Academic boycott of Israel redux

In terms of the boycott itself, the best argument for it is one of the second best: I might prefer severe economic sanctions on Israel to withdraw to the 1967 border and compensate the Palestinians, while upgrading academic exchanges and other interaction. But US foreign policy is captured by Israeli-lobby interests, and British foreign policy is largely subservient to US foreign policy, and neither of these two circumstances are at all likely to change. Given that, those in Britain who want to put some pressure on the Israelis to stop their bigotry, and to match in a tiny way the enormous pressures the Palestinians have been under since before 1947, have to take action directly from British civil society to Israeli civil society, of which an academic boycott is the obvious example. Let’s have more of it, including excluding Israel from sporting and other international events. Israeli society is so convinced of its right to colonise and ethnically cleanse the Palestinians that explicit and open rejectionism of Israeli attitudes and policies is required.

The argument is this: that the Israeli perpetrators of injustice are far more vulnerable to outside pressure than, say, the Chinese or the Russians are. Measures taken against Israel therefore stand a better chance of being effective. The Russian treatment of the Chechens or the Chinese treatment of the Tibetans may indeed be worse than the Israeli treatment of the Palestinians. But we can take action now to force the Israelis to negotiate and to end the injustice of the occupation, whereas we cannot act with similar prospect of success against Russia or China. Obviously that argument depends on a number of facts about the way the world is. And those facts are highly contestable. But it doesn’t depend (to the contrary!) on any claim that Israel is uniquely or even especially evil or unjust.

Right, it depends on the fact that Israel is a “normal” democratic country. If it were authoritarian and more evil like many worse abusers, then it would be left alone to treat the Palestinians as badly, say, as the Chinese treat the Tibetans. It would be free to move as many Israelis into the West Bank as it liked as China has done with ethnic Chinese into Tibet and there would be a few scattered protests but mostly the world would conduct business-as-usual with Israel as it does with China.

It strikes me that there’s a pretty serious moral hazard argument against this approach, which is that a reason for China’s leaders NOT to democratize is that, as a democracy, it would then be granted much less latitude in dealing with Tibet (and Taiwan and other issues) than it is now.

Another reason, of course, is that such unique pressure is applied to Israel but not Russia or China, say, is that applying pressure to Israel (a small country) is cost-free, whereas applying pressure to Russia and China would be economically costly. Russia is slated for elections soon and pressure might have an effect on the results, but no pressure will be applied. And so the morality behind anti-Israel pressure is revealed as merely opportunistic and capricious, which rather tends to undercut its authority, don’t you think?

And lastly — the difference between the treatment of Israel and China is not just a strategic one. It is not as if boycott organizers weighed up the costs and benefits of applying a boycott to Israeli academics vs Chinese academics and concluded, after careful analysis, to chose Israel rather than China as a target. Rather — there is a real, visceral animus felt toward the Israelis that is completely absent toward the Chinese. It is for this reason that antisemitism is suspected as the underlying factor.

For us Americans, at least, I think there is a strong argument that the actions of Israel are more “our business” because the country relies so strongly on our support economically, militarily, and politically. Even from a “realist” standpoint, Israel takes our money and acts in ways contrary to our interests. I realize the latter argument may not appeal either to academics or to the international community, but politics lives on coalitions.

I do think sloc has a point about the moral hazard of holding democracies to a higher standard and the notion that imposing sanctions on Israel is much less costly than doing the same to, say, China. I always thought trade with China should be strongly linked to human rights, but that train seems already gone (thanks, Clinton. And that spy plane business showed us your balls too, Bush). That said, costs of imposing sanctions to the imposers are realistically always going to be a consideration. And the way to deal with the moral hazard is to be more insistent with dictatorships, not less with democracies.

Just to be clear, I do oppose a boycott. Because of its international nature, I don’t think the question of US complicity is Israeli abuses applies, and I think if the academy is going to go down that road, perhaps not a good idea anyway, it should start with the worst offenders, which currently would seem to be countries like Sudan (for genocide) or North Korea (for suppression of its own population). However, further isolating those countries intellectually would probably be counter-productive. I suppose the academy should stay out of the boycott business, at least so far as intellectual isolation, rather than 80’s-style divestment.

I hope no one thinks that, because I granted some credence to slocum’s first two arguments that I have any respect for his third, his accusation of anti-semitism. That argument is vile and obvious BS.

I hope no one thinks that, because I granted some credence to slocum’s first two arguments that I have any respect for his third, his accusation of anti-semitism. That argument is vile and obvious BS.

Let me make it clear — I did not make an accusation of anti-semitism, I suggested why some suspect it (Norm Geras, for example). But it does seem clear that there is a strongly felt animus toward Israel that is absent toward China or Russia. People may realize, intellectually, that they really should care about Tibet as much (or more) than Palestine, but somehow they don’t seem to feel it in the same way (and there are not calls for academic boycotts that get discussed endlessly).

I don’t doubt that antisemitism is a motivation for some fraction (do any of you really think it play no role for any pro-Palestinian activists?) I believe anti-Americanism in a more important factor, though. And then there is simply ‘fashion’ — academics pay particular attention to Israel because it is currently a popular cause in the academic world, and one identifies oneself as a member of the tribe by holding particular opinions about Israel and Palestine.

This combination results in attention all out of proportion to the degree of persecution and size of the countries involved (Israel and Palestine combined are less than 100th the population of China).

It’s also the case that we – the US and the UK – have been largely responsible for organising the Jewish colonisation of Palestine and have no such role in Tibet.

Palestine gets more attention than Tibet in part because the conflict in Palestine is much much more violent. The violence in Chechnya is also declining, although there is not good reporting on what is really going on for well known reasons. A generous analysis of why there is more focus on Palestine should at least include the possibility that some reasonably view or perceive, because of media attention, this conflict to be a more urgent crisis.

This does not of course negate the fact that there is a double standard at work because few countries have the kinds of vested interests in good relations with Israel that they do have with China and Russia.

Of course this assessment leads to all kinds of further questions and problems. For example, doesn’t giving attention to violent conflicts actually promote violence? Nevertheless, we can’t get away from the reasonableness of being particularly affronted by ongoing violent conflict. And all this makes the relative lack of attention to African genocides even more suspect.

One of my main concerns about Israeli policies is the potential for the problems to escalate severely. These concerns are worsened by the fact that so many prominent Christians and Muslems (don’t know about Jews) are actively pushing for armageddon. I think that the shelling of Israel showed that the country’s days are numbered unless it can make peace with its neighbors; had those been targeted missles with some payload, Israel would be in ruins. I figure Israel has about five years to do one of two things: make peace with its nieghbors or decimate (since it cannot govern) the region. The second is madness and probably wouldn’t work anyway. And a decent solution to the Palestinian situation is a strong prerequisite of the first. So compassion for the Palestinians is not my biggest reason for wanting that situation resolved. The Tibetan situation may be morally worse, considered in isolation, and I’m all for arm-twisting China, or was when that was possible, but the Palestinian situation is more dangerous.

There are two other options I could see: one is that the US dominate the region thoroughly enough that no real existential threat to Israel could emerge. This seems to have been part of the plan we’re been following (though I think the oil was a stronger interest than Israel, but both arrows pointed the same direction on this policy), and it does not seem to be working at all. The other is that Israel give up: as an American, I would favor simply giving all Israeli citizens passports and passage here. If the original idea was to create a safe home for Jews, Israel has already failed; is there any country where Jews are less safe than in Israel? However, currently this idea is a non-starter; neither the Israelis nor the Americans want it.

If the original idea was to create a safe home for Jews, Israel has already failed; is there any country where Jews are less safe than in Israel?

Martin — The way I understood it, the impetus for the Zionist movement in the 19th century was for a homeland where Jews would no longer be dependent on the whims of their hosts. One could argue that Israel is now more dependent than it has ever been — on an external power, the United States, but which small countries anywhere are not dependent to various degrees on larger powers?

NYT correction today

A headline on Friday about a growing movement in Britain to boycott Israel economically and culturally referred incorrectly in some copies to a decision reached by the union of public service employees, the largest British labor union. The union said a resolution that would call for a boycott of Israel would be considered at its upcoming annual meeting. The union did not call for such a boycott.

Truly amazing how a story that was not true became so widely accepted so quickly.

http://www.nytimes.com/ref/pageoneplus/corrections.html

People think that ‘academic’ is roughly equivalent to ‘liberal’. Well, not in Israel; I’ve been there, I talked to some of them.

Dershowitz is an academic. Wouldn’t you want to boycott him?

Keely, it may be that small countries generally rely on larger countries, at least nowadays, but if the idea is to be immune to whims, a small country can at least have a diversity of such contacts. Israel has just the US pretty much. Even a country close to the US, like Belize, seems much less dependent.

ohenry, OK, so the answer to my rhetorical question is yes. It doesn’t change the point, though: Israel is not a safe home for Jews, looks to become drastically less safe over time, and safer homes do exist, such as the United States.

I know a Jewish woman who lived in Iraq under Saddam, married to an Arabic man. Not a problem, she said. But, I suppose like so many things, that attitude got shocked and awed into oblivion.

#28 – ah, an adversary who goes right for the capillary. Look, academics in Britain suck at the public tit whether they are formally state employees are not. Academic freedom means they say what they want, not that they can commandeer public resources for private ends. Academics who make decisions regarding allocation of resources at their jobs based on their personal political beliefs are thieves. They are stealing from their employers and from the public at large. It doesn’t matter whether they think their motives are good. All thieves believe that they are entitled to steal. The entire boycott business demonstrates that British academics have an infantile grandiose view of their role in society.

Chris,

I’m unclear why your enthusiasm, for or against a boycott of Israeli academics, should be at all influenced by the actions of the Israeli government. This would be understandable to the extent that Israeli academics influence government policy. But as has been well-established, academics have if anything been far to the left of the country as a whole.

Is this just a rhetorical device to express your dissatisfaction with the conduct of the Israeli government and the quality of the e-mail you receive?

novakant,

Please learn to read.

Notice the “in part” in my comment. Notice my reference and my point in relation to Africa.

Why is this even an alternative claim?

Supposing people to have these motivations does not rule out anti-semitism as a motivation of course, but the anti-semitism hypothesis is usually put forward by people who apparently assume that it is the only possible explanation for people paying special attention to Israel/Palestine. Pointing out that actually things are a bit more complicated than that and there are lots of possible reasons, of varying degrees of moral force, for why they might do so shows that their claim is a non sequitur.

‘Look, academics in Britain suck at the public tit whether they are formally state employees are not.’

Absolute and total bollocks. Many academics (specifically researchers but also some lecturers) have their fees paid by external funding bodies. I’ve been an academic for nearly ten years now, but I’ve never, EVER, ‘sucked at the public tit’. Instead I sell my labour power to however wants it: some of those who want to buy (but not all) are universities.

Which makes me part of the glorious free enterprise, free market economy. So I can say what I want and boycott who I want.

All thieves believe that they are entitled to steal.

They do?

#42- Yes, external funding bodies – like the seven research councils, which are government funded. You don’t mention your field, but perhaps you get your funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council, which along with the other research councils is funded by the Office of Science and Innovation, part of the Department of Trade and Industry. Where do you think the money comes from? Do you think that books on Rousseau and the social contract are flying off the shelves at Waterstone’s? This is public money we’re talking about, to be spent for the public good. You are deluding yourself when you say you operate in the free market.

When you apply for a grant, Hidari, you are representing to the grant-giver that you will do your level best to carry out the task that you are set. You do not say, “I will do my job except when I choose to spend the money to advance a political goal of my own.” If If you take the money and then spend it in ways that are influenced by your personal political agenda, you are stealing. You are violating a public trust.

Every managerial employee understands that he can’t prefer his friends when he’s awarding a contract for the copy machine service, and that he can’t choose only his co-religionists when looking to place a print job. But academics seem to think that it’s okay for them to give or withhold public money on the basis of the nationality of the potential recipient, regardless of the quality of the work. Who gave you the right to divert public funds to further your personal goals?

I say it again: any academic who makes decisions over funding, or invitations to meetings, or publications, or any work-related event, on the basis of a personal political view, is a thief. You are stealing public money and you are violating the terms of your employment. Perhaps you think you are Robin Hood. Well, Robin Hood was a thief, wasn’t he?

Every managerial employee understands that he can’t prefer his friends when he’s awarding a contract for the copy machine service, and that he can’t choose only his co-religionists when looking to place a print job.

But that’s why they do it thru the union. If their employers (whoever they are) don’t like the boycott, they are free to negotiate or do whatever employers do when they happen to disagree with unions.

Also, if they are indeed employed by the public (directly or indirectly), and if the public doesn’t mind or even supports the boycott (which seems likely), then what’s the problem, where’s the thievery?

I can’t see why anyone has the obligation to be even-handed in campaigning against oppressive regimes. There are a whole host of personal reasons for being selective. I for one care more about the moral fate of Israel than about the moral fate of China because I’ve been to Israel several times and have friends there. I identify with them and that makes me care about the problems that they care about, including the problem of their racist government.

This is no different from someone who cares more about research into heart disease than research into cancer because his or her father died of heart disease. Is this attitude immoral? No. It’s better to cure some diseases than none, and a diffuse campaign about disease in general is less likely to bear fruit than a selective focus on one disease or another. So long as the selectivity is not on immoral grounds (e.g. because cancer is imagined to be a black person’s disease, because Israel’s dominant population is Jewish) there is no credible objection to selective campaigning. Indeed there’s no credible objection to joining one campaign rather than another purely on a whim (e.g. because it is the only campaign one heard about, or the only campaign that exists), assuming it’s a worthy campaign.

I don’t think that the ‘boycott Israeli academics’ campaign is a worthy campaign. But that’s another matter.

I think organizations have the right to decide who to boycott.

And john, I don’t get your argument. The problem isn’t when someone cares more about one foreign country than the others. You use China, I prefer that state because I find it’s culture older and more advanced than the Israeli’s. their mythology is much richer, their belief systems far more nuanced, and their literature far superior. Their state is also well… Real. Israeli seems manufactured, and in a large part it is. They are not a self-sufficient country and that lowers them in my view.

But those aren’t really important issues. The real problem is that some people put the interests of foreign nations over the interests of their own. Some of these people are Christians who place religion before country, some are Jews who place ethnicity over nationality. They may trick themselves into thinking our interests are uniquely intertwined, but that’s not a view that can be, or ever has been, validated by an argument as to how that is so. I don’t really mean to single out Israeli interests in this, it’s hardly unique to them. There were plenty of Irishmen in this country who send money to the IRA, despite the importance of this nations alliance with England. Don’t even get me started about Cubans in Florida. It’s a problem that some people want to put use our government to further the interests of another nation, even in spite of the nation they claim fealty too.

Chris but this is also you:

“However there’s one pro-boycott argument that she doesn’t address and which I’ve not heard a good reply to. It doesn’t, for me, outweigh the arguments against, but I do think it weakens the often-put “double standards” argument that anti-Israel measures unfairly discriminate against Israel since there are far worse countries in…”

Here is the thing, if the argument in question is weak for the reasons I mention it cannot weaken anything since it is hopelessly weak itself. At best you can say ” if the argument was any good then it might do such and such ..” but this is worthless as a defense of anything surely you can see that.

Another thing of course is that when you say ” I vave not heard a good reply to it…” you are assuming that the argument works ( i.e. is sound and persuasive ) but as I showed this is an illicit move.

#50

I can’t see why anyone has the obligation to be even-handed in campaigning against oppressive regimes. There are a whole host of personal reasons for being selective.

This is no different from someone who cares more about research into heart disease than research into cancer because his or her father died of heart disease. Is this attitude immoral? No.

I think the flaw here, and in the argument Chris likes, is the assumption that the propsed action is costly, and that it is wise to allocate resources where they will do the most good. The researcher can’t study all diseases, but must choose.

The UCU can pass as many angry resolutions as it likes. Hence its selectivity is suspect.

#22

If the original idea was to create a safe home for Jews, Israel has already failed; is there any country where Jews are less safe than in Israel?

I think the briefest glimpse at twentieth century history ought to be enough to concvince anyone that the original Zionists were quite correct that Jews needed a homeland to be safe. You might even want to examine the post-war experience of the survivors.

abb1 – Unions do not implement policies that advise their members how they may spend their employers’ money. A public employees union cannot implement a policy that says, “our members must place print jobs with Christian printers” or “our members may not attend meetings with persons having Hispanic surnames” or “our members must purchase photocopy paper only from wholesalers who pay 5% to the Union benefit fund.”

Academics are given a very wide latitude in how to expend public funds – including their own salaries or grant funding – because it is recognized that academic work contributes to the public good. Academics must have a significant amount of freedom from retaliation in order to do their work, hence the concept of academic freedom.

Now, suppose we have a linguist who edits a scholarly journal of translation studies, which is funded by government grants. Her salary and that of her staff is paid by the taxpayer because a decision has been made, via the political process, that the people of Britain are well-served by the existence of scholarship in this field. Some of her funding comes from subscriptions, which are purchased by universities and libraries funded by the government, and the decisions to subscribe are made by government-funded employees who have been entrusted by the people of Britain to decide which scholarly journals are required by the participants in those libraries and universities. But in the end, all or virtually all the funding is public.

Now, suppose this editor receives an article that meets her requirements as publishable. It is in her view, a valuable addition to the corpus of translation studies. It is something that would be useful to the scholars who read this journal. It would advance the goal of her journal, which is the increase and dissemination of knowledge in the field of translation studies.

Nonetheless she decides not to publish it, because the author has a position at the University of Haifa. Instead she publishes an article that is not as good but is by a scholar at Penn State.

In doing so, she deprives the readership of her journal of an article that they are entitled to receive and would benefit from reading. She has explicitly subjugated her judgment in the area of translation studies, a field in which she is a recognized expert and in which she has been entrusted with public funds, to her judgment in the field of Israel-Palestine relations, an area in which she has no expertise and no position of public trust. She has used the money given to her to publish the best available scholarship for an entirely different purpose – to coerce a change in Israeli government policy. Her journal is now not the best translation studies journal she could publish. It is an inferior publication because it excludes work that is better than the work she chooses to publish. Because she is choosing not to do what she was hired to do – to use her expertise and her academic freedom to publish the best possible journal that she can – she is stealing the money that has been entrusted to her.

She is of course entitled to have a personal view, as every citizen and voter is entitled. She may work tirelessly in her own time in favor of a boycott of Israeli goods and services. But it is unethical for her to use her position of public trust to advance her personal political views.

Well, Hidari, if you get your funding from private companies (and again you don’t specify your field) then you are an exception to the rule. But suppose you’re a computer scientist of some sort. Would you refuse to purchase a text authored by an expert at the Technion? Suppose it is a text that may advance your work by several weeks? Would you refuse to attend a conference at which that expert is speaking, even though his presentation is directly related to the topic of your grant? Did you tell your grantor that you will not do the best work of which you are capable because your political beliefs prevent you from taking advantage of the best research available? If you did not then you are stealing from your grantor. The fact that your grantor won’t ever know it does not change the ethical status of your actions.

Keely, OK, but you appeared to be responding to me, and your comment is only of relevance to a rhetorical question I posed on which my argument does not rely. In any case, I thought it uncontroversial that Israel is dependent on the US in a very basic way; Military independence without economic independence doesn’t count for much in any but the short-term. It is interesting that I made what I think it is very stark assessment of the situation, and a deliberately provocative proposal as to one of the solutions, and all anyone seems to be up to responding to is the rhetorical question, which I should have omitted as it has proved distracting.

Bernard, the Holocaust showed that Jews were not safe in mid-20th century Europe. That doesn’t prove or even support that they are not safe in the United States now. Questioning whether Israel has really been an effective solution to the problem of Jewish security is not at all the same as denying there is or has been such a problem, and it is intellectually dishonest to conflate the two positions. I suppose it is possible in theory that the US will someday again be an inhospitible environment for Jews – a great many things are possible in theory – but what I said, and what no one seems prepared to address, is that either Israel or the bulk of the Middle East is doomed if Israel does not reach peace reasonably soon. I’m not arguing that this is theoretically possible; I’m arguing that it is the logical trajectory of the current situaiton. Needing a homeland, at least that specific homeland, to be safe is only really a viable position if they are in fact safe, and one has only to picture last year’s bombing with better missles to see how unlikely such safety is a few years out.

In any case, I’m not opposed to a Jewish homeland in Israel, but I don’t see it as viable without a peaceful relation with its neighbors. The only other basic alternatives I see are what I mentioned: 1) Decimate the region to such an extent that it will not in the foreseeable future be able to launch an equivalent of the Hezbo missles attacks, but with targetted, payload-carrying missles. 2) Have the US effectively govern the region. The current administration seems quite willing, but unable, and this solution does not seem viable 3) Abandon a Jewish homeland in the Middle East. This is commonly phrased as “pushing the Jews into the sea”, so I put forth a proposal that amounts to no such thing. 2 won’t work; 1 should be unthinkable, and also won’t work. If 3 is unthinkable or won’t work, that leaves peace. Peace or annihilation.

“I thought it uncontroversial that Israel is dependent on the US in a very basic way; Military independence without economic independence doesn’t count for much in any but the short-term.”

Israel’s total PPP-adjusted GDP is about USD 160 to 180 billion, with a growth rate of 4.8 percent in 2006 and expected growth of about 4 percent in 2007. American aid in 2006 totaled $2.5 billion. In other words, not only does American money account for less than 2 percent of the Israeli economy, but if discontinued tomorrow, it would be absorbed into current-year growth. Israel is no more economically dependent than any other country that receives American military aid, and probably less so than most.

‘Israel is no more economically dependent than any other country that receives American military aid, and probably less so than most.’

Weeeeeeeeeeeeell….up to a point. The other factor, of course, is that Israel trades a great deal with the US. The other factor is that Israel knows that she is a LOT safer with the strongest military power the world has ever seen behind her then…well….not. The point is not that Israel would simply collapse without US help: we know that’s not true. The point is that ceteris paribus Israel would rather have US help and support than not, and that, since, their broad aims in the region are the same, it is seldom in Israel’s long term interests to go against the specific aims of American foreign policy.

There are also cultural factors that also tend to link Israel to the US, not least the influence of the Christian Right in the US.

It’s not that Israel would simply curl up and die if the US stopped its military aid. But its military and financial situation would be greatly weakened. Moreover, say the US did stop its military aid…where would it go? Israel is well aware of the strong Saudi lobby: a tilt away from the Israelis would almost certainly lead to a tilt towards the Arab states.

In other words it is very very very very very much in the interests of Israel to stay in the US’ good books.

Bloix – Yeah, I’m sure we all agree professors can play golf with whoever they want. I was talking, as I think you were, about association in a professional capacity. Your claim that the choices of individual academics in these matters must pass a test of objective likelihood to optimally advance their areas of research is far too restrictive and does I think cut into freedom of association.

I think your problem starts with your assumption that academic salaries are “money entrusted to” the academic for him to do the best possible research, where the means for achieving the latter are to be objectively assessed. That is a very idiosyncratic view of the purpose of academic pay and the role of academics.

But we can take action now to force the Israelis to negotiate and to end the injustice of the occupation, whereas we cannot act with similar prospect of success against Russia or China.

This argument conveniently defines “success” in such a way as to support its point. Does anyone seriously believe that an end to the “injustice of occupation” as defined by the typical western academic would resolve or even significantly mitigate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and its impact on the people involved? The rhetoric coming from neighboring countries and the ongoing chaos in Gaza has put an end to the illusions I once had about the viability of a two state solution. In the current political environment nothing short of the dissolution of the state of Israel would end the conflict and this academic boycott will do nothing to bring that about.

Let’s face it, this boycott is purely symbolic and what it symbolizes is poorly defined and justifiably open to interpretation.

Hidari once again does not respond sustantively. BTW, “steal” means among other things to take money under false pretenses.

Engels, if you think my views of the role of scholars in society is incorrect, what is your view? Do you think that the public at large chooses to pay the salaries of people who have spent years studying medieval architecture or South Asian languages in order to set national priorities in health care, energy use and foreign policy? If you do I assure you that you are incorrect. Academics are trained, hired, and paid in order to do scholarship. If you take the money you are given for scholarship in order to do politics, in which your expertise is if anything less than that of the average educated citizen, then you are breaching your contract with society, which did not ask you to use public funds to set national priorities.

Martin,

the Holocaust showed that Jews were not safe in mid-20th century Europe. That doesn’t prove or even support that they are not safe in the United States now. Questioning whether Israel has really been an effective solution to the problem of Jewish security is not at all the same as denying there is or has been such a problem, and it is intellectually dishonest to conflate the two positions.

It was not only the Holocaust, and not only the middle of the century. There was ample evidence on the point both before and, startlingly, after WWII. Where should survivors have gone? Returned to Poland, perhaps? Or was the Soviet Union more hospitable?

Are Jews safe in the US today? Of course. But mass migration of Israelis to the US, even leaving aside from the effects it might have on that safety, is not remotely probable. So I don’t see how that addresses the question of whether Israel “has really been an effective solution to the problem of Jewish security.” The question is what would have happened had Israel not been created.

abb1,

Should this really be the lesson of the 20th century? Now, I’m not an erudite academic, but even I could easily come up with something much more enlightened and comprehensive.

The lesson? No.

One lesson? Yes.

Novakant,

#45

You claim that how much violence there is has NO relation WHATSOEVER to how important people think a conflict is. ?????

1) WTF are you talking about? That claim is patently false.

2) I never claimed that violence translates directly into a relative proportion of media attention. In fact I argued that this is not the case for violence in Africa, which is under reported given the level of violence. But, this fact does not amount to level of violence being of no relevance.

Please have the decency to admit that 1) you misrepresented my original comment and 2) that you are wrong on the fairly simplistic issue I was addressing.

seth edenbaum, you messed up the html in your Shin Bet comment. Plus you’ve linked to a citeless op-ed at Counterpunch.

aaron:

The Second Congo War is the bloodiest conflict since WW2, yet it is barely ever reported on and it is not part of the public consciousness at all.

Your thesis has to accomodate for this. It doesn’t and that’s why you are forced to resort to weasel words. It happens to the best of us.

Bernard, my point is that Israel has to come to peace with its neighbors, and soon, or it will be destroyed, possibly taking much of the mideast with it if it tries to solve its problems by force. The purpose of the Israeli immigration proposal is, first of all, to think a little outside the box, so as to look at all the possibilities not just the likely ones – I’m trying to be reasonably exhaustive here, because I am claiming “no alternative”, a strong claim – and, secondly, to show that one can be williing to see Israel “wiped off the map” without advocating the “Jews be thown into the sea”, thus countering some common rhetoric.

If we’re going to get into historical counterfactuals, I think a much stronger moral and, in hindsight, practical case could have been made for carving the Jewish homeland from the hide of Germany while it was in no position to object. That is not what the Zionists wanted, but there is a difference between what you can claim for security reasons and what your little heart desires. Perhaps Europe would not have accepted it, though I think otherwise; but there is no way to resolve the issue, and it’s not going to happen now. I’m not saying Israel was a bad idea. Had things gone a little differently later on, it’s not hard to see that it could have worked, and I still have (fading) hope that it can work. But it is time to recognize that it is in serious danger of not working – of not remaining a viable state – and it cannot counter these threats solely through military means and shouldn’t try. It will obtain peace, within a few years, or die, and it doesn’t matter a whit who does or does not find the end of Israel “acceptable”. Me personally, I don’t care who runs that chunk of real estate, and I’m for separating the combatants so they stop hurting each other. But I think the industrialized west has gotten used to the idea that the world’s possible outcomes are constrained by what the West, especially the US, happens to find acceptable, which is not the case.

Tracy W, imagine that a plant available only in South Africa was shown to provide a cure for HIV in, say, 1985. It would have been a gold mine for the apartheid government, and we would have been in an unpleasant position with our little boycott. There is no special condition attached to academic boycotts in this regard, and the argument you put (like Bloix`s argument about unions “stealing government money”) is an argument about the righteousness of boycotts generally. In fact your argument is really just a small part of the broader argument about why people don`t boycott china – the cost to them is too great.

After all, the kiddies throwing stones at Israeli tanks and copping head injuries from rubber and real bullets in the 90s probably don`t care overmuch about some person with a head injury in NZ who could get better treatment if only the Israeli oppressors could trade freely. That is a cost *we* can choose to bear, but those kiddies rely on us choosing to bear some kind of cost in order to change the policy of their oppressor. I would argue that the fact that western societies aren`t even willing to consider the marginal cost of an academic boycott shows just how low in the scheme of things we place muslim kiddies.

imagine that a plant available only in South Africa was shown to provide a cure for HIV in, say, 1985. It would have been a gold mine for the apartheid government, and we would have been in an unpleasant position with our little boycott.

This one strikes me as dead simple. If that happened, then dump the boycott to get the plant. How could anyone live with themselves if they didn’t?

I am opposed to apartheid, I am of mixed-race myself so I’ve never come across a racist society that’d be good for me and my loved ones. But introduce a bit of practicality here for Christ’s sake – in 1985 we had pretty good predictions that HIV would infect millions. The moral complexity of that choice is about zero. Of course boycoutts should be dropped when the cost to boycoutting is too high. Do you really think that all those people who get Aids count for less than the victims of apartheid?

And can you really advocate a NZ doctor ignoring research on head injuries that might help their patients just because it was done by Israelis? You’re kidding me. What happened to the doctor’s obligations to serve their patient? If I had a choice for my brother between a doctor who was prepared to ignore research just because it was done by Israelis and a doctor who’d use every thing they could I’d pick the second without a moment’s hesistation. Again, no moral problems here for me.

Far more people suffer head injuries than just Muslim kids and Muslim kids will continue to suffer head injuries even if Israel suddenly disappeared tomorrow (I presume that Muslim kids outside a war zone are likely to ride bikes into car doors or fall out of trees or off playround equipment or drop heavy books onto their head or otherwise get head injuries like everyone else). Everyone around the world deserves treatment for their head injuries that is informed by the best medical knowledge, and the faster that medical knowledge advances the better. Head injuries are an ongoing problem to far more than Muslim kids, I think Christian kids and atheist adults and Hindi teenagers and Wiccan grandparents count for as much as Muslim kids. And there are a lot of Muslim kids who don’t live anywhere near Israel and therefore aren’t at any risk from the Israeli government. You don’t mention them. Don’t try to claim the moral high ground on me.

Plus I’ve read enough history to know what happens when scientists start placing other priorities above improving human knowledge. For a start, they stop being scientists. Any academic who boycotts Israeli academic work should include a disclaimer on every paper, book or blog post they publish to the effect that they have placed other considerations above the accuracy of their work.

Lord Acton. When faced with a response that is that irrational, dishonest, and rife with ad hominem attacks and other cheap shots, whether it is worth the effort to respond is not an easy call. Well, here goes:

Forty years ago, Israel did very well. Meanwhile, last summer, as I said, they had missles pounding them for weeks and couldn’t do anything to stop it. Said missles were not guided and had little payload, so they mostly blew up dirt. But similar missles that do not have these limitations exist in greater numbers all the time. What the bombing showed is that Israel has no defense against such an attack. Pointing this out is not threatening Israel; it is facing reality. By your “logic”, those, for example on the Israeli right, who hold that Israel is existentially threatened by Iran’s nuclear potential are also “threatening Israel”, since they too are claiming that a catastrophe could likely await Israel if their council is not followed.

Israel being at peace with Egypt and Jordon is hardly sufficient. For it to be made safe by peace, it must be at peace with every force that constitutes an existential threat, not just with some of them; otherwise, it is still, by definition, under existential threat. And you pile bullshit on bullshit: no peace with Egypt is not relevant, but even if it were, I have said nothing about Egpytian likelihood to break the truce, and even if I had, that would not necessarily be a racist inference, depending on my basis for the assertion, of which there is none: I made no such assertion. So many layers of bullshit in so few words: impressive in its way.

Oh, look at me, I’m feeding a troll. Never mind.

In that case Tracy W, are we to infer that if someone tomorrow publishes a cure for ectopic pregnancies using forcibly impregnated North Korean prisoners, we are honour bound as scientists to use the material, even though it was obtained under completely unethical circumstances? After all, we can`t shift to a search for truth constrained by moral judgements about who is “acceptable”. And if we place other priorities above the quest for knowledge, we (in your words) “stop being scientists”. Presumably this applies to the work of all those nice nazi scientists – can`t boycott any academic work, after all, can we? It`s special.

All of your arguments at 88 and 91 are arguments about all boycotts, as will be your inevitable response to my nazi example, i.e. that they have a price and we have to decide whether the price is worth it. You don`t think the price is worth it in this case, and many people agree. But the price is not “special” because it concerns academic product. You just price this product above, say, plasma screen TVs (which everyone knows are Israel`s main export product).

But if, on the other hand, you thought the price was marginal (as I do) and you opposed the boycott on the basis that the consequences for the west were too high, then you would be saying that you don`t value muslim kiddies very much. My apologies if my statement to that effect in my previous comment implied such a judgement on your part.

I think that there are better arguments against the boycott than the marginal loss of knowledge it might cause.

re 58 ( Chris B ). Is this right ? : “If you concede the possibility also of reasonable disagreement about the facts, then you also ought to concede the possibility that someone favouring the boycott does so because they believe that it will make a difference.”

Yes but then if this is the principle underpinning the proposal ( lets boycott/ punish those who can be punished as opposed to those wrongdoers who are not punishable ) then we should expect a *consistent application* of this principle : we should see US academics being on the list or Australian academics . Do we see such a proposal ? No. So it is unlikely that any such principle is involved.
And hence it is unlikely that what we have here is a plausible explanation of why Israel and Israel alone is being singled out for punishment.

Well, Bernard, even as just ‘one lesson of the 20th century’, this idea that the Jews (as defined by all the various strains of antisemitism I suppose?) need to be moved into the middle of Levant and equipped with an all-powerful army – it strikes me as extremely myopic, Homer-Simpson-style judgment.

sg yes exactly the proposal to boycott Israeli academics is extremist. Thanks for making the point for me.

I think it should be pointed out that it has taken sixty years to get to this point: to talk seriously, outside the Arab world, about boycotts. It’s not something that’s been rushed into, is it? For that reason I take strong exception to Chris Bertram describing it as “stupid”.

Why has it taken so long? I’d like to say “because everything else has been tried”, but the truth is there’s been very little effort at all, on the part of Israel’s powerful backers, to try anything else. All the peace processes – not that there’s ben many – have been one-sided shams. They’ve all offered the Palestianians, who should be equal partners in any process, next to nothing.

Now why is this? Bluntly, because it suits the US and its Western European allies that it be so. They perceive it to be in their interest. So the agenda that they promote is one where Israel’s security (which in practice means its domination of the region and of the Palestinians in the Occupied Territories and within its borders) trumps everything else. Everybody else must provide all the guarantees that Israel wants – which will never be enough – and then perhaps there will be a process that will maybe lead to some sort of splintered Palestinian state that will be utterly subordinate to Israel.

So what’s the alternative, Chris? What alternative is there, other than the apeal to world public opinion? How can Israel be moved other than in the way that South Africa was moved? And how is it unreasonable for academics to propose sanctions which are sanctions in their field? Sportspeople and sporting organisations boycotted South Africa through sporting sanctions. Musicians operated a boycott of musicians. Academics would do so through academic sanctions. Clearly there are problems with this – of course there are. But surely while this grotesquae injustice continues to prevail and be underwritten by Western governments, then the process must start eventually.

I have no doubt, by the way, that the current movement to boycott will be defeated, for the while. But it will return, and have to do so, because people who argue that it is stupid and self-defeating (or that its advocates are “obsessed” with Israel, a stupid argument in itself) will not be able to show any meaningful alternative. And it will also get the question properly out into the open so that it is finally discussed properly in the West. God knows it has taken long enough.

Finally, I’m very tired of the argument “why aren’t you talking about Tibet” (or one could say “Western Sahara”, or others). It’s more and more a do-nothing argument (even when it is not, as it often is, a big “hint hint” that the boycotters are anti-Semites). Don’t do anything about this crime, there’s another crime along the street. I know about the other crimes. If people wish to argue that China or Morocco should be called to account then let them do so.

But then again, neither of those countries have reams of otherwise liberal intellectuals queuing up to lend them support and inists that they are the victims of a situation in which they are in fact the perpetrators, do they? Why do people single out Israel, Linda Grant? Because you do. Because you lend it support in a way which you do not for any similar manifest injustice.

And because it’s been sixty years. Pity’s sake, there’s nothing stupid and nothing premature and nothing unreasonable about it. It’s time.

re 101 please do yourself a favour and read Martha Nussbaum rejoinder to this nonsense ( link provided by Chris ): “However, an academic boycott crystallises the notion that intelligent people with time on their hands have come to the conclusion that Israel is behaving badly and deserves to be ostracised. That’s an important issue. It is also a left-wing issue, and academics supporting it means a gain for the left”

Well, only if you acccept that it is “counterproductive and self-defeating – rather than difficult and beset with potential problems. If there were an easier path do you not think it might have been travelled by now?

Chris – how do you expect people to demonstrate to their representatives that they think Israel should be punsihed and that they take this seriously, other than by demonstrating this in their own practice? What measures would be on your list and why do you consider them effective?

To be honest, Chris, I don’t much fancy your tone on this thread. I could do without “non-risible”. I’ve not treated your views or the subject without respect and I would appreciate it if you would demonstrate the same courtesy.

“You’re joking, right? You really think it would be practical for any country to boycott the US”

No it would have incredible symbolic power if British academics boycotted US academics , it would be propaganda coup. ( notice that those hostile to Israel are even more hostile to US ).

True what about the lucrative book contracts and nice conferences … I know that makes it very impractical.

The question of why Israel is singled out has been taken up by several posters above, myself included. It is possible that no answer we will give will ever be considered satisfactory. It is also possible that this is because we will never say “we admit it, we are unmasked, our motivation is anti-Semitism”.

In response to zarzur, I actually agree with everything you say, but I still think it kinda misses the point.

The point is not about the ‘absolute’ or ‘objective’ relationship between countries: the point is the ‘relative’ and ‘subjective’ relationship between countries.

The fact is that in the context of the middle east Israel is an extremely big player. Israel is not, actually, quite the economic success story its supporters imply, but compared to its neighbours (most of which are economic basket cases) it is an economic powerhouse. And a lot of this has to do with trade with the United States (it’s not fair to compare the EU with the US: it would be fair to compare individual countries within the EU with the US).

And this goes even more so with its military force. The IDF is not quite the super-efficient military force its supporters make out (especially not nowadays), but, again, it is clear that compared to its Arab neighbours, it is the superior power. And a great deal of this is due to Israel’s military alliance with the United States.

Likewise, until incredibly recently, Israel won (or at least didn’t lose) every war it fought and this ‘subjective’ impression of Israel being an unbeatable military force gave it much of the clout that it did (and still does) have. No Arab country was prepared to go ‘up against’ Israel because it was a ‘well known fact’ that they would inevitably lose. And the knowledge that behind Israel stands the United States has gone a long way to reinforce that aura of invincibility.

In other words, it’s true that Israel wouldn’t collapse if the US withdrew its support. But it would lose its air of invincibility and its huge regional superiority, and this would greatly weaken Israel’s negotiating position. Moreover the US wields a lot of power over other countries and over the World Bank, the IMF, the UN and other organisations. The US could make life very very difficult for Israel if it so chose. And this is different from many/most other countries because of Israel’s subjective self-image as a ‘lone’ ‘Western power’ ‘surrounded by’ hostile anti-Western Arab states. From what I can tell, the Israeli political class have managed to convince themselves that they ‘must have’ a major first world, rich, powerful, military sponsor or the Arabs will drive them ‘into the sea’. And you don’t get more rich or powerful than the US. This is a subjective view but it is still very (subjectively) real for all that.

So make no mistake it is very much in Israel’s self-perceived interests to do (more or less) what the US wants her to do (especially as, most of the time, US and Israeli interests are congruent).

If you’re a consistent opponent of singling out, why not protest, say, the US singling out Cuba? No matter how you look at it, it’s gotta be way more egregious case of singling out than any singling out a UK academic union can do in respect to Israel.

Unless, of course, you’re a kind of opponent of singling out that insists on singling out only one (and always the same) specific case of singling out.

This is for ejh :– Look the main purpose of the proposed boycott is to undermine legitimacy of Israel as a country : to isolate, not its government ,but its people; make them social outcasts and hence is a form of discrimination.

As such and because it is argued for by extremists it needs to be resisted and not promoted.

Is this anti-semitism ? Not necessarily but it energizes and clearly maps onto anti-semitism.

Look the main purpose of the proposed boycott is to undermine legitimacy of Israel as a country : to isolate, not its government ,but its people; make them social outcasts and hence is a form of discrimination.

Backwards. The main purpose is to facilitate the restoration of legitimacy of Israel as a country.

One wonders whether anything would have been done about any injustice in history had the advocates of action beeen required to act against every other injustice first.

“Note btw that you yourself have nothing to say about how good N’s rebuttal is so I am not sure why you say she is not much help.”

I specifically cited an argument (about the “singling out” issue.) I haven’t seen anyone else do that. Neither any reference to an actual argument from the article. If it were so convincing then some references would be in place.

re 126 :– “I specifically cited an argument (about the “singling out” issue.) I haven’t seen anyone else”

Yes but try to get what N says right first because what you say is a gross distortion of her view ( she is not saying that you must look at all wrong doing everywhere ) but simply the most vivid one.

Why do you think this is required ? It is a matter of justice . Suppose we are trying to catch speeders on the road. We clearly can not catch all of them so supppose we just arrest women because they resist less and are easier to catch. And we ignore everyone else.

Why is it wrong to arrest only women offenders ?
Because it is unfair and something like that is involved in boycotting only Israeli academics.

Because you’re not ruling out boycotting anybody else, are you? Nobody’s saying “only Israel can ever be boycotted”.

I don’t think, incidentally, that “what is being asked for is fairness and justice”. I think what is being asked for is “waiting forever before fairness and justice arrive”.

A word on boycotts in general. A boycott is a political campaign by a group of private individuals. It seems to me that on a broadly liberal view of justice the constraints which govern boycotts are not strict, at least in comparison to some of the examples (of eg. judicial power) which people are bringing up. It also seems to me that boycotts are, by their nature, discrimatory and even perhaps “unfair”. To take one example:

Anti-sweatshop protesters boycott Nike over the working conditions in its factories in overseas countries. There are many other companies in Nike’s market committing similar wrongs, or worse, but the protesters choose to “single out” Nike, partly because they decide it makes sense to go after a single target to send a message to others, partly because Nike is a high profile target, partly because they feel Nike will be more vulnerable to the bad publicity the boycott would generate than other companies, perhaps partly because they feel that Nike’s actions are especially hypocritical in the light of its public rhetoric, and partly for other reasons. No doubt by doing so they are being “unfair” on Nike: Nike’s directors and shareholders will suffer more as a result of the boycott than directors and shareholders of other companies which are complicit in similar or worse practices. But leaving aside the issue of whether one supports this boycott, I do not think that singling out Nike in this way is unethical.

It is not the impression she gives that she wants just the most vivid ones compared.

“By failing to consider all the possible applications of our principles, if we applied them impartially, we are failing to deliberate well about the choice of principles.”

And the specific references she gives to a wide range of abuses makes it hard to actually consider all of them, let alone make a meaningful comparison between for example “indifference to the lives and health of women” and apartheid as she suggests.

The trouble with your example is that the discrimination between two groups is established beforehand in an apparently unjust way.

But to make it into a realworld example, local cops check bikes (if they got lights etc.) specifically in the evenings on locations where many students pass. Is it unjust just to target students? Surely if you’re a student it looks that way. But since students are thought of as large scale violaters it really isn’t. But the cops can’t show you any report that they compared their action against students with actions against taxis driving too fast. Someone made the decision to target students, got it approved and you’ll have to live with it. Unless you can convince the major that the police have the wrong priorities.

I.e. convince the union that they should end their boycott.

I dont understand what “different ethical constraints” means, sorry.

I don’t want to be rude, but perhaps you should read the whole sentence again, with a bilingual dictionary if necessary? But I’ll try again: police or judges acting in an official capacity as agents of the criminal justice system are to be held to standards of fairness which are not applicable to an association of private individuals pursuing a political campaign.

Engels says, “A boycott is a political campaign by a group of private individuals.”

But that is my point. This boycott is not a political campaign by private individuals in their role as private individuals. It is a campaign by persons who are utilizing resources that have been placed under their control by their employers to conduct a political campaign that is not sponsored by those employers.

If I choose to have my car serviced at a service station owned by co-religionist, even though he is more expensive than another shop, that’s my free choice. If I choose to have my employers’ fleet serviced by a co-religionist whose services are more expensive, then I have abused by position of trust by diverting assets belonging to my employer for a purpose of my own.

If as a reader of novels I choose not to purchase books by Israelis because I dislike Israeli policies in the occupied territories, that is my free choice. If in my position as medical librarian at a university I choose not to subscribe to journals published in Israel, then I have abused by position in which I have been entrusted to make subscription decisions based on value to my scholarly community, not based on my own personal political views.

This point, which is so obvious as to go without saying in the non-academic world, seems to be beyond the comprehension of academics. I suspect this is because academics are protected by academic freedom, which properly permits them to say whatever they believe without fear of retaliation. But academic freedom is not limitless and it can be abused.

There is no possible objection to an academic speaking and writing against the Israeli occupation of the territories. A lecturer in public health has every right to write and lecture about the effect of the occupation on the health of Palestinians and may do so in the most vigorous manner in any forum.

But that same lecturer may not ethically refuse to permit a researcher from presenting at a conference work solely because of the researcher’s affilation with an Israeli institution. Her own institution did not give her the authority to make decisions over invitations to conferences in order to permit her to join in the conduct of a political campaign. Her employer has invested her with a public trust that she has earned by virtue of her expertise in public health. She is not invested with the right to use public funds to achieve goals that are irrelevant to her employment, in a manner that actually degrades her performance of her genuine responsibilities.

I must say that I deeply appreciate Chris’s initial post and I especially enjoyed reading Nussbaum’s piece in Dissent. I agree with both: a boycott of academics by academics is ridiculous, it will achieve nothing positive, and it may well do us all a world of damage.

One thing that has struck me is that time and time again we find philosophers, etc. of reputation arguing against the boycott. What academic of high standing is for the boycott? I don’t think I’ve ever read anything by the names of people supporting the boycott. It makes me think we have better things to do and bigger fish to fry than this one…

luc:– “most vivid ones” refers to wrong doing and not principles. So you are running things together. More important to say as you do that it is hard to consider all the relevant cases of wrong doing is not a criticism of N. That is partly her point to point out that we need to work harder to do the right thing.
So it strikes me like you do not understand what she is up to in that article.

Hmm, sophisticated sophistry. Ah, whatever.

“police or judges acting in an official capacity as agents of the criminal justice system are to be held to standards of fairness which are not applicable to an association of private individuals pursuing a political campaign.”

I thought this was a red herring and I was right : you are confusing internal set of values that each institution or organization may have ( and here there may indeed be difference ) and moral principles. The latter are the sort of judgements reasonable people would agree to in a reflective equilibrium and is a different thing altogether.

In the latter sense both the boycott by private individuals and a government can be discriminatory in exactly the same way.

Window dressing on what?

Ragout,
I pasted the first 3 paragraphs to a piece by Uri Avnery, the first of which was indented and in a hyperlink to the piece itself. I didn’t close the blockquote.
“Oops.”

And the article discusses a threat to the Jewish nature of the state.
As always in such situations, I ask myself what would be my response as a jew if the word “German” were to take the place of the word “Jewish” in each sentence. i.e.: “The German nature of the state”

I would support an academic boycott not because of the actions of the Israeli government but because the majority of the Jewish citizens of “democratic” Israel don’t recognize the implications in that simple switch of words.
The defense of this logic by friends of israel is yet another example of logic and reason being bounded by preexisting social ties and categories of proximity.

Men in our culture no longer speak for women without caveat, nor whites for blacks; Arabs are not yet in that position. We speak for them all the time (to each other). When they are things will have changed.

sg writes :– “Finally of course you haven’t suggested an alternative approach (and I think we can all guess why). So what, really, is left to talk about?”

Alternative approach is counter-boycott because what we have here ,in the proposal, is discriminatory. So we should resign from UCU where this is relevant and combat the boycott from outside by variety of ways including legal action in the same manner other forms of discrimination are legally dealt with.

Focus of such a counter boycott ? not individuals but institutions and organizations sanctioning this sort of discrimination.

Zdenek – You have failed to demonstrate that the boycott is “discriminatory” in any sense in which that would make it morally impermissible. You are essentially just repeating your claim over and over again while ignoring all the arguments other people have made.

“I have been talking about the second: moral principles. As I have now said several times, the norms which govern the conduct of private individuals pursuing a political campaign are different to, and less strict than, those which govern the conduct of agents of the state enforcing the criminal law.”

This is a confusion in the sense that you are equivocating with the term ‘norms’. It can be used loosely to mean ‘rules’ which does not involve universalizability or it can be used to mean ‘moral norms’ which can be universalized.

In the first sense there are clearly different and perhaps incompatible norms. But not in the stronger sense where this means ‘moral norms’.

To see this consider that virtues like impartiality, integrity ,trust, fairness and so on ( moral virtues and not just norms in your sense ) have same meaning and carry same normative weight in both contexts : integrity just is integrity for instance .
So yes you are confusing these two senses together which is rather sloppy.

Only Israel can legitimize or de-legitimize Israel. I suppose you could accuse someone of trying to demonize Israel, but that’s not done by a boycott. Rather it’s done the way you do it here to the boycott supporters.

Ok, Zdenek, whatever.

Bernard, that’s because I’m not making a primarily moral argument, but a realist one. Israel is under existential threat. It also constitutes an existential threat, perhaps, to its antagonists, but only in extremis (e.g., by going nuclear). This is the “decimate the region” option 1. I doubt even this would be effective at preventing a decentralized relatively low-tech attack along the lines of the Hezbo missle lodging. So I don’t think it really can work. Morally, I think the case for the existence of Israel vaporizes if the cost must be the decimation of the rest of the middle east. And I don’t think the world would tolerate it either, if only because it would make the oil inaccessible for an indeterminate period. So, in realistic terms, Israel is under existential threat and the middle east as a whole is not; it is an assymetric situation. Hence, Israel “must” – for its own survival – achieve peace. Now I’m not saying that increasing the cost of hostility to the other players is not a legitimate tactic, but it doesn’t change the underlying situation.

Earlier you said “The question is what would have happened had Israel not been created.” I don’t think that’s the question – though I did put forth an alternative – I think the question is what needs to happen now?

seth edenbaum: ‘That “citeless op-ed” is written by Uri Avnery.’

Note the difference between “unsigned op-ed” and “citeless op-ed”, the latter meaning that the author presents opinions without any citations to data. I had no reason to trust Avnery’s interpretation of what he claimed Shin Bet said. Via your helpful link to Ha’aretz, I was able to learn that his op-ed was somewhere between very tendentious and plain misleading propaganda. Linking to the (certainly somewhat disturbing) Ha’aretz article in the first place would have served you (though not your argument) much better.

This is becoming silly

Well, you’re right about that.

In other words people who organize themselves as private individuals for the purpose of a boycott have duty of virtue to not discriminate

Perhaps they do, but if so they are entitled in my view to derogate from this duty in pursuit of ends which they judge to be greater. If not, it would be hard to see how almost any boycott, or even campaign of censure, could get off the ground as these nearly always involve singling out a person or company and making an example of them while ignoring others who are guilty of similar of worse offences. See my Nike example above.

You clearly have a half-baked understanding of Kant

Maybe I do and maybe I don’t, but since my argument makes no appeal to Kant I’m not sure how this is relevant.

On second thoughts I think it would have been clearer to have said that I don’t think that the organisers of the boycott have “a duty of virtue not to discriminate”, at least in relation to the boycott. That idea is based on what appears to be the mistaken belief that boycotts serve a quasi-judicial function. They do not. They are a form of political expression. And while there are moral concerns which constrain the operation of boycotts the quasi-judicial duties which you are describing are not among them, IMO. Again, see my example above for a description of how what I take to be a normal boycott operates.

Zdenek – No, and it is hard to see why any moderately intelligent person would draw that inference from what I wrote. That statement referred to the organisers of boycotts. As I said, government agents have different and stronger obligations in this respect. This really is starting to get pretty tedious so I am afraid you will have to excuse me…

Zdenek – You haven’t shown that my “thinking… is just a muddle”. You have just asserted that it is, over and over again. I am afraid that even I can think of more entertaining ways to spend my time than that so I suggest we call it a day.

“Maybe some of them could go to Paris and move into Suha Arafat’s apartment.”

I’d like to suggest a general moritorium on using the corruption of resistence leaders as a response to the claims of the need for a resistence.
Claims for the primary moral superority of the Israeli position vis-a-vis the Palestinians are absurd.

“Only Israel can legitimize or de-legitimize Israel.”

Only [P.W. Botha’s] South Africa can legitimize or de-legitimize [P.W. Botha’s] South Africa.

Was it possible for the The United States, [in the 19th Century if not also the present] to be seen as de-legitimized in the eyes of Native Americans? Do you want a longer list? It’s not that hard.
This conversation will go on until someone finally breaks down and says: “but the jews are different.”
Then the rest of us will give up and go home.

#174- not as absurd as claims that a successful resistance will lead to a democratic Palestinian state.

“Now you can claim that everything is Israel’s fault”

And the rate of alcoholism on the Res is not entirely the fault of the US government.
I didn’t say there was no corruption, I said I’m tired of lectures by government appointed Indian Agents and moralizing racists: “Look, the niggers are burning down their own homes, what are we supposed to do?”
The destruction of a people, 40 years of occupation and the British are still importing Scottish Presbyterians [but to you of course such parallels are false]
This is stupid and unproductive. Worse, it’s boring.
If Chris Bertram and Martha Nussbaum want to think that the Jews have a right to a little white homeland that’s their business. But I don’t think the Germans have a right to one so follow the logic.
it’s simple

Zdenek – What you have repeatedly asserted, without any real evidence as far as I can see, is that I am muddled, that the claims I make are untenable, that you understand Kant better than I do, etc etc. That may all be very entertaining but it isn’t particularly persuasive.

You have correctly pointed out, and I am happy to agree, that I have not given a proof of my central claim, but pointing out that something is unproven is not to prove that it is false. I believe that it is true. I have tried to give some indication why I believe this and I believe that something similar must be held by any liberal.

Your view, on the other hand, appears to be that every ordinary citizen who takes action within his rights which is intended to punish another for a perceived moral wrong or alleviate a perceived injustice is subject to the same moral obligations to exercise his powers in a fair and non-discriminatory way as are judges and police officers who exercise the coercive powers of the state against suspected criminals. I do not find that claim at all plausible and I don’t think such a burden of obligations is consistent with the freedoms granted to the private citizen in a liberal society.

if academics in Europe and elsewhere are going to boycott Israel, they should also boycott the U.S

Maybe they should but perhaps it’s not practical. In that case, what’s Plan B?

FWIW I do not support this boycott. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it is stupid but I do think it is likely to be counterproductive. However, I do think that many of the arguments which have been given against it, and in particular the “singling out” argument of which our friend Zdenek has so kindly furnished us with a reductio, are remarkably weak.

“If Chris Bertram and Martha Nussbaum want to think that the Jews have a right to a little white homeland that’s their business.”

Repugnant on multiple levels. I feel sorry for Chris for having to put up with such stuff.

Herr Rilke, do you believe in a German homeland, or only in a place where Germans feel safe?
There are 15 million people of non-German descent in Germany.

I found this on the page for the demographics of France

Disclaimer: It must be noted that reference to “French people” as an ethnic group is not present in French official terminology. Official institutes that gather statistics (such as INED or INSEE) do not use the category of “ethnic French” – whom some have translated here by “Français de souche”, a term more often associated with far-right Front National than with demography in France. The French census also does not use this category or any of which regarding ethnicity. According to Dominique Schnapper, member of the Constitutional Council of France, “The classical conception of the nation is that of an entity which, opposed to the ethnic group, affirms itself as an open community, the will to live together expressing itself by the acceptation of the rules of an unified public domain which transcends all particularisms” [1], indicative of French citizenship.

French hypocrisy aside, the sentiment is noble.

Tracey at 177, obviously my examples are extreme but the extremity doesn’t matter. You have admitted that morality has to be considered in science. The rest is just an argument about whose morality. The UCU appear to be having that argument.

(and funny you should mention Israeli trauma papers, because a great deal of that research would have had to have been on people whose trauma was caused by a military out of control. I wonder how academics in the west dealing with that sort of thing feel about the israeli state? And also, while we’re at it, you do realise don’t you that for a little while it was legal in Israel to shake prisoners to force confessions? And a doctor had to be on hand, but some died? I wonder if that got published in an Israeli journal, and used by western doctors?)

Zdenek and Bloix, you both seem to be confusing unions and the state. Unions are not the state, and don’t have the same responsibilities – quite often they have to act as bandits to rein in the power of the state. If you are concerned about unions in one country doing this to another, go and examine the history of union activity in boycotts against South Africa. It’s a legitimate tactic, and not open to dispute by anyone except the ruling classes. You sound like whingeing small business people who think that the unions are misappropriating some kind of special fund of money, even though the union members are voting how to spend their own money. I really would have expected better.

Also zdenek, what is gained by criticising the boycott as an attempt to “deligitimize the state of israel”? Obviously a boycott of a nation is an attack on that nation. You either think the attack is worthwhile or not. Just say so, and while you’re at it just make it clear that you think any attack on Israel is anti-semitism. Then we can all stop talking to you.

“You have admitted that morality has to be considered in science.”

I’ve admitted that the morality _of the scientist_ has to be considered in science. The morality of the scientist’s _government_ shouldn’t be considered, unless the scientist is part of that government.

To return to the Israeli traumatic-injury literature, I think it’s fair to say that some of the injuries that make up the case studies are accidental, some are the results of Palestinian violence and some are the results of IDF violence. I also think it’s fair to say, with respect to the last group, that some of the IDF actions resulting in injuries are justified and some aren’t, and that some of the injured parties are combatants and others are bystanders. What all the categories have in common, though, are that the injuries _aren’t caused by the doctor_.

These considerations may raise ethical questions about the _perpetrators of the violence_, whether Palestinian or Israeli. The doctors’ own ethics aren’t at issue, though, and their write-ups aren’t in the least ethically questionable, any more than, say, literature by American doctors whose case studies include victims of urban police brutality. It’s not as if doctors elsewhere don’t draw from the experience of war and violence in trauma case studies.

Your torture example actually highlights the difference. If you can find an article by an Israeli doctor who participated in torture and that is based on medical results obtained from torture, then you’d have an excellent case to boycott both the author and the article (unless it’s an anti-torture piece). I’m not aware of any such literature, though, and there’s a fairly obvious moral distinction between that and the literature of doctors who simply treat their patients. In the latter case, you’re blaming doctors for something for which they simply aren’t accountable.

Case in point: Here’s a Pakistani article on treatment of traumatic landmine injuries that draws on experience from the Kashmir conflict. Some of those injuries were no doubt caused by Pakistani mines, because both sides used them during the 1999 war. Would you argue that it’s unethical to cite this article or to use its findings in treating other people who have suffered injuries from landmines? For that matter, would you argue that the Pakistani authors were wrong to cite Yugoslav, Turkish and Israeli literature (the latter dealing with injuries caused by suicide bombers) in arriving at their own conclusions?

Josh (#191),

Sadly, it apparent to me, as it is to other commenters, that (at least some of) the pro-boycott people are aiming for nothing less than your option number three: “the end of Israel”. I suspect they realize that this is too extremist a position to acknowledge now, so they’re window-dressing it with calls for a boycott. I’ve lent my name to several pro-Palestinian initiatives, even one while lecturing in Israel, but this one is not only counter-productive (on its face), it is devious, and has been hijacked by rejectionists seeking the ultimate dismantlement of Israel itself.

Josh, ejh didn’t say “it has taken 60 years to discuss boycotts aimed at destroying Israel.” I don’t expect ejh to qualify every comment which might imply a desire to destroy Israel, just to please you. He/she may have been referring to the human rights abuses manifest from the very start of the creation of Israel; or he/she might have been using very rough language to encompass the variety of stages of nastiness which have gone on there. You’re being picky, like Ragout with the plagiarism insinuations.

Well, zarzur, I`m glad we agree on the basics here. I would like to ask you about this though:

First, I believe that one of the fundamental rights of individuals is to be treated as individuals and not to be convicted by association

In this context, doesn`t this belief (which I generally agree with) prevent any kind of collective action against nations or organisations? You can`t go to war to protect Tibet, since you`d be affecting individuals not associated with the policies; you can`t boycott south africa for fear of convicting black people by association, etc. This is particularly true when one considers it is usually the elite who do the oppressing one wants to stop, and the rank and file who suffer from any actions to bring the elite around.

So then how does one do anything to stop anything in this world? In the absence of strikes, boycotts, pickets and in fact anything more than (carefully directed) harsh words, what can one do?

“Zdenek and Bloix, you both seem to be confusing unions and the state. Unions are not the state, and don’t have the same responsibilities –”

Lets make the point about discrimination differently then. Suppose that a parent singles out for punishment one of his children only, even though the other children have behaved same or worse. His reason for singling out this particular child is that it is convenient for him. Is this fair ? Clearly not.

Can you block criticism of this parent by pointing out that he has different duties from the sort of duties states posses ? No ,that would be irrelevant because what is salient is that the punishment which involves exclusion and ostracism needs to be based on showing why this particular person and not others equally guilty are treated in this way; why they are singled out.

As should now be obvious what is key is the child’s right to be treated fairly and this is why the parent is open to the discrimination criticism.

Absolutely same reasoning applies to the boycott case : it doesnt matter how you organize yourself or what you call yourself or how big /small you are ( or what other unique suis generis duties you possess ). As long as your actions involve people with right to be treated fairly , and you fail to do so , you open yourself to discrimination charge and this is what is wrong with this particular boycott.

Chris I do not think your example is quite right.
In your example the cops continue to arrrest white collar fraudsters and that is probably why burglars have no case so this is where your example dosnt capture the boycott.
Come up with an example which is like the following one but which allows the intuitions to go your way :suppose the police catch only women speeders and ignore all the other speeders because women are say docile and easy to arrest. Such women surely have a case ?

No zdenek my point is that the “moral consideration” of consistency is a luxury which the people of palestine can`t afford for us to exercise at their expense.

Therefore, I am not going to be held back from applying a boycott (if I think it`s right in this case; I haven`t said if I do), just because to do so would privilege the Palestinians` suffering over that of other people. I am, in fact, quite happy to aid those I think I can help, and not aid those I think I can`t, and if that is inconsistent well, bugger me sideways with a fishfork. And if it just so happens that those oppressors who “suffer” from assistance happen to be mostly Jewish, well bugger me with a fishfork again, and call me an anti-semite while you do it.

well, well, well, well… what a surprise…

I notice you didn’t complain on John Quiggin’s great shave post about why he singled out cancer for funding. You seem to only single out the instance of Israel for criticism of “inconsistency”.

I think your emotions on this – your willingness to call me anti-semitic when I haven’t said anything negative about Jews is a hint – are not entirely genuine. It’s a classic case of politically motivated action. Maybe you don’t like people supporting muslims…

are you an islamophobe then? Not necessarily but you energise hatred of muslims and your outlook seems to map onto islamophobia.