---
title: "Academic boycott of Israel"
chunk: 3/8
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_boycott_of_Israel"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:17:27.825907+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

The ironic thing, is if we had put this to delegates a couple of weeks ago, before the international pro-Israeli lobby started this massive campaign emailing delegates and trying to deny us our democratic right to discuss whatever we like, it probably wouldn't have passed. People feel bullied, and what we have seen is a hardening of attitudes. All they achieved was making the delegates determined to debate and pass the motion.
Tamara Traubmann and Benjamin Joffe-Walt, reporting for The Guardian, conducted an analysis of "whether the campaigns against such boycotts are actually motivated by concerns for academic freedom, or whether they are using the universalist ideal to stifle critical discussion of Israel". They describe their findings this way:

Through discussions with anti-boycott campaigners and a trace of the most common emails (not necessarily abusive) sent to the union and handed over by Natfhe, we found the vast majority of the tens of thousands of emails originated not with groups fighting for academic freedom, but with lobby groups and thinktanks that regularly work to delegitimise criticisms of Israel.

=== University and College Union ===

Since 2007, the UCU has been controversially involved in the academic boycotts of Israel and for rejecting the previously accepted definition of "anti-Semitism". Some members resigned following claims of an underlying institutional anti-Semitism. In 2010, the UCU passed a boycott motion that invoked a "call from the Palestinian Boycott National Committee" for "an isolation of Israel while it continues to act in breach of international law" and calls to "campaign actively" against Israel's trade agreement with the European Union. Dr John Chalcraft, of the London School of Economics, said: "A boycott will be effective because Israel considers itself part of the West: when Western civil society finally says 'enough is enough', Israelis, not to mention Western governments, will take notice. A non-violent international boycott, like that of South Africa, may well play a historic role in bringing down the Israeli system of apartheid."

Susan Fuhrman, President of Teachers College, Columbia University said: "As the president of an academic institution dedicated in large part to the preparation of teachers, I believe that universities and all centers of learning must be allowed to function as safe havens for freedom of discussion, debate and intellectual inquiry, standing apart from national and international politics and partisan strife. Only thus can they continue to produce scholarship that informs the policies and laws of democratic societies and stand as islands of hope in a frequently polarized world.... Teachers College welcomes dialogue with Israeli scholars and universities and stands with Columbia University President Lee Bollinger in expressing solidarity with them by inviting UCU to boycott us, as well."
In 2011, Jewish UCU member and chair of the Academic Friends of Israel, Ronnie Fraser, sued the union for breach of the Equality Act 2010 with the Employment Tribunal. In March 2013, the complaint was rejected in its entirety with the judgement describing it as "an impermissible attempt to achieve a political end by litigious means."

== France ==

=== During the Second Intifada ===
In April 2002, during the Al-Aqsa Intifada, around the time of the publication of the open letter in The Guardian, the Coordination des Scientifiques pour une Paix Juste au Proche-Orient, a group of French academics, published a call for a boycott of Israeli scientific institutions on the web. The statement was published in French and English and stressed that only "official Israeli institutions, including universities" were targeted, and that signatories "will continue to collaborate with, and host, Israeli scientific colleagues on an individual basis." The pledge was signed by several hundred academics from 30 countries. During the subsequent months it was the subject of discussion in the French press and in scientific journals.
In December of the same year, a motion put forward at the Administrative Council of the Université Paris 6 called for the suspension of the EU-Israel association agreement, referring to discrimination against Palestinian colleagues and to Article of this agreement, which states that "[r]elations between the Parties, as well as all the provisions of the Agreement itself, shall be based on respect for human rights and democratic principles, which guides their internal and international policy and constitutes an essential element of this Agreement." Far from calling for a boycott, the motion called on the President of the university to establish contact with Israeli and Palestinian university authorities in order to work for peace.  The motion was adopted on 16 December 2002 by 22 in favor, 4 opposed, and 6 abstentions.
An opposing motion was proposed and adopted on 27 January 2003 by members of the Council. It stated that it "recognized the emotions stirred up by the motion adopted on December 16, 2002, and by the way it was interpreted" and affirmed "its opposition to any moratorium or boycott in the relations between universities and university faculty; asked that, in the context of the preparation of the EU's Sixth Framework Program, the association agreement between the EU and Israel be renegotiated to include the Palestinians … and called on the EU to ensure compliance by all parties with all clauses of the agreement (…)".