BDS


Book Description

"I have been to Palestine where I've witnessed the racially segregated housing and the humiliation of Palestinians at military roadblocks. I can't help but remember the conditions we experienced in South Africa under apartheid. We could not have achieved our freedom without the help of people around the world using the nonviolent means of boycotts and divestment to compel governments and institutions to withdraw their support for the apartheid regime. Omar Barghouti's lucid and morally compelling book is perfectly timed to make a major contribution to this urgently needed global campaign for justice, freedom and peace." --Archbishop Desmond Tutu THIRTY YEARS ago, an international movement utilizing boycott, divestment, and sanction (BDS) tactics rose in solidarity with those suffering under the brutal apartheid regime of South Africa. The historic acts of BDS activists from around the world isolated South Africa as a pariah state and heralded the end of apartheid. Now, as awareness of the apartheid nature of the State of Israel continues to grow, Omar Barghouti, founding member of the Palestinian Civil Society Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, presents a renewed call to action. Aimed at forcing the State of Israel to uphold international law and universal human rights for the Palestinian people, here is a manifesto for change. "No one has done more to build the intellectual, legal and moral case for BDS than Omar Barghouti. The global Palestinian solidarity movement has been transformed and is on the cusp of major new breakthroughs." --Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine and No Logo "There is no more comprehensive and persuasive case than his for boycott, divestment, and sanctions to end the Israeli occupation and establish the ethical claim of Palestinian rights." --Judith Butler, University of California at Berkeley




Boycott!


Book Description

This title is part of American Studies Now and available as an e-book first. Visit ucpress.edu/go/americanstudiesnow to learn more. The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (BDS) has expanded rapidly though controversially in the United States in the last five years. The academic boycott of Israeli academic institutions is a key component of that movement. What is this boycott? Why does it make sense? And why is this an American Studies issue? These key questions and others are answered in this short essential book. Boycott! situates the academic boycott in the broader history of boycotts in the United States as well as Palestine and shows how it has evolved into a transnational social movement that has spurred profound intellectual and political shifts. It explores the movement’s implications for antiracist, feminist, queer, and academic labor organizing and examines the boycott in the context of debates about Palestine, Zionism, race, rights-based politics, academic freedom, decolonization, and neoliberal capitalism.




The Case for Sanctions Against Israel


Book Description

In July 2011, Israel passed legislation outlawing the public support of boycott activities against the state, corporations, and settlements, adding a crackdown on free speech to its continuing blockade of Gaza and the expansion of illegal settlements. Nonetheless, the campaign for boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) continues to grow in strength within Israel and Palestine, as well as in Europe and the US. This essential intervention considers all sides of the movement—including detailed comparisons with the South African experience—and contains contributions from both sides of the separation wall, along with a stellar list of international commentators. Contributors: Merav Amir and Dalit Baum, Ra’anaan Alexandrowicz, Hind Awwad, Mustafa Barghouthi, Omar Barghouti, Joel Beinin, John Berger, Angela Davis, Nada Elia, Marc Ellis, Noura Erakat, Ran Greenstein, Neve Gordon, Ronald Kasrils, Jamal Khader, Naomi Klein, Mark LeVine, Ken Loach, David Lloyd and Laura Pulido, Haneen Maikey, Ilan Pappe, Jonathan Pollak, Lisa Taraki, Rebecca Vilkomerson, Michael Warschawski, Slavoj Žižek.




Israel Denial


Book Description

A work of “rigorous intellectual inquiry” critiquing the BDS movement in academia (Jewish Journal). Israel Denial is the first book to offer detailed analyses of the work faculty members have published—individually and collectively—in support of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement; it contrasts their claims with options for promoting peace. The faculty discussed here have devoted a significant part of their professional lives to delegitimizing the Jewish state. While there are beliefs they hold in common—including the conviction that there is nothing good to say about Israel—they also develop distinctive arguments designed to recruit converts to their cause in novel ways. They do so both as writers and as teachers; Israel Denial is the first to give substantial attention to anti-Zionist pedagogy. No effort to understand the BDS movement’s impact on the academy and public policy can be complete without the kind of understanding this book offers. A co-publication of the Academic Engagement Network




The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel


Book Description

The first collection to take critical look at the international movement to boycott Israel.




Sanctions as War


Book Description

Sanctions as War is the first critical analysis of economic sanctions from a global perspective. Featuring case studies from 11 sanctioned countries and theoretical essays, it will be of immediate interest to those interested in understanding how sanctions became the common sense of American foreign policy.




Generation Palestine


Book Description

The unique model of apartheid, colonization, and military occupation that Israel imposes on the Palestinians, along with myriad violations of international law, have made Palestine the moral cause of a generation. Yet many people continue to ask, "what can we do?"Generation Palestine helps to answer this question by bringing together Palestinian and international activists in the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. The movement aims to pressure Israel until it complies with International Law, mirroring the model that was successfully utilized against South African apartheid.With essays written by a wide selection of contributors, Generation Palestine follows the BDS movement's model of inclusivity and collaboration. Contributors include Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Ken Loach, Iain Banks, Ronnie Kasrils, Professor Richard Falk, Ilan Pappe, Omar Barghouti, Ramzy Baroud, and Archbishop Attallah Hannah, alongside other internationally acclaimed artists, writers, academics, and grassroots activists.




Boycotting Israel is Wrong


Book Description

This is the first progressive book to argue that the BDS movement (boycott, divestment and sanctions) against Israel is the wrong way to broker peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; rather, it argues that peace will come ony when both Israelis’ and Palestinians’ legitimate claims to statehood are recognised – by both sides. The BDS movement (boycott, divestment, sanctions) against Israel has gained traction and publicity worldwide for a decade. Yet here, Philip Mendes and Nick Dyrenfurth – two politically progressive commentators – argue that BDS is far too blunt an instrument to use in such a complex political situation. Instead, they critically analyse the key arguments for and against BDS, and propose a solution that supports Israel’s existence and Palestinian rights to a homeland, urging mutual compromise and concessions from both sides.




The Beneficiary


Book Description

From iPhones and clothing to jewelry and food, the products those of us in the developed world consume and enjoy exist only through the labor and suffering of countless others. In his new book Bruce Robbins examines the implications of this dynamic for humanitarianism and social justice. He locates the figure of the "beneficiary" in the history of humanitarian thought, which asks the prosperous to help the poor without requiring them to recognize their causal role in the creation of the abhorrent conditions they seek to remedy. Tracing how the beneficiary has manifested itself in the work of George Orwell, Virginia Woolf, Jamaica Kincaid, Naomi Klein, and others, Robbins uncovers a hidden tradition of economic cosmopolitanism. There are no easy answers to the question of how to confront systematic inequality on a global scale. But the first step, Robbins suggests, is to acknowledge that we are, in fact, beneficiaries.




Enforcing Silence


Book Description

Academic freedom is under siege, as our universities become the sites of increasingly fraught battles over freedom of speech. While much of the public debate has focussed on ‘no platforming’ by students, this overlooks the far graver threat posed by concerted efforts to silence the critical voices of both academics and students, through the use of bureaucracy, legal threats and online harassment. Such tactics have conspicuously been used, with particularly virulent effect, in an attempt to silence academic criticism of Israel. This collection uses the controversies surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a means of exploring the limits placed on academic freedom in a variety of different national contexts. It looks at how the increased neoliberalisation of higher education has shaped the current climate, and considers how academics and their universities should respond to these new threats. Bringing together new and established scholars from Palestine and the wider Middle East as well as the US and Europe, Enforcing Silence shows us how we can and must defend our universities as places for critical thinking and free expression.