Just two points:
1. If Israel's academia is part and parcel of an oppressive system, how can
we claim that most Western academias are not? Is it not the international
community of business and management scientists who are among others
responsible for the dominance of those neo-liberal concepts that are used to
ruin one third-world economy after the other, is it not the our natural
sciences who are delivering the Western states much of there not always
beneficial technological edge? Is it not us social scientists who draw up
the concepts to help integrating our - at least when viewed on a global
level - injust societies? So all the arguments for a boycott against
Israel's academic community are to be turned on ourselves very easily (see
the examples Baruch Kimmerlilng has given). Well, let's boycott ourselves!
2. From the 1950s onwards, no serious initiatives were taken to exclude
German academia from being viewed as European with all the humanistic
implications that has, albeit the fact that German universities did next to
nothing to expell all those academics involved in Nazi movement - a bit of
hypocrisy here?
If a European boycott against Israeli universities were to happen, that
would mean that I as a German academic would see myself placed in a moral
position to punish off my Israeli counterparts - this seems to me most
absurd.
I'd like to thank Baruch Kimmerling for all his efforts to prevent this from
happening.
Matthias Z Varul
----- Original Message -----
From: "Baruch Kimmerling" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, May 25, 2002 11:55 PM
Subject: ALEF: THE MEANING OF ACADEMIC BOYCOTT
> THE MEANING OF ACADEMIC BYCOTT
> (A Reply To Tanya Reinhart and others)
>
> My dear colleagues and friends Tanya Reinhart, Rita Giacaman and Elia
Zureik:
>
> On May 17 Professor Tanya Reinhart published a lengthy and well-documented
> article in "Indymedia Israel" (http://www.indymedia.org.il), seeking to
> convince Israeli academics opposing Israel's oppressive and brutal
policies
> toward the Palestinian people to join Professors Hilary and Steven Rose in
> their effort to promote a boycott against the Israeli academic community
> and its institutions. The appeal suggests that European research
institutes
> stop treating Israel like a European country in their scientific relations
> with it until Israel acts according to UN resolutions and opens serious
> peace negotiations with the Palestinians. About 270 European and some
> American and Palestinian scientists signed this appeal, including about 10
> Israelis.
>
> Contrary to some of my Israeli colleagues I do respect the right of every
> member of the scientific international community to make such a demand,
and
> as all of you know, I even agree with most of the reasons behind this
call.
> However, the same reasons that lead the Professors Rose to call for a
> boycott against Israeli academic institutions lead me to urge the world
> academic community not only refrain from boycotting us but to offer us its
> support and protection.
>
> First of all I have to admit that Israeli academic institutions are a part
> and parcel of the oppressive Israeli state that has, among its other acts
> of foolishness and villainy, committed unforgettable crimes against the
> Palestinian people. A major cause for the Israeli academy's inseparability
> from the state is that we are so heavily funded and subsidized by the
> Israeli government. A successful boycott will have a boomerang effect by
> cementing the dependence of Israeli academic institutions and their
members
> on an increasingly capricious government.
>
>
> Since Ms. Limor Livnat was appointed Minister of Education under the
> present government, the Israeli academy became the target of a
> reconstruction and "reeducation" campaign. This policy was in no way
> accidental. In Israel today, the mass media are generally chauvinistic and
> unwilling to challenge the Sharon government. Dissenting journalists like
> Amira Hass and Gideon Levy, who document the daily afflictions and human
> rights violations suffered by the Palestinian population, are subjected to
> petition drives designed to pressure the country's most liberal private
> newspaper to stop publishing their work. In this repressive climate, the
> Israeli academy remains the last bastion of free thought and free speech.
> Most humanistic, dissident voices in Israel originate in the academy or
are
> supported by faculty members.
>
> This is not to say that all the members of the Israeli academy are great
> humanists or support the idea of self-determination of the Palestinian
> people. We are a highly heterogeneous community, as is true in any other
> fine academic environment. Some of us are highly active in ethnocentric
> groups, other (perhaps the majority) alienated from any public or
> intellectual activities, while a small but salient minority (of which
Prof.
> Reinhart is a prominent member) are very active and highly committed to
the
> humanization and democratization of various aspects of the Israeli
society.
> However, the most important feature of this community is that so far, in
> spite of the deep cleavages among us, we have found a way to co-exist each
> with the other and to conduct spirited dialogs among ourselves and with
the
> world outside the ivory tower - under the umbrella of academic freedom I
> also think we, the Israeli academy, have stood fast in a time of crisis
and
> have conducted ourselves more credibly than the British academy (while the
> British government was engaging in acts of brutality against the
> Irish-Catholics, during the Falkland/Malvinas war, or throughout the long
> Thatcher regime) , or the patriotic American academy (during the current
> war against Afghanistan, the McCarthy-era witch hunts, or even during most
> phases of the Korean and Vietnam wars). Yet I have never heard of any
calls
> to boycott either the British or American academies. As for the cause
> celebre of the "successful" boycott of the South African academy, it is
> well known that it mainly damaged the progressive forces within South
> Africa and probably hindered its democratization process. As sociologists,
> the Roses have to know the inner dynamics of communities under siege.
>
> My friend Elia Zureik suggested that the boycott should be only
> institutional but not personal. Very kindly and generously, he has offered
> to cooperate with me, (presuming I'm on his personal list of "good guys")
> but to boycott my institution, the Hebrew University. Self-evidently it is
> his right to boycott every institution or person he want to, but he must
> realize that if his call to freeze funds to my institution is effective,
> the resulting constraints on research and conferences will also hurt "good
> guys" like me. Moreover, the very idea of making selections among members
> of the academy is a horrifying idea and I hereby pledge not to cooperate
> with any institution or person who will make such selections, even if I
> myself am ruled acceptable by them. Selections made on the basis of
> non-academic criteria endanger academic freedom.
>
> I'm fully aware that academic freedom is not above other moral
> considerations and does not exist within a political and social vacuum. I
> can understand European and American academics who feel strong moral
> resentments when confronted by oppressive policies and war crimes directed
> against Palestinians and who desire "to do something" within their own
> profession. Even more, I can sympathize with Palestinian academics like
> Professor Rita Giacaman, who daily witnesses the destruction of
Palestinian
> academic institutions and the harassment of faculty and students while
only
> miles away, my institution operates more or less normally.
> Her feelings are especially comprehensible because my institution, as an
> institution, never did anything to relieve the severe conditions suffered
> by Palestinian universities and colleges. True, we had some of common
> research and development projects, some funded by European authorities and
> NGOs, but under the present circumstances they provided almost no remedy
to
> the Palestinians.
>
> However, I have less understanding for my Israeli colleagues who are
asking
> to be boycotted. I don't condemn them as our "trade union" did, because
> they are fully entitled to express their opinions and to try to convince
us
> of their correctness. Moreover, they and I have the common goal of
> democratizing and de-colonizing Israeli society. The only divergence
> between us, beside the very meaning of the academy, is that, should their
> call be taken seriously it would weaken our common academic autonomy and
> freedom - the precise goal of our adversaries - and ultimately have
> catastrophic consequences for our common struggle.
>
> Therefore, I'm calling on the international academic community to
> strengthen its connections with the Israeli and Palestinian academic
> communities, in order to empower their autonomy and freedom. Both people
> needs a strong academic space as a part of their civil and civilized
> societies in order to promote the elements that are able to initiate major
> social and political changes in the region.
>
> Baruch Kimmerling
>
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