Silver: No state aid for groups that boycott Israel

[NeoConsSuck]

Source: Albany Times Union

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has introduced legislation that would block colleges and universities from using state aid to fund groups that, according to his office’s release, “have passed resolutions or taken official actions to promote discriminatory boycotts.” (Question: Is there such a thing as a non-discriminatory boycott?)

The bill comes in response to the American Studies Association’s controversial decision to boycott Israel and its academic institutions, a largely symbolic action that supporters of that nation fear could become a camel’s nose under the tent for broader boycotts or divestments prompted by Israel’s policies in the occupied territories and its more general treatment of Palestinians.

Silver’s bill stops short of the approach favored by Senate IDC leader Jeff Klein and Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who would deny state aid to the colleges or universities that choose to support such organizations. Silver’s bill would block funding to those groups more directly. (Silver’s bill would resort to cutting off the larger institution only if it violates the ban on funding the offending groups.)

SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher is a critic of the ASA’s boycott, though she noted that “individuals at SUNY may embrace the boycott or attempt to find other solutions, and that is their choice.”

Read more: http://blog.timesunion.com/capitol/archives/203084/silver-no-state-aid-for-groups-that-boycott-israel/

[Spitfire of ATJ]

1. Howzabout funding for the peace movements? Oh wait,...peace is against government policy.

[karynnj]

2. This would have blocked any group in the 1980s boycotting over appartheit

It also seems undemocratic. I saw NO problem with people boycotting Arizona over Brewer's immigration law. If we tried, I suspect we could come up with a pretty big list of boycotts going back to boycotting grapes in the early 70s! In fact, wasn't there a boycott of tea over the tea taxes -- in addition to a certain city ending up with lots of tea in its harbor?

[Ash_F]

22. Yeah I wonder what this guy was up to in the eighties. /nt

[Ken Burch]

27. He was already in the assembly, on his way up the ladder.

The guy's been speaker since...19 freaking 94!

In New York, do you get that job for life?

[Ash_F]

28. More specifically I wonder what his statements towards apartheid were.

If he had the courage to speak up in a time when bigotry against Blacks was as fashionable in this country as it is against Arabs today.

[AndreaCG]

3. Fuck Silver

That hack.

[A Simple Game]

4. Silver, Shumer, Gillibrand, just who do these people think they work for?

I'm getting pretty sick of paying their salaries so they can support a foreign country. Especially one that, while unprovoked, attacked one of our navy ships while it was in international waters. Of course they only killed and/or wounded over 200 of our sailors.

Perhaps we could devote some of this time to the internal problems we have in this country?

[Mr.Bill]

6. It's more like the problem is

they know exactly who they work for.

[A Simple Game]

7. I'm afraid you are right. n/t

[lumpy]

24. Hear Hear Well stated

[imthevicar]

42. They Know exactly who they work for.

And If any of us at DU dare Speak it's name we will be branded as haters.

[eggplant]

5. OFFS.

Time for another strongly worded letter.

[OmahaBlueDog]

8. Ideally, a university should be a "marketplace of ideas"

The good ideas rise and endure, and the bad ideas sink and fade away. Rather than attempt to defund groups calling for a boycott of Israel, I'd challenge other student groups that support Israel to come up with arguments as to why American support of Israel makes sense.

[840high]

12. Good idea.

[DeadLetterOffice]

9. So very not happy with my elected persons at the moment...

I expect this kind of narrow-minded dreck from Shelly Silver, honestly, and from Schumer for that matter. But I'm seriously hacked off at Gillibrand.

[hrmjustin]

10. I make no comment on the boycott but I as a nyer do not support this bill.

[Deep13]

11. "Congress shall make no law...

...respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

And yeah, it applies to the State of NY too.

[kelliekat44]

13. And we expect other nations to follow our brand of "democracy?" nt

[geomon666]

14. Freedom of association, so....

[DLnyc]

15. How about no salaries for hack politicians who do nothing but play power games

and manage corrupt empires?

[Dawson Leery]

16. First amendment.

[sulphurdunn]

17. There are members of Congress

who need to register as foreign lobbyists, after which they should be expelled for taking their oaths of office under false pretenses.

[olddad56]

18. Gee, wonder if Mr. Silver has a vested interest in this issue.

[Renew Deal]

19. That sounds unenforcable to me

[alcibiades_mystery]

20. The Modern Language Association considered a resolution supporting the ASA (rejected today)

It would be easy enough to make policy that prevents faculty members from seeking travel funds for traveling to and presenting at MLA. That would be an enforceable policy deriving from such a law. You'd essentially ban all SUNY and CUNY faculty in language/literature studies from attending the main national conference in their field. That is, if the resolution passed, which it did not (a separate resolution calling on the State Deparetment to attend to what some MLA members consider discriminatory acts against Palestinian scholars/students did pass the delegate assembly - unfortunately...it was a bone stupid resolution).

Point here is simple: it would be very easy for the state to enforce something like a reimbursement ban for particular conferences, and such a ban would essentially make them no-go conferences for faculty in numerous disciplines at dozens of state schools in NY. Faculty would also probably stop renewing memberships, and would resign executive, delegate, and board positions, since it would be prohibitive to attend the meetings.

[cstanleytech]

21. Wait, wouldnt that violate the 1st amendment? Specifically the whole freedom of speech aspect?

[former9thward]

34. No.

The First Amendment does not require that your speech be funded.

[cstanleytech]

39. Well the text says

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." And since this law is designed to prevent a form of speech I wonder it might not survive a challenge before SCOTUS.

[former9thward]

41. No speech is being prevented.

It is not being funded. Colleges are free to do what they want. They do not have a first amendment right to money.

[cstanleytech]

43. I think we are going to have to wait until SCOTUS rules on that assuming it even

makes it that far.
After all they did rule corporations have a right to free speech so why not colleges?

[blackspade]

23. A horrible precedent to set....

Don't these assemblymen have some poor people's pockets to pick for their corporate masters?

[NealK]

25. Sounds like blackmail to me.

Bunch of corrupted scumbags.

[Purveyor]

26. Thank you for posting. +1 eom

[blkmusclmachine]

29. Bow down and kiss Israel's A$$, cuz Gawd's in the mix!!!

[Jesus Malverde]

30. Another Academic Group Considers Israel Censure

A movement to pressure and isolate Israel gained further ground among American academics on Saturday, when the Modern Language Association took a step toward approving a resolution calling on the State Department to contest what it characterized as Israel’s discriminatory “denials of entry” to American scholars seeking to visit the West Bank to work at Palestinian universities.

After nearly three hours of fractious debate and procedural maneuvering, the group’s delegate assembly voted 60 to 53 to adopt the resolution, which will be submitted to the group’s nearly 28,000 members after review by its executive council. If it is approved, the Modern Language Association would be the fourth, and by far the largest, such group to endorse a measure critical of Israel in the past year.

The travel resolution did not call for a boycott like the one announced last month by the American Studies Association, which has prompted a backlash, including statements from more than 100 university presidents criticizing boycotts as a threat to academic freedom.

The group’s delegate assembly also voted against considering a second resolution, introduced by its Radical Caucus, to condemn the “attacks on the A.S.A.” and defend the right of individual scholars and groups to “take positions in solidarity with the Palestinian struggle against racism.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/12/us/another-academic-group-considers-israel-censure.html?_r=0

[Jesus Malverde]

31. He may be getting somewhere, after all

Israel is also being nudged along by the growing threats of an international boycott. Had its government not yielded when the EU insisted that Israeli institutions in the occupied West Bank would have to be excluded from certain joint research programmes, Israeli students might have lost their access to European universities, Tzipi Livni, Israel’s chief negotiator, recently told an audience at the Hebrew University.

http://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21593478-john-kerry-may-be-gradually-persuading-enough-israeli-right-wingers

[Jesus Malverde]

32. Ministry summons Dutch envoy over pension fund divestment

PGGM announces decision to divest from Israeli banks; envoy told Israel expects the Netherlands to object the move.

For the second time in the last month and a half, the Foreign Ministry on Friday summoned the Dutch ambassador to protest against a large Dutch company’s decision to sever ties with Israel.

Raffi Schutz, the ministry’s deputy director-general for European affairs, told the ambassador that the decision of PGGM pension fund to divest from Israel is unacceptable and relies on false pretexts.

Schutz told Ambassador Caspar Velkamp that Israel expected the Dutch government, in “the spirit of friendship between our countries, to take an unequivocal stance against such steps, which only wreak damage to the relations between Israel and the Netherlands.”

The PGGM company announced its decision to divest on its website on Wednesday from Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, First International Bank of Israel, Israel Discount Bank and Mizrahi Tefahot Bank.

http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/Foreign-Ministry-summons-Dutch-ambassador-over-pension-fund-divestment-337754

What starts out as a drop of rain, trickles down into a creek, before merging into an unstoppable torrent overrunning all that stand in it's path.

They can fight it, sandbagging their positions until their strength is sapped. An island surrounded by the fresh clear water of justice, lapping at it's shores. Isolated and waiting...and like apartheid, swept away by the tides of history.

[Jesus Malverde]

33. Dutch pension fund manager PGGM divests from 5 big Israeli banks over occupied territories

PGGM of the Netherlands, one of the 20 largest pension asset managers globally, said Wednesday it has divested from five Israeli banks because they are involved in financing the construction of Jewish settlements in occupied territories.

In financial terms the move is not that significant, given that PGGM had only several tens of millions invested in the banks out of the more than $170 billion in assets it manages. Yet it is the latest in a string of rebuffs to hit Israel over its settlement policies.

PGGM spokesman Wout Dekker confirmed the move first reported by the Haaretz newspaper. He said the decision followed years of discussions with the banks.

PGGM said it considers the settlements unethical due to the International Court of Justice's 2004 advisory opinion that found they were an illegal violation of Palestinian rights. That sentiment, rejected by Israel, is shared by most of the international community.

"In line with our policy of responsible investment, we sought a dialogue with the banks," PGGM said. "However, from those talks it emerged that the banks have little to no room to end their involvement in the financing of settlements in the occupied territories, given Israeli national law and the everyday reality in which they operate."

http://www.startribune.com/world/239229061.html

Up until last month, the European Union had been considering measures to clearly label products made in the settlements, a move that could harm sales. But discussions on labeling have been put on hold for now because Europe is working closely with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to support ongoing Israeli-Palestinian negotiations that are supposed to conclude in April.

[L0oniX]

35. Another self important stooge.

[Jesus Malverde]

36. If we’re not yet scared of Israel boycotts, we should be

The ASA boycott of Israel is no once-off event to wave off as ‘anti-Semitic.’ The BDS movement will be here to stay, unless we get out and fight it.


In April 2013, the general membership of the Association for Asian American Studies voted unanimously to institute an academic boycott of Israeli universities, their scholars and professors. Their reason for singling out Israel’s academic institutions is that they perceive them as “deeply complicit in Israel's violations of international law and human rights and in its denial of the right to education and academic freedom to Palestinians, in addition to their basic rights as guaranteed by international law."

Barely anyone stopped to notice.

But when in December 2013 the American Studies Association voted - though far from unanimously - to approve a nearly identical academic boycott, people stood up and noticed. Why?

Perhaps it was the sense of sheer magnitude: The nation’s largest interdisciplinary organization, representing 5,000 American Studies professors, was now officially lending its voice to the previously taboo tactics of boycott, divestment and sanctions.

Or perhaps it was the fact that the source of this boycott was none other than the ivory tower of academia in America, an auspicious collection of some of the greatest scholars in the world, and therefore their voices could not simply be swatted away as the pattering of some sophomoric anti-Israel co-eds.

http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/rabbis-round-table/.premium-1.568094

[Jesus Malverde]

37. Israeli settlements hit by boycott campaign

An international campaign to boycott Israeli settlement products has rapidly turned from a distant nuisance into a harsh economic reality for Israeli farmers in the West Bank’s Jordan Valley.

The export-driven income of growers in the valley’s 21 settlements dropped by more than 14 percent, or $29 million, last year, largely because Western European supermarket chains, particularly those in Britain and Scandinavia, are increasingly shunning the area’s peppers, dates, grapes and fresh herbs, settlers say.

“The damage is enormous,” said David Elhayani, head of the Jordan Valley Regional Council, which represents about 7,000 settlers. “In effect, today, we are almost not selling to the (Western) European market anymore.

Sales to Western Europe plummeted in the past two years, she said, adding that she now sells mostly to Eastern Europe and Russia, for up to 40 percent less. She reduced her growing area by one-third this season and doubts she can make ends meet in the future.

http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20140111/BIZ/140119881/Israeli-settlements-hit-by-boycott-campaign

[Jesus Malverde]

38. Krauthammer: Poison of anti-Semitism continues to proliferate

Which makes obvious that the ASA boycott has nothing to do with human rights. It's an exercise in radical chic, giving marginalized academics a frisson of pretend anti-colonialism, seasoned with a dose of edgy anti-Semitism.

And don't tell me this is merely about Zionism. The ruse is transparent. Israel is the world's only Jewish state. To apply to the state of the Jews a double standard that you apply to none other, to judge one people in a way you judge no other, to single out that one people for condemnation and isolation - is to engage in a gross act of discrimination.

And discrimination against Jews has a name. It's called anti-Semitism.

http://www.chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Krauthammer-Poison-of-anti-Semitism-continues-to-5128807.php

[Tom Ripley]

40. Well, if Chuckie the Cabbage-Smasher says so, it must be true