No Israel Please, We're Jewish Students

With nasty chants such as these on college campuses it's no wonder Jewish and pro-Israel students feel intimidated:

(The venue: Hunter College in New York; the chants: "Zionists out of CUNY!" and "Long live the Intifada!")

Even so, US-based Rabbi Shmuley Boteach was ill-prepared for the craven response of Jewish students across the herring pond a few days ago when he mentioned the "I" word:

'What shook my confidence in British Jewry today was my experience at King’s College [London] where I was invited to address the Jewish Society. I focused my remarks on Israeli democracy and the ways in which it could be a model for the autocratic Arab states of the region. Israel is the great hope for the spread of human rights throughout the Middle East.

As I spoke, I could see my hosts growing restless and the discomfiture on their faces surprised me. I was in for a bigger shock, however, when my hosts stopped me mid-lecture and said that they were opening the floor for questions. I am always happy to respond to questions, friendly or hostile, but I have rarely been interrupted so abruptly by the people who invited me to speak. (The talk was video taped on a phone.)

When I asked for an explanation, I was told by the president of the organization, a young man wearing a yarmulke, that the Jewish Society has a policy against speaking about Israel. The group, he said was non-political and focused on “Jewish subjects.”

Israel not a Jewish subject? I was dumbfounded. It was as if Israel had become the Voldemort of nations, the country that dare not be named.

When I recovered from the shock, I asked if I should speak about lox and bagels, klezmer music or Manischewitz wine. My sarcasm seemed to go right over my hosts’ heads. For them, Israel and Judaism were unrelated. I asked if the murder of Israeli citizens in countless terror attacks over the past month was likewise a “political issue,” or one of human rights. I was told by one of the students that these things needs not be put in boxes. Worse, I sensed that these students, who had enough pride in their heritage, and commitment to their faith, to wear their yarmulkes in public, had become so cowed by the omnipresent hostility and bullying on and off British campuses that they were afraid to engage in a dialogue about Israel.

The talk was video taped on a phone and the discomfort of the students discussing, let alone defending, Israel is deeply jarring....' 

 Read more here

See this by Boteach too

"I Urge Jewish Students ... To Avoid Most London Colleges...; The Atmosphere is Thoroughly Toxic"

Remember my recent post here regarding the adoption of a BDS motion by the King's College London Students' Union (KCLSU)?

As reported in the campus newspaper, KCLSU's Trustee Board has since decided that it won't override the motion, and that consequently

"the motion will be published within the KCLSU Welfare and Community Zone alongside other issues on which our members have, by majority, voted."

The same source reports that the Trustee Board also decided that

''we will not use KCLSU resources to implement the ‘Resolves’ section of the motion or otherwise promote the BDS movement through the union."

 It quotes KCLSU President and Chair of the Trustee Board Sebastiaan Debrouwere thus:

"[The Board] decided that the motion as democratically approved by Student General Meeting should stand as a record of the majority view expressed on the issue, but that we should not act on the resolves, given the laws that govern us as a charity and our wider objectives as a charity..."

Cold comfort for Jewish and other pro-Israel students on a campus where for all too many anti-Israel activity seems to have become a way of life:

"As an alumnus of KCL, I wrote to the Chancellor a few months ago, expressing concern about the College - during my time there, extremist groups like Hizb-ut Tahrir set up stalls at the entrance and acted in an intimidating way, and the Jewish Society's noticeboard was routinely vandalised and defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti, including Holocaust denial. The College also has the dubious "honour" of educating a British suicide bomber, who attempted to blow up Mike's Bar in Tel Aviv (his accomplice was unfortunately successful).

The Chancellor's representative assured me that the atmosphere was now completely different and there was no problem at all.

They then invited Richard Falk, the anti-Semite at the UN, to give a speech. This time the Chancellor gave me a list of Falk's credentials, and defended the invitation.

I see nothing has changed. The College authorities, whilst not directly responsible for the shameful vote, stoke the fire and then act all surprised when it the fire spreads.

I urge Jewish students, and right minded decent young people, to avoid most London colleges - indeed, most UK campuses, and study somewhere else. The atmosphere is thoroughly toxic."

So writes a commenter named Adam on my recent post here.

 Oxford student Jonathan Hunter (if the name if familiar, it's probably because of this incident)  reflected thus on KCL's invitation to Falk:

".....This man has repeatedly violated principles at the forefront of King’s College’s own external speakers policy; especially in regard to the incitement of religious hatred. And his talk wasn’t even educational; it was filled with garbage. A moral equivocation between U.S. military action during the Second World War and Nazi genocide. A defence of what he even termed ‘inconsistency’ in singling out Israel and the U.S. for human rights abuses. After the talk, when I approached him for clarification on some his views, he basically denied outright that he was a 9/11 truther; despite being a signatory to an organisation called 9/11 Truth.

So why on earth did King’s College invite this clown? Why should King’s grant legitimacy to this complete and utter nut? And more bizarrely, how can this be a compulsory session for students?....

In essence, it boils down to that obsession with Israel which permeates nearly every academic institution. A pathological infatuation which latches onto any crank so long as he has something bad to say about Israel. It doesn’t matter if it’s a Holocaust denier like Israel Shamir – the House of Lords will warmly receive him. Nobody cares if it’s someone as offensive as George Galloway – the Oxford Union will still invite him. Who gives a damn if they’re an apologist for suicide bombers? Azzam Tamimi continues to hop from campus to campus spouting hatred...."

The toxic atmosphere which Adam cites is, of course, apparent on many campuses in the Western world, especially during the excrescence known as "Israel Apartheid Week" (see, for example, the  outbreak of antisemitic daubings at Adelaide University recently (more here) and the outrageous goings-on at Vassar, as described here.

British blogger Edgar Davidson has many interesting insights on Israel Apartheid Week here.  In that must-read post, dated 18th March, he notes, inter alia:

'A number of my friends' children have just experienced their first 'Israel Apartheid' week on campus ... and this has raised the question of how best to respond.... You should expose the person who says that as the liar and insane psychopath that they are.

The long-term objective of the ‘Israel is an apartheid state’ lie is similarly nothing less than the destruction of the Jewish state and its 6 million Jewish inhabitants. Just look at the people who are behind the lie....

  I am not talking about the thousands of naive, easily influenced (and sometimes well-meaning) university students who have fallen for the lie .... I am talking about those who started the lie and those who actively promote it.'

He goes on to say:

'For the historical record the apartheid lie was actually invented by the KGB in communist Russia as part of the Cold War – after the total defeat of the Arab armies with their Soviet equipment  in 1967.  The KGB produced all the propaganda material in the late 1960s and 1970s that was then used by radical leftists throughout the Western world. Since the fall of the Soviet Union the apartheid lie has been driven by a hard core of anti-Semites, leftist revolutionaries and Islamists – the latter of whom  come from Arab countries which practice real apartheid (those same Arab countries provide much of the funding now for the propaganda which is still based on the Soviet material). The liars’ agenda is the destruction of the State of Israel. Despite belonging to organisations with names like the ‘Palestine Solidarity Campaign’ or 'Students for Justice for Palestinians' they have no interest in the welfare of the Palestinians; this is proven by their total lack of concern for the genuinely appalling plight of Palestinians in Syria (where they are being starved and murdered) and Lebanon (where for over 65 years they have been denied rights of citizenship and are banned from most professions).  Read here about the kind of Western student organisations who promote Israel Apartheid week....'

The first source linked to by Davidson  in the paragraph above is an article by the splendidly pro-Israel Professor Alan Johnson, who is associated with BICOM.  Johnson writes:

'....The smear originated in "anti-Zionist" campaigns that were waged without let up by the Communist states during the Cold War. Seeking Arab allies, these campaigns frequently descended into antisemitism, the word "Zionist" understood by all as a fig-leaf for "Jew". Many ideas that have since spread around the world, especially amongst "progressives", began here: Zionism equals racism, Zionism equals imperialism. Israel is the USA's "watchdog" in the Middle East, Zionism is complicit with, or even promotes, antisemitism, and, of course, Zionism equals South African apartheid....

The smear got a huge boost in 1975 when a coalition between the Soviet Bloc, the authoritarian Arab states, and the so-called "Non-Aligned Movement" used its built-in majority at the UN General Assembly to pass Resolution 3379, which equated Zionism with racism. (The UN rescinded the resolution in 1991.)

The third key moment in the growth of the Apartheid Smear came in 2001 with the failure of the Camp David peace talks. This gave the smear an opening which was seized by tightly-organised, politically motivated and well-resourced group of NGOs and anti-Israel activists who hijacked the UN’s World Conference against Racism, Racial Intolerance and Xenophobia in Durban, South Africa to launch a global campaign against Israel as a "racist, apartheid state" and Israel itself as a "crime against humanity".

South Africa’s then Deputy Foreign Minister, Aziz Pahad, was appalled: "I wish to make it unequivocally clear that the SA government recognises that … [the Durban Conference] was hijacked and used by some with an anti-Israel agenda to turn into an antisemitic event."

The event was marked by hate speech. Pamphlets were circulated filled with grotesque caricatures of hook-nosed Jews depicted as Nazis, spearing Palestinian children, dripping blood from their fangs, with missiles bulging from their eyes or with pots of money nearby. In a Palestinian-led march with thousands of participants, a placard was held aloft that read ‘Hitler Should Have Finished the Job.’ Nearby, someone was selling the most notorious of anti-Jewish tracts, ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’, a forgery which purports to be the minutes of a world Jewish Conspiracy, and which has been called a ‘warrant for genocide’....

 Davidson, in his post, continues:

The Arabs who promote the Apartheid lie are simply projecting the Apartheid that is rampant in their in their own countries and minds.  The Apartheid states are all Arab and Muslim: not a single practising Jew lives in Gaza or the Palestinian Authority areas (where Jews cannot even travel without facing likely murder),  Jordan and Saudi Arabia (where in both countries it is illegal to be a citizen if you are a Jew). There are just 2 remaining Jews in Iraq (where there were 300,000 as recently as 1952), 3 in Syria, 40 in Lebanon and 30 in Egypt, and less than 3000 Jews live in all of the other Arab countries combined. Yet, less than 60 years ago those Arab countries had thriving communities of Jews totally over 1,000,000.  They have all been driven out. But while every University student knows about the ‘plight of the Palestinians’ none know about the plight of Jews forcibly driven from Arab lands.

The most curiously misunderstood thing about the 'Israel Apartheid' lie is that the only people in Israel who are actually subject to legal restrictions because of their religion are the Jews. For example:

while Muslims are free to pray at any of their holy sites anywhere in Israel, Jews are banned from stepping foot on their holiest site (Temple Mount) and can only enter others (such as Rachel's tomb) at great risk under army escort. Israeli police are not even allowed to intervene when Arabs stone Jews from the Temple Mount.

    only Jews (and Druze) are legally forced to give up 3 years of their life (and then one month per year until retirement) to go in the army. Muslims have no obligation at all for any type of national service despite having full (and indeed disproportionately large) access to all national benefits.

    because all terrorism in Israel is committed by Arabs against Jews, only Jewish-owned buildings and businesses are forced to maintain costly security guards, barriers, and checks on each person entering.

 ....

No Jew can freely walk into any Muslim neighbourhood in Israel without endangering their lives. In contrast any Muslim can enter any Jewish neighbourhood without any fear at all.

    Any plans for new construction in Jewish neighbourhoods result in condemnation by the ‘international community’.  Meanwhile completely illegal construction by Muslims anywhere goes unchallenged both by the ‘international community’ and by Israel lawmakers themselves..

As Davidson observes,

'[T]here is a wealth of unimpeachable, easily accessible material that exposes every single facet of the Israel Apartheid lie (see, e.g. here, here, here, here and here)...'

And here's an excellent interview with Rabbi Marc Golub of Shalom TV,  in which a Jewish, pro-Israel academic at Stanford University, Charles Small, exposes the BDS Movement for the hypocritical, antisemitic movement it is.  Rabbi Golub had asked a pro-BDS academic at Stanford to appear with Small, but the anti-Israel academic had refused, insisting on being interviewed alone; Small pulls no punches in his interpretation of this refusal.  The interview, which took place earlier this year, is well worth listening to: it is very insightful and instructive:

"A Campaign To Delegitimize & Ultimately Dismantle The State Of Israel”: In London, pro-Israel students condemn BDS motion

"What are you going to tell your children when they ask you why you did not vote for boycotting Israeli goods and services?”

Despite the fact that Israel is the one country in the Middle East in which women are not routinely viewed and treated as inferior beings, it was, bizarrely, a prominent campus feminist who posed the above question during a student vote on BDS in one of the University of London's constituents last week (25 March).

Granted, only 2.4 per cent of the 25,000-strong student body voted on the motion.  But it was a famous victory for BDS nevertheless, the adoption by the Students' Union at King's College London (KCLSU) of the motion by which the Union resolves

1. To carry out thorough research into KCL investments, partnerships, and contracted companies, including subcontractors, that may be implicated in violating Palestinian human rights as stated by the BDS movement

2. Pressure King’s College London to divest from Israel and from companies directly or indirectly supporting the Israeli occupation and apartheid policies;

3. To have a plaque in all KCLSU student centres acknowledging that KCLSU formally supported the BDS call, as was done when KCLSU showed solidarity to our sisters and brothers in their struggle against Apartheid South Africa with the following text: “KCLSU officially endorses the 2005 Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions of Israel until it abides by international law and ends it illegal occupation of Palestine. KCLSU is proud to follow the example of a similar call in the 1980’s, which successfully led to the end of apartheid in South Africa.

Moreover, thanks to energetic campaigning by the Israel-baiting side, the vote was decisive: 348 in favour to 252.


To his credit, KCLSU President Sebastiaan Debrouwere advised against the motion:

"I don’t believe that running the risk of alienating a large number of students … I don’t think that’s the right thing to do."

(Video here)

By contrast, Vice President Areeb Ullah advocated the motion:

"We don’t live in a bubble, we live in the world, a world ... where injustice happens, a world where oppression happens ..."

(Video here.  So true, Areeb: China, South Korea, Iran, in fact an entire clutch of Islamic states ... So, how about passing resolutions condemning those real oppressors in this world, eh!!!)

 According to one delegate Mr Ullah behaved inappropriately to students who expressed doubts about the wisdom of the motion by "spitefully" shouting at them "Shame On You!":

"Students he supposedly represents."

In fact, there have been subsequent calls for his resignation.

Adoption of the motion was greeted with wild scenes that left dejected pro-Israel students feeling overwhelmed: BDSers waving Palestinian flags and chanted "Free, Free Palestine” and “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free”:

"There is also little need to point to the tastelessness of the rampant jubilations of proponents of the motion in the face of Jewish and Israeli students reduced to tears. Tonight has seen a student community at King’s College London left bitterly divided and polarised. This is not an achievement to pride itself with. Tonight has likely created wounds that are not going to heal for a while."

Despite having voted in favour of the motion, KCLSU's Interfaith Officer observed:

"I’d just like to say that I was appalled by the reaction of some students to the passing of the BDS motion – what happened was both disrespectful and intimidating, and though it was a hard fought and won campaign, there is such a thing as a bad winner."

Reacting to the motion, the Israel Society at KCL captured the essence of the BDS Movement when it wrote:

"The BDS campaign, draped as it is in the language of human rights, is a seemingly-innocuous facade for a campaign to delegitimize and ultimately dismantle the state of Israel.  The thought that KCL students could support ‘joining’ this movement, as the motion states, is deeply troubling."

Similarly, the Board of Deputies of British Jews condemned

'the shameful scenes last night when the Student Union of King’s College London voted to support BDS.  Commenting on the vote, Board Vice President Jonathan Arkush said:

“When BDS supporters chanted “from the river to the sea” they sent a message of hate to Israel and once again demonstrated that the true agenda of BDS is not to influence Israel but to destroy it.  They succeeded in shaming their fine university and bringing it into disrepute.

 The motion was opposed by the Student Union President and was immediately disavowed by the academic leadership of King’s College London, who will now have to live with the consequences of such a hateful and divisive vote.

The Board strongly supports the courageous students from KCL Jewish Society and UJS who ran a strong campaign against the vote and stood up to the atmosphere of intimidation that has become the hallmark of the BDS bullies.”'

And three Jewish students at KCL who through no stretch of the imagination can be considered hawks have written, inter alia, of the BDS resolution:

"Instead of facilitating constructive dialogue, it has instigated an atmosphere of discontent and animosity. In no way can the impact of this motion be interpreted as a positive influence on academic discourse and free discussion at our university....

Astonishingly, the proponents of the motion claim it has opened a dialogue. By promoting a boycott, in reality it has achieved the very antithesis. It has spawned hatred and animosity, causing the worst elements of student politics to infiltrate our campus.

This is not South Africa in the 1980s, and a motion seeking to equivocate the two is based on a reductive and harmful misconception.  This conflict is far more complex than that abhorrent period in human history....

The proponents of this motion try to moralise to us by declaring that this is simply about human rights. It is pro-Palestinian but not anti-Israel, they tell us. As if we, mostly Jewish students, don’t know anything about human rights.

To those who shouted “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”, we question the sincerity of your call for human rights while you chant Hamas’s call for a genocide of Jews in their homeland.

We will not stand for this contradiction, and we will not be silent in the face of such behaviour...."

Read more here and  here and here and here

Incidentally, British blogger Edgar Davidson has a terrific post about responding to BDS here

Off-topic, but check this out!