Freedom of Speech, Dissent, and Political Activity

Freedom of speech is a basic human right and an essential component of any democracy. It is this freedom that enables citizens to exchange views and information, to protest against injustice, to influence the public discourse, and to criticize the actions of the government. As such, freedom of speech represents a necessary condition for the informed and effective political participation of a country’s citizenry. Restrictions on free speech cause harm to democratic life and stands in contradiction to the fundamental principles of democracy – that government should impose no more than the necessary minimum of restrictions on individuals, especially regarding their basic rights.

Freedom of speech is a basic human right and an essential component of any democracy. It is this freedom that enables citizens to exchange views and information, to protest against injustice, to influence the public discourse, and to criticize the actions of the government. As such, freedom of speech represents a necessary condition for the informed and effective political participation of a country’s citizenry. Restrictions on free speech cause harm to democratic life and stands in contradiction to the fundamental principles of democracy – that government should impose no more than the necessary minimum of restrictions on individuals, especially regarding their basic rights.

The safeguarding of free speech is especially critical for defending the rights of minority groups. Minorities often suffer from limited political influence and limited access to the corridors of power, and so the arena of public expression is where they are best able to give voice to their positions, to protest, and to influence public opinion.
In numerous and unrelenting rulings and legal decisions, Israel’s Supreme Court has defended freedom of speech, calling it “the lifeline of democracy.” In these principled rulings, time after time the justices have affirmed that the true test of freedom of speech is not the defense of commonly accepted statements – which no one seeks to limit anyway – but of statements considered irritating, extreme, and unexceptional.

Over the last two years, we have witnessed increasing threats in Israel to freedom of speech and those freedoms which derive from it: The right to demonstrate, freedom of the press, academic freedom and freedom of political activity. We have already described some of these threats in previous chapters of this report, titled “The State of Democracy in Israel 2010”:

• Violation of academic freedom, manifested among other things in verbal attacks on professors and educators critical of Israeli policies; actions taken against students who have sought to demonstrate on campus; and a determined campaign, supported by members of Knesset, seeking to dictate to our academics positions that are deemed more “Zionist.”

• Limiting the right of Israel’s Arab citizens to express their identity, both as equal citizens, and moreover as a homeland minority: Actions include the prohibition of teaching about the Nakba, the deliberate disappearance of the Arabic language from public spaces, the repeated repression and violation of Arab citizens’ right to demonstrate, and the efforts to de-legitimize the elected representatives of the Arab public.

• Legislative initiatives seeking to restrict the freedom of speech, including: Broadening the prohibition on incitement, prohibition of imposing boycotts, and conditioning the receipt of public funding for movies on the filmmaker’s “declaring allegiance” to the state. Two additional legislative initiatives, which would restrict the activities of human rights groups, will be discussed later in the chapter.

The fact that freedom of speech has appeared repeatedly throughout the chapters of this report demonstrates both the centrality of this fundamental right to democracy, and also the scope of the threats it currently faces. In the current chapter, we will address several other troubling manifestations of the infringement on freedom of speech: Limitations placed on demonstrations in Israel and the harassment of protesters; restrictions imposed on demonstrations in the Occupied Territories; attacks on freedom of the press; harassment of political activists and those who criticize the government; the infringement of artists’ freedom of expression; and the de-legitimization of human rights organizations.