We’re guessing you
didn’t mark it on your calendar: Feb. 3 to 9 is worldwide Israel Apartheid Week.
But students from
Berkeley to New Brunswick to New York did. So it’s a good bet that in the
coming week, an observant news watcher will learn how to read the phrase "Divest
from Israel" in many languages.
And while the
perennially photogenic campus Israel divestment movement has garnered a
firestorm of media coverage and induced much hand-wringing in the Jewish
community, divestment demands — in any language — have had no effect on
American university administrators.
After years of loud
demonstrations and circulating petitions, pro-divestment resolutions have been
passed by the University of Wisconsin-Platteville faculty senate and the
student government of the University of Michigan-Dearborn — and that’s it.
Neither resolution
was taken up by the administrations. The same goes for the much-ballyhooed
Harvard and MIT petitions and the divestment drive at U.C. Berkeley and other U.C.
campuses.
It’s not that
universities are automatically averse to divestment movements. In 2006, the
University of California system divested millions of dollars from companies
doing business in Sudan. The Iranian divestment movement also has gained
momentum across the country.
"A lot more
obstacles stand in the way of the Israel divestment movement than Iran or Sudan,"
says Jason Miller, a sixth-year medical student at U.C. San Francisco who co-founded
the Sudan Divestment Task Force in 2005.
While Miller had to
fight institutional intertia, no one was coming out in favor of the Sudanese
government or fighting the ethos behind his divestment call. When it comes to
Israel divestment, though, that’s exactly what’s happening.
Although Berkeley
is prominently listed as one of the campuses participating in Israel Apartheid
Week, Trey Davis, an Oakland-based spokesman for the U.C. system, said no
messages about Israel divestment have landed on his desk for several years now.
"Over the
years, divestment appeals come up on a whole wide range of reasons — environmental
impacts, labor practices, health care and so forth," he said.
But none of these
situations rose to the horrors of Darfur, where an "ongoing genocide"
provided "the magnitude for this exceptional action."
And there’s the rub:
The notion that Israel is committing a "genocide" against the
Palestinians comparable to that being perpetrated on the Darfurians does not
hold water with the American public.
Furthermore, based
on the visceral responses of Jews both on and off the nation’s campuses, any
university chancellor who would consider divesting from Israel knows he or she
would be entering a world of pain.
The same can’t be
said for the nation’s Protestant religious movements.
In 2004, a
Presbyterian General Assembly floor vote ratified a resolution supporting
peaceful negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. But buried deep
within the resolution was an amendment that opened the door to Israel
divestment. That door was partially closed with a reversal at the 2006 plenum.
The religious
movement’s 2008 gathering will be held in San Jose this June, and Yitzhak
Santis, director of Middle East affairs for the S.F.-based Jewish Community
Relations Council, foresees a floor battle over divestment.
Five Methodist
regions (out of more than 100) recently voted to support Israel divestment as
well. The Methodist quadrennial will be held in Fort Worth, Texas in May. Israel
divestment is expected to be a prominent topic.
In this struggle, Jews
are handicapped. Many of the most ardent church leaders advocating
disengagement are Palestinian Christians.
"Jewish voices
are systematically left out," Santis said. "I want to be very clear
about this — we are at a distinct disadvantage."
