latest element in a dispute about restrictions on freedom of speech in the US in relation to comments on Israel.

US free speech row grows as author says Jewish complaints stopped launch party | · Row over postscript on Palestinians' plight | · British-born academic claims lectures cancelled | Ed Pilkington in New York | Wednesday October 11, 2006 | The Guardian

The British-based author and former publisher Carmen Callil has become embroiled in a growing dispute over the limits of freedom of speech in America after a party celebrating her new book on Vichy France was cancelled because of the opinion she expresses about the modern state of Israel.

A party in honour of Bad Faith, Callil's account of Louis Darquier, the Vichy official who arranged the deportation of thousands of Jews, was to have taken place at the French embassy in New York last night but was cancelled after the embassy became aware of a paragraph in the postscript of the book. In the postscript Callil says she grew anxious while researching the "helpless terror of the Jews of France" to see "what the Jews of Israel were passing on to the Palestinian people. Like the rest of humanity, the Jews of Israel 'forget' the Palestinians. Everyone forgets."

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The embassy said the passage had been brought to its attention after a guest declined the invitation because of it. A spokesman denied allegations from Callil, reported by Reuters, that "fundamentalist Jews" had complained and had the party shut down.

The row over Callil's book is the latest element in a dispute about restrictions on freedom of speech in the US in relation to comments on Israel. ...