No call for boycott

There was no decision at the University and College Union congress to call for an academic boycott of Israeli universities or academics, but to discuss the issue. See the press release on the UCU website: http://www.ucu.org.uk

Academic freedom is paramount and academics cannot restrict free speech and open debate without damaging the principle of the rational pursuit of knowledge and understanding which is the essence of the academy.

Combating all restrictions on academic freedom that necessarily damage the pursuit of truth is the basis on which Academics for Academic Freedom (AFAF) was established in the UK.

Your readers might be interested in AFAF’s statement of Academic Freedom: http://www.afaf.org.uk

Dr Dennis Hayes, Past President UCU, founder Academic s For Academic Freedom, at 6:40 am EDT on June 5, 2007

KEEPING IT REAL

Every year a small group of delegates to the British faculty union conference proposes some boycott of Isreal, and every year there’s tremendous outrage about the suppposedly anti-isreali and anti-semetic views of British academics.

Anyone would think that British professors thought this was an important matter and rushed to vote. In fact, like so much that goes on in the world the continually unfolding tragedies of the Mid-East, Horn of Africa, and so forth, are matters of supreme indifference to them. The tiny group of union delegates involved in proposing this policy do so because their fellow union members neither know nor care about their views.

The most important thing to remember is that in Britain, there is no first amendment to protect our free speech. (Indeed, there is no constitution to amend.) For example, reciting the the names of British soldiers killed in Iraq (or even having them listed on a T-shirt), Isrealis killed by Palestinians,or Afghans in Gitmo, is a criminal offence within sight of Parliament. Expressing political views of any kind, or offering contentious opinions on policy, are often seen as conflicting with the ‘values’ of individual universities — who are all utterly dependent on government funding. All this would matter terribly if the majority of British academics were interested and not indifferent. But so few are....

Odysseus Blair, at 7:43 am EDT on June 5, 2007

The difference between South Africa and Israel

In the first case, apartheid was internal—within the borders of South Africa. In the second case, the apartheid is external. Palestinians were driven out of the country in 1948. Once you reduce the number of Palestinians inside Israel to a nonthreatening minority, it becomes possible to be “democratic". But essentially you are dealing with racism and colonialism. That is why Israel found it convenient to back South Africa under apartheid. There was a commonality of interests.

Louis Proyect, at 9:20 am EDT on June 5, 2007

Punish the Just

I am asking my colleagues to read in today’s edition of Haaretz the article entitled Moral Masturbation by Bradley Burston. The author points out how ridiculous it is to try to boycott Israeli academics who have been in the forefront for the Peace Movement and the dismantling of settlements.May I suggest in turn that we boycott all British academics for the “sins of the few"? How absurd!

kenneth feigenbaum, Punish the Just at U.of Maryland-University College, at 12:45 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

No surprise

No surprise here. American academics had no objection to the Chinese annexation of Tibet and the subsequent genocide. The political bias and selectivity of American academics is a longstanding tradition. And now even in the responses to this piece, attempts to justify the UCU.

John Lobell, at 1:00 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

an elected delegate conference

The writer cannot tell the difference between an elected delegate conference which took the vote and the mass membership of the UCU. Delegates to this conference were elected by union branches — there were over 80 people present at my branch meeting where we elected the delegate who supported this resolution. The conference had the perfect right to discuss motionssent by branches.

The resolution did not call for boycotting all Israeli academics but those who collaborated with the illegal occupation of the West Bank including teaching in universities illegally based in the occupied territories. This is not an attack on academic freedom — the occupation is preventing academic freedom in Palestinian institutions where students cannot attend classes because of Israeli closures of checkpoints. When the Israeli army destroyed the mainframe at Bir Zeit, why was there no outcry about academic freedom then? As Jewish academic I feel it is my duty to reject the oppressive policies carried out by the Israeli state in the name of all Jews. As a UCU branch secretary I therefore totally support calls for a boycott

Neil Rogall, at 2:17 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

Debate, not polemics

Polemics without setting the debate at stake goes nowhere. In that, my first post is guilty to a degree. Let me phrase it in a way that people can disagree or agree with if they want. I think that the argument revolves around a few questions (I provide commentary on them):

A— Is the UCU Anti-Semitic? That is, do they only dislike Jews, and not just Israel? If there are Jews on the UCU, which there are, it seems to moot the point. Also, are they anti-Jewish in places other than Israel? I’m not sure to the answer of this question.

B — Is boycotting Israel worse than not boycotting other places? Or is it even true that scholars only boycott Israel? Since scholars boycott Sudan stocks these days, as well as North Korea and Iran, it seems that the Tibet argument offered is one of the only valid points left. In that case, it seems like a red herring, really, to offer up the Tibet example if it is the only one left (and even then, academics wear the stickers “free Tibet,” etc.). Other countries are boycotted, and that point seems to be meant only to detract, not to actually find out the essential qualities of the UCU’s proposal in relation with other anti-Sudan, Iran, etc. movements.

C — Is boycotting Israel pro-Hamas? To make that link is more difficult than saying people want Palestine to have some rights and dignity restored to it. I think that the Hamas issue is very recent, and to invoke it, as the article’s author did, is ahistorical and merely rhetorical. Prove that the UCU is only for Hamas; otherwise the strength of the point is lost.

D – If banning all of Israel is like the Nazi categorizing, how do we explain the fact that Israel is a state and the Jews are a people? That is to say, the UCU says nothing about Jews in Britain or America. To make such a connection seems tedious, and in fact, quite devious possibly—one is a state the other is a people. A state has a military, a people does not. To equate Israel with the Jews is only half correct. The Jews are a people, Israel is a state, and the two are quite separable.

In my mind, the answers to these questions exonerate the UCU from the charges being made in the article and in the posts. Reply to these questions if you have a different perspective, it would be most welcome to get a real discussion.

A, at 2:17 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

Response to Feigenbaum

For Kenneth Feigenbaum’s earlier question:

If you have a hard time believing Israel would blow up a synagogue to aid its own state making process, you have not been reading much Middle Eastern history. As for evidence, in this posting Avi Shlaim discusses the creation of anti-Semitism (not unlike on this article) for the support of the Israeli state. It also discusses a grenade thrown into the central synagogue in Baghdad. You can disagree with the quite possibly the leading Israel-Palestine historian in the world if you want:

http://www.fromoccupiedpalestine.org/node/1566

Obviously Feigenbaum can’t have a discussion without screaming (hence the caps). Shlaim and other Jews and non-Jews have always noted how heated and polemic the anti-anti-Semitic groups are when pressed. I think Feigenbaum’s caps and incredulous posting only continues to prove the point that the Israeli lobby and group does not want debate—they want silence. I think that this continues to prove that the argumentation, evidence, and logic of the pro-Israeli faction pales to that of the UCU and other groups who continue to argue in the face of screaming and intense vitriolic criticism without grounding. Can’t you see why the UCU does what it does when you treat your debaters like this?

Thanks for the debate.

A, at 3:15 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

powerful professors???

Do the members of the UCU really believe that Israeli professors are powerful enough to change government policy and that a boycott will have an effect on the occupation? Would that academics in this country were so powerful. We’d have been out of Iraq before ever getting in...

Betsy Smith, at 4:00 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

UCU ‘boycott’

‘Concerned professor’ writes ‘only a few (mostly) marginal groups in the Middle East and around the world think that Israel can ever be moved’. Which Middle East would that be? This is one of the most naïve and fatuous statements I have read. A great many groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, its Palestinian offshoot Hamas, the Iranian-backed Hizbullah, the wider radical movement exemplified by al-Qaeda, the Iranian government, the Syrian government are all vocal about their wish to destroy Israel. This is based on Islamic theories of international law, according to which Jews cannot be allowed to rule over territory that has been Islamic waqf. Beyond the extremists, most Middle Easterners would rather see Israel gone than have it survive. How many wars does Israel have to fight to show there are people out there with guns who want to bring it down? How many suicide bombings and rocket attacks do Israelis have to endure before ‘concerned professor’ and the UCU realize someone really does mean them harm. The British campaigners openly ally themselves with the Palestinian cause, and for the moment that cause is the displacement of Israel and its replacement with a theocratic Islamic state. Don’t believe me. Read the Hamas charter. Read statements from Hizbollah. And yes, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did say he wanted to wipe Israel out and to exterminate its inhabitants. Back in the 1930s, there was a situation very like this. Many fooliesh academics back then (notably, most German academics) made the wrong choice. The UCU needs to think twice before it makes the same mistake.

Denis MacEoin, Dr, at 5:20 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

I was at conference as a delgate for Barnet College and I am amazed that Dennis Hayes, the ex-President of the UCU didnt read the small print in the motions

The motions include several pro-boycott measures which my union is obliged to carry out. The UCU effectively has become a platform for the campaign of the SWP and the other pro-boycotters organisations against Israel.

The UCU will be obliged to circulate a Palestinian boycott call to all its local branches, support a speaking tour by Palestinian academics presumably supporting a boycott, encourage members to “consider the moral implications of links with Israeli academic institutions” and campaign for a “moratorium on research and cultural collaborations with Israel via EU and European Science Foundation funding”. For an organisation supposedly representing academics – this is a suspiciously one-sided, debate stifling position.

Sally Hunt has once again has shown weak leadership and the inability to understand the issues, which as spokesman for the TUC on International affairs is inexcusable. On one hand she has indicated to congress that the motion on anti-Semitism should be withdrawn because the NEC has a working plan on the matter. With the same breath she indicates she doesn’t see the benefit of voting for a boycott in Congress yet she doesn’t call for the withdrawal of those motions even though the NEC, which met on 4 May with its partner organisations produced a plan for UCU support of academics and Trade Unions in Palestine and Israel.

There are lots of question marks arising from such a behavior as well as with regard to Ms. Hunt’s personal view point on the matter. If she instructs the UCU to distribute to members details of the Palestinian Campaign for an Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) – which effectively, according to the motion passed she needs to do, she and the UCU will be party to the PACBI aim of the destruction of the State of Israel. I therefore challenge her to publically state her personal opposition to an academic boycott of Israel

The real significance of the UCU’s decision is that it confirms that the battleground is now the Trade Union movement not only in the UK but worldwide. In a few weeks time Unison, Britain largest union, will be asked to boycott Israel and the showdown will come at the Trades Union Congress, the supreme body for all UK Trade Unions at their meeting in September. Couple this with the recent Canadian and South African Unions boycott calls and the message is clear: Single out one country, one conflict and set your advocacy at them. There is a real threat that the entire British Trade Union movement will be hi-jacked by an extreme minority set to de-legitimise the right of Jews to self-determination. If that is not antisemitism, I would love to hear what is.

Ronnie Fraser, MR at Barnet College , London, at 7:05 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

Horrible Essay

Inside Higher Ed as well as the Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Anti-Semitism do themselves a disfavor by allowing this essay to appear. The poster “AT” has done the most efficient job of highlighting the intellectual fallacies in the work, but I must say the writing and structure itself is horrendous.

While it is understandable that this boycott has gotten passions inflamed, certainly better opposition essays can be done.

Joseph C., at 7:05 pm EDT on June 5, 2007

Your piece does not mention that Israel in fact enjoys academic and cultural access to European institutions and funding without parallel (i.e. it can apply for funding as though it were a European state). There are reasons of historical guilt behind this, but, in the long run, I do not think Israel benefits form being treated as though it were a European colony in the middle east.

As a British academic, though not a member of UCU, I am not in favour of a boycott. However, I do think that those Arabs unjustly displaced in 1948 and 1967 should be allowed to return to their land, and I am unhappy that Israel receives undue privileges not extended to other middle eastern states, or to other Meditarrenean states outside continental Europe.

David Jones, Professor at St Mary’s University College, at 6:05 am EDT on June 6, 2007

No Small Thing

I couldn’t have said it better myself, Professor Small. The double standard applies itself again and again in judgements about the Middle East, and if you doubt it, consider that wall erected to bar Palestinians from a certain country in the region. No; not that one, but the one the Egyptians stacked atop its boundary to keep the Palestinians at arm’s length. See, for example

http://www.worldpress.org/Mideast/2212.cfm

http://www.dailystaregypt.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=2742

How do we explain the astonishing refusal of the world to excoriate THIS wall?

Abbott Katz, Dr. at MST COllege, at 7:25 am EDT on June 6, 2007

Israel is One of the More Peaceful Countries

While 400,000 Blacks are murdered by Arabs in Sudan...

Thousands of gay individuals in Arab countries have no rights...

All Saudi Arabian women are oppressed...

the British want to boycott Israel, which is one of the most open societies on Earth?

To single out Israel for criticism is to put Jews in danger.

Just as Jews made a tolerant society in Israel, we will make sure that other societies around the world are humane.

Matt Hoffman, student at UMass-Amherst, at 4:35 pm EDT on June 6, 2007

Double Standards?

“Who is the racist really? Israel won’t give full citizenship to its Muslim citizens (about 20% of the population) and it practices a racial/religious state openly.”

A, Saudi Arabia practices an extreme form of religious apartheid, in which not only can no non-muslims become citizens at all, but they are banned from even congregating to worship on pain of imprisonment and torture. Conversions from Islam in Saudi are punished by death (as it is in most Islamic states).

But we don’t see any academic boycott against that nation.

Maybe the boycotters done feel that anything they can do can ‘fix’ the repression of Saudi Arabia, and that Israel is more susceptible to pressure. Or maybe they’re afraid of the (likely violent) protests and whines of ‘islamophobia’ that they would have to undergo.

If the Jews were as violent when offended as we have seen Muslim groups being, then maybe they would get more respect from cowardly academics.

Young Professor, Assistant Professor, at 9:00 pm EDT on June 6, 2007

British boycott

So I gather A’s defense of the double standard is that the British academics actually think they can have some influence on the Jews of Israel, who are, after all, modern, Western, white folks (well, not the majority who immigrated from the Arab lands and Iran to Israel). I don’t think that even requires a response.

A also incorrectly states that the Arab citizens of Israel do not have full citizenship. On the contrary, they do — they vote, there are Arab reprsentatives in the Knesset, they have access to the courts, they have all the rights of any Israeli citizen. They are excused only from one of the obligations of Israeli citizenship, namely, compulsory military service. So are Orthodox Jews, so it’s hard to see where the discrimination is.

Perhaps A can point me to one Arab state where Jews had full legal rights before they were all driven out?

DBL, at 10:40 am EDT on June 7, 2007

Moral equivalency please

‘A’ wrote, “...providing all the bad places in the world doesn’t make Israel’s stances and actions any better—two wrongs don’t make a right.”

Sorry — that argument doesn’t fly.

Sure; it’s convenient to focus on “what is closest to home.” But it’s also shallow.

Here’s a new filter for you to consider as you decide on where to place your change efforts. Who will cut your head off and tape it for the entire world to see if you don’t agree with their religion? Start there.

Never again.

Kevin, at 5:30 pm EDT on June 7, 2007

I’m intrigued, A. I’d like to know more about you...

You are so terribly interesting, A. Let’s see: Shlaim is “one of the key historians” (chuckle) and “he is a scholar at Oxford University—one of the premier schools in the world, and usually not one that hires ‘crackpots’.” I can assure you, as a previous scholar at Oxford myself, that one might be forgiven for thinking that “crackpot” is a requirement for getting hired at Oxford. (No, not all of us, but seriously, are you really so star-struck?).

So tell us, what’s this top-ten program you claim to have attended? And if you are indeed a professor, where? Have you any existing restraining orders against you?

aitatxua, at 10:15 am EDT on June 8, 2007