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Last update - 20:27 30/08/2009
ANALYSIS / Israeli academics must pay price to end occupation
By Anat Matar
Tags: Israel boycott 

Several days ago Dr. Neve Gordon of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev published an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times. In that article he explained why, after years of activity in the peace camp here, he has decided to pin his hopes on applying external pressure on Israel - including sanctions, divestment and an economic, cultural and academic boycott.

He believes, and so do I, that only when the Israeli society's well-heeled strata pay a real price for the continuous occupation will they finally take genuine steps to put an end to it.

Gordon looks at the Israeli society and sees an apartheid state. While the Palestinians' living conditions deteriorate, many Israelis are benefiting from the occupation. In between the two sides, Israeli society is sinking into complete denial - drawn into extreme hatred and violence.
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The academic community has an important role to play in this process. Yet, instead of sounding the alarm, it wakes up only when someone dares approach the international community and desperately call for help.

The worn-out slogan that everybody raises in this context is "academic freedom," but it is time to somewhat crack this myth.

The appeal to academic freedom was born during the Enlightenment, when ruling powers tried to suppress independent minded thinkers. Already then, more than 200 years ago, Imannuel Kant differentiated between academics whose expertise (law, theology, and medicine) served the establishment and those who had neither power nor proximity to power. As for the first, he said, there was no sense in talking about "freedom" or "independent thought" as any use of such terminology is cynical.

Since then, cynicism has spread to other faculties as well. At best academic freedom was perceived as the right not to ask troubling questions. At worst was the right to harass whomever asked too much.

When the flag of academic freedom is raised, the oppressor and not the oppressed is usually the one who flies it. What is that academic freedom that so interests the academic community in Israel? When, for example, has it shown concern for the state of academic freedom in the occupied territories?

This school year in Gaza will open in shattered classrooms as there are no building materials there for rehabilitating the ruins; without notebooks, books and writing utensils that cannot be brought into Gaza because of the goods embargo (yes, Israel may boycott schools there and no cry is heard).

Hundreds of students in West Bank universities are under arrest or detention in Israeli jails, usually because they belong to student organizations that the ruling power does not like.

The separation fence and the barriers prevent students and lecturers from reaching classes, libraries and tests. Attending conferences abroad is almost unthinkable and the entry of experts who bear foreign passports is permitted only sparingly.

On the other hand, members of the Israeli academia staunchly guard their right to research what the regime expects them to research and appoint former army officers to university positions. Tel Aviv University alone prides itself over the fact that the Defense Ministry is funding 55 of its research projects and that DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in the U.S. Defense Department, is funding nine more. All the universities offer special study programs for the defense establishment.

Are those programs met with any protest? In contrast with the accepted impression, only few lecturers speak up decisively against the occupation, its effect and the increasingly bestial nature of the State of Israel.

The vast majority retains its freedom to be indifferent, up to the moment that someone begs the international community for rescue. Then the voices rise from right and left, the indifference disappears, and violence replaces it: Boycott Israeli universities? This strikes at the holy of holies, academic freedom!

The writer is a lecturer in Tel Aviv University's Department of Philosophy.

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      1.   Israel academics must pay the price 05:32  |  Jay Stonehill 27/08/09
      2.   Israel Already Offered to Stop the Occupation in 2000 05:35  |  DB 27/08/09
      3.   So let her resign and walk the talk 05:54  |  Ron 27/08/09
      4.   kol hakavod Ha`aretz and Ms. Matar 06:17  |  D. 27/08/09
      5.   Ghost of V.I. Lenin 06:30  |  Greg 27/08/09
      6.   Israel should be dealt with no different from South Africa 06:44  |  Marc Leb 27/08/09
      7.   Give me a break 06:45  |  Peace Games 27/08/09
      8.   What a hypocrite do not accept pay if u so concerned!! 07:03  |  arthur 27/08/09
      9.   israeli academics 07:20  |  professor USA 27/08/09
      10.   Impressive arguments based on morality and rational 07:44  |  Joe 27/08/09
      11.   Not About Academic Freedom 07:48  |  Brad 27/08/09
      12.   I agree, boycott the leftists! 08:07  |  Shimshon 27/08/09
      13.   the narrow-mindedness of this lecturer horrifies me! 08:31  |  saul a readner 27/08/09
      14.   Dr. Ndeve Gordon`s opinion column written for the LA Times 08:31  |  Yesh Prabhu 27/08/09
      15.   question to anat matar 08:36  |  saul a. readner 27/08/09
      16.   Or can we fire people for their politics? 08:50  |  Ilan 27/08/09
      17.   yes to boycott of israeli lecturers 09:30  |  scallywag 27/08/09
      18.   d. 09:31  |  scallywag 27/08/09
      19.   joe 09:44  |  scallywag 27/08/09
      20.   Now I Know 09:48  |  Donor 27/08/09
      21.   yesh prabhu 09:49  |  scallywag 27/08/09
      22.   boycotting israel contradicts the wish of easing palest. plight 09:55  |  scallywag 27/08/09
      23.   I hope she signs the petition then 10:10  |  jo 27/08/09
      24.   Education 10:33  |  Phil 27/08/09
      25.   Set an example Anat Matar and RESIGN 11:04  |  Uzi 27/08/09
      26.   Anat why don`t you focus on training students? 11:07  |  Genuine Moshe 27/08/09
      27.   Complete lack of logic 11:46  |  Ber 27/08/09
      28.   pay the price yourself 12:18  |  Alavai 27/08/09
      29.   The same must happen..... 12:20  |  Rubicon 27/08/09
      30.   Self excluded 12:45  |  Andy 27/08/09
      31.   The first academic to do so must be herself. resign in protest 13:34  |  de 27/08/09
      32.   The `Myth of Taba` - #2 DB 14:39  |  Dany 27/08/09
      33.   Total paranoia. Next: Fluoride is a Communist Plot. 14:57  |  Ovadiah ben Avraham 27/08/09
      34.   SO Lefty Matar supports"collective punishment" 14:57  |  PETER SM 27/08/09
      35.   MARCLEB LEBANON&Jordan etc practice apartheid as we speak 15:03  |  PETER SM 27/08/09
      36.   Gorge Orwell`s "Certain ideas are so stupid, only an intellectual 15:05  |  Jak 27/08/09
      37.   a different approach 15:16  |  tiki Belgium 27/08/09
      38.   Anat who? 15:20  |  AA 27/08/09
      39.   Israeli academics must pay... 15:21  |  Meny Grauman 27/08/09
      40.   Bravo Anat Matar! 15:23  |  Kim 27/08/09
      41.   WHY IS IT?Naive Gordon 15:25  |  oz 27/08/09
      42.   Matar! GIVE BACK DIRTY MONEY! RESIGN! 15:27  |  ADAM 27/08/09
      43.   What`s being missed here is deceptive methodology 15:33  |  Peace Games 27/08/09
      44.   #14 Yesh Prabhu about Tutu and Carter 15:46  |  John 27/08/09
      45.   Until individual Israelis 15:51  |  Chris Linthwaite 27/08/09
      46.   #31 de 15:56  |  John 27/08/09
      47.   Great! 16:04  |  Enrico 27/08/09
      48.   Since when are academics society`s well-heeled strata? 16:04  |  Smadar 27/08/09
      49.   Anat, nice try, but no cigar 16:11  |  Tomas 27/08/09
      50.   LINTHWAITE until Pals&their pals desist from absurd demands 16:21  |  PETER SM 27/08/09
      51.   Perversions of Israeli so called academia 16:31  |  TOMY 27/08/09
      52.   israeli academics 16:39  |  jon 27/08/09
      53.   academics as bridges for peace 17:01  |  As`ad - Angry Arab 27/08/09
      54.   congratulation 18:02  |  peter 27/08/09
      55.   Why does it take so long to realise sanctions are needed? 18:03  |  Tcherkessi 27/08/09
      56.   Even with sanctions, Israel and US helped keep aparheid going 18:04  |  Tcherkessi 27/08/09
      57.   Jay Stonehill. On some "details" in the overall picture 18:26  |  zmogus 27/08/09
      58.   boucott 18:26  |  JJimUSA 27/08/09
      59.   The End of the Occupation is not Necessarily 18:35  |  ARTH 27/08/09
      60.   collective punishment 18:47  |  JimUSA 27/08/09
      61.   PAY PRICE TO END OCCUPATION 18:54  |  ACHIM NEUHOFER 27/08/09
      62.   Like Pharamaceuticals funded research 19:27  |  Shaul Ben-Yimini 27/08/09
      63.   #9 Professor USA 19:49  |  arik 27/08/09
      64.   lecturer in philosophy 19:57  |  Cipora Julianna Kohn 27/08/09
      65.   #50 Peter SM getting desperate again 19:58  |  Chris Linthwaite 27/08/09
      66.   Bass Ackwards 20:18  |  Schtarker Yid 27/08/09
      67.   And now some wealthy US Jewish donors 20:42  |  steve 27/08/09
      68.   "the increasingly bestial nature of the State of Israel" 20:52  |  chet 27/08/09
      69.   Neve Gordon/academic boycott 20:58  |  Df 27/08/09
      70.   Chris Linthwaite (#65) Oh Yes, how smart of you mentioning that 20:59  |  Gil 27/08/09
      71.   To Israeli academics who practice treason 21:01  |  Nechama 27/08/09
      72.   PeterSM. 21:36  |  zmogus 27/08/09
      73.   Matar should pay the price and resign 21:40  |  Shalom Freedman 27/08/09
      74.   Guess - what? 21:47  |  Gene 27/08/09
      75.   The USA is not going to sanction Israel 22:09  |  Mark Lincoln 27/08/09
      76.   Israel needs more Anat Matars 22:22  |  Dorothy 27/08/09
      77.   Dorothy claiming that Anat Matar is correct 22:49  |  SDHD 27/08/09
      78.   what occupation??? 23:20  |  Lenny 27/08/09
      79.   fraudulent article: classrooms broken in gaza because gazans... 01:38  |  bernard ross 28/08/09
      80.   Chet # 68 has nothing to say but pass on hate 04:53  |  Darth Zaider (Ed) 28/08/09
      81.   Israel still occupies Gaza 05:01  |  Concerned American 28/08/09
      82.   peter sm 50 05:57  |  potobac 28/08/09
      83.   ZMOGUS in a word 06:07  |  PETER SM 28/08/09
      84.   LINTHWAITE You are avoiding the real issue& going for the rider 06:13  |  PETER SM 28/08/09
      85.   CONCERNED American Gaza is under siege.Hamas is law,they shoot 06:17  |  PETER SM 28/08/09
      86.   POTOBAC the Argenitian military junta was ousted decades ago. 06:55  |  PETER SM 28/08/09
      87.   Postmodernist (relativist) philosopher: irrational non-scientist 09:13  |  Paqid Yirmeyahu 28/08/09
      88.   Price for their anti Israel stance. 09:36  |  Harry 28/08/09
      89.   Nechama (another Jew who stays afar) 09:52  |  john Spear 28/08/09
      90.   Lenny! 10:01  |  john Spear 28/08/09
      91.   #70 Gil of Haifa 11:08  |  Chris Linthwaite 28/08/09
      92.   the government doesn`t really care anyway 11:40  |  Israeli lecturer 28/08/09
      93.   Cipora Julianna Kohn 12:33  |  zmogus 28/08/09
      94.   Dear Anat Matar, with all my sympathy, 12:37  |  zmogus 28/08/09
      95.   #78. Lenny. We`re chatting on occup. of our Gallaxy by Xyggoroids 12:40  |  zmogus 28/08/09
      96.   What would happen if... 17:26  |  Clear thinker 28/08/09
      97.   The Fist 21:08  |  Moses Weitzman 28/08/09
      98.   #84 Peter SM 01:35  |  Chris Linthwaite 29/08/09
      99.   I just don`t get it ??? 03:26  |  Larry Golden 29/08/09
      100.   Israeli Occupation 04:41  |  Martin 29/08/09
      101.   Academics 09:07  |  Zadok Ram 29/08/09
      102.   Chris Linthwaite (#91) If I wanted to speak about 10:13  |  Gil 29/08/09
      103.   Chris Linthwaite (#91) If I wanted to speak about 10:14  |  Gil 29/08/09
      104.   Analysis : Israeli left (2nd atmt) 11:00  |  The Teacher/Instruct 29/08/09
      105.   DB #2 22:51  |  Sharonelle 29/08/09
      106.   Israeli academics must pay price to end occupation 05:06  |  Victor Elnecave 30/08/09
      107.   #102,The Teacher/Instruct. Get instructed for once. 15:13  |  zmogus 30/08/09
      108.   There is Arab occupation of Jewish land 15:28  |  Regina N. 30/08/09
      109.   # 107 zmogus 19:31  |  The Teacher/Instruct 30/08/09
      110.   aparthied 13:37  |  boo 07/09/09
      111.   peace 13:50  |  boo 07/09/09
      112.   West Bank 13:53  |  boo 07/09/09
      113.   External pressure on Israel 23:45  |  Peter Brown 10/09/09
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