{"id":7573,"date":"2010-10-04T00:00:33","date_gmt":"2010-10-03T22:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=7573"},"modified":"2010-10-02T01:56:26","modified_gmt":"2010-10-01T23:56:26","slug":"south-africa-school-rethinks-israel-ties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2010\/10\/south-africa-school-rethinks-israel-ties\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa School Rethinks Israel Ties"},"content":{"rendered":"

University of Johannesburg threatens to sever ties with Israeli Ben-Gurion University if certain conditions are not met.<\/em><\/p>\n

The South African University of Johannesburg (UJ) senate\u00a0has threatened to end\u00a0its relationship with\u00a0the Israeli university,\u00a0Ben-Gurion (BGU), unless certain conditions are met.<\/p>\n

In a statement released on Wednesday, the South African university’s highest academic body\u00a0said Ben-Gurion University\u00a0would have to\u00a0work with Palestinian universities on research projects and stop its “direct and indirect support for the Israeli military and the occupation”.<\/p>\n

“The conditions are that the memorandum of understanding governing the relationship between the two institutions be amended to include Palestinian universities chosen with the direct involvement of UJ,” the university said in a statement.<\/p>\n

“Additionally, UJ will not engage in any activities with BGU that have direct or indirect military implications, this to be monitored by UJ’s senate academic freedom committee.<\/p>\n

“Should these conditions not be met within six months, the memorandum of understanding will automatically lapse on April 1 2011,” UJ said.<\/p>\n

Describing the afternoon senate meeting on Wednesday as mostly “tense”, the UJ senate also\u00a0called on\u00a0BGU to “respect UJ’s duty (and)\u00a0to take seriously, allegations of behaviour on the part of BGU’s stakeholders that is incompatible with UJ’s values”.<\/p>\n

‘Human dignity’<\/strong><\/p>\n

Adam Habib, the UJ’s\u00a0vice-chancellor told Al Jazeera that the decision\u00a0was based\u00a0on two principles.<\/p>\n

“Firstly it was important to identify with\u00a0an oppressed population and secondly, it was about creating an enabling environment for reconciliation and the achievement of human dignity.”<\/p>\n

Habib said his university will be engaging Palestinian academic institutions in a bid to solicit advice on mapping a way\u00a0forward, and that the current memorandum of understanding (MOU) between\u00a0UJ and Ben-Gurion would have to broaden.<\/p>\n

“For instance, we know that the BGU has collaborative projects with the Israeli army and we also know that the university\u00a0implements state policy, which invariably results in the discrimination of the Palestinian people,” Habib said.<\/p>\n

“Crucially, there can be no activities between UJ and an Israeli\u00a0educational\u00a0institution\u00a0that discriminated against the Palestinian people.”<\/p>\n

Habib\u00a0said\u00a0that while the\u00a0decision\u00a0still had to be ratified by the university council,\u00a0these changes\u00a0would have to happen over the next six\u00a0months, or the existing MOU would collapse.<\/p>\n

‘Unprecedented momentum’<\/strong><\/p>\n

Salim Vally, a senior researcher at the Faculty of Education and spokesman for the Palestinian Solidarity Committee (PSC),\u00a0told Al Jazeera\u00a0that the move to sever academic ties with BGU “has created an unprecedented momentum and has galvanised academics towards fighting for social justice”.<\/p>\n

“While the PSC\u00a0supports an unequivocal and unambiguous boycott of all Israeli state institutions, this is a move in the right direction and we are confident that it would lead to a\u00a0more comprehensive boycott of Israel in the future.<\/p>\n

“We know that they have a relationship with the military, making them complicit in the acts of the army, and in the next six months we will prove that the relationship with BGU should be severed completely,” Vally said.<\/p>\n

Relations between Ben-Gurion University and\u00a0the University of Johannesburg, formerly\u00a0the\u00a0Rand Afrikaans University, a formerly all-white university under South Africa’s apartheid system, began in
\n1987.<\/p>\n

The University of Johannesburg, created in 2005, took over various campuses including Rand Afrikaans University and a university in the black township of Soweto as part of efforts to ensure higher education was transformed with the rest of South Africa after the end of apartheid.<\/p>\n

The current partnership with Ben Gurion dates back to August 2009 when the universities signed an academic cooperation and staff exchange agreement, concerning water purification and micro-algal biotechnology research.<\/p>\n

Academic dissonance<\/strong><\/p>\n

The re-established relationship drew sharp criticism from the university\u00a0community and\u00a0catalysed the\u00a0formation of a petition that has drawn some of the biggest academics,\u00a0authors and\u00a0social activists\u00a0in South Africa.<\/p>\n

Desmond Tutu\u00a0and\u00a0around 250 other\u00a0prominent South African academics have supported ending UJ’s links with the Israeli institution.<\/p>\n

“Israeli universities are an intimate part of the Israeli regime, by active choice,” Tutu wrote in an essay that appeared in a South African newspaper on Sunday.<\/p>\n

“While Palestinians are not able to access universities and schools, Israeli universities produce the research, technology, arguments and leaders for maintaining the occupation.”<\/p>\n

Academic boycotts of Israeli universities have been inspired by boycotts of South African institutions during apartheid.<\/p>\n

A 2003 proposal for British universities to sever all ties with Israeli academic institutions was
\ndefeated.<\/p>\n

Two years later Britain’s Association of University Teachers voted to boycott Israel’s Haifa and Bar Ilan universities. That decision was overturned only a month later under fierce international pressure.
\nUS\u00a0professors and students also have called for academic and cultural boycotts of Israel.<\/p>\n

The moves have prompted sharp criticism. Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz once threatened legal action that would “devastate and bankrupt” anyone who boycotts Israeli universities.<\/p>\n

The New York-based Anti-Defamation League described the British moves as anti-Semitic, arguing Israel was being singled out while human rights violators such as Iran, Sudan, Venezuela and Zimbabwe were ignored.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 aljazeera.net<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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