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Posted by Laurel Conrad on March 08, 2014 8 Comments
I'd like to re-pose the age-old question: "If Israeli Apartheid Week happens on campus and no one notices, does it make a sound?" Israel Apartheid Week (IAW) officially took place on campuses across the U.S. over the course of February 24-March 2, although the exact boundaries of the "week" varied somewhat. When we set out to monitor events at Legal Insurrection, we expected an avalanche.  But it never showed up.  There were events, but none seemed to have much energy or attendance. We're just starting the "Israeli Apartheid week" in Europe too, but even in Sussex, England, only 8 people showed up to the BDS march.  That may reflect that even in Britain, a hotbed of anti-Israel activities on campus, IAW is losing steam, UK Students Say 'Israel Apartheid Week' Losing Steam. Has Israeli Apartheid Week peaked already in the U.S.? The Jewish Press reported that pro-Israel counter-events outnumbered IAW events. We had trouble finding reports of any large-scale IAW activities, and those that did occur failed to draw coverage or attendance on numerous campuses. For example, at the University of Maryland, only 12 of 426 invited guests rsvp'ed as attending the IAW event, "The Wall Must Fall." Neither did the event receive any coverage from their student newspaper.

University Maryland IAW

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 26, 2014 9 Comments
After an all-night session, the UCLA student council defeated an ant-Israel divestment resolution by a vote of 7-5.  (Featured image is moment vote announced.) The vote received enormous attention, and was trending in the U.S. on Twitter. This is a huge defeat for BDS on campus. Divestment resolutions recently were overturned at UC-Riverside and defeated at UC-Santa Barbara. I can't say whether this is a national trend, but it does signify that pro-Israel students now are more organized than in the past. (added) Ben Shapiro made a "guest" appearance against the resolution: In this image, one of the student council members a student note taker, who appears to have supported the resolution, is crying and screaming that she's never been so disappointed and that "we just fucking blew it." (UPDATE -- Video HERE) UCLA student we just fucking blew it

Posted by William A. Jacobson on November 27, 2013 15 Comments

It's hard being a principled member of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement. With Israel being a leader in computer, medical and other technologies, one would have to enter a time machine back to the 1950s to truly boycott Israeli products. The Cornell Students For Justice...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on November 05, 2013 14 Comments
Our examination of the shout-down of Ray Kelly at Brown University has moved from the events that day to examining reaction of faculty, including from Political Science Professor Marion Orr who apologized for inviting Kelly, and Biology Professor Ken Miller who issued a forceful denunciation of the shout-down. Something interesting happened along the way, as more faculty went on record supporting the protests, if not the shout down. Post doctoral fellow and instructor Linda Quiquivix, who spoke on a panel discussion in favor of the protests, turned out to be a zealous critic of Israel, to put it very mildly.  In light of Quiquivix's background, I suggested that there may be a connection between supporters of the tactics used against Israel on campuses and those used against Kelly. It turns out that another faculty member who supported the shout-down also has a background in the Israel divestment movement.  More than that, she sits on the University advisory committee on social investing, which has taken up the Israel boycott issue at the behest of Brown's Students for Justice in Palestine. Naoko Shibusawa is a professor of history, specializing in "U.S. cultural history." [caption id="attachment_69998" align="alignnone" width="436"]Naoko Shibusawa Syria Forum 3 (Naoko Shibusawa)[/caption] In the wake of the Kelly shout-down, Shibusawa wrote a Letter to the Editor of The Brown Daily Herald on November 1, fully supporting the events that took place (emphasis added):

Posted by William A. Jacobson on November 03, 2013 31 Comments

I have been following various faculty reactions to the Ray Kelly shout-down, including from Political Science Professor Marion Orr who apologized for inviting Kelly, and Biology Professor Ken Miller who issued a forceful denunciation of the shout-down. So when I saw an article in The Brown...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on September 20, 2013 8 Comments
Yesterday we posted examples of the racist and other posters placed around the Oberlin campus last February as part of The Great Oberlin College Racism Hoax of 2013.  There are many more in the Oberlin police department document production we did not post. On no campus in the United States or elsewhere would the racist posters using the "N" word and so on be acceptable public discourse (even if it is an interesting free speech legal issue). But what about the anti-Israel poster? Oberlin Poster Anti-Israel w out handwriting Unfortunately, such discourse on campuses and elsewhere is par for the course in the anti-Israel movement.  The attempt to single out Israel alone for boycott, and the false equation of Israel with Apartheid, fascism and Nazism, is part of the dialogue and accepted.  Oberlin is one of only a handful of higher education campuses where the student government has endorsed the anti-Israel BDS movement and boycott.  https://twitter.com/SJPNational/status/331473633899864064 In fact, Oberlin has one of the most active anti-Israel movements which spreads historically inaccurate falsehoods about the "occupation" and Israeli "Apartheid" policies: I have to wonder, if only the anti-Israel posters were put up around Oberlin not accompanied by attacks on blacks, Muslims and gays, would anyone have noticed or cared?  Would the campus have erupted in protest? Somehow I doubt it. The specific flag used on the Oberlin poster is akin to a stock image in anti-Israel protests, this one in San Francisco:
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