Yasmin Yablonko, an Israeli who refused army service, describes the social pressure on those Jews who don’t want to sign up for mandatory service. Abandonment of duty is a source of great social shame.

An open letter signed by dozens of prominent legal scholars calls on the European Union to stop trading with Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories. This letter comes in the wake of the EU decision to label settlement products. However, as the international law experts confirm, the EU and its member states have a firm obligation under international law to stop trading with settlements altogether.

Due to pressure from the Afrikan Black Coalition (ABC), a coalition of Black student groups on University of California campuses, UC will have all holdings in private prisons sold by December 31st, 2015. The three corporations are Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), Geo Group, and G4S. G4S has been targeted by the BDS movement and profits from incarceration and deportation in Palestine as well as the US.

On Thursday Dec 10, 2015 over 800 members from the Arab community, Muslim community and human rights activists of New York City came together in solidarity for Syrian and Iraqi refugees to say no to the harmful racism, Islamophobia, Arabphobia, and Xenophobia towards the refugee community. People of all different faiths and backgrounds joined the rally, simultaneously there was a banner drop at the Trump Towers.

On Wednesday November 18, 2015, San Jose State University became the first California State University to pass a student government resolution to divest from companies complicit in the Israeli occupation of Palestine. The Associated Students resolution calls on the Board of Directors to remove San Jose State University’s holdings from four companies that play an active role in the human rights violations committed by the Israeli Government in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. This resolution is endorsed by 28 organizations the vast majority of which are student organizations of diverse backgrounds.

Faculty and graduate student members of CUNY for Palestine, reiterate their unequivocal support for students to organize for social justice, and to protest against injustices, without having their rights to free speech and free assembly infringed upon or violated by members of the university administration or law enforcement.

Yesterday a settlement was announced in Professor Steven Salaita’s lawsuit against the University of Illinois for violating his academic freedom and right to free speech. Over 80 academics have responded by signing onto a letter saying: We are pleased that the University of Illinois trustees, through the payment of a substantial monetary settlement to Professor Salaita, have acknowledged how Professor Salaita’s termination amounted to a serious violation of both his constitutional right to free speech on matters of public concern, and principles of academic freedom. We recognize that UIUC’s unlawful treatment of Professor Salaita has had implications well beyond Professor Salaita individually. We feel strongly that the monetary settlement of Professor Salaita’s legal claim does not address the underlying breaches of academic freedom and widely accepted standards for the conduct of academic governance.

Palestinian student organizations in Gaza call upon student organizations and unions around the world to mobilize against Israel’s policies of occupation, colonization and apartheid in Palestine by intensifying the #WaveSolidarityBDS campaign initiated by the Palestinian BDS National Committee.

Tuesday, November 10, 2015 at 11:30 am, Jewish Americans CODEPINK activists, Ariel Gold, of Ithaca, NY and Ariel Vegosen, of Oakland, CA, unfurled a banner near the Kotel (Western Wall) reading, “American Jews support BDS.” Representing the women’s peace organization, Code Pink, the activists goal was to express Jewish opposition to the Israeli occupation of Palestine and endorse the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement as a nonviolent strategy to bring about a just peace in Palestine and Israel.

A member of Christian Peacemaker Teams writes to author J.K. Rowling from Hebron: I want to tell you that in the city of Hebron where I have worked for the last twenty years, I have, with my own eyes, seen Palestinian children attacked, beaten, arrested—without any of the due process the civilized world grants minor children—and in general treated with utter contempt by Israeli soldiers and settlers. Ms. Rowling, you do not have to support the Academic and Cultural Boycott, but for the sake of all Palestinian children who love Harry, you do need to say their lives matter.