Is Broadcasting Terrorist Propaganda Protected Free Speech?
Posted on August 25, 2006
Yesterday Stop The ACLU reported about a New Yorker being arrested for broadcasting Hizbollah T.V.
Iqbal has been charged with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the statement said. Federal authorities searched HDTV’s Brooklyn office and Iqbal’s Staten Island home, where Iqbal was suspected of maintaining satellite dishes, the statement said.
The U.S. Treasury Department froze U.S. assets of al-Manar in March, saying it supported fund-raising and recruitment activities of Hizbollah, a Shiite Muslim group backed by Syria and Iran that has been at war with Israel in southern Lebanon. Source
One of our contributors made a bold prediction that the ACLU couldn’t be far behind. Well, it looks like his magic 8 ball is leaning to “very likely.”
Donna Lieberman of the American Civil Liberties Union said she is “deeply troubled” that a television distributor is being prosecuted for the content of a broadcaster. Such a prosecution, she said, “raises serious First Amendment concerns.” She said she thinks that the law under which Iqbal has been charged has a First Amendment exception for news communications. Washington Post
Is the speech a direct enough incitement to violence that it can (and should) be banned?
To me what the ACLU has to say on this is just about irrelevant. We need thoughtful commentary on these issues in time of war, but the ACLU has repeatedly proven they’re incapable of being the voice providing that commentary: they just knee jerk on these questions. We need people who’ve thought deeply about free speech and it’s legitimate limitations who are willing to concede that there are legitimate limitations. I’ve yet to hear the ACLU come across a single security provision or response to the situation they haven’t automatically rejected or suggested an acceptable alternative to.
There is no other purpose but to incite violence in broadcasting this terror propaganda. It is the only media network we have declared a terrorist organization. They are filled with hate, racism, and definitely promote violence, jihad, and terrorism. If you think this is protected free speech you live in la la land. It most definitely incites violence to the point it should be banned.
Michelle Malkin vents about this at Hot Air.
She also has all kinds of information about this up at her site.
» Filed Under ACLU, News, War On Terror
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17 Responses to “Is Broadcasting Terrorist Propaganda Protected Free Speech?”
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Un-stinkin’-believable.
“news communications”
Like Goebbels was running a “news” room.
OF course its protected speech. What probably isn’t protected is doing business with Hezbollah. Not unless you’re selling them missles to trade for hostages.
The “speech” is the RESULT OF doing business with the Hezzbos, therefore…
Donna Lieberman thinks she is “Hezbollah Donna” the “Hanoi Jane” of today and she thinks it is “cool to be labeled as such; plus the Hollywood socialist will love me if I support the “West-Haters” and killers of innocent children.”
“If I myself and the ACLU condone, encourage, and support the rape of innocent children by supporting child pornography and NAMBLA, well I myself and the ACLU can certainly support their butchery and slaughter by suicide bombers…it’s kind of romantic if you think about it. Telling my own Jewish children that I helped destroy their brothers and sisters because I am an immoral unethical treasonous moron just like Jane Fonda.” Wouldn’t my “Mamme and Tatte” be proud of my “Menshlechykayt?”
Maybe Donna Lieberman and I stress “Lieberman” could contact the local New York Jewish community to help her do some fund-raising and recruitment activities of Hezbollah (the Shiite Muslim group backed by Syria and Iran that has been at war with Israel in southern Lebanon) since the television distributor is being harassed by the man and can no longer earn a decent wage as the benefactor of the bloodshed of innocent Jews.
We?re at war: Turn off Hezbollah TV
But we are at war and we do not need to give Hezbollah access to every household and prison cell in America. In fact, we need not give Hezbollah access to even one
“The “speech” is the RESULT OF doing business with the Hezzbos, therefore…”
Someone could take the speech and re-broadcast it without doing business with them. That would be protected.
But that doesn’t seem to be the case here gfactor, so the point you’re making is academic.
The point i’m making is answering the question posed: Is broadcasting hizbollah tv protected speech. The answer I gave is yes. To you this may be academic, but to me its accurate.
gfactor-
Whatcha say we broadcast some child rapes, snuff films, and some good old fashioned race motivated beatings of some innocent black folk. Sounds legal…and a plausable re-broadcast; the ACLU will certainly advertise in our re-broadcast to generate some additional “it’s ok since its legal” money.
You looking for work? Maybe you could be the t.v. station manager and bring your daughter to work so she could be proud of what Daddy does, see what your moral strength, character, and ethics are all about.
Thanks for helping us build a great nation.
I was wrong. I did not believe the ACLU would touch this. I am either misinterpreting the evidence or there is evidence I do not know. Well I guess I can not be right all the time.
I don’t have much to say about the ACLU, but I certainly agree that it should not be deemed protected speech when the intent of the broadcast, replayed or original, is to incite illegal behavior. We are a people who banned Joe the Camel because of the message it was thought to send. In your mind you must decide if a choice is legally wrong or morally wrong. Morals differ, laws are the same for everyone. You can be arrested for inciting riots without braking any other law. So it should be with the broadcast of such materials. Be they religious, racial, or sexual in content.
“Whatcha say we broadcast some child rapes, snuff films, and some good old fashioned race motivated beatings of some innocent black folk.”
I don’t think child rapes are protected, snuff films — you can find internet videos of insurgents being killed, or doing killing. Violence? That you can get on most cable stations.
Thank you for the ad hominem you launched at me. The point I have so far made on this topic is an apology in comment I made earlier that the ACLU would not touch this case.
You of course have presented little evidence or no evidence to back up the accusations you made. The one statement that may be construed as evidence is at best a spurious opinion.
How do you know if the accused individual is “brown“? My guess is he is a Caucasian from the Middle East. Caucasians are usually referred to as Whites or are we redefining that term now.
I believe Hezbollah TV is the tip off that it is terrorist propaganda. I lay you odds that it is highly Anti Semantic at the very least. I suppose you support racial hatred and believe that the KKK and the Black Panthers should have their own TV where they can stir up Blacks and Whites against each other. That would make Middle East Caucasians and European Caucasian allies against African and Australian Blacks.
If you think I am making fun of you then you are correct. If you want to be taken seriously then post a valid argument. If you wish to be ridiculed for being ludicrous then keep posting ad hominem attacks.
“How do you know what the purpose of the broadcaster was? You’re only assuming he was trying to “incite illegal behavior” because he’s a brown person.”
Hmmmmmmm…you imply that there is no way anyone could guess the intentions of this terror propaganda dealer despite a fair amount of evidence that what this guy did is a crime, yet you have no problem assigning motives to others based on NOTHING but a lunatic Leftist reflex. How do you reconcile this hypocrisy?
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