Anti-Israel divestment movement gaining traction at US colleges

In this photo provided by the The Daily Northwestern, Northwestern University students celebrate after the Associated Student Government Senate passed a Northwestern Divest-sponsored resolution in Evanston, Ill. just before 1:30 a.m. on Thursday, Feb. 19, 2015. The resolution asks the university to divest from six corporations the resolution’s sponsors say violate Palestinians' human rights. (AP Photo/The Daily Northwestern, Nathan Richards) (The Associated Press)

NEW YORK – The ritual has become increasingly commonplace on many American college campuses: A student government body takes up Israeli policy toward the Palestinians and decides whether to demand their school divest from companies that work with the Jewish state.

In the United States, Israel's closest ally, the decade-old boycott-divestment-sanctions movement, or BDS, is making its strongest inroads on college campuses. No U.S. school has sold off stock and none is expected to do so anytime soon. Still, the current academic year is seeing an increasing number of divestment drives on campus. Since January, student governments at four universities have taken divestment votes.

While the campaigns unfold around resolutions largely proposed by chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine, outside groups have become increasingly involved. They include American Muslims for Palestine and the Quakers' American Friends Service Committee, on one side, to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, on the other.

At some campuses, candidates for student government are being asked their views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The heated rhetoric has led to claims of anti-Semitism and of infringement on free speech.

"I don't think anyone is surprised when they hear a BDS movement is coming," said Ira Stup, a 2009 Columbia University graduate and former director of J Street U, the college arm of the liberal pro-Israel lobby J Street, which opposes BDS. "It's becoming a regular occurrence."

"It's creating a debate. It's creating a significant amount of conversation in the entire community, and it's set on the terms the activists want it to be set on," said Rahim Kurwa, a doctoral candidate and member of Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of California, Los Angeles.

The boycott-divestment-sanctions movement grew from a 2005 international call from Palestinian groups as an alternative to armed struggle over control of the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem, which Israel captured in 1967 and Palestinians seek for an independent state.

BDS advocates say the movement, based on the campaign against South African apartheid decades ago, is aimed at Israeli policy, not Jews, in response to two decades of failed peace talks and expanded Israeli settlement of the West Bank and east Jerusalem.

But supporters of Israel say that boycotting the country is no way to make peace, especially since many BDS supporters do not differentiate between protesting Jewish settlements on occupied lands or Israel as a whole.

Only a few dozen student governments have cast ballots on divestment proposals since 2012. Of those votes, about a dozen have won passage. University administrators and boards, not student governments, oversee investments, and trustees have widely rejected divestment.

Still, the campaigns have succeeded in challenging students to re-consider their views of Palestinians.

Nowhere is the impact more evident than the University of California system. Student governments at five of the 10 UC campuses have voted for divestment. Since December, divestment also won the backing of the labor union representing thousands of teaching assistants and other workers for the entire UC system and the University of California Students Association, which represents student government bodies statewide.

"The movement is getting more and more organized," said Roz Rothstein, chief executive and co-founder of the California-based group Stand With Us, which helps train students to defend the Jewish state. "The strategy is being shared across campuses."