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Today’s Top BDS Stories:
1. The Soviet origins of the Apartheid smear.
In 1975, the Soviets began pushing another libelous tract by Valeri Skurlatov, entitled “Zionism and Apartheid.” In that work, Skurlatov screeched, “Racial biological doctrines, according to which people are divided into ‘chosen people’ and goyim, have been turned into official ideology and state policy in Israel and South Africa, where the ‘inferior’ are forcibly separated from the ‘superior.’ That is what apartheid is.”
Such propaganda went hand in hand with Soviet efforts to demonize Zionism as a form of racism, culminating in the notorious U.N. Resolution 3379—rescinded in 1991— equating Zionism with racism. And because foreign policy is often domestic policy, the campaign against “Zionism” was an integral component of the repression of the Jewish communities inside the Soviet Union.
2. ‘Apartheid Week’ organizers remove image of Jewish student Joshua Nass from promotional video.
On Friday, Feb. 28, before Shabbat, Nass checked the link to the promotional trailer, and saw something odd: “this video has been removed by the user.” When Nass checked it again after Shabbat ended, he saw that the video had been replaced with one that did not include the Fox Business News clip in which he appeared. “They buckled under the pressure,” Nass told The Jewish Press in a follow-up interview on Sunday. “Not surprisingly, they did not reveal who they are, but they did reveal what they are,” he said.
3. Celebrity Rabbi and columnist, Shmuley Boteach, looks at the insidious effects on BDS on Jews in South Africa and even in the US.
The gradual trickle of self-hatred into the Jewish soul is evidencing itself in the growing American Jewish call for Israel-hating speakers to be hosted by Jewish organizations at Jewish venues in order to demonstrate our open-mindedness. We first saw this with Swarthmore Hillel when it bizarrely announced its “Open Hillel” policy, opening their doors to anti-Zionist speakers. Asking people who wish to destroy Israel to come and address Jewish audiences – and make no mistake about it, BDS is only about destroying Israel – would be the equivalent of the ANC inviting white bigots to argue that apartheid should be reinstated.
Other BDS-Related Content:
*Codepink co-founder Medea Benjamin was arrested in Egypt trying to get to Gaza. Elder of Ziyon analyzes the flow of tweets from prison, and some other tweets that manage to lay the blame on Israel.
* University of Regina’s academic agreement with Hebrew University is stirring up controversy among faculty on campus.
* The influential Internet site Buzzfeed dived into the world of pro-Israel activism and the BDS again, this time focusing on a speech by Senator Charles Schumer at the AIPAC Conference. Schumer called out the BDS movement for anti-Semitism:
“I believe that those who call for boycotts of Israel without calling for boycotts of other neighboring nations whose human rights records are in fact reprehensible are practicing, whether they know it or not, whether they admit it or not, a modern form of what we call anti-Semitism,” Schumer said
* The Canadian Jewish News provides more information about the hate crime at the University of Windsor one the eve of its student vote calling for divestment from Israel.
* The president of Brooklyn College, Robert Wohl, has a dynamic piece in The Tower magazine about why liberals should repudiate the BDS Movement.
See yesterday’s Fighting BDS Roundup.
