Remembering David Horowitz

This article first appeared in New English Review. 

Today, we are mourning the loss of conservative activist, writer, and speaker, David Horowitz, who has died after a long battle with cancer. He was 86. Horowitz, who was a Marxist and radical leftist in his youth, later became a leading conservative figure and one of America’s leading voices in warning about the threat of political Islam and anti-Semitism in this country. He was condemned by those on the left, like the Southern Poverty Law Center, but in my view, he was simply fighting unapologetically against hate directed at America, Israel, and the Jewish people. He was incredibly courageous and took his fight right to the campuses, facing angry students, radical professors, and activists, taking their questions, and routinely defeating them and their arguments.

Horowitz’s signature moment, in my opinion, came in 2010 when he was speaking at the University of California, San Diego. During question and answer, he engaged with a young woman from the UCSD Muslim Student Association. At the end, he asked her if she supported Hamas. Failing to get a direct answer from her, Horowitz then recounted the words of former Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, saying that, “The head of Hezbollah has said that he hopes we will all gather in Israel so that he doesn’t have to hunt us down globally.” 

“For it or against it?” he asked.

“For it”, she answered. 

That exchange serves as evidence that the pro-Palestinian movement, both in the Middle East and here in the West, is anti-Semitic to its core. It puts the lie to the constant claim that these people are not anti-Jewish, simply anti-Zionist. That woman was not just speaking for herself. She represented the views of millions of people who know only violence and hate.

I cannot claim to have known Horowitz personally, but I did get to meet him briefly on two occasions when he came to speak at UC Irvine and once at UCLA. The last time he came to speak at UC Irvine, he seemed very tired and was clearly not well. We exchanged emails once when he asked me some questions about what was happening at UC Irvine, where I was teaching part-time. Later, I had the honor of writing several profiles of radical leftists for his Freedom Foundation’s “Discover the Networks” website.

David Horowitz was not a hate monger. Unlike his detractors and others who refused to join him in his fight against anti-Semitism, he was a courageous man who stood up to the radicals and haters in our society. He was a true hero, and he will be missed.

May his memory be a blessing.