AUT votes to boycott Israeli universities
The Association of University Teachers (AUT), which represents 42,000 lecturers at British universities, has passed a motion calling on academics to sever links with three Israeli universities.
The motion was passed overwhelmingly at the AUT's 2005 Council which sets policy for the trade union. An attempt to introduce similar policy failed in 2004 because it called for a blanket boycott of Israeli universities. The new motion, proposed by the Birmingham University and Open University branches of the AUT singled out three Israeli universities for boycott; the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Haifa University and Bar Ilan University.
The motion accuses the Hebrew University of dispossessing Palestinian families from their land in order to expand the university campus. Haifa University is accused of attempting to sack radical left-wing academic Dr. Ilan Pappe, a senior lecturer in Political Science at the university. Authorities at Bar Ilan University are criticised for establishing links with colleges that serve Israeli settlements in Palestinian territory. The AUT executive, which opposed the motion, has remitted the sections concerning Bar Ilan whilst the motion's claims are investigated.
The motion also endorsed a statement from the Federation of Unions of Palestinian Universities' Professors and Employees that, "In the spirit of international solidarity, moral consistency and resistance and oppression, we, Palestinian academics and intellectuals, call upon our colleagues in the international community to comprehensively and consistently boycott all Israeli academic and cultural institutions."
The AUT is taking legal advice on how to implement the boycott without putting members at risk of breaking their employment contracts. AUT members will face stiff opposition to the boycott. The move has already been condemned by Britain's Chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, and the Israeli Minister for the Diaspora. Several AUT members have already resigned in protest and there is move to challenge the boycott using a provision in the AUT constitution which allows for a special conference to be convened if demanded by 25 members in writing. Opponents of the boycott hope that the boycott could be over turned at a special conference.
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