B.D.S. Divests From Students More Than Anyone Else
Protesters and counter-protesters at a 2017 march in Washington, D.C. Photo by Ted Eytan.
If the Columbia College student body approves an upcoming referendum to divest the College’s stocks, funds and endowments from companies based in Israel, it will join a growing number of college campuses that have expressed support for the Boycott, Divestments, and Sanctions (B.D.S.) movement. While the stated goal of B.D.S. is to exert economic pressure on Israel to affect their policies surrounding territorial disputes over the West Bank and the Golan Heights, the implementation of this referendum—and the broader success of the movement—represents a serious threat to nuanced dialogue and the student experience at Columbia.
To fully conceptualize the potential harm of B.D.S., it is necessary to analyze the effects of similar measures on other campuses. Although the B.D.S. movement aims to halt alleged discrimination and oppression, research suggests that the introduction and adoption of B.D.S. has done exactly the opposite, resulting in discomfort, bias, hostility, and division among Jewish students and non-Jewish students alike.
According to the Anti-Defamation League, an organization that tracks domestic and international sentiments toward Jewish people, college campuses in which B.D.S. initiatives are most prominent experience an 89% increase in anti-Semitic incidents. Recognizing this relationship between B.D.S. and anti-Semitism, the California state legislature passed A.B. 2844, which bars state agencies and public colleges from contracting with businesses that participate in the B.D.S. movement. California’s State Assembly deemed B.D.S. a violation of statutes that prohibit discrimination against Jews.
Critics claim that such legislation stifles legitimate criticism of the Israeli government protected under the First Amendment. However, B.D.S. activities on campuses escalate from legitimate criticism of Israel to anti-Semitism when they explicitly target Jewish people for the actions and policies of the Israeli government—targeting a specific domestic demographic for grievances against a foreign state.
The divisions between students that arise from B.D.S. do not solely manifest in the form of discrimination against Jewish students. Bassem Eid, a Palestinian human rights activist, believes that B.D.S. often fuels hatred and hostility by oversimplifying the conflict. Even as a critic of Israel and a proud Palestinian, Eid was silenced at the University of Johannesburg by B.D.S. supporters for pointing out that B.D.S. imposes economic hardship on Palestinians. In this way, B.D.S. has become a litmus test to gauge one’s unequivocal support for the Palestinian cause, brushing aside the nuance of an impossibly complex conflict in favor of a binary choice. Instead of fostering rigorous intellectual engagement, B.D.S. prevents important debates that might illuminate the dangers of fanaticism and intransigence on both sides.
Moreover, by limiting the range of acceptable stances on the conflict, the B.D.S. movement ostracizes pro-Palestinian students who reject B.D.S. for its inefficacy and inability to uplift the lives of Palestinians. B.D.S. does not create space for students who support the co-existence of a Jewish and Palestinian state; the founder of B.D.S. himself said that “no Palestinian—rational Palestinian, not a sell-out Palestinian—will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.” Similar sentiments were shared at Columbia. Following the vote by the Columbia College Student Council to introduce a B.D.S. referendum, supporters of the initiative began chanting the adage: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” This slogan references the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, which are the distinctive borders of both the internationally-recognized territory belonging to Israel and the disputed regions. Claiming that the land between these borders will belong only to Palestinians implies the elimination of the Jewish state that exists there.
Some of the main proponents of Columbia’s referendum attempt to distance the proposed measure from the broader B.D.S. movement by asserting that they are focused on specific companies that are engaged in oppressive practices—not a complete boycott of all things associated with Israel. But this distancing rings hollow when they refer to a direct affiliation with the “larger Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement in which our campaign is embedded” on their website.
Even more striking, the danger of B.D.S. is not merely rhetorical or ideological—its passage could affect any student who benefits from educational opportunities with ties to Israel. The B.D.S. proposal at Columbia calls for the divestment of all “stocks, funds, and endowments” from companies that profit from Israel’s alleged occupation of territories claimed by Palestinians. Academic programs would suffer as universities nationwide have partnerships with public Israeli institutions through which students are granted the chance to study abroad. Columbia offers semester-long and dual degree programs with Tel Aviv University, but if B.D.S. is carried out to its logical conclusion, students will miss out on valuable opportunities to participate in similar academic and cultural programs due to divestment from the institutions and corporations that finance these programs.
The Porter School of Environmental Studies at Tel Aviv University. Photo by Dodgerit.
B.D.S. would also restrict university-sponsored research. For example, Israeli energy companies have partnered with American universities, and M.I.T. collaborates with Israeli companies that conduct novel research and develop new technologies. Johns Hopkins University, one of the nation’s leading medical institutions, works with Israeli digital healthcare startups to explore advancements in e-health. Depending on the standards for divestment defined by each university, such partnerships would have to be abandoned if B.D.S. were adopted. Such a measure would jeopardize the objectives of institutions that engage with the most advanced research and innovation, as well as limit the exposure of students to such novel developments across disciplines.
In accordance with President Trump’s “Executive Order on Combatting Anti-Semitism,” institutions that receive federal funding will be at risk of the government abrogating those funds if B.D.S. is successfully adopted. The surges of anti-Semitism that have occurred on campuses where B.D.S. is most present allow for the invocation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. While the statute does not define Judaism as a race or national origin, it asserts that Title VI protections remain applicable when anti-Semitism is expressed in racial terms, such as denying the Jewish people the right to self-determination, or in response to Israeli nationality.
Columbia University alone receives nearly $600 million in federal funds that contribute to the financing of research projects. This accounts for 69% of Columbia’s research and development expenditure, meaning that refusing such financial support would severely limit the capacity of Columbia to sponsor research. The threat that the broader B.D.S. movement poses to higher education is hardly confined to research, though. Considering that the eight Ivy League institutions receive more in federal funds than they collect in tuition payment—exceeding sums provided by the U.S. Treasury to sixteen state governments—the strength of American research and the ability of America’s most prestigious universities to provide tuition assistance would be greatly threatened if these colleges were to embrace B.D.S. resolutions.
Despite a growing number of B.D.S. proposals being introduced by college students nationwide, the students at these universities stand to bear a much larger financial burden from these referenda than would either Israel or the Palestinians. When divestment measures against profiteers from Israel are adopted as a political statement by student governments, the proposals do not reflect the totality of interests possessed by the students that the councils represent. Rather than asserting a political statement on the occupation of disputed territories, campus B.D.S. spurs discrimination and limitations on students—even on those with no opinions on such measures.
For all of these reasons, regardless of the outcome of the upcoming vote, the University would be wise to recognize the many dangers of divestment from Israel. When Barnard College passed a B.D.S. referendum in the spring of 2018, Barnard President Sian Beilock cited concerns about the crystallization of divisions between students caused by accepting the binary logic of B.D.S. and the failure of the referendum to illustrate consensus. Despite winning a majority of votes, the Barnard referendum received support from fewer than 30 percent of students because of poor voter participation. The referendum was therefore not a reflection of the sentiments held by many that comprise the student body.
A similar course of events might play out this spring with the upcoming vote at Columbia College. Even if the referendum were to pass with a high participation rate, the Advisory Committee on Socially Responsible Investing (A.C.S.R.I.) holds that “the merits of the dispute must lie clearly on one side” to move forward with divestment. If there is anything about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that most observers agree upon, it’s that there is definitely more than one side of the story. Columbia should reject B.D.S. once and for all and promote more nuanced dialogue about how to build peaceful co-existence for Israelis and Palestinians alike.
Zachary Becker is a staff writer at CPR and a sophomore in Columbia College studying Political Science. He grew up in Texas and Florida but has most recently lived in Newport Beach, California.