Boycott Israel?

The debate within UCU, the University and College Union, on whether to launch a boycott of Israeli academia has been called off after lawyers consulted by the leadership declared a boycott “illegal”. After a unanimous vote by the Strategy and Finance Committee, including members of UCU Left, union branches have been told they cannot vote on a boycott, and a planned speaker tour of Israeli and Palestinian academics has been called off, at least for this term. Despite calls from both supporters and opponents of the boycott, the legal opinions — one reportedly given by the Liberal Democrat peer...

By Jim Denham John Pilger has a major piece entitled (appropriately in more ways than one) "An important marker has been passed" in the present issue of the New Statesman. It calls for the boycott "of Israel", questions whether Arab leaders ever called for Jews to be "thrown into the sea", appears to blame Israel for the "war on terror" (I say "appears" because Pilger's latter-day prose style is far from clear), describes "the premises of Zionism" as "racist" and those who object to the boycott as "Zionist fanatics", seems to dismiss anti-semitism as a "mere threat" and backs the "courageous...

Sacha Ismail and Chris Marks report on the anti-boycott meeting called by ‘Engage’, 11 July 2007 Something like 250 or 300 people attended the meeting on opposing boycotts of Israel called by the Engage campaign on 11 July. The main room in which the plenary sessions were held was packed — despite the £5 entrance fee. The audience was mostly quite old, very posh and, it seemed, Jewish. This last fact is, of course, quite understandable: it is British Jews who will be the primary victims of the anti-semitism the boycott campaign is whipping up. However, it confirms the suspicion that Engage...

The T&G has joined the growing number of unions voting to support a boycott of Israel in some form. The Biennial Delegate Conference voted on 4 July to “support a boycott of Israeli products and goods” — in very strange circumstances. This decision follows the recent passing of pro-boycott motions by NUJ, UCU and Unison. Those votes, though in no case did they represent likely majority opinion among the membership, were carried out properly after a fairly extensive debate from the floor. At the T&G conference, however, pro-boycott activists manoeuvred successfully to avoid a debate. Two...