Big Win for Anti-Israel Academic BDS Movement

PALESTINE - ISRAEL, 16 Dec 2013

Scott Jaschik – The Australian

THE National Council of the American Studies Association announced last week that it has unanimously endorsed a boycott of Israeli universities and other Israeli institutions–and urged its members to vote to make the boycott official policy of the association.

THE National Council of the American Studies Association announced last week that it has unanimously endorsed a boycott of Israeli universities and other Israeli institutions — and urged its members to vote to make the boycott official policy of the association.

The move by the council, even if awaiting approval by the membership, is seen as a major victory for the movement for an academic boycott of Israel. The movement has considerable support in Europe, but has been largely opposed by major academic associations in the US, citing longstanding objections to countrywide boycotts as antithetical to academic freedom.

But in April, the Association for Asian American Studies became the first disciplinary group to endorse the academic boycott of Israel, and the American Studies Association now appears to be the second.

In Australia, Sydney University academic Jake Lynch, director of the Centre for Peace and Conflict studies has been embroiled in a public stoush and is now being taken to court over his decision to boycott an Israeli academic.

“The council voted for an academic boycott of Israeli institutions as an ethical stance, a form of material and symbolic action. It represents a principle of solidarity with scholars and students deprived of their academic freedom and an aspiration to enlarge that freedom for all, including Palestinians,” said the statement issued by the association.

“Our resolution understands boycott as limited to a refusal on the part of the association in its official capacities to enter into formal collaborations with Israeli academic institutions, or with scholars who are expressly serving as representatives or ambassadors of those institutions, or on behalf of the Israeli government, until Israel ceases to violate human rights and international law,” the association added.

The voting will run to December 15. While the association’s statements noted that some members disagree with the boycott, and that no member would be forced to honour it, the association has urged a vote in favour of the boycott. It has also distributed quotes from leading scholars backing the boycott.

Curtis Marez, president of the association and a professor of ethnic studies at the University of California at San Diego, was quoted as saying: “The boycott is the best way to protect and expand academic freedom and access to education. Palestinian academics are frequently impeded by Israeli occupation authorities, schools and universities have been bombed by US-supported Israeli military forces, and the Wall blocks educational access for thousands of students. As an association of scholars and educators, the ASA has an ethical responsibility to act.”

Critics of the boycott have questioned why the association has taken a stand against Israel and not other countries that lack anything even close to academic freedom or free speech rights. Supporters say the association honoured the boycott against apartheid South Africa, and has condemned anti-immigrant legislation in Arizona and elsewhere.

Go to Original – theaustralian.com.au

Join the BDS-BOYCOTT, DIVESTMENT, SANCTIONS campaign to protest the Israeli barbaric siege of Gaza, illegal occupation of the Palestine nation’s territory, the apartheid wall, its inhuman and degrading treatment of the Palestinian people, and the more than 7,000 Palestinian men, women, elderly and children arbitrarily locked up in Israeli prisons.

DON’T BUY PRODUCTS WHOSE BARCODE STARTS WITH 729, which indicates that it is produced in Israel.    DO YOUR PART! MAKE A DIFFERENCE!

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