Israeli Apartheid Week

Confronting bias on campus

Poster available on Israeli Apartheid Week website

Portrayals of Israel as apartheid state coming soon to a college near you

By Yaffi Spodek

The Jewish Star

Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) 2009 will arrive in communities worldwide beginning March 1 and continue through March 8.

Now in its fifth year, the annual anti-Israel campaign has experienced steady growth since its debut in Toronto in 2005, expanding to 44 cities this year, including New York, which is participating for the third time.

“This year, IAW occurs in the wake of Israel’s barbaric assault against the people of Gaza,” notes the apartheidweek.org web site. “Lectures, films, and actions will make the point that these latest massacres further confirm the true nature of Israeli Apartheid. IAW 2009 will continue to build and strengthen the growing Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement at a global level.”

The IAW Web site is not functional most of the year, but was recently re-launched to promote upcoming activities. Though there is an index of participating cities, specific details regarding locations and featured speakers have not yet been publicized.

“They don’t seem to have listed where their events are happening, which may be a tactical move,” observed Dani Klein, the campus director of North America for StandWithUs, an organization that trains students to become better advocates for Israel on college campuses. “But we know exactly what they are going to say –– they are going to accuse Israel of being an apartheid state and will most probably bring up war crimes from Gaza in January…The events could happen anywhere, but we are ready.”

StandWithUs has created two related booklets containing apartheid information that will be distributed to campuses and communities in the coming weeks to educate students about how to defend Israel.

One booklet focuses on apartheid as it occurred in South Africa and explains why comparisons to a democratic Israel are invalid. The second discusses the concept of apartheid in general, and how it exists today throughout Muslim countries in various forms, including gender, sexual and religious.

“In no way can that be attributed to the State of Israel,” explained Klein, a graduate of the Rambam Mesivta High School in Lawrence. “The two booklets are meant to go hand in hand…StandWithUs is known for creating materials relevant for students on campus, and we have also created handouts specifically discussing what happened in Gaza.”

StandWithUs works year round with pro-Israel activists and campus organizations to arm students with information that they can use to challenge the IAW speakers and their allegations, by presenting positive facts about Israel. StandWithUs staff members frequently attend events as well to ensure that a pro-Israel point of view is well represented.

In previous years IAW events were a combination of speakers and a film or panel.

“The panels are never unbiased,” Klein told The Jewish Star. “All the people sitting on the panel are diverse in terms of background, but not opinion. It is basically a panel of different types of people who all agree that Israel is bad.”

In the past, several colleges in New York, including Columbia, NYU and Hunter, hosted events.

“They might pop up at other campuses as well this year, like Baruch, Pace, Queens and Brooklyn,” Klein cautioned.

The opening event for IAW 2008 was titled “60 Years of Exile” and featured a video message given by Azmi Bishara, head of the Tajamu party and an exiled member of the Israeli parliament. A second presentation was given by Jamil Dakwar, former senior attorney for Adalah: the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel.

IAW, according to its site, is comprised of a coalition of student community groups including NYU Students for Justice in Palestine; Adalah NY: The Coalition for Justice in the Middle East; the Palestine Education Project; and the WESPAC Foundation. Klein added that events are frequently attended by members of the International Palestinian Solidarity Movement, known as ISM or PSM.

Hillel, the Foundation for Jewish Campus Life, did not return phone calls requesting comment.