Eretz Israel is our unforgettable historic homeland...The Jews who will it shall achieve their State...And whatever we attempt there for our own benefit will redound mightily and beneficially to the good of all mankind.(Theodor Herzl, DerJudenstaat, 1896)
We offer peace and amity to all the neighbouring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all. The State of Israel is ready to contribute its full share to the peaceful progress and development of the Middle East.(From Proclamation of the State of Israel, 5 Iyar 5708; 14 May 1948) With a liberal democratic political system operating under the rule of law, a flourishing market economy producing technological innovation to the benefit of the wider world, and a population as educated and cultured as anywhere in Europe or North America, Israel is a normal Western country with a right to be treated as such in the community of nations.... For the global jihad, Israel may be the first objective. But it will not be the last.(Friends of Israel Initiative)
Showing posts with label University and College Union. Show all posts
Showing posts with label University and College Union. Show all posts
This short and snappy indictment by the prominent Anglo-Jewish communal figure Jonathan Hoffman of the verdict of a British court in the case of maths lecturer Ronnie Fraser versus the University and College Union regarding its stance on Israel is cross-posted from the JCBlogs.
"When a rugby player takes the field, he must accept his fair share of minor injuries. Similarly a political activist accepts the risk of being offended or hurt on occasions by things said or done by his opponents (who themselves take on a corresponding risk)."
Jaw-dropping. The Tribunal sees fighting antisemitism as akin to participating in a sport with the 'teams' evenly balanced and the contest played according to some kind of rulebook!
What planet do they live on?
Would they dismiss black or Muslim victims of racism – or female victims of sex discrimination – as mere players in a game?
Paragraph 150:
"Belief in the Zionist project or an attachment to Israel ... is not intrinsically part of Jewishness ..."
Is it really possible that Judge A M Snelson, Mr A Grant and Lady Sedley could have sat through 20 days of the hearing, done their post-hearing due diligence and STILL failed to appreciate how Israel came into being and the centrality of Israel to the Jewish people?'
I would add that there is already plenty of evidence, on social media and elsewhere, that the heinous judgment is giving that aid and comfort to the enemy that Ben Cohen in his must-read article identifies as the inevitable outcome:
"The lesson of the Fraser debacle is simply this: a single employment tribunal in the United Kingdom has created a precedent which will be invoked by every Jew-baiter around the globe; namely, that when Jews raise the question of anti-Semitism in the context of visceral hostility toward Israel, they do so in bad faith. That such a bigoted principle can be established in a democracy famed for its enlightened judicial methods is, perhaps, the most shocking realization of all."
Read Ronnie Fraser's personal statement regarding the hearing and the judgment here
Despite his professions of solidarity with Israel before a Jewish audience in the prelude to last year's May election (well he would say that, wouldn't he, at a juncture when the keys to Number Ten seemed to be unexpectedly slipping beyond his grasp?) Britain's slimy prime minister David Cameron has accelerated his inexorable descent into the ranks of the Israel bashers which began almost a year ago, in the immediate wake of the Mavi Marmara affair (just look at this lot, some company, eh?).
Keeping company with him - and them - is the University and College Union, whose leftist hijackers have proved their malevolent intent by distancing themselves from that part of the EUMC Working Definition on Antisemitism that relates to Israel, about which I posted last week: http://daphneanson.blogspot.com/2011/05/demonic-on-campus-british-students-and.html
Harrogate, that rather genteel and prosperous spa town in north Yorkshire, will be the setting from 28-30 May of the anual conference of the University and College Union (UCU), which to the dismay of many rank-and-file members has been hijacked by elements devoted to the boycott of Israel. (See, for instance, http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2010/01/21/jewish-chronicle-report-of-ucu-meeting-on-antisemitism/)
Among the items on the Congress's agenda, which in addition to issues directly focusing on the higher education sector in the UK also embraces topics pertaining to British society (including motions condemning the EDL and Islamophobia), is a pernicious motion designed to redefine the meaning of antisemitism in order that Israel can be maligned with impunity on campuses in the UK.
The motion upon which delegates are asked to vote concerns the "Working Definition of Antisemitism" set out in 2005 by the European Union Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC), now known as the Fundamental Rights Agency.
The EUMC document, which was adopted by all the EU member states as well as by the USA, and by the National Union of Students (NUS), includes several clauses relating to Israel in its definition of antisemitism, but specifically says: "critiscism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other country cannot be considered antisemitism".
The Israel-demonising Left have predictably been deeply unhappy with the relevant aspects of this document, and some have sought to discredit it - witness a piece from 2007 in the Guardian's notorious "Comment-is-Free" online section by self-described "Jewish anti-Zionist" Arthur Neslen and a piece written earlier this year by Richard Kuper, a former chairman of the fringe group Jews for Justice for Palestinians.
Last Tuesday, as the result of a vigorous campaign waged by the NUS's Black Students' Committee, supported by students from nine universities including such hives of anti-Israel activity as the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), Sussex, Essex, and Bradford, the NUS adopted a virulently anti-Israel motion.
To quote the current issue of the Jewish Chronicle, it undertook
'to send British students on future flotillas to Gaza, build links with the Hamas-backed Islamic University of Gaza, twin British student unions with Palestinian universities, and called for the right to return for all Palestinian refugees....
The motion makes no reference to Hamas, but acknowledges Archbishop Desmond Tutu's likening of Israel to apartheid South Africa, and former UN relief agency head John Ging's belief that conditions in Gaza represent a "medieval siege".'
The shock move was condemned by a spokesperson for the Union of Jewish Students, who said:
"This is such a regressive move when NUS is taking so many steps forward with regard to hate speech and its negative impact on campus..... This is not just NUS taking a side on a heavily-polarised conflict, irresponsible though that is. It is NUS taking actions that isolate Jewish students from their national movement."
And a Board of Deputies official added:
"This motion will not contribute to bringing peace to the Middle East. It will only serve to undermine attempts to improve campus relations and will leave Jewish students and those who support Israel feeling marginalised and abandoned by the very union which is meant to protect, defend and represent them."
The motion to be voted upon in Harrogate, framed by the ECU's National Executive Committe, reads:
Congress notes with concern that the so-called 'EUMC working definition of antisemitism', while not adopted by the EU or the UK government and having no official status, is being used by bodies such as the NUS and local student unions in relation to activities on campus.
Congress believes that the EUMC definition confuses criticism of Israeli government policy and actions with genuine antisemitism, and is being used to silence debate about Israel and Palestine on campus.Congress resolves:
that UCU will make no use of the EUMC definition (e.g. in educating members or dealing with internal complaints)
that UCU will dissociate itself from the EUMC definition in any public discussion on the matter in which UCU is involved
that UCU will campaign for open debate on campus concerning Israel's past history and current policy, while continuing to combat all forms of racial or religious discrimination
Notes blogger and academic David Hirsh, who's been in the forefront of opposition to the UCU's noxious boycott of Israel policy:
"The EUMC definition says it may, in some contexts, be antisemitic to accuse Jews of being more loyal to Israel than to their union; to say Israel is a racist endeavour; to apply double standards; to boycott Israelis but not others for the same violations; to say that Israeli policy is like Nazi policy; to hold Jews collectively responsible for the actions of Israel. All of these things have been going on a lot inside the academic unions for the last eight years. Instead of addressing the antisemitic culture, the leadership of the union now proposes to alter the definition of antisemitism. The union wants to carry on treating ‘Zionists’ as disloyal; singling out Israel and only Israel for boycott; holding Israeli universities responsible for their government; allowing ‘Zionist’ union members to be denounced as Nazis or supporters of apartheid.
The precise form that bullying typically takes within UCU is that people who complain about antisemitism are accused of doing so in bad faith in a dishonest attempt to outlaw criticism of Israel. The antisemitism isn’t seen, isn’t acknowledged, the accuser is accused; and Israel is blamed for the unseen and unacknowledged antisemitism.
The new motion makes this form of bullying into official union policy. Even though the definition says that ‘criticism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic’, the new motion declares that the definition outlaws criticism and is intended to silence debate.
UCU will now oppose all bigotry except for one particular category: racism which can be said to resemble criticism of Israel. UCU will oppose racist and religious antisemitism, but political antisemitism will be protected under the new policy."
He adds, with understandable sarcasm:
"Israel murders children? Not antisemitic. Israel controls US foreign policy? Not antisemitic. Magen David = Swastika stuck on your office door? Not antisemitic. Jews invent antisemitism to de-legitimise criticism of Israel? Not antisemitic. Host a man found guilty of hate speech by the South African Human Rights commission? [For this shameful incident see http://www.thejc.com/blogpost/antisemitic-meeting-soas] Not antisemitic. Exclude nobody but Israelis from the global academic community? Not antisemitic."
And observes:
"It is clear now how antisemitism against Israelis far away, in the form of a boycott campaign, also threatens ‘Zionists’ within the union. We have learnt that the boycott campaign brings antisemitism with it into any organisation which treats it as one side in a legitimate debate. UCU have understood it too, now. The only thing left for them, now, is to change the defiinition of antisemitism so that they fall outside of it."
Mark Gardner of the Community Security Trust's Mark Gardner told the Jewish Chronicle:
"It proves, once again, that the UCU's executive are political extremists who care only about their ideological wars, including obsessively hating Israel and condemning mainstream political attempts to protect Jews from antisemitism..."
And on his blog he notes, inter alia:
'This resolution ... not only hurts Jews and the fight against antisemitism, it actually reinforces antisemitism; and does so notwithstanding that noisy minority of people of Jewish identity or origin, who consciously parade their Jewishness in order to help legitimise political and rhetorical attacks upon Israel and Zionism and Zionists (and therefore the broad mass of their co-religionists, over 70% of whom self-identify as Zionists).
The resolution comes under the header, “Campaigning for equality”. It would be funny, or at least ironic, were it not so Orwellian.'
The eminent British cardovascular physiologist Emeritus Professor Denis Noble CBE, FRS, has resigned from the University and College Union in protest at its discriminatory attitude and double standards towards Israel, an attitude which he now believes is motivated by antisemitism. His letter to the union’s general secretary, Sally Hunt, is printed in the Oxford Magazine, and I reproduce it here from the website of the anti-academic boycott organisation Engage, run by London academic David Hirsh http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2010/11/14/open-letter-of-resignation
where more details may be found.
'I joined the AUT nearly 50 years ago as a young assistant lecturer at University College London. When I retired from my Oxford professorship in 2004 I chose to retain my membership – although I no longer stood to gain from the union’s negotiating any improvements in salary or conditions of service – because I believe in trade unions and thought that by remaining a member I would, in some small measure, help colleagues. But the behaviour of UCU over the past several years has made it impossible for me to continue, and I now resign my membership.
In a letter I wrote to you over a year ago, which has remained unanswered and unacknowledged, I said that UCU’s repeated conference decisions to discriminate against certain colleagues (Israelis) on the grounds of their nationality were unacceptable. Such discrimination is contrary to the universally recognised norms of academic practice, as set out (for example) in the Statutes of the International Council of Science (ICSU). I also sent a letter as President of IUPS, which adheres to ICSU. Nobody in the world of learning can take seriously a professional organisation that purports to represent academic staff but which entertains proposals to discriminate whether it be on grounds of sex, race, national origin or other characteristics that are irrelevant to academic excellence. Nonetheless our union has voted repeatedly in favour of such discrimination, and those who have been discriminated against are always Israelis. The wording of the discriminatory resolutions has sometimes been contorted for legal reasons, but the intention has been transparent: to hold Israeli colleagues responsible for, and punish them for, the actions of their government via a type of reasoning (guilt by association) that is never applied to the academics of any other country. Of course, I accept that the Israeli government is guilty of human-rights violations, and I accept that the union is entitled to criticise it. But many other governments in the world are also guilty of human-rights violations, often far more egregious than those committed by Israel, and yet Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) have never been endorsed by the Annual Congress of UCU against any other country.
It is instructive to compare the motion about China adopted by Congress at its 2010 meeting with one of those about Israel. (I choose these examples because both countries have been in occupation of the territories of a different ethnic group for many years and both have encouraged their citizens to settle in the territories thus occupied). The motion on China, while asserting that UCU “will continue to condemn abuses of human rights of trade unionists and others”, recognised “the need to encourage collegial dialogue” with Chinese institutions. By contrast, a motion on Israel approved in the same session of Congress reaffirmed its support for BDS, sought to establish an annual international conference on BDS and a BDS website, and severed all relations with the Histadrut, the Israeli counterpart to the TUC. There are many countries in the world whose governments are guilty of atrocities: there is no other country in the world whose national trade union organisation is boycotted by UCU.
I find it impossible not to ask myself why UCU exhibits this obsession with Israel. The obvious explanation – that the union is institutionally anti-semitic – is so unpleasant that I have till recently been unwilling to accept it, but I changed my mind after witnessing the fate at the 2010 Congress of the motion of my local branch (University of Oxford) about Bongani Masuku. As you know, Masuku was invited to a meeting on BDS hosted by the union in London last December. Some months earlier, he had made a speech during a rally at the University of the Witwatersrand. This speech has been described by the South African Human Rights Commission (the body set up by the Constitution to promote inter-racial harmony after the end of apartheid) as including “numerous anti-semitic remarks which were seen to have incited violence and hatred”. The Oxford motion debated at Congress did not allege that the union invited Masuku despite knowing his views; instead it merely invited Congress to dissociate itself from Masuku’s views. This was the minimum that UCU could be expected to do to reassure members like me that we still belong. That this motion was rejected by a large majority makes it clear to me that the union either regards anti-semitic views as acceptable or, at least, has no objection to their being expressed in public by the national official of a fraternal trade union organisation. I do not wish to remain a member of such a union.'
