Mucho Gratzias...
Israel signed a bilateral industrial R&D cooperation agreement on Tuesday with China’s Zhejiang Province, known as the Silicon Valley of China, as 350 delegates from the Asian giant attended MIXiii, the Israel Innovation Conference. It also inked agreements with Jiangsu Province’s Science and Technology Department to promote Israeli companies’ participation in Chinese innovation parks and a first-of-its kind pilot program to encourage Israeli companies participation in the Changzhou Innovation Park in Jiangsu (population 79 million). “The science and technology of Israel need market potential and also market rules, and Zhejiang is a great partner,” Zhou Guohni, director- general of Zhejiang Province (population 55 million), told The Jerusalem Post at the signing in Tel Aviv. “We are facing a transformation and upgrade of the industry, and we need Israel’s technology to help transform and upgrade it.” The Economy Ministry’s Chief Scientist Avi Hasson said the agreement “will help many Israeli companies expand into the Chinese market and marks the next stage in the economic and technological relationship between our two countries.”Read on, the expansion of ties is even wider than described above. Meanwhile, on campuses like UCLA, U. Michigan, Wesleyan and a dozen or two more, naive students are trying to get their student governments to call for divestment from selected companies doing business in Israel. The student governments have no power to effect divestment of university endowments, it's all symbolic. Sure, we're going to fight BDS vigorously, to the end, because it's malicious. Witness what happened at Vassar, where SJP actually posted a Nazi cartoon and cited white supremacists for their anti-Zionist theories.
Pro-Israel student leader at Vassar was warned: "Remember the devil has enough advocates"...
Narendra Modi is the next Prime Minister of India. Modi’s NDA-Alliance won 336 out of 543 seats in the Indian parliament. He has routed the ruling Congress Party led by Rahul Gandhi, the 4th generation member of Nehru-Gandhi dynasty Modi is arguably one of the most capable administrators in India. As Chief Minister of Gujarat State (2002-14) he turned around the economy, created infrastructure and improved public services. With a population of 60 million, Gujarat’s per-capita GDP today is much higher than India’s average. A lot of ink has been spilled in the international press over this relatively unknown man now at the helm in New Delhi. However there is one story readers in Israel need to hear: Modi is a friend of Israel, the like of whom India has not seen before. This fact can be stated without any exaggeration or wishful thinking. All one needs to do is to look at Modi’s track record. Modi is the first Indian leader to have actually visited Israel. He has often expressed admiration for Israel’s achievements in research, technology and innovation; espacially in the field of agriculture and water resources. Every year more than 2000 farmers from Gujarat visit Israel to get trained in advance farming techniques – at their own expense. He welcomed Israeli Companies to enter water management and recycling sector in 50 cities of Gujarat; and invited Israel to be the guest country at Gujarat state’s flagship Agricultural Fair (Vibrant Gujarat Agro Tech Global Fair 2014).
... Faculty members have joined the depravity. Thirty-nine professors protested after [Vassar President Catharine] Hill properly said in January that Vassar would not join the American Studies Association’s anti-Semitism-tinged call for boycotting Israeli universities. The 39 backed the boycott, with some asserting that Hill’s action “silenced discourse on campus,” as one put it. Duh, they claim they want dialogue while supporting a boycott against dialogue. Then it turned out that the 39 lacked the courage of their convictions. When Cornell University Law School professor Bill Jacobson challenged the entire group to debate the merits of boycotting Israel, they all ducked. So on May 5, Jacobson spoke — without fee — on campus at the invitation of the Vassar Conservative Libertarian Union, which is headed by a Muslim student. The libertarian union had sought co-sponsorships for Jacobson’s talk from numerous student groups and academic departments. All refused, a fact that demonstrates how strongly anti-Israel sentiment holds sway at Vassar, perhaps inducing a climate of fear among those who feel otherwise.
I graduated from Vassar two years ago and I am a proud left winger, but I just can't be down with the Students for Justice in Palestine group at my alma mater. The group is full of filthy anti-Semites, who are spectacularly ignorant about everything from Nazi propaganda to Israel's defense of itself..... At Vassar, even for me, the unhinged left wingers could be too much.... Vassar has become a reactionary, ignorant, illiberal place full of unlettered bigots. No longer will I aid those values with donations.The Vassar Conservative-Libertarian Union (VCLU), which sponsored my speech at Vassar, decided that it was time to protest before students left campus for the summer. VCLU erected a Wall of Truth to counter the many defamatory and false allegations made against Israel. [caption id="attachment_86233" align="alignnone" width="547"] (Wall of Truth at Vassar College, May 2014, feat. Alec Ferretti and Julian Hassan)[/caption] The Wall of Truth specifically was placed in the same location that Vassar SJP puts its misnomered "Apartheid Wall" during Israeli Apartheid Week:
Demands SJP "cease representing itself as an official Vassar group, pending these investigations"...
There was a time when people looking for intellectual debate turned away from politics to the university. Political backrooms bred slogans and bagmen; universities fostered educated discussion. But when students in the 1960s began occupying university property like the thugs of regimes America was fighting abroad, the venues gradually reversed. Open debate is now protected only in the polity: In universities, muggers prevail....
Here's UM CSG Vice Pres @Bobby_Dishell at AIPAC: http://t.co/dYE6kOJ9xJ He has learned from the best.
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) March 26, 2014
Bobby Dishell is Campus Coordinator at Teach for America. School privatization hawk and Israel hawk. http://t.co/d62X23oJ1i #UMDivest
— Rania Khalek (@RaniaKhalek) March 26, 2014
So I was not completely surprised when I learned from reader emails over the past several days that there is an attempt at UCLA to disqualify any student who received pro-Israel training or trips from being on the Student Council.
Because of my trip to Vassar and follow up, I didn't have time to write it up. So I'm glad that two others have done so.
Jonathan Tobin at Commentary writes, The Next Step in the Campus War on Jews:
"I have never seen so many older white people packed into a room"...
My speech for Israel and against the academic boycott was well-attended....
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