Seeking to stage a conference that would bring some balance to discussions of the Arab-Israeli conflict, Prof. Hanan Alexander was a little taken aback by a remark from an academic colleague at the University of California at Berkeley.
Prof. Hanan Alexander
The professor, Malcolm Feeley, “said it was the first time since 1983 that an event took place that looked at Israel in a balanced light,” said Alexander. “One would have hoped you’d get a balanced perspective.”
Alexander, a visiting professor from the University of Haifa, titled the conference “Israel as a Jewish and Democratic State: Challenges and Perspectives.” The event was co-sponsored by Feeley and Prof. Calvin Morrill.
It took place April 13, around the time the campus’ student senate (ASUC) was meeting to consider overturning a veto by student president Will Smelko that had nullified a senate vote calling on the university to divest from General Electric and United Technologies, two U.S. companies that supply Israel’s military.
The ASUC had approved the divestment bill, even though the university has no stake in the two companies.
Alexander, a specialist in Jewish education, said the student bill had no practical significance “This is a struggle for the symbolism at the U of C at Berkeley,” he said. “The leaders of this have a particular agenda, that they hold Israel as the problem in the Middle East conflict, and if that changes, it would end the conflict.”
Alexander, who teaches courses on Israeli civics and Jewish identity, said proponents of divestment are engaged in “magical thinking” that includes “anti-Semitic rhetoric.”
Berkeley is a centre of Marxist, neo-Marxist and post-colonial studies, and those theories “offer a simplistic view of the Palestinians as powerless and the Israelis with all the power,” he said.
Instead, “this is an intractable political conflict” – not one of victims and victors – and the Palestinians are actors who have made decisions and reaped the results.
By believing “only Jews can solve the problem” and “holding Israel to blame and the Palestinians blameless” the theories reprise the view that Jews are all-powerful, similar to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, he said.
Meanwhile, debate over the divestment resolution has made many Jewish students feel marginalized and uncomfortable. Students at the campus Hillel “felt personally attacked,” Alexander said.
Last week, in the latest development on the divestment bill, the ASUC met to discuss ways of overriding the president’s veto. The Daily Californian Online reported that the senators failed to come to a consensus on overriding the veto, leaving it in place. However, reports indicate pro-bill senators are considering various parliamentary procedures to revisit it.
Earlier, an attempt to overturn the veto failed after a 12-7-1 vote fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to negate it. The bill, titled “A Bill in Support of UC Divestment from War Crimes” attracted international attention and was supported by Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Toronto author Naomi Klein, according YNet News. Other supporters included activist Daniel Boyarin, a Jewish history researcher, and Ofra Ben-Artzi, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sister-in-law.
Among the bill’s opponents are Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz and Israeli authors Amos Oz and A.B. Yehoshua.
Jweekly.com reported that in advance of the override meeting, Berkeley Hillel briefed student senators about the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Lobbying to maintain the veto, Hillel presented a letter to senators signed by 40 rabbis from the San Francisco area, local philanthropist Richard Goldman and Jewish organizations such as AIPAC, the Anti-Defamation League and the local Jewish Community Relations Council.