BDS | Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion - Part 26
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Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 16, 2017 3 Comments
There is an increasing recognition that most of the anti-Zionist movement, including Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), is the new format for centuries-old anti-Semitism. The reason anti-Zionists, with few exceptions, seek the destruction of Israel and deny the Jews the right to a homeland in their historic homeland, is because of Israel's Jewish identity. As we have posted before, historian Benny Morris documents how the Arab war against Israel's independence was viewed in the Arab world as a religious holy Jihad:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 03, 2017 7 Comments
On June 24, 2017, Jews who carried a Jewish LGBT Pride flag with a Star of David on it at the "Dyke March Chicago" were singled out by organizers and kicked out of the event, which was held on public property. The actions were anti-Semitic despite claims by the organizers they were only "anti-Zionist," as explained in our post, Psychosis-laced anti-Semitism: Anti-Israel LGBT activists ban Star of David from Chicago parade:
Claims of anti-Semitism are being made over actions yesterday by organizers of a “Dyke March” in Chicago to remove certain Jewish participants from the event because they carried a Jewish LGBT Pride Flag that had a Star of David in the Middle of a rainbow flag. The flag was alleged to be “triggering” to “pro-Palestinian” participants....

Posted by Miriam Elman on July 02, 2017 31 Comments
For a century Palestinians have been denying and denigrating the Jewish people’s attachment to the Land of Israel even as they’ve been doubling-down on their own fictitious claims to ‘Palestine’ in antiquity and to family lineages in the Holy Land that predate that of the ancient Hebrews. A former adjunct lecturer of Jewish history at Haifa University, now the creative director at a Tel Aviv advertising agency, decided to poke fun at this absurd situation in which Palestinians reject the historical accuracy of a Hebrew/Jewish presence in the land while simultaneously concocting an essentially fraudulent narrative of their own history. The literary product is History of the Palestinian People: From Ancient Times to the Modern Era.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 01, 2017 2 Comments
The anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement is becoming increasingly violent. We have seen this in the U.S. through frequent physical disruptions of Israel-related events. Indeed, as I have documented many times, disruption of Israel-related events was a precursor to the more general campus intolerance we are seeing at places such as Berkeley, Middlebury, and universities in Britain and Ireland. In my post, With campus shout downs, first they came for the Jews and Israel, I provide many examples of increasing BDS violence and physical intimidation that accompanies these shout downs. Disrupting Israel-related events is not limited to the U.S. and Britain. At Humboldt University in Berlin, a criminal complaint has been filed after an aggressive disruption.

Posted by Vijeta Uniyal on June 22, 2017 6 Comments
Germany’s Jewish community has criticised the government and lawmakers for failing to act against the rising antisemitism in the country. The Head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Josef Schuster, slammed the German politicians over 'lack of interest' when it comes to combatting the rising antisemitism within the country. The Central Council of Jews in Germany is the umbrella organization of Jewish communities in the country. The statements coincides with the recent parliamentary debate centred on a detailed report on antisemitism by a group of independent experts tabled in the German Bundestag. The 311-page report by the 'Independent Expert Group on Anti-Semitism' deals with -- to quote a German news network -- the "current anti-Jewish sentiment in Germany." The German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported the recent parliamentary debate saying, “One by one, politicians from all of Germany's major parties took to the podium to condemn anti-Semitism and stress how seriously they took the problem”. Deutsche Welle revealingly called the parliamentary debate on Antisemitism a “ritualized speech-making.” The Bundestag debate ended with Merkel's government deciding to put the report on the back burner.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on June 14, 2017 2 Comments
In a severe blow to the anti-Israel academic boycott movement, the 18,000 member Modern Language Association has passed a Resolution explicitly rejecting the academic boycott of Israel. The academic boycott of Israel had been termed a grave threat to the academic freedom of everyone and the free exchange of ideas by over 250 university presidents and numerous prominent university organizations. Nonetheless, the academic boycott, which is part of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, is a focal point of anti-Israel activist professors and graduate students. We have highlighted this MLA Resolution in prior votes, including a recent post, Tables turned: Modern Language Association in midst of voting on Anti-BDS Resolution:

Posted by Miriam Elman on May 30, 2017 4 Comments
We’ve written before about Ryerson University in Toronto, Canada in connection to BDS and virulently anti-Israel activism crossing over into flagrant antisemitism and creating a toxic environment for Jews, Anti-Israel protest disrupts vote to support Holocaust Education Week at Ryerson U. In that earlier post we highlighted how several groups of Ryerson students, members of Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslim Students Association, reportedly staged an “unofficial” walk-out so that a student government vote on a resolution to commemorate Holocaust Education Week would be deprived of a quorum. Now, a new disturbing story has surfaced at Ryerson. But this time it involves anti-Israel, pro-BDS faculty there allegedly behaving badly toward a Jewish undergraduate student.

Posted by Occam's Razor on May 26, 2017 5 Comments
We've written extensively of the disturbing phenomenon of anti-Israel activists taking over professional and academic associations (even associations in memory of holocaust victims), and diverting them for their own radical political agendas. This has been especially pronounced in the long battle that seems to dominate large portions of the social sciences and humanities academy: we refer of course to the apparently serious question of whether the academy should be devoted to the furtherance of knowledge and wisdom...or whether it should be devoted to fighting the State of Israel.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 23, 2017 5 Comments
We previously wrote about the firestorm that erupted over the appointment of Professor N. Bruce Duthu to be Dean of the Faculty at Dartmouth College, New Dartmouth Dean of Faculty endorsed academic boycott of Israel, here’s what that entails. In that post, I questioned how Duthu could fulfill the duties of the position of Dean of Faculty in light of the sweeping nature of the academic boycott guidelines:

Posted by Occam's Razor on May 18, 2017 3 Comments
We have previously covered the never-ending saga at the anti-Israel obsession of some members of Modern Language Association (MLA). Those members have engaged in a years-long attempt to get MLA, the largest academic society in the humanities, to boycott Israel and to officially join the “Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions” (BDS) movement. After the radicals’ massive defeat at the MLA business meeting at the annual convention in Philadelphia in January, they are on the defensive: not only was their resolution to boycott Israel (2017-2) defeated by the Delegate Assembly, but a counter-resolution (2017-1), calling on MLA to reject academic boycott, was approved and placed before the general membership.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 15, 2017 14 Comments
Rasmea Odeh recently pleaded guilty to immigration fraud, for failing to disclose on her immigration applications her 1970 conviction and imprisonment in Israel for a 1969 supermarket bombing that killed two Hebrew University students, Edward Joffe and Leon Kanner. Rasmea concocted a defense that she falsely answered the questions because she was suffering from PTSD, which made her “filter” the plain wording. At multiple levels that defense was as big a lie as her lies on her immigration forms, and in the plea agreement she admitted her false statements were not the result of PTSD or any other mental condition. But if you need a refresher on the case, and Rasmea’s other nonsense claims, see our coverage of the guilty plea, Rasmea Odeh pleads guilty to immigration fraud, and follow up post, VIDEO: Terror victim’s brother says Rasmea Odeh supporters “have to eat their words”. Rasmea has been treated as a hero by anti-Israel groups, including Jewish Voice for Peace and various chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).

Posted by Miriam Elman on May 14, 2017 7 Comments
On Thursday May 11, at the 67th FIFA Congress in Manama, Bahrain the Palestinian Football Association (PFA) and its supporters of vehemently anti-Israel ‘human rights’ organizations lost their bid to sanction or suspend the Israel Football Association (IFA) from FIFA—the governing body of world soccer. Eligible member associations voted 138-50 to approve the FIFA Council’s alternative proposed motion to delay the issue for one more year until March 2018. I highlighted the persistent campaign against Israel at FIFA in a recent post, Will FIFA Kick Israel Out of World Football?

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 10, 2017 4 Comments
We previously reported on the growing controversy surrounding newly appointed Dartmouth College Dean of Faculty N. Bruce Duthu, due to his prior endorsement of the academic boycott of Israel, New Dartmouth Dean of Faculty endorsed academic boycott of Israel, here’s what that entails. In that post, I questioned how Duthu could fulfill the duties of the position of Dean of Faculty in light of the sweeping nature of the academic boycott guidelines:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 08, 2017 11 Comments
There is a mini-firestorm that has erupted slowly over the appointment of Professor N. Bruce Duthu to be Dean of the Faculty at Dartmouth College. The first flames appeared in late March 2017 at the Dartblog, run by Dartmouth alums. After noting Duthu's alleged lack of academic and professional qualifications for such a position, Joseph Asch '79 wrote:
Finally, and of greatest concern, is the man’s politics. He signed the American Studies Association petition urging the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) directed at Israeli universities.... Additionally he is listed as an author of the Declaration of Support for the Boycott of Israeli Academic Institutions by the Council of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association....

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 04, 2017 8 Comments
At Cornell we mostly have great students. This is a story about some of those great students at an Israel Independence Day event who reacted in a powerful way when a small group of students from the anti-Israel Students for Justice in Palestine disrupted the event. You may recall that there have been problems with anti-Israel activists on campus disrupting any positive event about Israel. Anti-Israel activists were the vanguard of the campus anti-free speech movement, as I documented in With campus shout downs, first they came for the Jews and Israel. At places like Berkeley, Jewish students have to find non-disclosed locations for pro-Israel events. Intimidation tactics by anti-Israel students have not been as big a problem at Cornell as on some other campuses, but a dozen or twenty people can cause a lot of trouble. In November 2014, anti-Israel students, assisted by Ithaca activists, tried to physically intimidate pro-Israel students. I covered the story, Cornell Pro-Israel students taunted: “F**k You Zionist scums” (Video at the link).

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 03, 2017 12 Comments
The Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is a well-financed international movement launched at the anti-Semitic 2001 Durban conference. The BDS movement falsely is portrayed as having launched as a 2005 grassroots call from Palestinian civil society. In fact, as I have proven, BDS  traces its roots back to the anti-Jewish Arab boycotts of the 1920s and 1930s, and is a variation on the Arab League boycott that reached its zenith in the 1970s, The REAL history of the BDS movement. The BDS movement seeks to slam university doors in the faces of Israelis, to prevent cultural exchanges, and to harm Israel economically through economic boycotts.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 18, 2017 4 Comments
The National Lawyers Guild is a left-wing lawyer organization that, among other things, actively provides legal advocacy in support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. NLG also advocates against Israel on a variety of international issues. NLG is a "proud member" of the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation (since rebranded as U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights), the group that is so toxically anti-Israel that not a single congressman or congresswoman would sponsor its intended Capitol Hill event. NLG also has filed legal briefs and provide other legal support in support of convicted terrorist Rasmea Odeh, who recently agreed to plead guilty to immigration fraud. In July 2016, the National Lawyers Guild, Inc. and the National Lawyers Guild Foundation, Inc. (collectively, "NLG") were sued by Bibliotechnical Athenaeum, an Israeli company.