The American Studies Association resolution has punctured a longstanding silence.<\/i><\/p>\n
Editor\u2019s Note: In response to Michelle Goldberg\u2019s pos<\/a>t about the American Studies Association\u2019s proposed boycott of Israel, we have convened a variety of responses. Alex Lubin writes in support of the boycott below, and you can read Ari Y. Kelman\u2019s argument against it here<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n I was raised to believe you never cross a picket line.<\/p>\n The National Council of the American Studies Association recently endorsed a resolution to boycott Israeli academic institutions and has asked its members to vote. We would do well to read what the resolution actually calls for: \u201cIt is resolved that the American Studies Association (ASA) endorses and will honor the call of Palestinian civil society for a boycott of Israeli academic institutions. It is also resolved that the ASA supports the protected rights of students and scholars everywhere to engage in research and public speaking about Israel-Palestine and in support of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.\u201d<\/p>\n Boycotts are the weapons of the dispossessed; they are pleas for global solidarity from people who have few other forms of power. They are peaceful attempts to disrupt business as usual by setting up a global picket-line and by asking us not to cross that picket line. The ASA National Council has heeded Palestinians\u2019 call for an academic boycott, and ASA members have been asked to give their endorsement.<\/p>\n The boycott movement has clearly defined goals of ending the occupation, ending discrimination against Palestinians with Israeli citizenship and ending forced exile and ongoing expulsion of Palestinians from their homes. All three of these place profound restrictions on Palestinian academic life.<\/p>\n Although we commonly think of universities as spaces of academic freedom, where the unfettered exchange of ideas exists apart from the partisan sphere of politics, universities are also inherently political institutions. In Israel nearly all universities are state institutions. In Israel and Occupied Palestine, Arab scholars\u2019 mobility is restricted by identification cards. Some Arab students and professors have mobility across Israel but can\u2019t travel to the West Bank, while Palestinian scholars who live in the West Bank cannot travel to Israel unless they have a Jerusalem ID. Mobility is a key component of academic life; it enables scholars to attend conferences, to visit archives and to collaborate with colleagues in their field.<\/p>\n Throughout the West Bank and Gaza, academic life is more precarious. In 2008, Israeli forces bombed Gaza\u2019s Islamic University, using<\/a> US-made F-16 aircraft. At Al Quds University in Jerusalem, the illegal Israeli security wall bisects the Abu Dis campus, leaving<\/a> 6,000 Al Quds students on the \u201cwrong side\u201d of the wall and unable to attend classes on the other side. Israeli soldiers arrested<\/a> 400 Birzeit University students between 2003 and 2009. Nine thousand students at An Najah University have to cross<\/a> one or two Israeli check-points in order to travel between their homes and the University. At any time, and in any location of the West Bank, Israeli soldiers can close roads leading to universities or can detain students and scholars at check-points. Bombings, partitions, check-points and closures restrict academic freedom, not to mention more basic fundamental human rights.<\/p>\n