DEAR GOD, WE NEED MORE PLAGUES:

Under siege (Melanie Phillips, 4/24/05)

Jews are currently celebrating the festival of Passover. This commemorates the exodus of the Jews from slavery in Egypt, the point at which they gained their freedom and became a nation. The two concepts are intimately connected. On Friday afternoon, when orthodox Jews preparing for both the Sabbath and Passover would have been unable to attend, the Association of University Teachers took a large step towards delegitimising the Jewish national homeland as a prelude to its destruction. It passed a motion calling for a boycott of two Israeli universities, Haifa and Bar Ilan, which it accused of being complicit in the abuse of Palestinians in the occupied territories, and agreed to circulate a Palestinian call for a total university boycott.

The targeted Israeli institutions have denied the specific charges. They were given no opportunity to put their case; indeed, a request from Bar Ilan to send someone to do so at the conference was turned down. This was not surprising to anyone who has grasped what is going on here. For it was not these universities which were on trial, but Israel itself. And for the stupid and vicious people who now pass for our intelligentsia, Israel is a pariah nation — an ‘apartheid state’ — simply because the Arabs who are trying to exterminate it say that this is so.

The vote has drawn immediate protests at the denial of academic freedom that it embodies. I have already commented in posts below on this particular aspect, along with the disgusting requirement for Israeli academics to side with those who would exterminate their nation in order to avoid this punishment. In these circumstances, it was astonishing to hear Steven Rose, the original begetter of the boycott movement three years ago, adduce on BBC Radio Four’s The World Tonight as a reason for this action the ‘appalling’ restrictions by the Israeli authorities on the academic freedom of his Palestinian colleagues who were prevented from moving freely between universities in the territories. No mention by Rose, of course, of the 50-year Arab war against Israel and the systematic mass murder of Israeli citizens by Palestinians — the only reason for those restrictions being applied.

But then, the whole premise of the motion is a truly monstrous lie about who is the aggressor and who the victim in the Middle East, with Israel being wickedly blamed for having the temerity to defend itself against annihilation and genocide. Susan Blackwell, the Birmingham university lecturer (described in David Aaronovitch’s Observer column as a former Christian turned revolutionary socialist who co-wrote the motion, said the union was ‘standing up for human rights’. What is so terrifying is that, in stamping on the human right to life of the Israelis, she probably sincerely believes this Orwellian inversion of the truth. And these people are teaching our young. [...]

The AUT motion cannot be dismissed as the ravings of a tiny minority of far-left academics in a marginal union. It may be that other academics, appalled by what has occurred, will resign from that union or protest in other ways. But this development is merely the latest in an apparently unstoppable stream of comments and incidents of an anti-Jewish nature. And the crucial thing is the absence of outrage in the wider community — indeed, on occasion, it provides its endorsement. The AUT motion came at the end of a week which saw the award of the MBE to Orla Guerin, the BBC reporter whose venomous dispatches from Israel have come to epitomise the virulent anti-Israel hatred at the BBC. For her to be given this award, presented by Baroness Symons, the junior Foreign Office minister, is a calculated kick in the teeth by the labour government towards the Jewish community in Britain, where feeling about Guerin’s reporting runs very high as the government well knows.

The Jewish community in Britain is under siege.

Academia, the media, and parties of the Left--the new home of anti-Semitism.

MORE:
Why Israel will always be vilified: It is convenient for many British liberals that Israel exists. It saves them from examining the manifest failings in their own actions (David Aaronovitch, April 24, 2005, Observer)

In itself, Israel is not anything like South Africa, where a majority was denied all political and civic rights on the grounds of race. What is analogous, however, is Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories, which bears comparison with South Africa's occupation of Namibia or, some might say, Serbia's occupation of Kosovo.

So the object of those wanting peace and justice in the Middle East is to bring about an end to that occupation, and enable the establishment of a viable, contiguous Palestinian state. It is to persuade both sides that such a settlement is practical and to persuade both sides to make the difficult sacrifices that are necessary. It is to build confidence between Jews and Palestinians, and to strengthen, always, the hand of the peacemakers.

Unless, of course, you don't believe that Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state at all within any borders. And this, as it happens, seems to be the view of Sue Blackwell, who describes Israel as 'an illegitimate state'. Unlike the United Nations, she does not believe it should have been set up and she would rather it disappeared. As she pointed out in 2003 to a previous AUT council: 'From its very inception, the state of Israel has attracted international condemnation for violating the human rights of the Palestinian people and making war on its neighbours.' Or, to put it even more bluntly, everything is all the fault of the Israelis.

The problem is that many Jews understand very well that this is her view and, unfortunately, will believe that it is also the view of all her fellow campaigners. Consequently, there will now be a battle royal (of which this article is part) about the rights and wrongs of these particular tactics, and the bigger picture will inevitably be lost. Everyone will return to their trenches and take the tarpaulins off their heaviest and most inaccurate artillery.

Posted by Orrin Judd at April 24, 2005 6:35 PM