When David Horowitz, the editor in chief of the conservative online journal FrontPage, published the pamphlet “Campus Support for Terrorism” last year, he put a photograph of Joel Beinin, a professor of Middle East history at Stanford, on the cover. The move effectively relocated an ideological battle between Mr. Horowitz and Mr. Beinin, who has criticized the war in Iraq, from the pages of newspapers and magazines to the courtroom.
In March, Mr. Beinin filed a complaint charging copyright infringement against Mr. Horowitz and the Center for the Study of Popular Culture, which Mr. Horowitz founded and heads. He said an earlier request faxed to Mr. Horowitz to take his likeness off the pamphlet had been ignored, leaving him no recourse but legal action.
“The title of the booklet clearly means to say that I am a supporter of terrorism and there is absolutely no truth to that. There is not even a claim of that within the booklet itself,” said Mr. Beinin, who asked for and was granted the rights to the photograph after he learned of the cover. (The cover has four photos, including one of Sami al-Arian, a former professor who last month pleaded guilty in Tampa, Fla., to helping the Palestinian group Islamic Jihad.)
“I have spoken against terrorism, written against terrorism many times, and I object to the illegal use of my photograph for that reason,” Mr. Beinin said.
Mr. Horowitz said he never saw any fax from Mr. Beinin and first learned of the complaint through the lawsuit. A formal answer to Mr. Beinin’s complaint, filed last week on behalf of the Center for the Study of Popular Culture, asserted that revised covers of the pamphlet in subsequent printings would not have the photograph.
But the picture, Mr. Horowitz said, is beside the point, adding, “The leftists claim to be concerned about the chilling of free speech, but think nothing of using the courts to chill speech.”
