion page at all?