If there is
Free Speech for Gender Critical Feminists why does this not apply to critics of
Zionism and Apartheid Israel?
Kathleen
Stock is a gender critical feminist. She believes that there are fundamentally
two sexes – male and female – and that gender cannot change biological facts. She
believes that someone who possesses male genitalia cannot be a woman or have
access to women’s only spaces such as womens’ refuges, toilets and prisons.
Kathleen’s
views can be seen here
alongside other feminist philosophers and writers. My own views on the subject
are irrelevant in so far as I’m neither a woman nor trans! For what it is worth
I find it difficult to accept that a man can simply declare he’s a woman for
that to be an accepted fact. I have little doubt that some men will self-declare
in order to gain access to vulnerable women.
On
the other hand I have considerable doubt that one can simply declare that there
are 2 sexes and nothing in between. But the point is that there is a debate to
be had. The attempt by some students at Sussex University to harass or
intimidate Kathleen off campus and to demand her sacking is reprehensible.
‘Universities aren't places where students should just expect
to hear their own thoughts reflected back at them. Arguments should be met by
arguments and evidence by evidence, not intimidation or aggression’.
That must be right. Identity politics students who
expect to be comforted in their views, whether it be support of Israel and Zionism
or Gender politics must expect to be challenged and if they are not up to it
then they should not be at university.
To those trans activists who claim that Kathleen is a
threat
to their safety one is tempted to say that she is a threat to their
intellect. There is no credible argument that the slight figure of Kathleen
Stock poses a physical threat to any student.
However the contrast with David Miller is
remarkable. The stench of hypocrisy is overpowering. There is a united
front of the establishment press that Kathleen Stock has been the subject
of bullying.
However when it comes to Professor David Miller of
Bristol University the opposite is the case. The All Party Parliamentary Group wrote
to Bristol University alleging that David Miller was a threat to Jewish students
no less than 4 times. It beggars belief that David’s slight figure is a threat
to anyone let alone the Jewish American Princesses and Divas of Bristol University.
Still less Bristol J-Soc’s racist liar of a Chair David Isaacs.
For once the BBC got it right when it reported that
Bristol
University: Professor David Miller sacked over Israel comments. This is what is
so outrageous. David was sacked for his political opinions which were twisted
into an attack on Jewish students because Israel calls itself a ‘Jewish state’.
David called for an ‘end
to Zionism’ not an end to Jews, at a meeting of the Labour Campaign for Free
Speech. He also criticized the Israeli funded Union of Jewish Students. How was
this interpreted?According to
the BBC again this was
"inciting hatred against Jewish
students".Why? Israel is a
foreign state. If Jewish students want to support this cesspit of racism it is
up to them, but why did David’s comments threaten the ‘safety’ of Jewish students
any more than Kathleen Stock threatened the safety of trans students?
This is the obvious question - how does David Miller threaten the safety of Jewish or any other students?
Indeed according
to The Tab, Bristol University’s student newspaper .
‘Bristol
Uni’s Professor David Miller is under police investigation following remarks
allegedly made during his lectures.’
In a statement Avon and Somerset Police
confirmed the investigation into “a hate
crime or hate incident taking place during lectures at the University of
Bristol.” The allegation of hate speech against Kathleen Stock is exactly
what trans activists are alleging yet are Sussex Police investigating Ms Stock?Quite the contrary.They are investigating
those who threatened Kathleen Stock.
What were the trans activists burning? Witches?
The double standards are so obvious you
would need to be blind and stupid not to notice them.Yet the reasons are clear enough.What Kathleen Stock has said is an example of
what might be called identity politics and poses no threat to the system we
live under.David Miller by way of
contrast, by challenging Zionism, the ideology of Apartheid Israel, threatens
our and the United States’s relationship with Israel. That and that alone
explains the difference in treatment.
Jewish students are therefore wheeled
out, or rather Jewish Zionist students are paraded, as a soft rationalization for
what is a political position – support for Israel, right or wrong.
Did David Miller threaten to go round
to visit any individual student?Did he
threaten any individual students?Of
course not. The threat to their personal safety is entirely in their minds.When over 100 MPs and peers, including
shamefully Caroline Lucas, wrote
to Bristol University’s cowardly Vice Chancellor Sir Hugh Brady saying that
David Miller had been ‘inciting hatred
against Jewish students on your campus’ they were lying.David Miller was no more inciting hatred than
Kathleen Stock.
David’s dismissal is a clear and
obvious attack on freedom of speech yet Bristol University has complied with
the demands of the political establishment with the press and police doing
their best to heighten the animosity towards David.
The Jewish Chronicle Makes It Clear that David Miller is Just the Start
This is not
fanciful. The Jewish Chronicle as is to be expected was crowing
this week about the dismissal but it made it clear in its Leader ‘Miller’s
sacking should be the beginning, not the end’ that this was never about the
safety of Jewish students but the politics of anti-Zionist lecturers.
The
dismissal of David Miller matters not because it is the end of the affair, but
because (irrespective of whether he chooses to fight) it should mark a
beginning — the point at which cranks like him start to notice that the tide is
turning and their universities will no longer be able to offer them a safe
space from which to spread their toxic poison.
What the Jewish Chronicle under
its Islamaphobic Editor Stephen Pollard means by ‘crank’ is anyone who opposes
the racism inherent in a Jew settler colonial state.
In a front page article the Jewish
Chronicle claimed that ‘Miller is gone but he is only tip of the iceberg’ and
that ‘Analysis of the signatories to a letter supporting the disgraced
professor reveals academics in 74 separate British institutions’ The implication
is obvious. David Miller’s sacking is the beginning of a process whereby
socialist and left-wing. Lecturers, in particular anti-Zionists, will be under
threat of dismissal if they open their mouths too widely.
But what is missing at the moment is
any response from David’s trade union, the University College Union. It has
been totally silent on this threat to academic freedom despite having policy on
Boycott of Israel. The position of UCU, which appears to be to have no
position, is utterly shameful.
I am pleased to say that Scottish UCU
has passed
policy on David Miller which:
Condemns the attack on Professor David Miller by Zionist
lobby groups and the call for his dismissal from Bristol University
following his address to the online conference held by the Labour Campaign
for Free Speech on 13 February;
Calls on Bristol University to defend Professor Miller, his
academic freedom and right to free speech;
Mandates UCU officers, in liaison with the Bristol UCU branch
and UK officers, to write to the vice chancellor of Bristol University
expressing our outrage at the treatment of Professor Miller and the inadequate
response so far in his defence;
Agrees to promote campaign material to members to encourage
support for David Miller.
It
is to be hoped that UCU nationally comes off the fence and defends, not just
David Miller, but the principle of free speech and academic freedom.
The difference is that Scottish Palestine
Solidarity Campaign is supporting David whilst the Socialist Action controlled
PSC has nothing to say.
Sentenced
life imprisonment alongside Mandela at the 1963-4 Rivonia to Trial, Goldberg’s
death passed unnoticed in Israel where opposition to racism and Apartheid is
not a popular cause
Denis Goldberg and Nelson Mandela
When
Marek Edelman, Commander of the Warsaw Ghetto Resistance died in 2009, Moshe
Arens, Likud’s former Foreign Minister wrote
that:
‘He had received Poland's highest honor, and
at the 65th commemoration of the Warsaw ghetto uprising he was awarded the
French Legion of He died not having received the recognition from Israel that
he so richly deserved.’
The President
of Poland spoke at his funeral, held in the old Jewish cemetery of Warsaw. Two
thousand people attended the grave-side ceremony. But no one from the Israeli
government attended - though Israel's former ambassador to Poland, Shevach
Weiss, attended in a personal capacity. No official representative of any
international Jewish organization attended either: not even from the Holocaust
memorialization organizations. As far as I can tell, neither the Jerusalem Post
nor Ha'aretz ran a story when Edelman died, nor any sort of eulogy.
Marek
Edelman was probably fortunate not to have had a hypocritical tribute by a
state founded on the same principles as the European fascists of the 1930s.
The
same is true of Denis
Goldberg, who died of cancer on April 29th aged 87, a
Jewish veteran of the anti-Apartheid struggle. Israel calls itself a ‘Jewish’
state but it doesn’t care to celebrate Jewish heroes of the fight against
racism. Indeed it barely acknowledges the contribution of anti-Zionist Jews to
Jewish history. They are written out of Zionist history. This is probably a
good thing as there could be no greater dishonour than to be praised by the
apartheid regime in Tel Aviv and its sycophants.
Only
a couple of months ago I had the privilege of attending a packed meeting at
Sussex University, which was addressed by Albie Sachs,
another Jewish veteran of the anti-Apartheid struggle. Sachs was blinded in one
eye and lost an arm when opening a letter bomb from South Africa’s secret
police, BOSS.
Last
year I attended a meeting at SOAS with Ronnie
Kassrill’s, the former ANC security minister and commander of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the ANC’s military
wing. Ronnie told us how, under the IHRA misdefinition of ‘anti-Semitism’ his meeting
in support of the Palestinians was banned by Vienna’s local authority from
Council property. The decision had been unanimous. The Green Party, the SPD and Austria’s
neo-Nazi Freedom Party had all voted together to ban a Jewish veteran of the anti-apartheid
struggle. Such are the alliances that have been formed in defence of the
world’s only apartheid state.
Denis
Goldberg was born on April 11 1933 in Cape Town to Annie and Sam, communist
working-class Jewish immigrants from Britain who would die when their son was
in prison. His
mother later spent time in prison for her anti-apartheid activism. His parents
were the children of Jewish immigrants from Lithuania. He recalled
that his opposition to racism began at the age of six when he and his parents
would give food to striking workers.
Goldberg grew up reading about Nazi
atrocities during the Second World War. After leaving the Observatory Boys
School he studied civil engineering at the University of Cape Town because, he
said, he wanted to “build roads and
bridges, dams and pipelines for people”. Why did he get involved in the
anti-Apartheid struggle? He told a 2019
interviewer with the
University of Cape Town.
Denis Goldberg with fellow Rivonia defendants
“I understood that what was happening in South
Africa with its racism was like the racism of Nazi Germany in Europe that we
were supposed to be fighting against,”
“You have to
be involved one way or another. That’s what I grew up with. I come from a generation who were prepared to put our
lives on the line for freedom”
Just as Denis Goldberg was inspired to
oppose Apartheid by what the Nazis had done to the Jews so many Jews today
oppose Israel, the so-called Jewish state for the same reasons. Hatred of racism is a universal principle or
it is nothing.
Denis's Art Collection
It was at Cape Town University that he
met Esme Bodenstein, a physiotherapist and fellow activist whom he married in
1954. They had two children, Hilary, who ran a nursery in London and predeceased
him, and David, who went into finance, working in foreign exchange in the City.
In
1957 Goldberg joined the banned Communist Party and his first run-in with the
law came in 1960, during protests following the Sharpeville massacre when 69
unarmed protestors were shot dead by South African police. During the state of
emergency imposed after the Sharpeville massacre of 1960 he was imprisoned for
four months as the regime cracked down on activists. He again lost his job,
this time with a construction company building a power station. Following his
release from custody, he joined the military wing of the African National
Congress (ANC), uMkhonto we Sizwe.
In
1962 Mandela set up Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) and Goldberg, now notorious as “the most dangerous white man in South
Africa”, went underground to set up a training camp near Cape Town for a
campaign of sabotage directed at government buildings and infrastructure, the
first such camp inside South Africa.
After
being arrested Goldberg was sentenced to life imprisonment alongside Nelson
Mandela and nine others in the 1964 Rivonia trial in which he was
found guilty of sabotage. He was the only white man to be convicted and, at 31,
he was the youngest of the defendants. The Defendants had expected to be
sentenced to death and it was almost certainly international pressure which
averted this.
After their
life sentences were handed down, Goldberg’s mother, who was hard of hearing,
called down from the public gallery: “Denis,
what is it?” He shouted back: “It’s
life, and life is wonderful!”. In the documentary, Life is Wonderful,
Goldberg emerged as its gentle, self-deprecating but steely star.
When his father died Goldberg did not
seek permission to attend his funeral because “I wasn’t going to give them the pleasure of refusing me”.
In prison in
Pretoria Goldberg took degrees in Public Administration, History, Geography and
Library Science, taught himself German and was half way through a law degree
when he was released from prison in 1985 as international pressure forced the
apartheid regime into making concessions.
My posting on the South Africa Board of Deputies Facebook Page
On release he was allowed a visit to
his father’s grave in a Jewish cemetery in Johannesburg then put on a plane to
Tel Aviv. His daughter was working on Kibbutz Ma’ayanei HaYeshu where he stayed
for a short period with his family before living in exile in London, where he
continued to take part in the anti-Apartheid movement. Though Israel had helped
to secure his release, Goldberg denounced its close ties to South Africa’s
apartheid regime.
Israel and Zionism
Goldberg recalled that some people questioned his
description of Israel as an apartheid state, when Israel, for example, has a
number of Palestinian members of parliament and Israeli Palestinians can vote.
His response was clear and simple:
“Well I say
you don’t need to be like South Africa to be an apartheid state; there is a
definition in international law through the UNESCO declaration on apartheid.”
Apartheid exists, he said, in states
that enforce laws and policies that discriminate between people on the basis of
race or religion, and this holds true in Israel proper as well as in the
occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. He was one of a panel of anti-apartheid
activists discussing the lessons that struggle holds for the Palestinian cause.
Like so many of his colleagues in the anti-apartheid
movement, Goldberg became a vocal critic of Israel and a stalwart supporter of
the Palestinian cause.
Goldberg told an Israel Apartheid Week meeting at
Johannesburg University in 2015 that
"There
is no doubt in my mind that Israel is an apartheid state. Having lived through
apartheid in South Africa, I cannot allow in my name the same kind of
oppression to go on."
“It’s simple: the dominant group excludes the indigenous people from
their equal rights within the borders of Israel itself and in the occupied
territories, in breach of international law,
“Going on free trips to Israel causes harm to the Palestinian people
just as people who visited South Africa and broke the cultural and academic
boycott against white South Africa, did harm to our movement.”
He also described the “enormous” lies propagated to defend
Israel. “I’ve lived through South African
apartheid and I saw it there as well.”
Goldberg added that not a single settlement is built by
Israel that is not erected on the ruins of Palestinians homes, their livelihood
and the livelihood of their children for generations to come. “This is outrageous, I cannot possibly
support them.”
Goldberg said he had a responsibility
as a human being to uphold justice, truth and righteousness, “just as I did as a first-generation white
South African” who opposed apartheid.
Goldberg also said that the situation
in Israel is not as complicated as the Zionist lobby tries to make it seem.
“It’s simple: the dominant group excludes the
indigenous people from their equal rights within the borders of Israel itself
and in the occupied territories, in breach of international law,”
He said these actions showed an
attitude that Palestinians were considered lesser people, which is similar to
what happened in South Africa during the apartheid era when blacks were barred
from voting.
"I have to be an
opponent of the exclusionist policies of Zionism, but let me say straight away
that I have to be opposed to the exclusionary policies of the feudal Arab
states of the Middle East as well."
When apartheid eventually began to
crumble, and Mandela was freed in 1990, he wanted to return to South Africa but
his wife was reluctant and Britain was by that time home for his children
He returned to attend Mandela’s
inauguration after South Africa’s first free elections in 1994. The following
day Elias Motsoaledi, a fellow Rivonia defendant, died. At his wake in Soweto
Goldberg received a hero’s welcome.
During a subsequent visit to South
Africa that November Goldberg resolved to help rebuild his native country
and destroy apartheid’s legacy. He founded a UK-based charity, Community Heart,
to help raise standards of health and education for black South Africans.
With his new wife, Goldberg, aged 69,
returned to South Africa after 18 years in Britain to work as an adviser to
Ronnie Kasrils, then minister of water affairs, in Pretoria, the city of his
previous imprisonment. “I have the desire
to go home. The time is right and I need a breather,” he said.
He retired in 2006, and the man who
had spent so long staring at walls moved to a house he had built on a hilltop
near Cape Town with a spectacular view across Hout Bay. Later that year his
second wife died of cancer.
Goldberg never lost faith in the ANC,
though he was dismayed by the corruption that engulfed the party during Jacob
Zuma’s presidency. Its members needed to “renew
the leadership from top to bottom”, he said.
In 2016 he
returned to Britain after being invited by David Cameron – along with fellow
Rivonia veterans Kathrada and Mlangeni and their surviving lawyers – to a
ceremony at Number 10 to honour them and recognise their contribution to the
ending of apartheid.
There was a
certain irony in having a Tory Prime Minister entertaining those who had been
called ‘terrorists’ by Margaret Thatcher two decades before. This shows that
‘terrorism’ is what you call your enemies and if you are the victor then you
are no longer a terrorist!
The same
year Goldberg published a memoir, A Life
for Freedom: The Mission to End Racial Injustice in South Africa.
In 2017,
despite having received a diagnosis of lung cancer, Goldberg
undertook a campaign to build a centre for the arts, House of Hope, in his
hometown of Hout Bay, near Cape Town.
In 2009 he was awarded South Africa’s
Order of Luthuli (silver). “A luta
continua,” he
told a university
audience in 2012, repeating a Portuguese anti-colonial rallying cry while
urging South Africans to continue the struggle for justice. “Let it continue. . . . I don’t want to see
what we fought for collapse.”
Below there
are a number of links to obituaries and articles on Denis Goldberg. I am also
republishing a wonderful tribute by Gideon Levy, Israel’s bravest journalist,
in tribute to Denis Goldberg.
Denis Goldberg, anti-apartheid
activist, was born on April 11, 1933. He died of cancer on April 29, 2020, aged
87
A Jewish hero died on Independence Day, with his death
unmarked here. Denis Goldberg died in Cape Town, the city he was born in, at
the age of 87. He was the epitome of struggle, sacrifice, courage and
solidarity, all the qualities so lacking in Israel’s left. If he’d immigrated
to Israel, he’d be considered a traitor and terrorist here. But Israel never
had Jews such as him, willing to sacrifice everything in the struggle for the
freedom of the Palestinians.
In South Africa he wasn’t the only Jew who sacrificed
all for the struggle for freedom of blacks. Ruth First was killed by a parcel
bomb addressed to her, Albie Sachs lost an arm and an eye, later becoming a
judge on the Constitutional Court of South Africa. There aren’t many Jewish
communities that gave rise to such heroes. In Israel, obviously, no one tells
their stories.
Goldberg wasn’t an esteemed Jew like Sheldon
Adelson or an influential one like Israeli media personality Sivan
Rahav Meir, but he and his friends were the heroes history will remember. They
didn’t fight for their nation, they fought for others. It’s hard to think of
loftier or more courageous conduct. If there is a reason for Jewish pride, it
is these Jews who crossed the lines in South Africa, not falling in line with
position taken by Jewish leaders in their country and the Jewish Board of
Deputies, the biggest collaborator with the apartheid regime and its inveterate
ally, the state of Israel.
Goldberg was arrested along with Nelson Mandela on
July 11, 1963, at the farm of Arthur Goldreich, another Jewish hero. Of the 17
members of the African National Congress who were arrested that day at
Liliesleaf Farm, five were Jewish. At the Rivonia Trial, Goldberg was
sentenced, along with Mandela, to four life sentences, for 200 acts of terror.
These arch-terrorists are now considered national and international heroes,
more food for thought in Israel.
In a heated debate in the literature section of
Haaretz over the weekend, Professors Hannan Hever and Dan Miron discussed the
courage of author S. Yizhar [one of the first writers to write about and issue
a moral outcry related to the events of 1948]. Goldberg could have served as an
example bolstering Hever’s position, since he believed in an armed struggle. He
spent 22 years in prison until his release, owed in part to Herut Lapid, an
Israeli activist who brought about the release of many prisoners.
Goldberg was flown to Israel, where he spent a brief
time in his daughter’s kibbutz before hurrying to depart. Like his partners to
the struggle, he detested
what was happening here. He told historian Tom Segev that Israel was the
Middle East’s South Africa and that the solution in both places should be
identical: one state with equal rights for all. His vision was realized in his
own country and Goldberg returned there, crowned in glory.
Over the weekend, Mandela’s grandson, Chief
Zwelivelile Mandela, wrote on WhatsApp: “we salute a great man and a leader of
our struggle…he belonged to a special generation of people who chose a life of
struggle over one of convenience, unafraid of the brutality of the apartheid
state.” Mandela ended his words with the Hebrew words commemorating a person’s
memory. Shivers and Jewish pride. He added a photo of himself with Goldberg,
when the latter was already in a wheelchair.
I didn’t know him, but I did meet two of his partners
to the struggle, Ronnie Kasrils, who was the Minister for Intelligence Services
under Mandela, and Ben Turok, a member of parliament on behalf of the African
National Congress, both of them Jewish. There aren’t many Jews as sharply
critical of Israel as these two were. One can’t be a freedom fighter like they
were and think otherwise. In the eyes of people like them, who know a thing or
two about human rights, equality and struggle, Israel is an apartheid state
just like their country was.
But no one here wants to know about Goldberg and his
associates. The residence of South Africa’s ambassador in Ramat Gan has been
vacant for months, a protest against the occupation and apartheid. In an ironic
coincidence, Goldberg died on Israel’s Independence Day. Let us light a
symbolic memorial candle in his honor.
This is an Older Post From 2013 Which Has Been Updated
Amir Sagie’s of Israel's Foreign Office has some novel advice – shoot the messenger not the message
Update at Sussex University
A magnificent victory at Sussex University for the BDS campaign. The significance of this vote isn’t simply in the massive majorities, but the fact that students today are tomorrow’s decision makers. Everything points in one direction – that the Zionists have lost the propaganda war and it is but the last lap to ensure that that translates into action.
Those who argue for the ‘piss process’ (as Israelis call it) are really trying to put off the day of judgement. When asked what they mean by ‘peace’ they have nothing but the status quo to defend.
Below is an interesting article from our enemies on how they think they can defeat BDS. One thing is for sure; notwithstanding defeatists like Norman Finkelstein, BDS is the only show in town. Notice how the racism oozes into Sagie's speech – ‘Muslim money pouring into Academia’ now if a supporter of Hamas were to speak of ‘Jewish money pouring into Academia’ there would be the inevitable cries of ‘anti-Semitism’. But Muslims are fair game.
You can see the essential weakness of the Zionist argument by the fact that their main defence is not 'expropriations are justified' but 'why pick on us when there's Syria and China etc.'. Their only resort now is that of South Africa in its dying days of Apartheid - to say they may be bad but there are others who are worse!
Amir Sagie, the director, civil society affairs department, Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs was the Keynote Guest speaker at Sunday’s overwhelmingly successful Israel Advocacy Seminar in Joburg.
This speech, by the man at the forefront of combatting the global BDS movement, was extremely informative and useful to all present – given that it was an Israel advocacy seminar.
MyShtetl took a complete transcript of the speech. However, the information has been edited to exclude strategically sensitive information from the eyes of anti-Israel forces who are becoming increasingly common users of the website. [now I wonder what ‘strategically sensitive information’ might be? Surely these democrats don’t have anything to hide?!! - TG]
“Combating BDS Internationally”
The issue of Settlements is increasingly becoming more of the core campaign in fighting BDS.
OVERVIEW – there are seven eminent issues in the current phenomena of the Boycott, Divest, Sanction (BDS) movement globally:
Labelling of goods is becoming a bigger issue
Labelling of goods – which has been a major issue in SA but which is also of much concern in EU and, most recently, within the UN.
South Africa's Jewish community distinguished itself by its support of Apartheid - it is the most pro-Zionist Jewish community in the world
In recent weeks in the EU, political will was translated into operational activity with legislators trying to find the legislative mechanisms to label goods from occupied territories.
They have found that they only have an existing legal framework covering labelling of agricultural products. But even there concerns about discrimination have been raised by Denmark, Holland, the UK and others. We are watching the situation closely.
The workers most affected by any such changes will be the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who are working in the Jordan Valley and other areas.
Boycotting international cultural exchanges
Attempts to boycott international cultural exchanges are another growing phenomenon. The UK is a major problem area which is growing. It has targeted Madonna and other leading musicians.
In the UK Israeli culture has been a huge success, the critics and the public liked the Israeli culture.
But one of the recent consequences has been that the increased investment in security and keeping order in and around venues is of concern to promoters and local authorities. Now this additional cost is scaring event organisers off.
BDS hasn’t been able to scare any major performers from coming to Israel. Even though artists have been getting threats (even on their lives) but they keep coming.
[presumably being Black, Stevie Wonder isn’t a major artist, nor Roger Waters nor Santana to name but 3]
Researching the legal frameworks
Legal sphere: various ministries have been investing heavily in this area – in research, mainly in key countries in the EU. For us to challenge BDS initiatives we need to understand the legal environment. Over the last six months Israel has taken on two (court) cases in partnership with UK Jewry. We are trying wherever possible to challenge BDS morally and legally. But some legal systems are not geared to this. France’s legal system (provides ways to challenge boycotts) while the UK (legal) system is not (similarly geared). [a pity then that one of those legal challenges, against the Universities College Union] was described by a spokesman for Lawyers for Israel as an ‘act of epic folly’!!]
Problems on university campuses
Academics and campuses are another area of concern. Most of our work is around North American campuses and we have to apologise if we are not spending enough time here. The good news is that most US campuses are not infected by BDS - but we have found that students are ambivalent about Israel.
In reality we have 10 West Coast campuses, most in California, that have been troublesome.
Apartheid Week is declining in its support and numbers of participants. We are not making too much fuss over this. Sometimes it is better to not add traction (to these initiatives).
We have found that we have bigger problems with faculty members. The newer faculty members are informed by the growing anti-Israel environment that exists today.
We are following developments closely and we have had issues over the last few days at a Brooklyn College.
We are trying to restrain the pro-Israel groups from lashing out at BDS-ers. We would prefer not to give traction to (their initiatives) and focus our enrgy to use more productively and proactively.
Muslim money pouring into Academia [substitute ‘Jewish’ for ‘Muslim’ to get a racist flavour of the comment]
Money is being poured into North American universities by wealthy countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iran.
There is a proliferation of increasingly strong faculties of Islamic Studies adding strength to both students and faculty.
Civil society groups being infiltrated by BDS
Certain civil society groups are increasingly being infiltrated by BDS. The most noteworthy areas of their influence are:
Churches – we are trying to build partnerships but this has become a bigger challenge recently.
Labour unions – national unions, and more particularly international union groups, are areas we are addressing.
Boycott, divest & sanction campaigns
The boycott, divest and sanction campaigns have been concentrated on two popular product ranges - Ahava and Sodastream. Their impact has been negligible.
Sodastream have appointed lobbyists – an initiative that is paying dividends. [how interesting! and also given journalists all-expense paid trips, like John Keenan of Brighton's Argus, to come and visit]
Of more concern and a bigger potential threat to Israel is the multinationals who are being accused of being active in occupied territories. There is a concern that a number of international companies who are under pressure may come to us and tell us they have to leave as their activities in Israel are standing in the way of their global operations.
Challenges and threats
Hard-core BDS-ers are in the minority – but we are increasingly seeing ‘spill-over’ into some sensitive constituencies – mainly liberals.
We accept that we won’t be able to change the minds of BDS-ers. We are more concerned about trying to fine tune our strategy to target the spill-over.
We need to reclaim the narrative. For too many years we have left it for the Palestinians to build the narrative – even domestically in Israel.
What is now important is the need to develop a more provocative message with regard to explaining the reality about the peace process and settlement development.
Dispelling the Myths
The Palestinian-driven narrative has resulted in numerous myths having taken hold over recent years. These can be grouped into three major groups of myths:
1. Israel is jeopardising Palestinian statehood by doing everything it can to frustrate their efforts;
2. New settlements and expansion – by building relentlessly Israel is making sure there will never be the possibility of a viable state; and
3. Israel is opposed to reconciliation and is working pro-actively against the reunification of PA and Hamas.
Let’s debunk these three common myths:
MYTH #1: Frustrating Palestinian Statehood
In recent years the number of checkpoints has been reduced to the minimum required to make it easier for Palestinians to move around. The economic growth rate is incredible in Palestine: building of homes and malls, the proliferation of cars – Israel is fully supportive in every way it can be (of this growth).
We have been working with the Palestinian Authority on all aspects of preparing for their Statehood. This is happening in respect of security – with a lot of help from the US mainly, and the Europeans.
In the past year not one single Israeli was killed in the West Bank.
Israelis is doing everything we can to help build a strong economy in Palestine, to build strong institutions that will be required for Statehood, building new towns and cities.
Some Palestinians talk about boycotting Israeli goods. But the two economies are so interconnected that there is no viable possibility of an economic boycott. Palestinians even use Israeli currency.
MYTH #2: New settlement development
No new settlements have been added in the West bank in at least four years. The (geographic) footprint hasn’t changed at all. We have only added buildings within the existing (settlement) borders.
Netanyahu’s 10-month freeze was (absolute) – residents couldn’t even enclose a balcony.
MYTH #3: Frustrating reconciliation between parties
This is nonsense. Israel is opening its arms for the PA to return to the (negotiating) table with no preconditions whatsoever.
A large part of this myth is that the population in Israel has been moving to the right! We need to put these facts right. The (political position that) was the main claim of the left parties 20 years ago, is now supported by 60 to 70 percent of Israelis.
Support of Israelis for a two-State solution is at 80 percent. But not on terms that (creates a risk that) there will be no Israel!
Public opinion has moved to the left and that is where it is today.
The UN Human Rights Council report that follows trends suggests a process (whereby) Israel will remove 100 percent of its citizens from the West Bank.
This can never be. They are building the ladder higher and higher (to the extent that) it cannot be climbed.
How Israel can deal with these issues
How we deal with things – here are some of our conceptual strategies:
We as Civil Society Affairs have to build partnerships. We are not just there to fight against BDS – we need to keep working on this as you are doing here.
When the time comes for a resolution to be tabled anywhere, you can’t (simply) call on someone the night before and lobby (them for their vote). We have learned that these relationships have to be built over time.
Importantly, we need to reclaim the narrative – for many years we have left it for the Palestinians to build the narrative – both globally and in Israel.
Let me give you an example: How many Jews (never mind others) are aware of the role of the Palestinians played in Holocaust? They were actively promoting it. [a complete fabrication which exonerates the Nazis. If anyone were guilty of such a role it is the Zionist leadership under Ben-Gurion which actively opposed the rescue of Jews to any other country bar Palestine which they knew was barred. The Zionist leaders not only abandoned their own chaverim (comrades) but the masses of European Jewry who they considered anti-Zionist and not the kind of Jew they wanted].
The Palestinians have been tempted (to link up with anti-Jewish forces) three times over the years.
First there was the collaboration with the Nazis to annihilate the Jews in both Europe and in Palestine. [this myth is based on the pro-Nazi views of the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj-al-Amin Husseini. But Husseini came fourth in elections to the post of Mufti and it was the British High Commissioner Sir Herbert Samuel who nonetheless appointed this reactionary buffoon. If anyone was responsible for the Mufti’s act ions it was the Zionists themselves – Samuel had been an ardent member of the Asquith government and had long lobbied for the equivalent of the Balfour Declaration. It should also be pointed out that the SS battallions he did form in the Balkans did not take part in the deportation of Jews, with the exception of 300 from Kosovo. So ‘bad’ was their attitude to Jews that they were sent for ‘retraining’ to France where they promptly mutinied and joined the French resistance. The only known instance of an SS group rebelling].This was followed by a similar collaboration with the communists. More recently, after the fall of communism, they have collaborated with Jihadists and radical Islamists (with a view) to annihilate the Jews.
We have to remember these things and we must tell (people) about it.
We have to reframe the Middle East, to contextualise it. And we have to be very frank with ourselves.
There is a belief that that the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is the core problem of Middle East. It isn’t! Although settlement seems to be (seen as) the biggest obstacle of peace, it isn’t.
For example, in respect of Syria and the consequences of the aftermath (of their civil war) – we can’t simply sit back and believe it will all be okay.
We are facing huge strategic weapons, the largest chemical weapons stockpiles in the world are in Syria. They are shipping these weapons to their neighbours.
[It is noteworthy that the morning after Amir Sagie made this statement in Joburg Israel acted against shipments to Lebanon -ED]
Pillar of Defence (Israel’s attack to stop Palestinian rockets in November 2012) put a lot of wind into the sails of BDS. They have been trying their hardest to build energy out of it.
Unfortunately for them, the paradox is that there are no more missiles being fired at Israel.
SA Zionist Organisations and Israel
We appreciate the (valuable) work you are doing (to counter BDS) here in South Africa. And it is not taken for granted. We wish you and us all the best (in our endeavours).
Seminar convener and FairPlay chair Ben Swartz said after Amir Sagie had spoken that there were “two significant take-aways” for him from the speech, which were:
1. That BDS are more obsessed with punishing Israel than they are about helping the Palestinians – making resolution that much harder; and
2. The importance of our driving our own narrative.
Both Agie and Swartz paid tribute to Chief Rabbi Dr Warren Goldstein who had introduced the subject of the historical lack of driving the real narrative to wide applause in the morning session – see: LIVE-BLOG 11h44 post!
Amir Sagie has been involved with the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) since 1998. During his time there he has served as the Spokesman and head of the Public Diplomacy department in the Israeli Embassy in Beijing, China; he supervised the China, South Korea and Mongolia Desk in the North-Asia Department; he worked as the Deputy Director of the Information and Internet Department. He managed the MFA’s main website as well as Israel’s missions’ website infrastructure; he served as DCM of the Israeli Embassy in Lisbon, Portugal; and he worked as Deputy Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Policy Department, the Strategic Affairs Division.
Currently Amir holds the position of Director of the Civil Society Affairs Department in the Public Diplomacy Directorate.
