Years ago I was a lead writer for a flashy column in Chicago's daily newspaper the Sun-Times. Called Page Ten, it showcased an assortment of news tidbits - some called gossip, others called insider tips - and my beat was politics, mainly Chicago's City Hall.

 After two years, the editor called me one day and said the column run was over. All the celebrity recognition I received from the column quickly ended and the column was replaced by someone else. They moved me back to my regular beat covering Chicago's City Hall, which is where I wanted to be from the beginning.

 In journalism, this happens all the time. Sometimes it the move is a shift. Other times it involves scandal. Sometimes, it even involves a newspaper reacting to public outcry.

 In Israel, this week, the Jerusalem Post decided to drop the regular column by Naomi Chazen, the head of the liberal New Israel Fund. The change came in the middle of a storm of controversy in which Chazen and the NIF were being demonized by rightwing Israeli haters who were angry because, they asserted, NIF had made it possible for the United Nations to produce "The Goldstone Report."

 The Goldstone Report, as you have read, is the report completed by a fact finding mission led by renown international jurist and civil rights lawyer Richard Goldstone.

 The report concluded that Israel and Hamas both committed acts of War Crimes.

 But the critics in demonizing NIF and Chazen complained not that the report is inaccurate, but that some of the facts obtained by the report came from organizations that received funds from NIF.

 It is a typical lynch mob mentality. Demagoguery at its worst.

 Nevertheless, Chazen's column was dropped. It should also be noted that Chazen was also writing for Yedioth Ahronot and Maariv newspapers and online web sites and some of her columns were dropped there, too.

 I know NIF very well. They have, in the past, supported the Israeli-Palestinian Comedy Tour. I have attended many of their events in Chicago and in Jerusalem. They are progressive and they support peace based on justice. The back the two-state solution and their programs often involve frank discussions and analysis that not only challenge the extremism in the Palestinian community but the growing extremism in Israel, too.

 I worked for Yedioth Ahronot's online web page, YnetNews.com, also. And I have been writing irregularly for the Jerusalem Post since leaving YnetNews about two years ago. (I won a Society of Professional Journalism Lisagor Award for my columns at YnetNews.com and I enjoyed the freedom they gave me.)

 But YnetNews.com is an online news site. And being the old fashioned journalist that I am, I still prefer the printed news paper. I like to see my columns in print on paper, not just online.

 Recently, the Jerusalem Post announced it was going to give me a regular column. It started this week, coincidentally. The column will run every Wednesday. I haven't come up with a name yet, although the column will reflect my fiercely moderate views and unashamedly anti-extremist views. I passionately dislike extremists - a political lifestyle I define as someone who rejects compromise and enables violence through selective silence. Someone who denounces others for violence but is silent when their side engages in the same violence.

 A moderate is everything an extremist is not. And, I will go further to say that the new Middle East is not a conflict between Israeli and Palestinians, but rather between extremists and moderates. I am proud to help lead that fight.

 The fact that I am Palestinian does not make me feel uncomfortable writing for the Jerusalem post, which is usually right of center and all the way to the limits of the right. I don't mind. To me, journalism is about divergent views.

 In fact, to the contrary, I feel at home writing for the Jerusalem Post. I believe in the secular future of Palestine and Israel. I also recognize and respect the heritage of my family which has had roots in Jerusalem for a millennium and probably even more. Jerusalem is my home whether it is controlled by the Ottomans, the British or Israel.

 May Palestinians are angry with me for writing for the Jerusalem Post, but I don't care. There are even more Israelis angered by my columns who sometimes are more articulate in expressing their hate.

 But there are far more Palestinians and Israelis who support my views and who reject the extremists who try to control through censorship, intolerance and bullying.

 I support NIF. And I am proud to also write for the Jerusalem Post. I am sure Chazen will do well and find a new forum for her views, views that are badly needed.

 In the meantime, I'll keep writing at the Jerusalem Post and define "the moderate Arab voice" speaking to an audience or primarily Jews and Israelis who I believe need to better understand what has otherwise been a poorly articulated Palestinian narrative and viewpoint.

 I hope you'll join me there, as well as here at PalestineNote.com.

 www.RadioChicagoland.com

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