'Public Health Leaders' Must Condemn Terror

As the world recoils from yet another atrocity, offering platitudes of “standing with Manchester” while actually doing very little to challenge terrorism, the City University of New York’s School of Public Health is getting ready to send the wrong message to its graduates.

Linda Sarsour

Palestinian-American activist Linda Sarsour, who has a history of inflammatory behavior toward Israel and its supporters and supports the violent intifada, will be a keynote speaker at that school’s commencement. She’ll share the stage with New York’s first lady, Chirlane McCray, and Mary Bassett, Commissioner of the New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene as “public health and social justice leaders.” This honor is ostensibly in recognition of her role in organizing the massive women’s march on Washington protesting against Donald Trump, in which potential cuts to health services were decried.

The irony is stark: It’s hard to conceive of a bigger public health threat than terrorism -- The weaponization of disaffected young people around the world via online channels, recruited to commit despicable acts in places like Jerusalem, San Bernardino, Orlando, Paris, Istanbul ....the list goes on.

Sarsour, who has forged alliances with many liberal Jewish leaders, condemned the 5/22 attack on the Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, calling it in a Facebook post “a whole different level of evil” for targeting children, and “sickening.”

But such statements are inconsistent with her stated support for the Palestinian intifada and the boycott-divest-sanction movement against Israel. BDS is a form of soft terrorism, as it is focused on one side of the conflict with the intention of forcing Israel into territorial concessions that are against its interests. Given Israel’s precarious geography, those concessions could ultimately cost lives on a scale bigger than any one suicide bomb.

Activists gathered outside CUNY headquarters on May 25 to demand the invitation be revoked, but that’s unlikely, given the fallout from a similar controversy in 2011, when Jewish Israel critic Tony Kushner had his honorary degree yanked under pressure.  Pro-Kushner forces prevailed and the school did a 180.

Chancellor James Milliken released a statement in April saying “the fact that Ms. Sarsour might hold views that are controversial cannot be the basis for withdrawing an invitation to speak,” while noting that the university itself “sees BDS as anathema to the values of higher education.”

But where are those values when Sarsour declares that “you can’t be a Zionist and a feminist.” Is she kidding? Where in the Middle East are women’s rights protected better than in Israel, which had a female prime minister in 1969. Maybe she would prefer the feminism of Saudi Arabia, where women can’t drive, much less run for office, or of Jordan, where they need a husband’s permission to travel.

Israel’s leaders continuously cast aside politics in the name of humanity, allowing relatives of Hamas leaders who want to destroy them to be treated in Jewish hospitals, and sending aid around the world in times of need. Arab citizens have full rights in Israel and serve in the Knesset. And yet Linda Sarsour calls Zionism “creepy.”

CUNY isn’t the only public institution sending mixed signals about terrorism and the Middle East conflict.

A Public Broadcasting System curriculum is drawing fire from conservative critics for its effort to create understanding about the motivations of suicide bombers (who should more properly be called homicide bombers.)

The lesson plan “Dying to be a Martyr,” is 10 years old and likely came to light now because the fight over federal funding for public broadcasting, which is on President Trump’s budget chopping block. But that fact should not take away from serious discussion about the content.

High-school teachers are encouraged to show their students interviews with would-be Palestinian bombers. The lesson teaches students to empathize with violent Palestinian terrorists who are willing to murder Jews in Israel and beyond.

Perhaps there is a shred of a noble intention in this program’s origins, but it is at best naive, bordering on biased. There are many peoples in the world who collectively feel aggrieved and don’t resort to terrorism and violence, and they are better off as a result.

Page Fortna, an associate political science professor at Columbia University wrote in a recent paper, highlighted in The Atlantic following the Manchester bombing, that “The disadvantages of terrorism generally outweigh its advantages.” She concluded from a detailed study of 104 recent global conflicts that terror historically hurts rather than helps a cause. “None of those that deliberately killed large numbers of civilians through terrorist attacks won its fight outright,” Fortna said.

So it’s surely in no one’s interest to promote a mindset that terrorism is an inevitable (or effective) product of an uprising against a more powerful enemy.

In defending the programming, PBS in a statement said “In no way does it condone the heinous actions of individuals who would target innocent civilians. PBS would strongly condemn any assertion that terrorism is ever appropriate.”

But just watch the video, which features a sympathetic kid who ultimately decided that God told him not to carry out an attack in an Israeli town. Everything we know about these bombers, much of it from the videos they leave behind, is that they believe God wants the exact opposite. So it’s not as much frustration with lack of a peace diplomacy but rather a twisted religious fervor (denounced by mainstream Islam) that guides these acts.

PBS’s ombudsman, Michael Getler noted in a column that “Dying to be a Martyr” contains “what I consider to be some legitimate questions about the content, or more precisely as I read it, a lack of more contextual content, within this lesson plan.” He concurs that what is missing from the curriculum is instructions for teachers to denounce suicide bombing and radical Islamic views in general,” something we might assume to be a given. Some teachers, however, might be too afraid of offending people to do that.

There’s nothing healthy about either supporting terrorism outright or trying to understand it rationally, and the sooner institutions like CUNY and PBS realize that, the better off we’ll all be.

Originally Published by The Algemeiner

Brooklyn College Must Stand Firm Against Terror Supporters

By: Eli Verschleiser

What is it about Brooklyn College that makes it such a hotbed of anti-Zionism and flashpoint in the political war against Israel?

This “middle-class Ivy League” school in Midwood, where my parents and wife Dr. Shani Verschleiser attended, is part of the City University of New York system and has high populations of Jews and Muslims, but so do other schools. We don’t seem to hear nearly as much about the activities of Students for Justice in Palestine and other groups devoted to the destruction of Israel as we know it at big city public or private colleges as much as we do at Brooklyn. In the New York area, it particularly stands out.

Per the conservative Los Angeles-based David Horowitz Freedom Center, which tracks campus anti-Israel activity, Brooklyn College is one of the top 10 schools in the nation for anti-Israel activity, alongside such peers as San Diego State, University of California at Irvine, Vassar College and the University of Tennessee at Knoxville.

According to the center’s website, stopthejewhatredoncampus.org, Brooklyn College “is home to one of the most active and extreme SJP chapters in the nation. Brooklyn College SJP has posted articles and videos online defending terrorism including an advertisement titled “The Third Intifada” on its Facebook page.” Antics have included a “die-in” to dramatize Palestinian victims, trampling on Israeli flags and mock-up military checkpoints to illustrated West Bank life for Arabs.

The campus is a battleground for the insidious Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. According to Amcha Initiative, another group that rose from outrage over the demonization of Israel on our college campuses, last year, more than 300 incidents of anti-Semitism occurred at 109 schools in 28 states.

SJP and other anti-Zionist student groups are a major source of anti-Semitic rhetoric and behavior at many schools.” The Israel on Campus Coalition (ICC) counted 649 anti-Israel events at colleges in the U.S.

This shows how we are losing the battle of social media which allows today's youth to be educated with lies and deception. Israel and Jewish organizations are doing a lot to provide Jewish students with balanced information, including free Birthright Israel trips. They must continue their efforts and do more to show Israel’s hard work to make peace, its contributions to the world and the stubbornness of the Palestinians in resisting productive talks.

Several high-profile Israel-bashing events, some coordinated with faculty, have been held at the campus. And four Jewish students recently fought a long battle for justice after they were inexplicably thrown out of a SJP event in February 2013, simply for holding pro-Israel fact sheets they had yet to distribute. It took just over a year and the assistance of the The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law before President Karen Gould apologized to the students, acknowledging that a college official violated the students’ civil rights by ejecting them. The college then added insult to injury by incorrectly telling the press the students had been disruptive to defend his actions.

But things haven’t improved much in the interim. In February of this year, a group of rowdy protestors stormed into a Faculty Council meeting and started chanting anti-Zionist nonsense at the professors. The meeting had to be adjourned, and The Jewish Week reported that some felt threatened by the incident.

This is not to say that students shouldn’t be free to voice criticism of Israel under their First Amendment rights. No country is perfect, and people are entitled to opinions even if they are misinformed or biased.

But increasingly anti-Zionist protestors all over North America have tried to silence and intimidate the other side, disrupting events, shouting down speakers, targeting students in their dorms with “eviction notices” and striving to make it difficult to express pride in the Jewish state (which, last time I checked, was also protected by the Constitution.)

A recent survey by the Cohen Center at Brandeis University found one quarter of North American Jewish students "describe hostility toward Israel on campus by their peers as a 'fairly' or 'very big' problem".

The Zionist Organization of America and the Brandeis Center for Human Rights have been advising Jewish students about their rights and how to protect them from infringement, whether it’s from peers or misguided or overzealous college administrators, faculty or security guards.

This atmosphere of bias and intimidation is especially poignant at a time when colleges are increasingly going on about trigger warnings, safe spaces and open bathrooms to ensure that no one’s feelings are hurt, and that counseling is available if they are.

Aren’t Israel supporters entitled to the same protection and concern?

There may be no easy answer as to why Brooklyn College has become such a battleground. Maybe the situation just builds on itself.

Fortunately, the college has a top-notch Hillel organization with ample facilities just off campus for pro-Israel students to safely and comfortably hold their events. There is no shortage of pro-Israel organizations and activities run by proud and tough Jews, including a sizable share of Israelis, who aren’t going anywhere and aren’t about to hide their blue and white flags for anyone.

The Hillel director, Nadya Drucker, her staff and board work closely with the administration to share concerns. Hopefully the new president, Michelle J. Anderson, understands the need for open dialogue and exchange of ideas, without intimidation, between students.

But bad decisions like the one in 2013, taking sides against the Israel supporters at an event, can have a lasting negative impact, suggesting to SJP and others that they have free reign and friends in high places.

In keeping with its role as an academic haven for thousands of Jewish students and other Israel supporters, the administration must disabuse them of this notion. Just as it’s crucial to stand firm against terrorists, so must we do the same with their supporters.

BDS- Boycott Double Standards

By: Eli Verschleiser

As a horrifying wave of stabbing and shooting attacks against Israelis producing an almost daily body count, the United Methodist Church has decided to take decisive action.

A boycott aimed at Israel.

The church has announced that it will not allow its $20 billion pension fund to invest in five Israeli banks that have financed construction of housing in the West Bank.

In the wake of UN leader Ban Ki-Moon’s suggestion that violent Palestinian frustration is only a result of “human nature” and the Obama administration’s consistent policy that building apartments is as bad as or worse than terrorism, this particular approach to the problem should not surprise.

Other churches have flirted or grappled with similar boycotts, including the Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Mennonites, the Church of England and the World Council of Churches. Academic and student groups, and even a grocery co-op in Brooklyn have put resolutions past their members, and some musical performers, notably Roger Waters, have declared they won’t appear before Israeli fans on either side of the Green Line.

There are many double standards at play here. Let’s take stock of them.

First, when it comes to so-called moral voices trying to impose peace, the onus always falls squarely on Israel, because the more powerful side is always assumed to be the one at fault. As mentioned before, it’s hard to place any economic pressure on the Palestinians, given their trade status. But what if the UN and EU, as a precondition to development funding, took a serious stand to push them to, at minimum, come to peace talks without preconditions? Maybe they could also crack down on violent incitement of youth who, no longer able to smuggle explosives past the security barrier, are now resorting to stabbing attacks.

Second, there are no such boycott, divestment and sanctions movements against countries that oppress their own people or others that match the scope and intensity of the boycott push against Israel.

Third, these moralists would like to pick and choose what they boycott. If you’re in, go all in. Don’t just boycott Israeli universities and banks and food products made on the West Bank.

Boycott the research pouring out of those universities every day that stand to greatly alleviate or cure diseases, from cancer and diabetes to malaria.

Boycott pharmaceuticals patented by Israeli companies like Rafa or Teva that greatly control symptoms and improve quality of life for the sick or injured. Boycott the Pentium chips, Motorola phone systems and Microsoft OS technology developed in partnership with those companies by Israelis.

And if you’re in California, stay thirsty rather than drink the water from the San Diego desalination plant Israelis are building to help alleviate the drought there.

Does it not seem disingenuous to denounce a country as belligerent and in great need of moral rectitude while availing yourself of all the wonders resulting from Jews unencumbered by fear of being chased out of their jobs, universities, homes and countries? That scenario happened to their parents or grandparents, and there are even those who experienced it personally, either in Europe or Arab countries.

Perhaps the Palestinian boycott organizers would also like to declare that they won’t use Israeli hospitals, like Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, which recently helped save the life of a 17-year-old suffering from a rare endocrine condition. Not likely. Even stick-in-the-mud Hamas will look the other way when it comes to quality Jewish medicine in the Middle East. Relatives of top Hamas officials have sought, and received treatment for serious diseases.

Israel’s government sees the BDS movement as nothing short of an effort to destroy the country as it exists today in favor of an untenable two-state solution that would leave the Jewish half within impossible borders. There may be some well-meaning activists who naively believe something positive can be accomplished by applying economic pressure on one side of the equation (the less violent half.)

But on the whole it seems plain that the pro-boycott movement isn’t after a just outcome in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, as much as a reversal of fortune for the Jews and an end to their contemporary self-determination.


If those folks really want to make a difference in the world, they should start by cleaning up their own house. Because when people are being stabbed to death in the streets, or on the receiving end of rocket attacks, and your only reaction is to pull money out of their banks, something’s not quite right with your moral center.

Originally Published: The Huffington Post

Black-and-White Boycotts Defy a Technicolor Middle East

By: Eli Verschleiser

The subtleties beneath Scarlett Johansson’s controversial endorsement of SodaStream products should blunt the euphoria of pro-Israel advocates, who celebrate the Hollywood star’s choice to abandon Oxfam in favor of her new West Bank-based patron. More fundamentally, the fallout in this case reveals the all-out assault on Israel’s very existence, and should give everyone pause about making facile judgments about right and wrong in a complex situation. The world is never black and white, and it's just such binary, zero-sum thinking that perpetuates the Israeli-Palestinian impasse in the Middle East.

Scarlett chose to stick with a model of Jewish-Palestinian coexistence within the West Bank, rather than accept the dogma against conducting any business involving Israeli settlements over the 1949 Green Line. The reactions against her decision demonstrate that the sophisticated effort to condemn and boycott Israel’s West Bank settlements without demonizing pre-1967 Israel has largely failed, both in the popular imagination and in the pronouncements of other high-profile celebrities. Any well-intentioned supporters of the West Bank boycott must realize that the so-called “BDS” movement (pushing for boycott, divestment, sanctions) against the entire State of Israel is coopting their message for a greater cause – eliminating the Jewish state.

I vehemently disagree with those choosing to deny Israel their patronage for items produced in the West Bank until the entire dispute is resolved, but I can also understand their moral premise. But as the SodaStream controversy has highlighted, many BDS activists see Jewish independence anywhere in historical Israel as illegitimate and offensive. What could have been a principled abstaining from the fruits of the West Bank is now a witch hunt, boycotting or intimidating anyone who sees the world differently, or without the same black-and-white filter.

Well-meaning people who support Palestinian rights in the West Bank while accepting Israel's right to exist within secure and negotiated borders should understand that this level of nuance is beyond the comprehension of many Israel-haters. Possibly against its own better judgment, BDS has seamlessly conflated a boycott against Jewish settlements over the Green Line with boycotting all Israeli people and products.

Make no mistake: Plenty of BDS activists would attack Scarlett for representing SodaStream even if it were based in the heart of Tel Aviv. An official BDS website, representing two dozen groups identified as Palestinian, celebrated the fact that Scarlett Johansson stepped down as an Oxfam Ambassador, “following public outcry,” and

Every entity which agrees to boycott Israeli companies doing business with the West Bank represents a victory for the BDS movement. And such a secondary boycott is hardly some new innovation meant to punish Israel’s current right-wing government for not moving fast enough to abandon the West Bank. The boycott of Israeli products, and of companies that do business with Israeli companies or use Israeli products, goes back decades. It gathered steam after the 1973 surprise attack against Israel by Egypt and Syria, when the Arab Gulf states imposed an oil embargo against countries dealing with Israel.

It’s not just Palestinians or Arabs who recognize no Green Line. For Pink Floyd front man Roger Waters, Israel is illegitimate and unjust on either side of the Green Line, so it doesn't even matter that SodaStream is based in the West Bank. In an open letter on Facebook, he lectures Johansson about Israeli human rights violations against non-Jews inside the Green Line – which international law recognizes as Israel – and champions the return of a Palestinian refugees, not to the West Bank but to Israel proper. He also objectifies people like Scarlett, having once pegged her as "anti-neo-con" and now labeling her a turncoat, all because of personal choices she has made. When the world, and the people in it, disappoint our neatly tailored expectations, that's not necessarily a crime against humanity.

Beyond Waters, for years hundreds of intellectuals and artists have also been promoting a “cultural boycott of Israel”. While only comprising a slender minority of the Western cultural elite, led by such notables as Booker Prize winner John Berger, this movement (also titled “The Electronic Intifada”) promotes the isolation of Israel – not as an extension of the West Bank-related campaign, but as a continuation of the longstanding boycott of Israel.

More recently, the American Studies Association (ASA) joined the list of academic groups boycotting Israel for its West Bank policies, its actions in Lebanon, and even this shocking reason: “Armed soldiers patrol Israeli university campuses, and some have been trained at Israeli universities in techniques to suppress protesters.” Such twisted reasoning should offend anyone who’s seen the long list of terror attacks on Israeli institutions, from which many Palestinian BDS leaders received their own degrees. Anyone who thinks Israelis enjoy needing soldiers to patrol their universities… should probably join the ASA.

In its ultimatum to Scarlett Johansson, Oxfam comes across as anti-Israel, or at least as anti-occupation, and its overt political style has overshadowed its record of feeding millions sound the world. Now, its political choices have definitely tarnished the hunger brand in ways that could impact a million or more innocent, hungry humans who depend on voluntary donations via Oxfam.

One humane West Bank factory does not undo all the grievances of Palestinians, but that also doesn't make the company (or its spokesperson) a villain for coloring outside the lines imposed by one ideology or the other. Ironically, SodaStream is a rare example of how Jewish-Palestinian coexistence could actually succeed. Including this company among Israel’s crimes against Palestinians undermines the already dubious case for a single bi-national state as advocated by Waters and so many others would-be do-gooders. And yes, there are many.

The American Jewish Congress has made it a high priority on our current agenda to challenge the BDS movement to de-legitimize and isolate Israel, as we continue the agency’s efforts to bring about peace in the Middle East.

One lesson we might all take from this latest ripple is that, even if SodaStream and BDS remain problematic, most Jews and Palestinians on the ground are increasingly seeing their grievances and aspirations in full color, not as a take-no-prisoners battle to the death. Anyone who claims to want peace in that part of the world should not be allowed to think any less broadly than they do.

Originally Published: The Allgemeiner