What Universities Can Learn From Israel's Status on Campus

                     
                                                                                                                  published at Honest Reporting                                                                      
In the post-modern university where, at least in the social sciences and humanities, facts are no longer, well, factual, the country of Israel fares badly.  Rather than information about the actual country, an abstract idea of Israel has emerged on college campuses over the past dozen years. The Jewish state appears as the single nation of the world deserving boycott of its (actual) products and academic institutions. A Palestinian narrative prevails, but it is a particular, monolithic, Palestinian narrative that leaves out, for instance, the opposition of Palestinians to Israel boycotts.

This abstract notion of Israel also shows up in countless campus forums, classroom lectures, protest demonstrations, associated students’ election campaigns and, on many campuses for two weeks of every year, as performance activism confronting students with staged “checkpoints,” photos of bloody victims and towering, cardboard, “apartheid” walls. 

Writing in an important recent collection, The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel, 32 scholars consider gaps between Israel’s campus status and its real life. Among other topics, they address the assault on academic freedom that occurs if academics are boycotted because of their nationality (R. Berman; G. Brahm and A. Romirowsky; D. Hirsh; M. Nussbaum) and the absurdity of maligning Israeli institutions that not only exemplify multicultural learning and teaching but that are themselves bastions of academic freedom; the founder of the boycott Israel movement was getting an advanced degree at Tel Aviv University while advocating for its boycott (S. Wolosky; I. Troen). The book also offers a valuable, concise history of Israel (C. Nelson, R. Harris, and K. Stein), much needed because boycott movements and agitation against Israel on campus exhibit a startling lack of interest in verifiable evidence, dialogue, and the usual expectations of academic argument.

A number of writers in The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel attest to one-sided presentation of proposals and procedural moves to minimize dissenting voices (S. Musher; J.Robbins). Further, the objections of students and faculty to singling out the Jewish state for approbation alone among the countries of the world and the extreme discourse with which this is promoted are often disregarded (D. Divine; M.Kotzin). While speech codes and sensitivity to even micro-aggressions are mainstream at universities, several of the authors note that Jewish concerns about anti-Semitism are dismissed or, worse, are considered merely ways of shutting down debate (R. Fine; K. Marcus).

By paying attention to Israel’s status on campus we learn that debate on this topic is not really is possible. The veracity of claims about Israel in boycott proposals is off limits for discussion. The only questions addressed are whether or not to boycott and whether or not academic freedom or the professional organization proposing the boycott will be harmed.  Labels like “apartheid” and “colonialist” applied to Israel are not considered controversial in most academic settings. What is missing from discussion of Israel on campus is Israel: its history, people, current situation, daily life, and place in the Middle East.

Anti-Zionism at universities, notes co-editor Cary Nelson, is treated as if it is essential to progressive politics -- regardless of Israel’s genuine progressivism, its real-life democracy, its vibrant freedoms of speech, of the press, of religion, and its commitment to the rights of women, gays, minorities, and all its citizens.

This refusal to acknowledge the realities of Israel and to insist on singling out the one democracy in the Middle East for boycott may say more about universities than it says about the topic of Israel.

The American Studies Association called their Israel boycott a “litmus test” of the organization’s “stance on Palestine.” For, the current campus status of Israel is possible only in an academic environment of litmus tests, where one’s progressive credentials rest on adhering to a party line, where facts are not merely malleable but acceptable only to the degree that they fit prevailing ideologies.

Israel on campus stands out precisely because there is pushback among students and some professors to university anti-Israelism.  In fact, it may be the only major challenge to mainstream campus politics. As such, the status of Israel on campus serves as a warning of encroaching dogmatism and lack of room for diversity of thought in what we used to refer to as the marketplace of ideas.

                                                                                                  

                                                                                                  comments welcome at Honest Reporting

In Praise of Student Supporters of Israel

                                                                                                                     photo by Israel Campus Beat

                                
                                                                                                                       published at Times of Israel

In spite of the many biases, phobias, anti-"isms" and micro-aggressions studied at universities, anti-Israelism does not seem to be a familiar term in most academic settings.

When, at a rally, Israelis are called “Nazis”; when Israel “apartheid” weeks set up on campus; when there is a performance piece about “Israel/Palestine” involving simulated blood, or amplified shouting that Israel should not exist, as in “from the river to the sea/Palestine must be free,” these are simply referred to as free speech.

Students cannot expect that there will be allotted time for Israel’s perspective, or a sharing of “competing narratives” or that Jews will be considered a minority.

As a first world, successful, capitalist, democratic, progressive, multicultural, open society, with a strong military, a starting point for academic discussion of America is often its responsibility for most of world’s problems and its racism. Imagine trying to argue on campus for what is wonderful about America.

Arguing for Israel, students often need to counter claims that are not based on facts but are supported by a view of facts as simply agreed-upon interpretations.  For example:

Anyone spending even a few days in Israel can tell that the apartheid label doesn’t apply (and that this slander diminishes the experiences of people who lived under actual apartheid in South Africa).  But present the overwhelming evidence of Arabs and Jews going about their everyday lives in shared shopping malls, restaurants, buses, and trains; point out that all Israeli citizens are subject to the same laws or that Israeli doctors, professors, Knesset members and Supreme Court judges are Arabs as well as Jews, and your comments may simply crash against the chant of “apartheid wall.”

This stalemate occurs in part because, as a supporter of Israel, you naturally think the argument is about Israel. But creators of Israel “apartheid” week focus on only one state and it is called Palestine.

The separation barrier (the 95% chain link fencing/5% wall that reduced suicide bombing by more than 90%) stands, for them, as an arbitrary intrusion into the country of Palestine – a hoped for territory covering all of Israel, the West Bank and Gaza -- from the river along the Jordan border to the Mediterranean Sea at Tel Aviv.

When you realize that they actually mean No Israel, you may find yourself free falling through an Alice in Wonderland space where up is down and the one progressive country of the Middle East is the only one called out as oppressive. (At least, this was my experience.)

The more you know about Israel, the better, but this knowledge will not be persuasive to boycott advocates or apartheid week promoters.

Facts will be useful if you are talking about specific events. Like this. How have the lives of Palestinians and Israelis been impacted by the Jews unilaterally leaving Gaza in 2005?  If you are in a setting where the people with whom you are speaking know that there are no Jews in Gaza and accept that Israel is a sovereign democratic Jewish nation then, yes, facts will be valuable to share and debate. This setting may hard to locate in public campus forums.

The facts are also valuable because knowing them will help you keep some equilibrium when you are going though that Alice in Wonderland free fall.

But facts will not help you argue against ideologies.

Anti-Israel voices on campus have a great deal of ideological support. For starters, there’s the ideology of post-modernism within which there are no impartial facts-- only narratives open for interpretation.

However, your interpretation, because it appears to privilege the oppressors (Israelis) over the oppressed (Palestinians) is not credible.

And your objection that Israelis are not oppressors, even if you also voice your disapproval of particular Israeli policies, likewise is not credible because Israel is Western and first world; it has a powerful military, a high standard of living, a thriving economy, and so on. It is, necessarily, an oppressor.

Because you are standing up for Israel, the one Jewish country of the world, you too are supporting an ideology: Zionism. Knowing that Zionism is the belief that Jews, like the other peoples of the world, have a right to their own country, or even if you simply appreciate the reality that Israel is a democratic Jewish state, you can count yourself a Zionist.  It’s not an especially valued ideology on campus, pretty much like American patriotism isn’t especially valued in these post-nationalist times.

Like any other workplace, a university is a cultural setting in which some values are valued over others. Power relationships impact, if not our real freedoms, at least our sense of freedom to say what we believe. It can feel scary to stand up for a minority opinion in any setting.

When, in spite of it all, you get out there with an Israeli flag and say that you support Israel you are doing something important for yourself and for your campus. Most students on campus are not concerned or knowledgeable about Israel but may be open to learning about it.  Because of your presence other students learn that there is more to this story than what they have been hearing. You’ll influence some of these students. You can impact boycott voting even if you can’t expect to influence boycott activists.

And take pride that as a pro-Israel student you are demonstrating one of the longest running and highest campus values: speaking truth to power.

Breaking News of No Boycott

Forbes Magazine made a new list of the top 10 health technology companies in the world. Five of them are from Israel. 

Among these is ReWalk Robotics, inventors of an apparatus that allows people who have spinal injuries that keep them confined to wheel chairs to be able to walk with the help of a “wearable exoskeleton” supporting hip and knee motion.

In clean technology, Israel outranked every country in the world in 2014 according to the World Wildlife Fund and the Clean-Tech Group that compared 40 countries in terms of their renewable and environmental energy development.  Israel is especially good at water management and in this area is “many levels ahead of other countries.”

An Israeli company has just signed a billion dollar agreement to improve water systems and tackle water shortages in Kazakhstan. “Mekorot will assist the Kazakhstan government in developing the local water system and establishing a national water company…”  

Israel recently contracted with Jordon to send them $15 billion worth of natural gas from the Leviathon energy field over the next 15 years. This is in addition to the $500 million worth Jordan already ordered from the Tamar gas field. Egypt and the Palestinian Authority also import natural gas from Israel.  (The PA was Israel’s first customer.)

“The Jordanians turned to Israel because their supply of natural gas from Egypt had been halted by repeated terrorist attacks on the gas pipeline from Egypt.”

And the beat goes on: Legends--Beach Boys; Metal—KISS; Indie-- Emperor X; and whatever category is Lady Gaga--are performing soon.

Against Israel Boycott: Ninety-Nine University Presidents So Far

Ninety-nine university presidents have come out against academic boycott of Israel and the number is growing every day. This is remarkable.

Perhaps, the small number (three) and small size of the professional organizations endorsing boycott, along with the enormous media coverage given to the recent boycott vote by the Association of American Studies, has prompted university administrators to get out in front of the issue before more divisive academic calls for boycott occur. Perhaps a real concern for academic freedom and fairness prompting major university presidents to speak out encourages the rest to join in.  Included so far are the University of California, Davis, San Diego, Irvine, and Berkeley, the City University of New York, Stanford, Harvard, Cornell, Yale, Johns Hopkins, University of Chicago, Princeton, MIT and a long list of other schools; the list is impressive.

Will this impact the amount of attention given to singling out Israel, among all the countries of the world, for condemnation by professors?  Or will some feel emboldened to "speak truth to power" across the faculty/administration divide?

Encouraging, however, is that the largest professional organization of faculty: the American Association of University Professors, which took a position condemning academic boycotts in 2005, issued a new statement specifically addressed to the ASA opposing boycotts of Israel. (Is any other country boycotted by academics?)

Whatever happens next, the groundswell of response against boycott from university leaders across the US speaks loudly and reasonably for the university as a center for the "free exchange of ideas."  Boycotts accomplish only the shutting down of any possible discussion.

Now, if the media will give as much space to the many against, as they do to the few for boycott, we'll really be getting somewhere.


UPDATE -- More than 200 University presidents now have opposed the boycott.

Reasons for ASA Boycott of Israel

                                                         Ben-Gurion University of the Negev


1. Otherwise, how would most people ever hear of the Association of American Studies?
2. Words like "human rights violations" are not scary to direct toward democratic countries with academic freedom.
3. Who would boycott China, Zimbabwe, Iran or Russia?
4. The boycott is "symbolic" and symbolic is cool on so many levels.
5. Singling out Israel and no other country does not indicate bias; how could you suggest that?
6. The ASA is not aware of the diversity of Israeli universities.
7. The ASA is not impressed that even Mahmoud Abbas opposes boycotting Israel.
8. The American Association of University Professors opposes academic boycotts but who cares? (Membership of AAUP: 47,000, of ASA: under 5000; 1252 voted with two-thirds for boycott.)
9. No one at a university in the Middle East actually benefits from this resolution.
10.There is no downside to the resolution for the lives of its promoters.