It is often asked, in response to the (mainly academic) boycott against Israel, why Israel is being singled out while countries with an indisputably worse human rights record, such as Iran, Sudan or China, are left alone. The question makes sense, though the comparison is hardly complimentary to Israel.
However, an even more pertinent question arises: why don't the boycotters start by boycotting their own country--in most cases Britain, as well as its closest ally, the United States? Why are we not seeing British and American universities boycotted? If a full-fledged self-boycott is somewhat impractical, why, at the very least, are British and American academics not required, on pain of academic excommunication, to renounce Bush/Blair/Brown and all their works? This could easily be arranged, and would surely help foster a healthy atmosphere of self-criticism and open-mindedness in British academic life. Assuming that the supporters of boycott take their own rhetoric even half-seriously, there is simply no rational explanation why they don't begin the charity of boycott at home.
The leaders of the boycott campaign and no doubt most of their supporters don't just believe that the invasion and occupation of Iraq was a political mistake, or even merely a violation of international law. They regard it as a crime against humanity, no less. They blame Bush and Blair for many tens of thousands--perhaps hundreds of thousands--of Iraqi dead (including many thousands of children whose death is blamed on the sanctions prior to the war). These figures exceed considerably the total number of casualties on both sides throughout the entire history of the Arab-Israel conflict.
Most people killed in the Middle East in recent decades have, of course, been Muslims and Arabs killed by Muslims and Arabs. Blaming all the carnage in Iraq on Bush and Blair is, needless to day, silly and unfair, whatever one thinks of the decision to go to war. But this is what those people profess. How then can they justify boycotting Israel and not the US and UK?
It might perhaps be argued that the Iraq war, however horrible, has yet to become a "chronic disease" on a par with an Israeli occupation that has lasted for decades. That Israel had no peace prior to the occupation, and has been repeatedly attacked from every piece of land it has handed over to the Palestinians, either by agreement or unilaterally, since the beginning of the peace process--this, naturally, is something unmentionable in polite society.
In many respects, then, including "collateral damage" to civilians, the comparison with the Iraq war is unfair to Israel. Be that as it may, the American government is blamed, vilified and demonized by the people in question for much more than Iraq. They regard America as the principle source of evil in our world for many decades. Countless sins, disasters and crimes from every corner of the globe are laid at America's doorstep--including, of course, the Israeli occupation itself and every other Zionist iniquity. Are these not sustained by Uncle Sam? Why, then, not boycott him?
Noam Chomsky once remarked that it would have been far more logical to boycott American universities than Israeli ones. The former friend of the Khmer Rouge and the admirer of Hizballah is no friend of Israel. But the obsessive, nauseating hatred of Israel, so popular in certain European circles, is not his cup of tea. One recalls the method of distinguishing between legitimate criticism of Israel and anti-Semitism suggested by Chaim Baram, a radical Israeli journalist who does little apart from criticize Israel: someone who says that Israel is an agent of American imperialism is a legitimate critic, but someone who says that America is a puppet of Israel and international Zionism is an anti-Semite. Chomsky takes the first option; the British boycotters act in a way that points in the direction of the second--assuming, that is, that these people have the courage of their convictions, however misguided.
But perhaps this is too much to assume. Certainly, an anti-Israel boycott is a much cheaper way to demonstrate one's affiliation with the Forces of Progress than an anti-American one. But whatever mixture of ideas, emotions and calculations drives these people, one thing is clear: the anti-Israel boycott cannot be justified by reference to universal principles. It is an entirely particularistic attack on the Jewish state.
Now the good news: they won't break us. Nobody is going to boycott Israeli hi-tech. Economic ties and research cooperation between Israel and the European Union have grown steadily closer in recent years, in step with the calls for boycott. Most British academics will surely ignore the boycott. The boycotters will, no doubt, succeed in harming some Israeli scholars. This is a pity. They will also remind all Israeli academics, however critical of their government, that it is not merely the policies of their government but their country and their people that are under attack. This is not necessarily a bad thing.
- Published 5/7/2007 © bitterlemons-international.org
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