Opposition to AUT snowballs and boycott may be overturned

[drdon326]

The controversial decision by Britain's Association of University Teachers (AUT), to boycott Bar-Ilan and Haifa universities, may be annulled before it actually takes effect. Members of the association who oppose the boycott are attempting to collect 25 signatures of AUT's council to force a special meeting that will overturn the decision.


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A week has passed since the AUT's annual convention in Eastbourne, where the association voted on the boycott. Bar-Ilan University was targetted due to its support of the College of Judea and Samaria in the settlement of Ariel, and Haifa was boycotted because the university victimized "academic staff and students who seek to research and discuss the history of the founding of the State of Israel." The latter clause refers mainly to Dr. Ilan Pappe, a post-Zionist historian from Haifa University. The decision exempts from the boycott academics and intellectuals who oppose "their state's colonialist and racist policies."

The AUT decision has aroused tremendous opposition, both in Israel and in England. Members of AUT said opponents of the boycott were not permitted to speak at the discussion, and the decision was taken without requesting the universities' response. In addition, doubts were raised about the legality of the decision. The past week was rife with anti-boycott activity: several lecturers resigned from the association in protest; faculty members, rectors, university presidents, and not only from Bar-Ilan and Haifa universities, asked British colleagues not to join the boycott, and to persuade others to reject it; and Jewish organizations in Britain, such as "Academic Friends for Israel," lobbied extensively to have the boycott annulled. In London, a Times editorial harshly condemned the decision, and university intranet and internet - the new arena for political warfare - is overflowing with condemnations and a variety of strategic proposals to counter the decision.

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A key figure behind the boycott is Dr. Sue Blackwell from Birmingham University. As an academic she specializes in language and gender issues, speech development in children and legal language. As an activist she is the local representative of AUT and campaigns against the war in Iraq, against Israel's policies and against racism. ("Whenever the British National Party stands for elections in Birmingham, you will find me campaigning against them on the street and reminding voters of the horrors of the Holocaust", Blackwell says.)

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AUT's decision, which was taken last Friday, has been in the pipeline for two years. Blackwell and other teachers had attempted to pass a general academic boycott of Israel, a move that failed. However a series of other decision were taken, including the condemnation of human rights violations in the occupied territories, and the decision that anti-Zionism is not equivalent to Anti-Semitism, as well as a condemnation of "the witch-hunt against colleagues who take part in the academic boycott of Israel."

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=570277&contrassID=2&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0

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Too bad Sue.

[Jim Sagle]

1. Sue ain't nuthin' but shit.

[drdon326]

2. Words cannot express.....

how much I despise and loathe that anti-semitic pos.