Middle East studies in the News

Fallout from the Cambridge Libel Settlement [on Khalid bin Mahfouz, Cambridge University Press, "Alms for Jihad,"

by David Glenn
Chronicle of Higher Education News Blog
August 13, 2007

http://chronicle.com/blogs/footnoted/index.php?id=409

http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/3872

Two weeks ago, The Chronicle reported Cambridge University Press's settlement of a libel claim filed by Khalid bin Mahfouz, a Saudi billionaire, regarding the 2006 book Alms for Jihad: Charity and Terrorism in the Islamic World. The publisher promised, among other things, to contact libraries worldwide and ask them to remove the book from their shelves.

Barbara Fister, a librarian at Gustavus Adolphus College, doubts that librarians should heed that request. On the blog of the Association of College and Research Libraries, she writes: "None of us want inaccurate information on our shelves, but it's there. We have information that is contradictory, biased, past its shelf life, and controversial."

At The Bookseller, Kevin Taylor, intellectual-property director at Cambridge, defends the settlement, arguing that Mr. Mahfouz's basic claims have been well established in previous libel cases:

Some American public opinion holds that Sheikh bin Mahfouz is "guilty of funding terrorism," but Cambridge University Press cannot act on the basis of popular opinion, however widely held. Evidence must be found. And the evidence produced by the authors of Alms for Jihad, repeated from earlier sources, has not stood up to the requisite tests. Even if we had taken our own case to judgement, an adverse outcome would have done nothing to vindicate the work of our authors, who would then have been even more publicly characterised as having failed the tests required by English libel law.

Taylor's statement does not satisfy the anonymous bloggers at The Literary Saloon, who argue that the press ought to publicly reveal how much money it paid to settle the case: "By shrouding all this in so much secrecy they make the whole arrangement look even more tawdry than it already does."

Note: Articles listed under "Middle East studies in the News" provide information on current developments concerning Middle East studies on North American campuses. These reports do not necessarily reflect the views of Campus Watch and do not necessarily correspond to Campus Watch's critique.

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