Academic Boycott of Ariel in Action

First, a Call for Papers was issued to academics on a university-sponsored forum in Israel for a conference at Ariel University on May 6 on "The Nation-State Dealing with Inter-Cultural Conflicts".  One professor immediately wrote back asking that if persons from "an institute for the Israeli conquest called by a general's edict a university" are permitted to make announcements, this would be a step towards "dark apartheid".

Another responded that it is the second's democratic right not to attend and that his own feeling, after reading what he wrote, is to attend.

An American professor then reacted by writing in agreement with the second:

I am concerned.  I do not want and cannot allow my presence on this list to imply any acceptance or endorsement of an Israeli university illegally established in occupied lands.  If there is a decision to allow these invitations to be issued on this list I will ask to be removed from the list.

but was then informed by the third

I am only speaking for myself, but though it will be hard for me to lose such a great friend of the Jewish state, I truly feel that if I had to chose between the freedom of this forum and your presence in it, I would regretfully have to choose the former.

A fourth then noted

Professor ________, I don't understand how your presence on this list can imply acceptance or endorsement of Ariel when you have clearly stated otherwise. If failing to leave a collective (and especially a loose collective like this list) implicitly means taking personal moral responsibility for whatever is happening in this collective, you will get some pretty strange implications: 1) If the NY times publishes an article by a settler (as it sometimes does) you will have to cancel your subscription. 2)  If the US congress moves to support Jerusalem as the Capital of Israel you have to give up your US citizenship.  3)  If Turkey, Egypt, Russia and China continue to talk with Iran, all those nations who decided to impose sanctions on Iran should, by your logic, stop talking with them.

Your threat to leave the list is in fact a statement that not only do you want to excommunicate Ariel, but you also want to excommunicate people who don't necessarily agree with you that Ariel should be excommunicated. What is the next step? Excommunicating those who don't excommunicate those who don't excommunicate Ariel?  Please enlighten me,

The answer was

Dear ______, There is no question that any line one draws is arbitrary.  When does involvement in an institution that shares in the occupation implicate one in the occupation?  If the Israeli Council on Higher Education treats the school in Ariel as a University like any other in Israel, then if one does promotional reviews for one member of the CHE does that implicate one in a set of standard operating procedures that  includes treating Ariel and TAU as parallel institutions?  If the US government funds activities in central America I find repulsive, does that mean I don't pay my taxes at all, or simply refuse to work with any US government branches that are involved in Central America?  The point is not to find the line that is not arbitrary, but to make sure one finds a line and stands on it.  Otherwise, all slopes can be made so slippery that the conscience never has a chance to speak clearly.  Perhaps this is not the line I should stand on, but for those who find the idea of establishing an Israeli university on occupied land ethically repulsive, where do you think the line should be drawn?  My fear is that unless we can draw clear lines to isolate this phenomenon then dozens, then scores, then hundreds, then thousands of scholars all over the world will draw the line around Israel itself.

I couldn't restrain myself and asked:

"Illegally"?  Didn't the High Court of Justice permit its establishment?  Is the court only to be respected in certain cases?

This is the level of "higher education" (and yes, there still is another appeal,, I think, pending but the okay was given).

I checked backed, and the conversation had continued:

A fifth reaction:

I am not sure how I feel about ______'s position, but we should face the bigger issue: since the declaration of Ariel as a university we all find ourselves having to make a decision whether to draw a line and where that line should be. Should we accept Ariel as any other Israeli academic institution; should we treat individual members of Ariel University different than academics in other institutions; should we make a stand only about Ariel as an institution thus maintaining the same level of contact with faculty members there as we would with others elsewhere. Of course there are other options. This way or the other we must also acknowledge that the pressure around the world for boycotting the Israeli academia will only increase because of Ariel. The questions raised by ____ and ______ are just a precursor for an issue we will have to eventually address. 

Yet another professor:

The legal system strives to impose equal injunctions on all of us. This is why the modern iconography of Justitia portrays the goddess with a blindfold. Moral imperatives, on the other hand, are in the eyes of the beholder. Some of us do not discern anything blameworthy in the settlement movement in general and in the establishment of a university in Ariel in particular, nor do they find any fault in the rather unusual procedure of that institute's accreditation.  For such persons there seems to be no reason to stay away from, let alone, boycott,  Ariel's academic events. Another subset of this list's participants either take issue with anything having to do with the settlement movement, or insist on accreditation procedures which were, in their opinion, brushed aside in the case of Ariel. For individual members of this subset, the undersigned included, there seems to be a strong moral reason to keep away from all activities associated with the "university" of Ariel. My point is that since the issue is a moral, rather than a legal one, there seems to be no objectively "correct" response to this issue. It is a case of facing one's conscience and in matters such as these we are all lone riders.

A word about the role of the Supreme Court in this matter. In making a decision in this case, the Court will not be called upon to opine on the morality of the issue. This is not a part of its business. The petition to set aside the accreditation of Ariel, is based on much narrower grounds, to wit whether the administrative agency in charge of accreditation violated some key rules of our public law, e.g. the imperative of equality under the law, of not being led by corrupt motives etc. Even if eventually it will not detect some forms of illegality which must trigger its intervention, the question of morality will still remain the individual problem of each one of us, not the problem of the Court.

That drew this response

I think you’re missing the point.  This isn’t about the moral imperative “to keep away from all activities associated with the "university" of Ariel.”  No one is denying you or _______ the right to do that. I’m reading this string as a proposal to ban the rest of us from SEEING an invitation about activities at the University of Ariel (or ‘“university” of Ariel’ if you prefer). Seeing!!  As if an invitation is the worst type of political porn. I can’t help but wonder what comes next? When do we start refusing to eat in the same restaurant, go to the same wedding, beach, school as someone who is on an open listserv where, once in a while, they might see these invitations?  Or when do we refuse to sponsor a student or hire a colleague who doesn’t sign some promise never to look at invitations from the dreaded University? Or publish in a newspaper or journal that has deigned to publish something by someone in Ariel. It’s time to stop this nonsense. If you don’t like the invitation, hit delete or decline it. But don’t stop the rest of us from SEEING it. Not on the main Israeli social science listserv!!

P.S.  The names were removed to protect, er, whatever.

___________________________

The discussion goes on:

...    On the grounds that every server list belongs to its members, it seems to me reasonable that the members can decide who they will invite to join them in becoming members and using the list. On those grounds, I would support a move to ban from our lists people associated with the school that now flatters itself with the title of "university" in Ariel. Where I come from, such titles are earned very differently from the way this one was awarded.

    Unfortunately, I don't know how such a ban could enacted. Could we somehow electronically vote on it, for or against? And I don't know how, if enacted, such a ban could be enforced since, if I understand computers correctly, anyone with a computer keyboard can send messages to any list. Maybe, though, if a ban were announced, the people banned would be embarrassed to violate it. I wouldn't count on that though. Embarrassment doesn't seem to be a very powerful force in modern society.  

    At any rate,  I would not view such a ban as violating any principle of free speech or anyone's "right to know." Ariel employees can send their messages out via newspaper announcements, Arutz Sheva, or web sites associated with their school. No one stops them from doing that, and if they would do only that, I would be pleased not to have to delete their mail from my computer. By the way, for me it is not a simple matter of deletion, because I have to look at each message I receive to see where it comes from and why it deserves deletion.

     By the way, I am sure that, as time passes, the school in Ariel will attract some moderate teachers who are desperate for academic employment in these hard times, just as some settlements have absorbed similar people who are desperate for relatively cheap housing. That is the long-term strategy of right-wing ministers, and if it works out as they hope, we inside the Green Line will more and more confront the difficulty of deciding how to relate, professionally and personally, to those teachers in Ariel.

^

Academic Freedom of Expression - Not

I received this message to a post I had sent on the academic mail-list at Hebrew University:

Your request to the SocSci-IL mailing list

Posting of your message titled "Re: [Social Science- IL]: The OTHER Eviction of Women from Busses - the one the Feminists Ignore" has been rejected by the list moderator. The moderator gave the following reason for rejecting your request:

"Your message was deemed inappropriate by the moderator."

Any questions or comments should be directed to the list administrator at: socsci-il-owner@listserver.cc.huji.ac.il

What was my post?

Here:

Yisrael Medad
Mar 6
to socsci-il
just as a matter of correct English. there's a spelling error. the plural of bus is buses.
"busses" is actually an exuberant kiss

Kissing and bussing differ both in this,
We busse our wantons, but our wives we kisse.
[Robert Herrick, "Hesperides," 1648]
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=robert+herrick

I was replying to this:

On Wed, Feb 29, 2012 at 11:41 AM, steven plaut wrote:

Israelis have been terribly upset when one or two bus lines were set up in Ultra-Orthodox chareidi neighborhoods in which the menfolk and womenfolk sat separately. The irony here is that there really is a form of malicious bus-related gender discrimination in Israel, although one about which Israel's feminists have never had anything to say.  Israel may be the only Western country in which there are no (or virtually no) women bus drivers. The reason for this is that, ever since it was created, the Egged monopoly has refused to allow women to be bus drivers. In my 32 years in the country I have seen one or two women bus drivers, and I think they were not even on Egged busses but Dan busses (the Tel Aviv separate bus monopoly). Egged denies it bars women from being drivers but Egged is lying.

In all other countries, women drive busses. And since Egged drivers are grossly overpaid, driving a bus would be a great form of livelihood for women who do not have college educations or technical training, and would even allow divorced and single mothers to raise families. There are also almost no women taxi drivers in Israel...In other words, the feminists are concerned with the advances of the pampered Queen Bees, but working class women have no interest for them.  Israeli women are harmed by the Egged discrimination far more than they were from being asked to sit separately from men on the Chareidi bus line.

Academic freedom.

Freedom of expression.

???

All I was doing was pointing out a spelling error.  One, by the way, which was, to my mind, a bit funny in its context.

Was I boycotted?

^

Where Is The Ariel University Center?

Yes, it's in Ariel.

Ariel is in Samaria.

Samaria, some assert, is actually the "West Bank".

In Ariel is the Ariel University Center.

And if in the "West Bank", it should be:

a) supported and funded;
b) ignored;
c) boycotted?

Don't answer that just yet. Wait for this item:

An American online university started by an Israeli entrepreneur has opened an operations center in the West Bank.

Shai Reshef, the founder of University of the People, a nonprofit institution that offers free online education to students in more than 120 countries, said in an interview last week that his agreement with ASAL Technologies, a Palestinian software and information technology services company based in Ramallah, was just the first stage of a plan to move the university’s entire back office to the West Bank.

Now what?

What are you going to do?


^

But What About the Boycott?

Caught this job offer:-

Council for British Research in the Levant (CBRL)

Director of the Kenyon Institute, Jerusalem

The CBRL is currently looking for a new Director at the Kenyon Institute in Jerusalem. The CBRL conducts research in the social sciences and humanities in the Levant as supported by the British Academy. The successful candidate will be a senior/experienced university academic conducting research in a relevant subject within Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories. The CBRL is keen that its research personnel should maintain strong links with universities in the UK. Applicants are therefore encouraged to propose ways in which they might maintain a connection during their period of appointment with a UK university department. The closing date for completed applications and references is 15 August 2011.

UK Office, CBRL
10 Carlton House Terrace
London, SW1Y 5AH
England
http://www.cbrl.org.uk/

Well, given the state of frothy frivolousness in the United Kingdom towards Israeli academics,* that's a non-starter job for an Israeli.


*
Here.
Here.
Here.

Oh So Notable - Not

"HAA Travels" has invited Alumni, Family, Friends, and Guests of the Harvard Alumni Association to travel to the Middle East with the HAA.

Laudable.

Here is the blurb for one of the tours, entitled "The Holy Land: Views on Israeli-Palestinian Relations" to take place between Oct 6-16, 2010 with Everett Mendelsohn:-

Explore the archaeological and cultural heritage of Israel and Palestine, and engage in the political issues that they face. Visit Jerusalem with its unique interplay of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim cultures and Ramallah, the political center of the Palestinian Authority. Then travel through the Jordan Valley to Tiberias, base for visits to ancient Capernaum and Beit She’an, a well preserved Roman and Byzantine city. Conclude in sophisticated and vibrant Tel Aviv. Meetings with distinguished Israeli and Palestinian notables in the political and diplomatic worlds will enhance this unique journey.

Here's an appreciation:

“Depth of information and contacts was beyond my expectations…It is hard to single out highlights as there were several each day. Personal contact and exposure were very meaningful.” – HAA Traveler from Hingham, Mass. reflecting on the trip to Israel in 2008

See here for more info.

By the way, this is a 'rich' tour: it "starts" from $7,795 per person. For 10 days (actually almost 9). Are they leaving big tips for Arab refugees?

But let's get back to basics.

Everett Mendelsohn is...Professor Emeritus of the History of Science at Harvard University, where he has been on the faculty since 1960. Among his recent publications are “Religious Fundamentalism and the Sciences” and “Grasping the Elusive Peace in the Middle East.” He coauthored the report, “Israeli-Palestinian Security – Issues in the Permanent Status Negotiations” for the American Academy of Arts and Sciences where he chaired the Middle East Security subcommittee. He has visited widely in the Middle East on a regular basis since 1968. He is committed to using his personal contacts to ensure we receive a balanced perspective on the history and current state of Israeli-Palestinian relations.

He happens to be on the FFIPP-USA Advisory Board. FFIPP is

an international network of academics and students that support a complete end to the illegal Israeli occupation of lands seized in the 1967 war and removal of all the settlements and the separation wall built on occupied land.

We call on Israeli, Palestinian and international academics everywhere to take a stand in support of ending the occupation, as well as against the extreme violence to which it has subjected both Palestinians and Israelis. Academics worldwide must also stand firm in support of the basic human right for free education in both Palestine and Israel, a right that has been compromised, continually in Palestine, due to the continued occupation.

1. We call upon international academics visiting Israeli institutions of higher education, and Israeli academics visiting foreign institutions, to make clear their support of ending the Israeli occupation and the removal of the separation wall built on occupied land.
2. Academics invited to speak at Israeli educational institutions should try to visit and speak at equivalent Palestinian institutions.
3. FFIPPI supports the call to sanction faculty and institutions, which clearly support the occupation.
4. FFIPPI calls on professional associations of academics, in Israel and internationally, to take a stand against the occupation and to issue guidelines regarding the use of academic connections to promote the end of Israeli occupation.
5. FFIPPI expresses its strong support for and encouragement of individuals in the Israeli and Palestinian academy whose actions against the occupation and in support of peace and justice have resulted in personal hardship. Notable cases include Israelis refusing IDF military service in the occupied territories; those publicly condemning the violation of civil and human rights in the occupied territories; and those Palestinians who have called for an end to suicide bombing and the use of arms against Civilian targets. FFIPPI will act to publicize their actions.
6. FFIPPI views the College of Judea and Samaria in the West Bank as a part of the machinery of Israeli occupation and calls upon academics worldwide to refuse to collaborate with it in any way...

Well, I just love the liberal progressive approach to academic freedom.

Those poor (actually quite rich) tourists. This is a political tour of pro-Pal. character.

But one more thing.

I love the use of "notables" up there.

"Notables" is a key term in what is claimed to be "Palestinian nationalism" which at the most was a clash of competing elite families who sought (and bought) favors from the central power authority - Ottoman or British, or Jordanian for that matter.

See here and also here. And this:

...the Muslim-Christian Association (MCA) first appeared in Jaffa early in November 1918, and in Jerusalem later the same month; subsequently it set up branches in various Palestinian towns. The purpose behind creating the MCA was to organize a Palestinian national struggle against the threat of Zionism.

The top leadership of the MCA was drawn largely from the older generation of urban notables who had social standing in Ottoman times. Initially, the MCA, under former Jerusalem mayor Musa Kazim al-Husayni, did not have much political power, and its significance derived from the fact that it embodied the concept of political cooperation between Muslims and Christians in Palestine. Gradually, however, it became a group of leaders and activists who were able to mobilize important segments of Palestinian society around a program of independence and opposition to Zionism...

More sympathetic background here.

The tour doesn't seem balanced.

I would suggest a meeting with a revenant Jew residing in the area of his historic national homeland to present his view and narrative.

Want to suggest me?

Write them at haatravels@harvard.edu.

New "Who?" Quiz

Which leading Israeli politician announced he would "ban extremist Islamist groups, refuse visas to hate preachers and insist that universities identify and root out radicals promoting violence, antisemitism and other racial intolerance on campus."?

Right. None.

It is David Cameron of the Conservative Party of Great Britain.

In an exclusive interview with the JC, Conservative leader David Cameron said his party would "drain the poison" of extremism. He said recent visitors to Britain such as Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the influential Egyptian cleric who supports suicide bombing against Israeli targets, and Ibrahim Moussawi, Hizbollah's "media relations officer", would never again be allowed into the country.

He also confirmed that a Tory government would ban the virulently anti-Zionist group Hizb-ut-Tahrir, which calls for the re-establishment of the caliphate (Islamic state).

While defending the principle of academic freedom, he said universities had a responsibility to root out extremism, even if this meant fingering individual students for their beliefs: "That means making clear to university authorities and student unions that they need to help identify those who are vulnerable to influence from extremists or show they are willing to promote hatred, just as they would in relation to any other suspected crime," he said.

"Faithfully"

OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

May 3, 2009

Dear Governors and Friends,

I am writing to you to clarify the University’s standing on the recent debate regarding Omar Barghouti, a Tel Aviv University master’s student of philosophy. Mr. Barghouti is leading an international campaign to boycott Israeli universities, despite being a student at one of those universities.

A university campus should be a place that encourages and tolerates free speech, no matter how offensive the expressed opinions may be to the majority of students and faculty at that institution, or indeed to the public at large.

Our university has adopted a similar policy also in previous occasions.

Moreover, if legal issues are involved, a university does not have the authority to prosecute individuals. Rather, such a matter should be pursued by the State through legal channels.

In response, therefore, to the petition calling for the expulsion of Mr. Barghouti
that will be submitted to us in the near future, the University cannot and will not expel this student based on his political views or actions. He will be assessed only
on the basis of his academic achievements and excellence.

I thank you for your time, and look forward to seeing many of you in May at the annual Board of Governors meeting.

Yours faithfully,

Prof. Zvi Galil

From Someone Who Was There

Written by Eve Garrard

Motion 25 was passed, by a huge majority. There was a real, palpable desire in the meeting to take some action against Israel. An otherwise rather somnolent audience woke up at the first mention of Palestine, and applauded every suggestion that action should be taken against Israel. A congress which had just passed very moderate motions on Burma and Zimbabwe and Sudan, about solidarity with trade unions and asylum seekers, and putting pressure on governments, quite clearly felt that these measures weren't sufficient for Israel's crimes: that for Israeli academics, nothing but punishment would do.

At first the discussion was procedurally unexceptionable - both sides of a debate were permitted on an amendment which called, among other things, for the motion to be put to a ballot of the whole membership. This amendment was voted on and rejected - the majority of union delegates didn't want to give the membership of the union the opportunity to choose for themselves on this issue. But when Motion 25 itself was proposed and seconded, several delegates spoke in favour of it - and then it was moved that it be put to the vote. None of the people who wanted to speak directly against the motion were permitted to do so. However, the motion's proposer, Tom Hickey, was at this point allowed by the Chair to speak in favour of it again. No explanation or justification was provided for halting the debate before anyone could speak against the motion, while allowing its proposer to speak twice. I have to say, though, that in my opinion even if the debate had been conducted in an impeccably proper manner, it would have made very little difference: that audience really did want to vote against Israel.

Source

Nice Going My Fellow Jews

The JC today identifies the key players in the escalating British campaign to boycott Israel. Our investigation shows that many are Jewish or Israeli, and that they justify their stance as part of the struggle for Palestinian rights and ending Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

Anti-boycott figures suggest that the campaign has been fuelled by a well-organised mix of far-left activists and Islamic organisations. In reality, the main proponents are a loosely knit collection of academics and trade unionists linked to groups such as the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Jews for the Boycotting of Israeli Goods, and Bricup, the British Committee for Universities of Palestine.

Short and to the Point

The hatred of Israel that now courses through Britain’s veins has now erupted in yet another frenzy whose irrationality and spite are scarcely credible. One now gets a whiff of what it must have been like during the witch-hunts of the Middle Ages

Source: Melanie Phillips.

And she points to this viscious and dangerous idiocy:-

Respect for democracy, individual rights and freedom of speech are being crushed beneath the juggernaut of shrill indignation. 

What is particularly disturbing is the way opposition to the Jewish state descends into vicious antagonism against Jews themselves, as shown by this sickening recent outburst from writer Pamela Hardyment, a member of the National Union of Journalists, which in April voted to boycott Israeli goods.

Explaining her support for the NUJ’s stance, Ms Hardyment described Israel as “a wonderful Nazi-like killing machine backed by the world’s richest Jews”. 

Then, like some lunatic from the far-Right, she referred to the “so-called Holocaust” before concluding: “Shame on all Jews, may your lives be cursed.” 

Such words could have come straight from Hitler or the most fervent supporter of Osama Bin Laden.

But Ms Hardyment is hardly unique.

British Academic Freedom

Melanie Phillips reports:

Leeds university to cancel the proposed lecture by Matthias Küntzel on the links between the Nazis and Islamic antisemitism was absolutely shameful. As the Telegraph reported:

Matthias Küntzel, a German author and political scientist who specialises in the threat of Islamic fundamentalism, was told yesterday by the University of Leeds that a talk scheduled for yesterday evening, and a two-day workshop, on Hitler’s Legacy: Islamic Anti-semitism in the Middle East, had been cancelled because of security fears.

In a statement yesterday, two academics in the Leeds German department, which had organised the event, claimed the university had bowed ‘to Muslim protests’. Dr Küntzel said he had given similar addresses around the world and there had been no problems. He added: ‘I was told it was for security reasons - that they cannot shelter my person. But I don’t feel in any way threatened. I know this is sometimes a controversial topic but I am accustomed to that and I have the ability to calm people down. It’s not a problem for me at all. My impression was that they wanted to avoid the issue in order to keep the situation calm. My feeling is that this is a kind of censorship.’

The UK, you'll recall, is the country that leads the campaign to boycott Israeli unviersities.