NH contributor Stan Cohen on Comment is Free

Regular New Humanist contributor Stan Cohen has a piece on the Guardian's Comment is Free site today, discussing Israeli academic Carmi Gillon's upcoming visit to London.

Gillon is the Hebrew University's vice president of external relations – but he is also a former head of the Shin Bet, the internal Israeli general security service. He occupied senior positions within the organisation from 1988-95, which, as Stan writes, "was the high point in Shin Bet's policy of torture and ill-treatment of Palestinian detainees". In his piece Stan questions Hebrew University's wisdom in appointing someone with Gillon's track record, while at the same time Israeli academics claim "to be at the forefront of the struggle for justice for the Palestinians".

This ties in nicely with Stan's upcoming article for the January/February 2008 issue of New Humanist, when he will be discussing the return of torture.