In early June, I had an email exchange with a colleague who found what she believed to be evidence of plagiarism by Rashid Khalidi, professor of Arab studies and director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia University.
Since the initial contacts with my associate, word of the Khalidi plagiarism charges has spread, and several online publications have picked up the story.[1]
Alan Dershowitz believes the evidence should be taken seriously. Lee Kaplan and Tony Badran see a potential cover-up by Khalidi and/or his associates – Badran also says that Khalidi’s research “reflects poor scholarship, historically and ethnohistorically.”
Khalidi himself denies the plagiarism charges and has questioned the “judgment” of my associate. Columbia University has taken no action to investigate the incident, despite the fact that it has been customary to do so in academia.
While doing some research on the Internet, my associate came upon an article entitled “Jerusalem: A Concise History,” attributed to Khalidi (“By Rashid Khalidi”) with the text “Copyright © 2001 American Committee on Jerusalem” in the article footer (posted on 2/27/2001). My colleague took a sentence from Khalidi’s article and entered into Google. This is what she found:
The search produced a nearly identical sentence, but this one was from a
1994 article on the history of Jerusalem written by the late Kamil Jamil el
Asali of the University of Jordan. … The two articles share more than
bad scholarship. They are alike. Very alike. Like, plagiarism. Entire sentences appear in both articles…
The entire text of my associate’s email is shown below [3], containing a detailed comparison of Khalidi’s and Asali’s articles.
My cohort brought the Khalidi article to the attention of a Columbia faculty member and two reporters:
I phoned a colleague on the Columbia faculty with the suggestion that she
take it to Dean Quigley, the ordinary procedure in cases of plagiarism. She
immediately pointed me to Appendix E in the Faculty Handbook. The relevant
section reads:
"In the event that the committee should find that an individual or
individuals have made charges against a researcher for malicious reasons, or
were otherwise not acting in good faith in making such charge, the dean will
take appropriate action." …
I sent both articles to a reporter at a major metropolitan daily. The
reporter first contacted a plagiarism expert, who called it a clear case of
plagiarism. He then phoned Rashid Khalidi, who refused to return the call.
And he contacted the American Committee on Jerusalem, told them he was
doing a story on plagiarism in the Khalidi article, and asked for a comment.
Then his editor killed the story, on the grounds that the plagiarized
article was merely an occasional piece on a web site. Not in a printed
periodical. Some of these print guys haven't noticed yet that the world has
changed.
I contacted a reporter at another paper, who told me that there was no
Khalidi byline on the article. I went to the web page. Sure enough. The
byline has disappeared. Someone at the ACJ changed the byline to read
"Compiled by ACJ from a variety of sources."
While the byline was changed, the header of the article still reads, “By Rashid Khalidi.”
The WaybackMachine.org, an organization devoted to archiving Internet content, contains 15 separate copies of the article, all which contain the byline, “By Rashid Khalidi,” dated Feb 27, 2001 *, Apr 11, 2001, Sep 06, 2001, Jun 23, 2002, Sep 18, 2002, Nov 02, 2002, Jan 05, 2003 *, Apr 25, 2003, Jun 24, 2003, Aug 30, 2003, Oct 15, 2003, Dec 23, 2003, Feb 28, 2004, May 10, 2004, Jul 11, 2004, and Oct 23, 2004, respectively. [2]
In other words, WaybackMachine.org software visited the website containing the article attributed to Khalidi 15 times and made an archive copy each time. According to WaybackMachine.org:
When our automated systems crawl the web every few months or so, we find that only about 50% of all pages on the web have changed from our previous visit. This means that much of the content in our archive is duplicate material. If you don't see ""*"" next to an archived document, then the content on the archived page is identical to the previously archived copy.
An article on the History News Network (HNN) states,
…The president of the successor organization, the American Task Force on Palestine, Ziad J. Asali, reportedly told the New York Sun newspaper that Professor Khalidi was the author of the article. But on June 20, 2005 the executive editor of the organization stated in an email to HNN that Professor Khalidi was not the author. Professor Khalidi himself says that he was not the author and he is no longer listed as the author. This is the email we were sent:
The byline to the 'Jerusalem, A Concise History' article was changed from 'By Rashid Khalidi' to 'Compiled by ACJ from a variety of sources' for the simple reason that at the time of its 2001 posting, an ACJ staffer had mistakenly attributed the article to Dr. Khalidi. Dr. Khalidi had only contributed to the article at the time and was mistakenly given full accreditation for it. Even though Dr. Khalidi was president of the board of directors of the ACJ at the time, he was not involved in any way in posting articles on, or making changes to the ACJ website, nor in supervising day-to-day activities of the ACJ. The mistake escaped unnoticed until it was brought to our attention in May 2005 as a result of the plagiarism contention. That was when the byline change was made to correct the error. …
My associate pointed out,
But it was the web page of the American Committee on Jerusalem, an
organization of which Khalidi was President when the article was published
in 2001 and for some years before and afterwards. … The President of
an organization is certainly responsible for articles published by that
organization under his byline. Even on a web page.
History News Network (HNN) states,
… Khalidi, for his part, sees the anonymous historian’s accusations as "part of a systematic, organized campaign of smears and harassment against faculty in the Middle East field." …
My colleague, Alan Dershowitz, and Lee Kaplan are urging Columbia University to open an investigation into Khalidi’s literary practices. Dean Austin Quigley can be reached at dhc14@columbia.edu or (212) 854-8296.
[1] It seems my colleague, who wishes to remain anonymous, has sent the same information to other publications besides netWMD.
[2] ALL MATERIALS AND REFERENCES CONTAINED IN THIS ARTICLE HAVE BEEN PERMANENTLY ARCHIVED.
[3] Original email from my associate:
I was fishing. Googling for silly statements about national
continuity between the ancient Philistines, Jebusites, or Canaanites and
modern Palestinian Arabs when I came upon this:
"According to a number of historians and scholars, many of the Arabs of
Jerusalem today, indeed the majority of Palestinian Arabs, are descendants
of the ancient Jebusites and Canaanites."
The byline read Rashid Khalidi. Whoa.
The article was posted on the web page of the American Committee of
Jerusalem. I wanted a better reference than a web page, so I googled a
particularly absurd phrase: The simple fact is that the majority of the
Arab people of Palestine are not descendants of those that arrived as part
of the wave of Islamic-Arab conquest in the seventh century.
The search produced a nearly identical sentence, but this one was from a
1994 article on the history of Jerusalem written by the late Kamil Jamil el
Asali of the University of Jordan. [i] The two articles share more than
bad scholarship. They are alike. Very alike. Like, plagiarism.
Entire sentences appear in both articles:
"The names of the two oldest rulers of the city, Saz Anu and Yaqir Ammo,
were identified by the American archaeologist W. F. Albright as Amoritic."
Khalidi uses the same sources and quotations used by Asali.
Kahalidi: In 1902, the British anthropologist Sir James Frazer wrote in his
book The Golden Bough: "The Arabic-speaking peasants of Palestine are the
progeny of the tribes which settled in the country before the Israelite
invasion. "
Asali: In The Golden Bough, the British anthropologist Sir James Frazer
(1854-1941) stressed that, "the Arabic-speaking peasants of Palestine are
the progeny of the tribes which settled in the country before the Israelite
invasion."
Khalidi: The Israeli historian Zev Vilnay, in his Encyclopedia for
Knowledge of the Land of Israel, and Ephraim and Menachem Tilmay in their
book Jerusalem agree that the age of the city is 5,000 years.
Asali: It is well-known that the correct age of the city, according to
historical accounts, is five thousand years. This estimation is given by the
Israeli historian Zev Vilnay, among other sources, in his comprehensive work
in Hebrew, The Encyclopedia for the Knowledge of the Land of Israel, in the
chapter titled "Jerusalem, the Capital of Israel.''[l] The same age is given
by the Israeli historians Ephraim and Menachem Tilmay at the end of their
book, Jerusalem.
Finally, Khalidi condenses Asali's analysis, lifting strings of phrases from
Asali to make the same point.
Khalidi:
In the second millenium BC, Jerusalem was inhabited by the Jebusites, a
Canaanite tribe, and the culture of the city was Canaanite. The Jebusites
built a fortress, "Zion", in Jerusalem. Zion is a Canaanite word meaning
"hill" or "height." Jerusalem was also known as Jebus. Canaanite society
flourished for two thousand years, and many aspects of Canaanite culture and
religion were later borrowed by the Hebrews.
Asali:
In the second millennium, Jerusalem was inhabited by the Jebusites. In the
Bible the Jebusites are considered to be Canaanites. It was the Jebusites
who first built the fortress Zion in the town. Zion is a Canaanite word
which means "hill" or "height."
The second name of Jerusalem was "Jebus". The culture of Jebus was
Canaanite, an ancient society which built many towns with well-built houses,
in numerous city-states, in industry and commerce and in an alphabet and
religion which flourished for two thousand years and were later borrowed by
the primitive Hebrews.
True, the Khalidi article was not in a refereed journal. It was on a web
page. But it was the web page of the American Committee on Jerusalem, an
organization of which Khalidi was President when the article was published
in 2001 and for some years before and afterwards. [ii] The President of
an organization is certainly responsible for articles published by that
organization under his byline. Even on a web page.
I phoned a colleague on the Columbia faculty with the suggestion that she
take it to Dean Quigley, the ordinary procedure in cases of plagiarism. She
immediately pointed me to Appendix E in the Faculty Handbook. The relevant
section reads:
"In the event that the committee should find that an individual or
individuals have made charges against a researcher for malicious reasons, or
were otherwise not acting in good faith in making such charge, the dean will
take appropriate action." [iii]
Malicious reasons. Hmmm.
Suppose a scholar not only believes in the right of Israel to exist -
Khalidi denies the Jewish nation this right - but further believes, as many
scholars do, that Khalidi's work is replete with half-truths and the
selective use of evidence to make a political case against the Jewish State.
Such a scholar might prefer to see an opponent of the existence of Israel
take a fall. Is that malicious? If it were your career on the line, would
you take the risk of making a complaint that others might characterize as
maliciously motivated when the Faculty Handbook directs the Dean to "take
appropriate action" in such an instance?
Call me a coward.
I sent both articles to a reporter at a major metropolitan daily. The
reporter first contacted a plagiarism expert, who called it a clear case of
plagiarism. He then phoned Rashid Khalidi, who refused to return the call.
And he contacted the American Committee on Jerusalem, told them he was
doing a story on plagiarism in the Khalidi article, and asked for a comment.
Then his editor killed the story, on the grounds that the plagiarized
article was merely an occasional piece on a web site. Not in a printed
periodical. Some of these print guys haven't noticed yet that the world has
changed.
I contacted a reporter at another paper, who told me that there was no
Khalidi byline on the article. I went to the web page. Sure enough. The
byline has disappeared. Someone at the ACJ changed the byline to read
"Compiled by ACJ from a variety of sources." [iv]
For such situations does Wayback Machine exist. Entering the original
URL[v] into this time travel machine[vi] reveals that the article with the
plagiarized material was posted with the byline "by Rashid Khalidi" by Feb.
27th 2001, and remained on the site under that byline for four years during
much of which time Khalidi continued to serve as President of the ACJ. I
found it there on May 10, 2005.
Will somebody please tell Dean Quigley.
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[i] (http://www.al-bushra.org/jerusalem1/jerhist.htm)
[ii] (http://www.acj.org/briefings/4_05_2001.htm)
[iii] http://www.columbia.edu/cu/vpaa/fhb/main.html Faculty Handbook,
Appendix E
[iv] http://www.acj.org/resources/khalidi/c_history.htm
[v] http://www.acj.org/resources/khalidi/c_history.htm
[vi] http://www.waybackmachine.org/
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