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UT-Austin and Texas A&M sponsoring annual meeting of anti-Israel academic boycott group

UT-Austin and Texas A&M sponsoring annual meeting of anti-Israel academic boycott group

Would UT-Austin permit any other group to enforce academic boycott rules at an on-campus conference?

The Native American and Indigenous Studies Assocition (NAISA) 2014 Annual Meeting will be held at UT-Austin in May 2014.

NAISA, a group that is only a few years old, recently announced that it is adopting the academic boycotts of Israel called for by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel PACBI and its U.S. offshoot (founded by one of the people behind the American Studies Association boycott), the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI).

Unlike ASA, NAISA has not even tried to scale back the boycott, and embraced in its resolution the full breadth of the academic boycott:

December 15, 2013

The council of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA) declares its support for the boycott of Israeli academic institutions.

A broad coalition of Palestinian non-governmental organizations, acting in concert to represent the Palestinian people, formed the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. Their call was taken up in the United States by the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. A NAISA member-initiated petition brought this issue to NAISA Council. After extensive deliberation on the merits of the petition, the NAISA Council decided by unanimous vote to encourage members of NAISA and all who support its mission to honor the boycott….

The PACBI and USACBI guildelines are quite sweeping.  You need to read those guidelines (at links above) to understand just how expansive the academic boycott campaign is.  Here is part of the USABI guideline, which makes clear that the boycott applies to academic conferences:

1. Academic events (such as conferences, symposia, workshops, book and museum exhibits) convened or co-sponsored by Israeli institutions. All academic events, whether held in Israel or abroad, and convened or co-sponsored by Israeli academic institutions or their departments and institutes, deserve to be boycotted on institutional grounds. These boycottable activities include panels and other activities sponsored or organized by Israeli academic bodies or associations at international conferences outside Israel. Importantly, they also include the convening in Israel of meetings of international bodies and associations….

4. Addresses and talks at international venues by official representatives of Israeli academic institutions such as presidents and rectors.

Again from the USACBI boycott statement (emphasis added):

While an individual’s academic freedom should be fully and consistently respected in this context, an individual academic, Israeli or not, cannot be exempt from being subject to boycotts that conscientious citizens around the world (beyond the scope of the PACBI boycott criteria) may call for in response to what is widely perceived as a particularly offensive act or statement by the academic in question (such as direct or indirect incitement to violence; justification — an indirect form of advocacy — of war crimes and other grave violations of international law; racial slurs; actual participation in human rights violations; etc.). At this level, Israeli academics should not be automatically exempted from due criticism or any lawful form of protest, including boycott; they should be treated like all other offenders in the same category, not better or worse.

With these guidelines in mind, formally adopted by NAISA, it it unfathomable that a U.S. university would host and sponsor a discriminatory conference run by NAISA at which Israeli academic institutions are banned and representatives of Israeli academic institutions would be excluded.

Yet that is what will be happening at the University of Texas – Austin in May 2014, when NAISA holds its annual meeting on campus.  That meeting was scheduled prior to the NAISA academic boycott announcement.

The NAISA annual meeting website indicates that “The Office of the President of the University of Texas, William Powers Jr.” and “The College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Austin,” and “Liberal Arts at Texas A & M University,” are featured Sponsors of the Annual Meeting.

NAIS 2014 Conference Sponsors

While we don’t know how much of a financial contribution these institutions are making, the 2013 NAISA Annual Meeting Sponsorhips prices ran into the tens of thousands of dollars.

The academic boycotts of Israel by NAISA, ASA and the Association for Asian American Studies have been denounced far and wide, including by President Powers at UT-Austin.  I have not received an answer from President Power’s office as to its position on continued sponsorship of the NAISA Annual Meeting in light of NAISA’s recently announced academic boycott of Israel.

This is not just an issue of Texas higher educational institutions lending their names and money to a conference by a group engaging in academic boycotts based on national origin.

Will UT-Austin allow the NAISA to exclude Israeli scholars and institutions from a conference held on campus?  If an Israeli Assistant Dean shows up at the conference, will UT-Austin campus police escort the Israeli from the conference if NAISA so demands?

Would UT-Austin permit any other group to enforce academic boycott rules based on national origin at an on-campus conference?

We need answers to these questions.

Related: List of Universities rejecting academic boycott of Israel and University statements rejecting academic boycott of Israel.

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Comments

I’m still waiting to hear back from the U of Hawaii.

I understand “Hawaiian time” and all, but I’d appreciate just a short yes or no answer as to the president’s support or opposition to the boycott.

P.S.

Quite proud of my son. We just came back from a three-day trip to Palm Desert and I saw him actually reading a book in our hotel room.

When I asked him what he was reading he told me it was “The Diary of Anne Frank.”

I asked him which class he was reading it for.

It wasn’t for any class. He was just reading it on his own.

I seriously doubt he’ll be joining BDS when he goes to college.

    rabid wombat in reply to LukeHandCool. | December 24, 2013 at 1:00 pm

    LukeHandCool,

    Good on your son. If “The Diary of Anne Frank” has his interest, try “Eyewitness Auschwitz: Three Years in the Gas Chambers”. Fair warning, this is a VERY dark book. You read it first, and determine if he is ready for it. Likewise, take him to Europe. Go see the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam. Follow that up with Bergen Belsen in northern Germany. We owe it to our children to make sure they understand.

If we’re to follow Alinsky rules, we need an Israeli assistant dean and lots of cameras and voice recorders at that event.

Texas A&M used to be conservative. It is not much more than tu on the Brazos now.

Boston College: bupkis

Rhode Island College: bupkis

Just to be clear the boycott would be about bringing awareness to the world of Israels on going genocide of Palestinians. Like there are 10 Million people living there, half of which 5 million are Israeli, and the other half of which 5 million are Palestinian, but this number would be 10 Million Palestinian, IF Israel did not have a 60 year war on the Palestinians. Much of this war, paid for by the United States of America.. Like 8 Million Dollars a day currently. You know, for clarity.. So you Know.. because from reading the article, we really did not come away knowing anything except whether or not we should ask if somehow the Universities of Texas would support an academic boycott of Israel and Israelis. I think another question of importance might be how many Academic Israelis themselves would support their own boycott; if it ended or stopped the violence against the people of Palestine? I mean really, since we are asking questions. And why would Native Americans support this? Oh yeah..

    LukeHandCool in reply to anony123. | December 24, 2013 at 7:22 pm

    You lost me in the first sentence at “genocide.”

    Jazzizhep in reply to anony123. | December 24, 2013 at 10:24 pm

    I’ll bite.

    Just to be clear the boycott would be about bringing awareness to the world of Israels on going genocide of Palestinians.

    1. It should be “on-going” or “ongoing”. If I understand your meaning—not a given considering your grammar and punctuation.
    2. Define genocide.
    3. So, your idea of spreading awareness is preventing scholars from traveling to Israel. O.K.

    Like there are 10 Million people living there

    1. Like what? Or do you mean “like” in the valley girl usage? Or perhaps you mean that since only 5 million Palestinians live “there”, it is proof of genocide. Only 26 million Texans live in Texas. Did Texas go genocide on Floridians? (go genocide is a reference to your previous misstatement “on going genocide” similar to saying “going postal”)
    2. Where exactly is “there”? In proper pronoun usage, a noun (place in this instance) is identified so the hearer knows where you are talking about. You do not list a “place” in your entire incomprehensible screed. You mention Israel and the U.S. but as a a government entity, not as a place (e.g. The Ukraine is in Europe (place), and the Ukraine chose to align with Russia (gov’t)) You could be talking about Timbuktu for all I know.

    half of which 5 million are Israeli

    1. Redundant
    2. Thanks for telling me 5 is half of ten. I suppose you believe the typical reader of LI is as dumb as yourself.
    3. Redundancy can be used for clarification or emphasis, but you must separate by using commas (e.g. He, the president of The United States, has decided to make up the law as he goes along.)

    Much of this war, paid for by the United States of America.. Like 8 Million Dollars a day currently.

    1. A comma does not take the place of a verb. The sentence should read; Much of this war is paid for by the U.S.
    2. Learn to use ellipses, or perhaps you thought “like 8 million dollars a day” was a complete sentence.
    3. Once again you use “like”. Like does not mean “such as”

      Jazzizhep in reply to Jazzizhep. | December 24, 2013 at 10:34 pm

      Crap, I was typing and then accidentally hit enter. so I will finish the previous thought and retire, one can see where I was going.

      Like does not mean “such as”. It be used colloquially (e.g. “He owes me like $20”), but that is the absolute worst way to make any kind of argument.

      You’re understanding of foreign policy, better than you’re understanding of grammar and it’s rules. But however because and, and the points your trying to make are absurd I feel that is like not the case..

    TerrorIsEvil in reply to anony123. | December 25, 2013 at 9:48 am

    What are you proposing to do about the Islamic/Arab terrorism targeting Jews for the past 100 years in the region? What do you think of the idea of having the Palestinians move to Jordan which was set aside by the British for the Palestinian people but given to Arab monarchy? Why did the Arab leaders not take their own people in (but instead set them like rabid dogs against the Jews)? Why are you not upset about the way Arab nations have treated their own refugees who are not one people but an assortment of refugees from Syria, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and parts of Israel where the Arab nations decided to use them in an armed conflict to get rid of Jews? Why not boycott, sanction and divest from Islamic countries that target others, including Christians, with terrorism and ongoing conquest? Do you perceive them to not be of any threat but merely a useful army to rid the world of Jews? That indicates to me that the BDS movement is a one-sided Nazi-style movement with anti-Semitic intent. Yes, they will start with Israel…and then come for you as they are doing today in Europe and America – recall 9/11? Thanks to loose immigration laws/enforcement/checks we are being flooded by those Islamists who want us dead and are doing their best to realize their deadly goals.

I hate to tell you but the only friend that you might find at UT-Austin would be Lino Graglia. I have a feeling that the both of you would get along famously as he may be the only evidence on conservatism to be found thereabouts.

Sorry but true…

UT, my mother’s Alma Mater and Texas A&M, who our family used for so long for the care of our cattle; etc. used to be respected institutions. No more.

This is how fascists (or leftists who are the new fascists) behave: 1) They target the Jews (or “Israel” for purposes of political correctness), 2) they bring Israel up on fake charges of “genocide” even though the Palestinians as a people are part of a growing Islamic onslaught that is orchestrating the leftists and using them to demonize the Jews, 3) They use propaganda very effectively as in the last century where the Mufti of Jerusalem and his Nazi cohorts spread lies to avoid any opening for Jews to be neighbors of Muslims, 4) They use the whatever is necessary to prevent the Jewish people from defending themselves in the court of public opinion – through terror – and by doing what they can to buy the politicians of the day and sway them to their treachery, 5) They use their holy books such as the Koran (or Mein Kampf which was the holy book of the Nazis) to get ignorant followers an excuse to kill and eradicate Jews from their midst – starting in the Middle East (where there are almost no Jews in Mulsim countries but over 1 million in Israel itself) but also spreading throughout Europe and America. Just remember that Jews, like the indigenous people of North America are as close as they come to the indigenous people of Israel – with 3700 years of unbroken habitation and Jewish life in the region to prove their rights. As for the politics and legal claims, do some reading for yourselves (San Remo, the League of Nations, Balfour, etc) and you will discover just how heinous, ridiculous and evil these boycotts are. It does not help when the guy at the top (Obama) is also working 24/7 to demonize Israel. I will not go down without a fight!

correction…(where there are almost no Jews in Mulsim countries – they were marginalized then killed or expelled – but there are over 1 million Muslims living very well in Israel itself)

Does anyone know of any groups planning to protest this event? Would love to help out.