Douglas Davis has a great commentary on this fatuous but despicable effort by the AUT:

http://www.spectator.co.uk/article.php?table=§ion=&issue=2005-04-16&id=5979

Posted by: Charles Martel at April 17, 2005 8:22 AM

Thanks for directing me to that article Charles.
At first I actually regarded this suggestion more seriously than the talk to the Conservative Party Society that we discussed yesterday, perhaps because, (to me, naively maybe) Universities involve the young, the future, formative minds, etc.

I particularly liked the comment "Of course, you will not have to bother your turbo-charged minds with this week’s Unicef report which shows that half of the women in the Arab world are illiterate and more than ten million children in the region don’t attend school."

Which brings us round to the best rebutal to the "can only understand the Koran in the original Arabic fallacy" But thats OT.

Posted by: Granny Weatherwax at April 17, 2005 10:20 AM

Happy to oblige Granny Weatherwax.

Although I am not a member (and never will be after this fiasco), my profession is represented by the AUT so this is particularly painful for me.

In addition to the fine points made by Davis, it should be noted that prior to the 1967 war, there were no universities in the Palestinian territories. Israel built five and it is sadly ironic that they are now a hotbed of anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic activity including these scholarly pursuits:

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=3788

It's easy to see why Sue Blackwell and the AUT are so keen on collaborations with the Palestinian academic community.

Posted by: Charles Martel at April 17, 2005 12:03 PM

If this is true at all, it is because these Palestine universities were serving as schools of jihad.
Posted by Robert at April 17, 2005 06:09 AM

Somebody send Sue Blackwell the footage captured (probably by Palestinian Media Watch) from PA TV of a display put on at a Palestinian university replicating the scene of carnage at the Szbarro pizza restaurant, replete with portions of bodies where they were left after the bomb detonated, and hajib-clad students pointing and gawking in amusement.

Posted by: waterdragon52 at April 17, 2005 12:25 PM

Let me get this straight, British dons & students-

The Jews support freedom of thought, freedom of assembly, a representative democracy (including Muslim Arabs in their own government) and simple survival against practically every country surrounding them ---after being thrown out of their land by a Roman dictator and driven around the world for 2,000 years, ghetto-ized and suffering pogroms century after century, during which they retained not only their culture, but became famous for their learning, producing doctors, scientists and leading lights in the arts and Law.

While the 'Palestinians' are those descendants of Muslims who invaded this ancient land from Arabia, squatted on stolen soil for 1350 years, tried to overthrow part of Jordan for a 'Palestinian state' a few years ago (and the Muslim King of Jordan destroyed them, to little notice in the world's press), and who suppress freedom of thought and conscience (Sharia Law), want a theocratic state with only Muslim leadership and legal codes, and the expulsion (AKA extermination) of all Jews from the area?

And you support the latter?

Am I missing something new in the thinking process of a liberal arts college?

Now they are in favor of supressing freedom of thought? And cheering on dogmatic despotism?

Well, the 'Palestinian scholars' will feel right at home in merry old 'Judenfrei' England.

Time to go back into the swastika and death's head ring biz, you nearby cockney entrepreneurs!

And printing those Arabic copies of "Mein Kampf".

While America will end up getting all of the fleeing Jewish intellectuals, as it did during WW II. (And that worked out real well for old Adolf, now, didn't it?)

There's always an upside to these Swiftian 'cut off your nose to spite your face' follies.

Keep me laughing, England!

(Where's Rowan "Mr. Bean/Black Adder" Atkinson in all of this?)

Posted by: BigSleep at April 17, 2005 1:47 PM

". . .Am I missing something new in the thinking process of a liberal arts college?

Now they are in favor of supressing freedom of thought? And cheering on dogmatic despotism? . . ."

Posted by: BigSleep at April 17, 2005 01:47 PM

Hey, Bigsleep, not exactly NEW, but only fairly recently crossed over the "critical mass" to the point where we all of a sudden take notice.

It started in the U.S. in the mid-1800s, but earlier in Europe, all thanks to the Three Stooges of Philosophy, Kant, Hegel, and Marx.

Naturally, the ancestral thinking that has led to this huge totalitarian influence in our institutions of learning went back much further than that, but if Europe had paid more attention to Bacon, Locke, and the pre-Revolutionary thinkers of America than to Kant, Hegel, and Marx, then none of us in the West would be troubled by the Tiny Minority of Extremists today.

That's no joke; NONE OF US.

Posted by: cubed at April 17, 2005 2:18 PM

Funny how these leftist scumbags seem to focus on Israel like a laser beam, yet don't care what Russia supressing the Chechens or Red China occupying Tibet and threatening Taiwan, or the Kurds not having their nation when they are a unique nationality and not some dirtbag Arab tribe like the beloved Palestinians.
By the way, here's that d'himmi twat Blackwell's web url:
http://www.sue.be/pal/

Posted by: Jakester at April 17, 2005 3:39 PM

"Sue Blackwell, a lecturer in English at Birmingham and a leading member of the British Committee for Universities of Palestine, said it was not possible to have links with both Israel and the Palestinians."

I agree completely. So choose sides. And make sure you have a list of such people as "Sue Blackwell, lecturer in English" and others who join her side, some of whom might someday hope to be given grants, or invited to an Ameridcan symposium, conference, academic association meeting, or university but, by lending their support to this boycott undertaken in the same spirit as animated the late Mr. Hitler, circa 1933, have put themselves beyond the pale of decency. While appeals to decency, morality, and history may fail, perhaps an appeal to some future self-interest -- for the list will be known, and permanently engraved on many memories -- will help make some think twice.

Posted by: Hugh at April 17, 2005 5:51 PM

Here is what puts my stomach in a knot, is that these leftists are predominantly Jewish themselves, take a roll call of prominent leftists, in academica, human rights, in the media and even in human rights organizations that defend Islamic terrorists.

A.N.S.W.E.R. the leftist organization that supported the Muslim Bosniaks, and demanded that the US intercede in the Balkans, and then led the anti war demonstrations is predominantly Jewish.

Israel has a large left contingent of Jews, that apparently are anti Israeli, a reporter for Ha'aretz even lives in the Palestine territories and reports their POV.

In fact one of the charges laid at the feet of Jews, by the neo NAZI's and other anti semites is that Communism is Jewish.

And by the way the neo cons are mostly Jewish, and neo cons are also unreconstructed Marxist Leninst Trotskyites.

So go figure. Looks more like the Jewish "Ummah", has a split personality, but when it comes to the descendants of "apes and pigs" the Muslims stand shoulder to shoulder. ibn Warrag and Ali Sina are no longer Muslims, just like I'm no longer Catholic.

Posted by: Giaour at April 17, 2005 6:23 PM

Here is the enemy Sue Blackwell's email: s.a.blackwell@bham.ac.uk

Posted by: Jakester at April 17, 2005 7:34 PM

Jaketser and others: The Western European intelligentsia will never forgive the USA for making it impossible for them to ever live and work under the wise, enlightened, creative leadership of Comrade Stalin. They're down on Israel because that country, while originally brought into being by Soviet support for the UN partition plan of 1947, ended up destroying quantities of Soviet weaponry and beating up Soviet "revolutionary" clients like Nasser and Assad.

Maybe, had Europe been left to its own devices after 1945, it would've been well-rid of a parasitic and self-destructive intellectual class in the Purges of '53; undergone spiritual renewal in the 1960's; and made its break with totalitarianism by 1979.

Posted by: Kepha at April 17, 2005 7:55 PM

While we're at it, our continent does have a longstanding tradition of providing refuge to Old Testament-reading Brits.

Posted by: Kepha at April 17, 2005 7:56 PM

Just on practical grounds: compare the academic achievements of the five miserable colleges(more like terrorist training schools) the Israelis founded in Palestinian occupied territories vs. all the colleges and universities in Israel proper. I they succeed, all they will be getting is some Koran quoting Muslim hotheads who amount to zip compared to the world class schools in Israel!

Posted by: Jakester at April 17, 2005 10:01 PM

FINE... let the universities keep investing in tobacco, rain forest lumber, Indian leather, Syria, Cuba, Niger, Mauritania, China, Iran, and Pakistan. Let them single out Israel for boycott.

Every share of stock they sell will be INSTANTLY gobbled up by serious investors that appreciate a culture that welcomes ingenuity, technology, inventiveness, and entrepreuership like Israel. If I had money laying around, I'd invest in Israel in a second.

And should England decide to kick out all of their Jews, please, send them to America! Please!

We could use an influx of scientists, doctors, researchers, teachers, bankers, attorneys, and merchants. And you can keep all of your "religion of peace"-ers that make nothing but terrorism, children, and misery.

Posted by: kj at April 18, 2005 10:59 AM

I'm no longer in school (thank God!!) but what about organizing a boycott of UK universities here? Any school which participates in that evil plan should be boycotted.

Posted by: Seymour Paine at April 18, 2005 1:54 PM

Stop beating up on England. It has a large number of University Marxist idiots and lunatics just like American campuses do. It doesnt make the whole of England inclined that way.

Posted by: Zico at April 18, 2005 2:10 PM