home |
By Olga Wojtas, The Times Higher Education Supplement, August 19 2005, pg 4
The attempt by the Association of University Teachers to boycott Israeli scholars and institutions has triggered a new debate on the value of academic freedom, acording to a senior academic at one of the targeted institutions.
Gerald Steinberg professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University praised the NPC for its "principled position" in opposing the AUT's boycott policy, subsequently overturned by a special AUT council.
Prof Steinberg said that the allegations of an absense of academic freedom in Israel had been repeated so often that they were taken as fact without examining the evidence.
But the boycott had "galvanised" staff and students across the Bar-Ilan campus to reasses the importance of academic freedom.
"I will not stand here and claim that Israeli behavious and policies are perfect. I have my critisisms like other Israeli citizens," he said. "But even our enemies admit and admire one aspect of Israeli society - its democracy, openness and unfettered free speech, and this certainly applied to the university campuses, classrooms, and publications."
The AUT boycott was a far cry from the Academic boycott of South Africa during apartheid, which had supported two academics jailed by the regime that denied academic freedom or disent, he said.
Prof Steinberg directs Bar-Ilans programme on conflict management and negotiation. He said much of its work was crucial to the efforts to understand how to create a basis for tolerance and understanding in the middle of protracted conflicts.
Why I am a Zionist
- The author takes stock of his feelings on Israel and Zionism on the occasion of Israel's 53rd Birthday
Do not treat Israel like apartheid South Africa
- The comparison with South Africa is intellectually lazy, morally questionable, and possibly even mendacious
This site provides resources about Zionism and Israeli history, including links to source documents. We are not responsible for the information content of these sites. These links are NOT intended to be an exhaustive reference about Zionism, but the list will keep growing...
Please tell us about your favorite links and we will review them for inclusion.
Copying - Please do copy these pages, and especially these links to your Web site, giving credit to Zionism on the Web www.zionismontheweb.org
Thank you.
Please link to our Sister Web sites - at http://www.zionism-israel.com Information about Israel and Zionism
and http://www.zionism.netfirms.com The Zionism Pages
Wikipedia article about Zionism
- A comprehensive article including the history of Zionism as well as links to specific topics and articles about anti-Zionism.Zionism - Table of contents at the Jewish Virtual Library
Zionism - Definition and Brief History - A balanced article that covers the definitions and history of Zionism as well as opposition to Zionism and criticisms by Arabs, Jewish anti-Zionists.
Labor Zionism - Early History and Critique - Contribution of Labor Zionism to the creation of the Jewish state, and problems of Labor Zionism in a changing reality.
The US Library of congress has a comprehensive and balanced set of articles about Zionism:
Zionist Precursors - US Library of Congress
Political Zionism - US Library of Congress
Cultural Zionism - US Library of Congress
Labor Zionism - US Library of Congress
Revisionist Zionism - US Library of Congress
Jewish Agency Zionism pages - Links to basic information about Zionism from the Jewish Agency
Ambassador Herzog explains Zionism in the UN
Advocacy
Active Zionism - A Zionist advocacy site with many useful links
Realistic Religious Zionism - moderate religious Zionist Web site