Amuta registration number 58-051-885-0

Over 13,000,000 visitors on Feb 05, 2012 Over 12,000,000 visitors on Nov 7, 2011 Over 11,000,000 visitors on August 23, 2011 Over 10,000,000 visitors on July 10, 2011 Over 9,000,000 visitors on June 14, 2011 Over 8,000,000 visitors on April 24, 2011 Over 7,000,000 visitors on March 27, 2011 Over 6,000,000 visitors on Jan 16, 2011

Contact lAM

Established in 2004

Subscribe

Israel Academia Monitor Follows Anti-Israel Activities of Israeli Academics

Reprints of anti-Israel articles do not represent the position of IAM, and they are being reproduced as a public service bbbbb IAM supports the universal tradition of academic freedom that is an indispensable characteristic of higher education in Israel. At the same time, it is concerned by the activities of a small group of academics--sometimes described as revisionist historians or post-Zionists, among other labels--who go beyond the “free search for truth and its free exposition” (to quote the American Association of University Professors) that is the hallmark of academic freedom. Exploiting the prestige (and security) of their positions, such individuals often propound unsubstantiated and, frequently, demonstrably false arguments that defame Israel and call into question its right to existence.        Click to view whole articles: [Excerpts]   Ben-Gurion University 05.02.12   BGU Oren Yiftachel, February in NY: On-going dispossession of Bedouins in the Negev and the West Bank   This doctrine stands behind on-going dispossession of Bedouins in the Negev and the West Bank, which has caused decades of deprivation, poverty and pervasive criminalization, as well as modernizing urbanization for about half the Bedouins. The paper presents a systematic challenge to the various pillars of the 'empty Negev' doctrine. It shows how Israel has 'emptied' the land 'backwards' by dispossessing Bedouins due to their ancestors' putative inaction vis the previous Ottoman and British regimes. The state refuses to recognize the autonomous legal system under which Bedouin managed their land prior to the Israeli regime. The discussion of the paper contributes both to theories of the legal geographies of settler societies, and to the on-going battle over democracy and human rights in Israel/Palestine.   General Articles 02.02.12   Bedouin Settlement in Late Ottoman and British Mandatory Palestine: Influence on the Cultural and Environmental Landscape, 1870-1948   Israel's treatment of the Negev Bedouins has become highly politicized under the doctrine of "indegeneity" developed by ethnographers and some legal scholars. The doctrine states that "native people's self- evident attachment to place is paramount in the articulation of rights to land;" Oren Yiftachel, a critical geographer, and Alexander Kedar, a critical legal expert, have claimed that Israel, a colonial/apartheid state, has violated the indegenity laws. They excoriate the Israeli government for herding the Bedouins into permanent settlements, confiscating their land and otherwise disrupting their nomadic existence. As IAM reported, Yiftachel and his followers have either overlooked or distorted the complex history of the Bedouins to make the case against Israel. The following article sheds more light on this issue.   Tel Aviv University 01.02.12   [TAU Sociology] Dan Rabinowitz "In the Shadow of Two States: Rural Electrification in the Occupied West Bank"   Dr. Dan Rabinowitz is a senior lecturer in the department of sociology and anthropology at Tel Aviv University. He also teaches at theCentral European University in Budapest. He is a member of the Gisha Board of Directors. According to NGO Monitor, Gisha employs “apartheid rhetoric” when discussing Israel. The head of Gisha, Sari Bashi, has accused the IDF of “enacting policies in order to empty the West Bank of Palestinians because of Israeli territorial claims.” Rabinowitz has a long record of radical activism. He has come out in favor of supporting boycotts against Israel and of indicting Israeli political leaders for war crimes.” In October 2008, Rabinowitz spoke at an anti-Israel conference on Jerusalem in the Hague, Netherlands, where he explained how Israelis legitimize “repression” of Palestinians. That year he also signed the Righteous Jews petition, which commemorates Palestinians who have been “depopulated, dispossessed, humiliated, tortured, and murdered in the name of political Zionism.” This petition goes on to claim that “from its founding in 1897 the Zionist endeavors to "pump in" Jews and "pump out" Palestinians from this land have been the root cause of bloodshed and conflict.   Tel Aviv University 31.01.12   Yoav Peled admires Palestinian democratic values: One state solution is "The Way Forward in the Middle East"   The stability of the future secular, democratic Israeli-Palestinian state would depend not only on it being truly democratic, but also on the strictest constitutional separation between state and religion. This should not mean forced secularization or placing restrictions on the free exercise of religion, but it does mean that the state will neither sanction nor subsidize religious activities and institutions, nor will it tolerate religious practices that are discriminatory towards women. In the present state of affairs this idea sounds utterly utopian, because both Israeli and Palestinian societies are becoming more and more religious and suspicious of each other. But as the young activists of Tahrir Square and elsewhere have shown, powerful liberal, democratic, emancipatory undercurrents exist underneath the placid façade of many Middle Eastern societies. These forces, we are convinced, exist in Israel and Palestine too and, given the opportunity, could transform the political reality and bring an end to the hundred-year old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.   Tel Aviv University 30.01.12   [TAU, Law] Aeyal Gross's highly hypocritical pinkwashing theory   Aeyal Gross (TAU, Law), a leading member of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender (GLBT) movement, is the intellectual architect of "pinkwashing," a far-fetched theory stipulating that Israel's liberal gay policies are a ploy to cover its mistreatment of Palestinians. As IAM previously reported, such accusations reached the pages of the New York Times and other mass media. The reality, of course, is very different. A few years ago, the Ministry of Tourism, launched a campaign to attract gay tourism, a model that was proved successful in selected cities in other tourist destinations. But the culture of tolerance goes well beyond money. Gays serve openly in the military and in the parliament and enjoy many civil rights. Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other cities host annual gay parades attended by thousands of people. Moreover, Israel has become a refuge for gay Palestinians fleeing persecution and death. A report of the Legal Clinic at Tel Aviv Law Faculty "Nowhere to Run: Gay Asylum Seekers in Israel" describes in harrowing details their brutal treatment at the hands of the police, Islamist vigilantes and even their own families. The fate of gays in theHamas-ruled Gaza Strip is especially daunting, reflecting the broader trends in the Middle East in the increasinglyIslamist Middle East. Gross is well aware of this reality as he contributed suggestions to the report. His continuous support for the "pinkwashing" theory is thus highly hypocritical but not surprising. For Gross and other radical critics, Israel cannot do anything right and the Palestinians cannot do anything wrong.   Tel Aviv University 29.01.12     Ariella Azoulay invites the pro-Palestinian philosopher Jacques Rancière to TAU and he declines, in support of BDS   Jacques Rancière is a French political philosopher, who supports the Palestinian cause while ignoring the fact that Palestinians had defied the UN Partition Resolution and initiated a war which they had the misfortune to lose. Considering that they were led by Haj Amin al Husseini, a close ally of Hitler, it is not hard to imagine what would have happened if the Jews had lost. It is not surprising that Ariella Azoulay of the TAU Minerva Humanities Photo-Lexic project invited him and offered to co-sponsor his talk. As IAM repeatedly reported, Azoulay is a hard-line post-Zionist scholar who uses her art to smear Israel. It is thus highly ironic that Ranciere declined the invitation in solidarity with the boycott movement.   Tel Aviv University 26.01.12   New study refutes TAU Anat Matar's claims that Israel is denying Palestinians water rights   Radical academics have often complained about Israel discriminatory treatment of Palestinians with regard to water use. As IAM recently reported, Tel Aviv University lecturer, Dr. Anat Matar included the alleged theft of Palestinian water in her definition of the apartheid regime. Indeed, many of these claims have been adopted by human rights organization and even made it into a recent report by Foreign Affairs committee of the French parliament that accused Israel of "water apartheid." The following report, based on newly released data by the Water Authority negates accusations of "water apartheid."   Tel Aviv University 25.01.12   TAU Adi Ophir together with Minerva Humanities fellows and other anti-Israel activists at a Columbia U Conference   Professor Adi Ophir, a philosopher at Tel Aviv University, is the academic director of the Lexicon Project at the Minerva Center, described as the study of "foundational concepts" in political theory. He is one of the organizers of a conference at Columbia University's prestigious Society of Fellows of Humanities designed to popularize the Project in the United States. The Society offers a doctoral program for American and foreign students from countries as far as Brazil and Australia and its functions attract an elite New York audience. The Lexicon group explains that "through the critical interpretation and redefinition of these concepts the group seeks to broaden the horizons of the theoretical thought and at the same time to shed light on present political conditions." To accomplish this goal, the Lexicon employs a number of fellows, ostensibly to provide new insights into issues of theory and practice. However, as IAM repeatedly reported, Lexicon fellows and their associates have produced some of the most delegtimizing critique of Israel. Ophir found Israel to be on the same ontological plane of evil as Nazi Germany. Ariella Azoulay, a "lexo-photographer" has "imagined" torture when describing a pictures of Palestinian prisoners and called Anat Kam, the solider imprisoned for leaking secret information an "archivist" who shared the IDF "archives" with the world. Hagar Kotef argues that the checkpoints are a destructive mean of control and therefore violence against them seem to be justified.   Tel Aviv University 24.01.12   TAU Moshe Zuckermann appears on Tehran's CASMII (Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran)   Moshe Zuckermann, one of the most radical academics at Tel Aviv University has been profiled by IAM before.  As noted, he is a self-proclaimed anti-Zionist and a follower of Norman Finkelstein who accused Israel of creating a "Holocaust industry" to further its political goals.  In his 2010 book Antisemit!  Zuckermann, a son of Holocaust survivors from Poland, repeats the charge that Israel has used anti-Semitism and the Holocaust as an instrument of dispossessing and oppressing the Palestinian people.  Working with the radical, Munich-based Salam, Shalom: Palestine-Israel Working Group headed by Eckhard Lenner and Christoph Steinbrink, Zuckermann has propagated the notion that Israel is an extreme abuser of human rights with regard to the Palestinians.   He has also emphasized that Germany, and to a lesser degree other Western countries, was cowed into supporting Israel because of political exploitation of the Holocaust Like ABNA, IRNA and the London-based Press TV, CASMII (Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran) is known to repeat Tehran's extreme hard-line on Israel.  Asserting that Iran's nuclear program is peaceful, the group has accused Israel of fabricating evidence, misleading public opinion and pushing the United States toward a war with Iran. Zuckermann, whose writings are regularly featured on the CASMII website, has supported this view.  In an interview given to a German newspaper, he accused the Israeli government of a hysterical reaction to Tehran's nuclear project.   Zuckermann's usefulness had earned him a place in the CASMII- sponsored International Rosa Luxemburg Conference in Berlin on January 8, 2011, a show of force of the pro-Palestinian- pro-Iranian network.  By turning into a CASMII star performer, Zuckermann is on his way to becoming the "Israeli Norman Finkelstein."    Tel Aviv University 23.01.12   TAU Ariella Azoulay: Anat Kam, the guardian of the archives, should be commended for "sharing the archive" with the public   Ariella Azoulay (TAU) has used the work of critical scholars to charge Israel with a long list of crimes against the Palestinians. In her article "Archive" she puts Jacques Derrida, a critical scholar pioneer to even more creative uses. To begin with, she proclaims that the military information stolen by Anat Kam is an "archive", more precisely Israeli Archives of Execution [of Palestinians]. In the fashion of Derrida, Kam is said to be an archon, the guardian of the archives who should be commended for the act of "sharing the archive" with the public. Next, Azoulay uses the ink flag planted by IDF soldiers in Um Rashrash, one of the iconic pictures of the 1948 war, to deconstruct the "true reality" behind it. In her view, there "was no victory" there and in other places because "we gradually discover that most of the violent events did not tip the scales in battles between two sides but rather cleansed the body politic of the governed and constituted the law that institutionalized the graphic, economic, social, urban and political reality that this cleansing had produced." In plain English, there was no real fighting between the two sides, just an act of ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, she claims.   About Us 22.01.12     Haaretz promotes anti-Israel activism "10 percent of Israeli academics labeled 'anti-Zionist' by campus watchdogs"   Haaretz reporter Talila Nesher's political bias is on display again. She essentially chose to accept the findings of the "blacklist" activists which include Professor Neve Gordon (BGU). IAM is not a political organization, does not adopt political positions and does not deal with politicians or any other members of the public. IAM does not oppose the right of academics as private individuals to express opinions including views that are not popular. IAM's mandate is limited to tracking scholars that use the classroom as an extension of their political agenda. The Council on Higher Education expressed concerns that students of some politically active academics do not benefit from a well-balanced curriculum promoting the ideal of an university as a "marketplace of ideas." As IAM noted, the CHE threatened to shut down the Department of Politics and Government at Ben Gurion University if changes are not implemented, because of poor academic standards and excessive politicization.   On the Brighter Side 20.01.12   IAM Friday Special- CSU has reinstated its study abroad program to Israel although some faculty opposed it   The CSU Office of International Programs has reinstated its study abroad program to Israel after an almost decade-long suspension. Cal State students at or above junior-level standing can still submit late applications for the program, which will start sending students to the University of Haifa in Fall 2012. CSU and UC officials froze their study abroad programs to Israel due to security concerns after the U.S. State Dept. issued a travel warning during the Second Intifada in 2002. Eighty-one California State University faculty, staff and administrators, and 46 students and alumni, have signed an open letter opposing the reinstatement of study abroad programming in Israel. The letter, sent Friday to Cal State’s chancellor, Charles B. Reed, outlines six concerns, among them threats to student safety and the possibility that students of Middle Eastern origin would face discriminatory treatment in entering and moving around Israel.   Tel Aviv University 19.01.12   TAU Tovi Fenster's "Judaization of space": The Separation Barrier has a wide range of damaging effects on Palestinians   The article is written by a professor in Tel Aviv University and a PhD student from BGU using the tools of critical geography, a post-modernist approach pioneered by Oren Yiftachel in the 1990s. Such critical methodology enabled the authors to "demonstrate" that security considerations had no role in building the separation fence. Indeed, they all but dismiss impact that terror attacks against Jews in Jerusalem including the infamous bombing of the Sbarro restaurant had anything to do with the construction of the barrier. This is not an accidental omission, as critical geography is foremost a critique of all and sundry Israeli behavior. For those, however, who remember facts, the decision to build the separation force first entertained by the Rabin government in 1995 when it became clear that the Palestinian Authority could not prevent terrorism and massive theft of automobiles and agricultural equipment. The bloody Second Intifida in which thousands of civilians died or wounded, clinched the deal. Fenser and Shlomo need to be reminded that from the perspective of fighting terrorism, the barrier proved a remarkable good strategy.   Boycott Calls Against Israel 18.01.12   A BDS group to meet HUJ & TAU academics in an "Educational Tour/Delegation To Palestine/Israel" June 15–21, 2012   Israeli academics meet with Faculty For Israeli-Palestinian Peace, a group that advocates for BDS, under the guise of "educational tours". Its mission statement also includes: "We strongly believe that no justice and no peace can be achieved without Israeli withdrawal from all occupied territories, and that anybody truly and honestly favoring peaceful coexistence must support such withdrawal." The Israeli academics are HUJ Daphna Golan, Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Yonathan Mizrachi, Amos Goldberg and TAU Yehouda Shenhav. In Ramallah, FFIPP Meets with Omar Barghouti, a founding member of the BDS campaign.   Ben-Gurion University, Arava Institute  17.01.12   [Arava & BGU] Anarchist Uri Gordon promotes "most important international anarchist congress"   Subject: International @ congress, St Imier, August 8-12, 2012 From: uri@riseup.net Date: 14/01/2012 21:53 To: againstwall@lists.riseup.net This is set to be the most important international anarchist congress for the last couple of decades. If anyone is thinking of going please email me off-list. Uri   Israelis in Non-Israeli Universities  16.01.12   Ilan Pappe on 20 Feb. at CSUN, on 24 Feb. at UCLA "THE FALSE PARADIGM OF PARITY & PARTITION: REVISITING 1967"   This talk will focus on the Israeli policy before and after the June 1967 war. Two theses would be argued through this revisit of the 1967 events: the first is that one can understand fully Israeli policies in that year only within the context of the overall Israeli strategy in 1948 and onwards. This means that the war of 1967 was a direct continuation of the 1948 Nakbah and not a separate event. The second argument will be that Israeli strategy, including the devise of what was later named as ‘the peace process’, was formulated already in 1967 and has not changed ever since that year and until today. This strategy it will be argued in the talk is the main obstacle for peace in Israel and Palestine. Ilan Pappé's research focuses on the modern Middle East and the history of Israel and Palestine. Recent publications include:Peoples Apart (2012); The Bureaucracy of Evil (2012); The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinian minority in Israel (2011); The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (2006). Sponsored by: CSUN Students for Justice in Palestine, CSUN Greens, Muslim Student Association, South Asia Club, and CSUN Communications Association   Israelis in Non-Israeli Universities 15.01.12   [Queen's U] Dorit Naaman on $223,000 federal government grant to project “Qatamon in Colour”   A team comprised of professors and students from Queen’s and Simon Fraser University (SFU) will work closely with families displaced by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Dorit Naaman, a professor of film and media at Queen’s, said the project has many steps, including an interactive website, digital media workshops for youth and a video installation. The video project “Qatamon in Colour” will encourage Qatamon families to recall their memories and experiences. These video installations will then be projected onto the houses. “I’m very interested in letting people tell their stories about their homes, but in a way letting the houses speak their history,” she said. “The idea of this installation is kind of letting the houses … focalize these different histories.” In 1947, the United Nations voted to partition British Palestine into the two states of Israeli and Palestine, which was accepted by the former but not by the latter. When Britain left in May of 1948, a war erupted and by April, Israel had begun taking over Qatamon.   Tel Aviv University  12.01.12   [TAU & CRFJ] A BIASED CONFERENCE ENTITLED “THE DYNAMICS OF IMAGES IN THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT”   A conference entitled “The Dynamics of Images in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict” featuring Gideon Levy etc., was hosted jointly by the French Research Center in Jerusalem and by Tel Aviv University on November 7 and 8, 2011. At this conference, Dr. Daniel Dor of Tel Aviv University, Dr. Zohar Kamft of Hebrew University, Prof. Ilan Greilsammer of Bar Ilan University and Dr. Yael Munk of the Open University gave presentations that promoted post-Zionist arguments. IAM covered their talks.   Boycott Calls Against Israel 11.01.12     TAU Rachel Giora Debates on Cultural Boycott: Methods, Aims and Effectiveness. BRICUP Newsletter #47   Rachel Giora of Tel Aviv University, a leading member of Boycottt from Within, started this debate by asking BRICUP whether an action that requires relaxation of principles can be effective. She argued that the demonstration inside the Hall did indeed involve the relaxation of an important principle – the freedom of expression. This is certainly an interesting question: here is Rachel’s argument- Protesting the performance of the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) was a major event, and, in various respects, historical and unprecedented. As a member of the global BDS movement I am taking the liberty here to share my thoughts (for future sake) on a very touchy topic: Is it possible that some of the actions, so carefully crafted, reaching high levels of ingenuity, might have curbed, if not violated freedom of expression?   Tel Aviv University 10.01.12   TAU Ariella Azoulay uses an art lecture to make a connection between the Holocaust and the treatment of Palestinians   Ariella Azoulay, describes herself as an artist, but her "art" is questionable, at times pure anti-Israeli propaganda, hosted by Palestinian art institutions in Europe and elsewhere. Her latest book on the destruction of Palestinian life during the 1947-9 war was published by Verso, a self-described radical press based in London that caters to other radical Israeli academics. Azoulay's penchant for comparing the fate of the Palestinian to that of European Jewry during the Holocaust is well documented. The following article about Dr. Geroges Didi-Hubmerman, a foremost art critic and scholar who, among others, wrote about the infamous photos taken by Jews from the Sonderkommando in Auschwitz documenting piles of bodies of women and children is a case in point. Azouly's used the occasion of his lecture in Tel Aviv to make a connection between the Holocaust and the treatment of Palestinians. This should not come as a surprise, since Azoulay and her fellow radicals have tried for years to establish "moral equivalency" between Nazi Germany and Israel. Her brand of critical scholarship which stipulates that there is no accepted truth, just "narratives" makes such comparisons easy. Still, any comparison between the Holocaust and the 1948 war is a disgrace.   Tel Aviv University 09.01.12   "Sourasky Operation" - How the political parties of HADASH & MAKI maneuver Tel Aviv University   Some two weeks ago, Haaretz educational reporter Talila Nesher used a sensationalist headline to denounce Tel Aviv University for "spying on students" (see below). Nesher wrote that security officers perused a YouTube clip (filmed by Social TV,) of a large group of students who planned to protest at the Sourasky Library, in order to identify individual perpetrators. Nesher took special exception to the fact that the security officer asked professors to help them identify students that might have been enrolled in their classes; she felt that TAU tried to turn them into "spies." Instead of shrill attacks, Nesher should have provided a more balanced story. The group had no permit to stage a protest and, according to the authorities, planned to occupy the library and barricade itself there. Among its many demands, "to the university, the municipality and the state" the students called to reduce or abolish tuition. When similar demands where made more than a decade ago, Professor Moshe Kaveh, president of Bar-Ilan University, wrote that in cases where tuition was abolished or minimized, academic excellence was severely undermined. Kaveh based his argument on research in a number of countries which pointed to this conclusion. Moreover, the Sourasky Operation, also known as the "Social University" is a movement sponsored by MAKI (the Communist Party) and HADASH which are trying hard to revive last summer's social protest. "Social University" attracted the support of some well known radical-leftist professors on campus including Adi Ophir, Rachel Giora, Yehouda Shenhav, Daniel Bar-Tal, Moshe Zuckerman, Shlomo Sand, Dana Olmert and others.   Ben-Gurion University 08.01.12   [BGU, Geography] Oren Yiftachel and his companions lost the high court bill against 'Nakba Law'   The petition was filed in May 2011 by the Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) on behalf of alumni of the Arab Orthodox School in Haifa. The petitioners argued that the law is anti-democratic and severely harms the basic rights of Arab Israelis, including the right to freedom of speech, political and artistic expression, equality, education, academic freedom and freedom of occupation Also named on the petition are Ben- Gurion University professor Oren Yiftachel, whose academic research challenges Israel’s definition as a Jewish and democratic state, and parents of pupils at the Galil Jewish-Arab school in Misgav, which commemorates Nakba Day alongside Independence Day. At the end of the judgement, Beinisch said she agreed with Naor that the petition raised “complex questions of public importance.” “I emphasize that these questions may, in certain circumstances, get to the roots of the problems dividing Israeli society,” Beinisch added. “However I accept my honorable friend’s position that this petition is not ripe for judicial discussion. The constitutionality of the [Nakba] law depends to a large extent on how its content is interpreted in practice, and that will be clear only when it is implemented.”   Boycott Calls Against Israel  05.01.12   [Haifa U, Gender] February, U Penn: Dalit Baum to speak in a Boycott Divestment and Sanctions Conference   On the first weekend in February, academics, activists, students and community leaders from across the US will converge on the University of Pennsylvania for the 2012 National Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Conference. Picking up where the 2009 Hampshire conference left off, we will continue growing the movement with two days of panel discussions, debates, activist workshops, and keynotes by Ali Abunimah and novelist Susan Abulhawa touching on every aspect of the multifarious global effort to heed the BDS Call and bring an end to Israel’s system of oppression, segregation and dispossession. Our speakers include journalists, professors, artists, writers, lawyers, and human and civil rights activists from various ethnic, religious, cultural and social communities. Special attention will be devoted to building alliances and uniting in struggle with other constituencies engaged in resistance to bigotry in all its forms, from African Americans to those fighting for LGBT rights. Saturday’s sessions will focus on comparative historical, sociological and philosophical analysis of BDS, both in its Israeli-Palestinian context and as a general tactic. Voices critical of certain aspects of BDS will be represented, and “tough questions” for the movement will be dealt with in a progressive, universalist framework. Sunday’s sessions will foreground movement-building and provide participants with the practical tools they need to launch or enhance BDS campaigns in their communities. We believe the conference will be an invaluable resource for new activists and a momentum-building opportunity for those already engaged with the fight for Palestinian freedom and equality.   Ben-Gurion University 04.01.12   [BGU, Sociology] Lev Grinberg: "Israel is a non-democracy" Review of 'Politics and Violence in Israel/Palestine'   Lev Luis Grinberg, Politics and Violence in Israel/Palestine, London: Rutledge, 2010. Lev Grinberg, a professor of sociology at Ben Gurion University, a veteran Marxist scholar and political activist, brings his moral sensibilities to bear on the issue of democracy in Israel. Stating that there is a close correlation between theory, research and the personal politics of the researcher, Grinberg informs the reader: “my interpretation of political dynamics is influenced by my own moral preferences and intentionally designed to facilitate a critique of politics.” Based on his moral position that “supports dialogue and recognition, while rejecting violence and unilateral imposition,” Grinberg proceeds to develop a strikingly idiosyncratic theory of democracy. Bypassing most mainstream literature, including the key contribution of Samuel Huntington on democratic transition, Grinberg asserts that democracy is only possible in countries that have defined borders. While striving to present this finding as a universal postulate, it is quite clear that the theory is tailor-built to the case of Israel, which Grinberg considers to be a “non-democracy. ” As Grinberg explains, Israel’s continuous territorial expansionism has enabled violence and the military that administer it to dominate the political agenda. In the absence of recognized borders, the “formal democratic regime fails to contain social and political conflicts by means of representations, negotiations, and compromise… politics is replaced by violence.” Not surprisingly, this peculiar normative approach gets Grinberg into trouble with reality.   Other Institutions 03.01.12   [Weizmann Institute, Neurobiology] Kobi Snitz signs a petition "Ban Israel from the London 2012 Olympics"   Dr. Kobi Snitz's hatred to Israel raises a serious question, whether he is suitable for employment in Israel's most lucrative science institution. The petition he signed reads:  Israel's attack on a humanitarian aid fleet on Monday 31 May 2010, its murder of 9 human rights activists in international waters, and wounding many more, demonstrate that Israel rejects the structural tenets of our shared humanity, manifested in a global moral consensus and international law. Israel was established on the ruins of another country, Palestine. In 1948 more than half the population of Palestine were uprooted from their cities and villages, 400 of which were completely destroyed. The state of Israel has never allowed Palestinian refugees to return and today their number has reached 7 million, many of whom are still stateless, living in refugee camps in Palestine and other Arab countries Since its establishment the state of Israel has consistently violated international law. To date, it has defied 246 UN Security Council Resolutions. As a direct consequence, seven million Palestinians are excluded from the right to live on land internationally acknowledged to be theirs; and increasingly, they are being excluded from their right to any future at all as a nation. The 4 million Palestinians in the occupied territories have endured over 40 years of brutal occupation and denied even the most basic Human rights. The 1.4 million who remain in Israel are second class citizens.   Tel Aviv University 02.01.12   [TAU, History] Gadi Algazi's version of history replete with half- truths: Israeli Tree Campaign "Judaizes" Expropriated Land   TAU Professor Gadi Algazi has once again ventured into the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in order to delegitimize the state of Israel. Not surprisingly, his version of events is replete with half- truths, misrepresentation and misinformation. In January 1949 the government sold one million dunam of Palestinian land to the Jewish National Fund; with an additional 300,000 sold subsequently. Up to 1962 the JNF paid some 30 million Israeli pounds to the government. The JNF used the land to resettle immigrants from Europe and the Arab counties; the law was patterned on a similar Pakistan and India arrangement where 16 million refugees were dispossessed by the bloody conflict between the Hindus and the Muslims. In 1953, the Knesset passed a law regulating the expropriation of Arab Palestinian land which also mandated compensations. The Israeli Arabs resisted, but the Israeli government exerted some pressure in order to complete the process. Left wing Israeli parties have protested the law and the process of confiscation. Years later Dorit Beinish, the Supreme Court justice, wrote that the legislation hurt the Israeli Arabs and the ideal of private property, but should be understood in the context of the unique historical circumstances that led to the creation of the State of Israel. Beinish noted that such a law would have serious legal challenges today. Indeed, Algazi makes no references to the circumstances of the 1948-9 war and the history of WWII and its aftermath that triggered massive population movements.   Israelis in Non-Israeli Universities - University of Exeter, U.K.  01.01.12   Ilan Pappe's grand scheme to reduce the influence of the US & the Zionist lobby, due to fabrication accusations   Ilan Pappe, the former Haifa University professor who moved to University of Exeter in England, to escape what he called Israeli intimidation, found new enemies. As he tells it, the entire Jewish and Zionist lobby in the West is persecuting him for his courageously stand for the Palestinians. Even his own university, "once a heaven of security" went "frigid" when confronted by "bunch of Zionist hooligans." Pappe's hysterical outburst refers to an inquiry launched by Exeter U. in response to CAMERA's accusation that he had fabricated key evidence indicating that David Ben-Gurion ordered an "ethnic cleansing" of Palestine. As IAM reported, so far Pappe has failed to provide the source of his claim. Apparently embittered by the experience, Pappe proposes a grand scheme to reduce the influence of the United States and thus undermine the power of the Zionist lobby to intimidate him (and the Palestinians). As this is unlikely to happen any time soon, Pappe may have to produce the evidence or face dismissal for fabrication.

All articles are Israel Academia Monitor COPYRIGHTS unless stated otherwise

Israel Academia Monitor, P.O. Box 997 Even Yehuda 40500, Israel

Tel: +972-54-4283749 e-mail@israel-academia-monitor.com