Paul Burstein:
I have to admit I don’t understand why South Africa is always brought up as an analogy. The issue there was having residents of the country defined by race and treated entirely differently as a result. But residents (and citizens) of Israel are not defined by race, and citizens have equal rights, at least in the same way Americans do. So there’s no more reason to boycott Israeli universities than to boycott American universities. (It is true that Israel declares itself a “Jewish state,” and some people object to that. But there are quite a few other countries that have official state religions. Barro and McCleary have quite a good list in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2005; there are [or were at the time] 29 states that were officially Muslim, 22 Catholic, 10 Protestant, 4 Buddhist, 8 [Christian] Orthodox, 4 Buddhist, and 1 Hindu, as well as one Jewish. Among the states in which some form of Christianity is the state religion are Denmark, Finland, Greece, Italy, Norway, and the United Kingdom.)
What is true is that Israel has been in a state of war ever since the Arab countries refused to accept the 1947 UN resolution declaring that the British Mandate in Palestine was to be divided into two states, one Jewish and one Arab (those were the terms used–at the time, “Palestinian” generally referred to Jews). Israel now has peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan (very cold peace indeed, especially with Egypt), but beyond that all the countries of the Arab League deny the right of Israel to exist, and they and many other countries and what the New York Times calls “militant groups” pledge themselves to its destruction. And this isn’t some kind of church-state thing, either, in which the countries pledge themselves to demanding that Israel adopt its own equivalent of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment freedom of religion and non-establishment clauses, or maybe Brown vs. Board of Education. Nor is this Israel’s idea; it was at Khartoum after the Six-Day War that the Arab League declared its famous “three no’s”: “No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel.” Destruction means destruction.
Maybe a better analogy would be the United Kingdom during World War II. The UK was far from perfect (and, in contrast to Israel, was actually a colonial power–in fact, Palestine was effectively if perhaps not legally a colony, with Jews and Arabs both among the colonized). In fact, some of its faults were pretty serious. So should the U.S. have boycotted the UK from 1939 on? Or U.S. academics boycotted UK universities? Or might a boycott and other activities might better have been adopted against Germany, Italy, and Japan, which actually declared war on the U.S., in much the same way the Arab countries declared war on Israel?
So maybe there’s a better analogy here. Maybe Israeli universities should be boycotted because they’re so similar to UK universities circa 1939.
Is it better to boycott the universities of a country whose citizens have equal rights while the country is still being threatened with destruction by so many other countries around it, or better to boycott the universities in those other countries, which do not provide equal rights and are pledged to the destruction of Israel? Or might it be better to support academic freedom?
The question is asked: “Do those opposed to airing the issue of institutional boycott on Israel also maintain that it was improper to discuss and advocate for the South African anti-apartheid boycott?” Oh, good, retroactive accusations of racism. How about rephrasing the question: “Should those who opposed apartheid in South Africa and actually knew something about it object to its being used as an analogy where it’s irrelevant, thereby trivializing it?” Some Republicans have been comparing the Affordable Care Act (or “Obamacare”) to slavery. Do people who know something about slavery think that’s a good analogy, well worth discussing?
As to eliminating presentation of the topic, I kind of doubt that’s possible. But we do need to establish priorities. I just read that some poll found that 10% of Americans think President Obama is the Antichrist (http://www.huffingtonpost.
Paul Burstein
I am frustrated by the continual absence of consideration for the approximately equal numbers of Jews who fled/ were rescued from their second-class status in the Arab countries following the establishment of the State of Israel by the UN. Were they ever compensated for what they left behind? They are not living in refugee camps, festering, as are “Palestinians” 65 years later. Israel was able to absorb them while fighting for its existence.
No doubt the Maclean’s survey’s were an inintestreg read, and that was half the problem – students actually taking the rankings seriously. Just looking at the methodology proves how arbritrary the rankings are (and that no matter what, the U of T is always going to rank 1st due to sheer size, something that David Naylor seems to realize). Personally, I’m quite glad that the Uni Prez’s have stood up to Maclean’s, it’s about time.