The Meaning of David Miller

According to Bristol University Professor David Miller, ‘Britain is in the grip of an assault on its public sphere by the state of Israel and its advocates’. He believes ‘Bristol’s JSoc [Jewish Society. Ed], like all JSocs, operates under the auspices of the Union of Jewish Students (UJS), an Israel lobby group’ and is part of ‘a campaign of censorship and manufactured hysteria’ that is ‘directed by the State of Israel’. The campaign involves false claims of antisemitism designed ‘to give cover to Zionist activists’. His outburst has led to outraged calls for his removal but also fulsome messages of support from the academic left, in the form of open letters that do not simply argue Miller has free speech rights but which endorse his world view. David Hirsh, author of Contemporary Left Antisemitism, explores the wider meanings and deeper roots of the controversy.