The New York Times today concedes the changing reality in recognizing that the boycott-Israel movement is growing. But it does everything it can to undermine the movement’s impact.
The boycott vote of the of American Studies Association is on front page of New York Times: “Boycott by Academic Group Is a Symbolic Sting to Israel,” by Richard Perez-Pena and Jodi Rudoren.
But the first two comments in the paper are from opponents of the measure, a leading Israeli scholar (“It’s almost like a family betrayal,” said Manuel Trajtenberg) followed by Israeli ambassador Ron Dermer. This is followed by a third comment, from Avraham Burg, that says he’s a leftist but he’s against the boycott.
Not until the 16th paragraph does boycott proponent Omar Barghouti get cited with one quotation:
“It is perhaps the strongest indicator yet that the B.D.S. movement is reaching a tipping point, even in the U.S., the last bastion of support for Israel’s unjust system,” he said.
Then it’s back to the negativity. The Times quotes Mahmoud Abbas publicly rejecting boycott of Israel and an adviser to Abbas saying we are not asking anyone to boycott products of Israel.
The Times had to cover this news. But how did they do it? They attacked it before they even told you what it was. You have to get to the 16th paragraph to find anyone who spoke out in favor of it– even though it won, 2-1.
Couldn’t they have found someone in the American Studies Association who voted for it? There were 1252 votes in the ASA. 66 percent were in favor. So that’s more than 800.
They couldn’t find any one of the 800 American scholars to explain why they voted for this historic measure? Not one?
Correction: The last paragraph of the NYT article does include a quotation from a Stanford Professor, David Palumbo-Liu, which seems to support the boycott.
They didn’t need new interviews. They could simply have quoted any one or more of the already-published ENDORSEMENTS in support of the boycott that were published here in Mondoweiss.
Compare the depth this NYT article from 1966 goes into about the former apartheid regime in S Africa: http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/blogs/learning/pdf/2013/19660619peopleothersLN.pdf
CAMERA has a blog and video devoted to NYT bias against Israel; at a glance, mostly centered on NYT coverage of Iran, Syria, I-P: http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=2&x_outlet=68&x_article=2602
“They couldn’t find any one of the 800 American scholars to explain why they voted for this historic measure? Not one?”
Did you miss the long quote from the Stanford professor at the end of the piece?
“A number of American scholars, while angry at Israeli policies in the West Bank, say they oppose singling Israel out over other countries with far worse human rights records.”
This is such BS. Anyone really angry at Israeli policies in the WB would notice that the US has been acting as Israel’s enabler and lawyer for decades. If they disagree with a boycott of Israeli universities, they would keep a sense of perspective about it. The US habitually singles out Israel by defending it against charges of human rights violations. And are any of these boycott critics speaking out against the blockade on Gaza? Not that I’ve seen. Do they worry about innocents who suffer under the sanctions on Iran? Not that you’d notice. Boycotts and sanctions imposed by our government or the Israeli government which do real harm to ordinary people don’t bother them at all. Or if it does, somehow nobody ever hears them complaining about it. Their “anger” at Israeli policies seems mainly a cover for attacking people who draw attention to those policies.