The backlash against a threatened British boycott of Israeli universities gathered pace today with a statement from more than 250 distinguished academics and thinkers condemning the move as “bad for Britain, bad for academic freedom, bad for Palestinians and bad for peace”.

Signatories of the statement, which appears as a full-page advertisement in The Times today, include the heads of some of Britain’s leading scientific and learned research organisations, as well as eminent writers and broadcasters.

Robert Winston, the fertility expert, said that the proposed academic boycott, put forward by the Universities and Colleges Union (UCU) Congress in protest at the continued occupation of the Palestinian territories, was “utterly inappropriate”.

Professor Winston added: “The academics in Israel are the very people we should be working with, rather than against, if we want to promote better understanding. I believe this boycott only has the support of a tiny proportion of academics in Britain.”

Lord Bragg, the writer and broadcaster, said that the UCU motion failed to take account of the complexities of Middle East politics.

“Long before me, people have fought for freedom of speech. It should be indivisible that that is that,” he said.

Colin Blakemore, chief executive of the Medical Research Council, said: “We have examined whether there are ever any circumstances where such a boycott would be effective and the only one would be where a country had sunk to such depths that its academics were effectively unable to communicate with colleagues in other countries and so would not really be affected.”

Baroness Julia Neuberger, a rabbi and Liberal Democrat peer, said that Israeli academics were responsible for important collaborative work with Palestinians. Baroness Ruth Deech, the independent adjudicator for British university students, said that she feared that the boycott would lead to a backlash against Jewish students on British campuses.

Last week Israel raised the spectre of international sanctions against British goods by preparing a motion for debate in its Parliament that would require British goods to be labelled: “This country is involved in an anti-Israeli boycott.”

The British production, of the Abba musical Mamma Mia!, due to open in Tel Aviv in a few weeks, has been jeopardised by threats from local theatre companies who are refusing to stage it in retaliation.

The UCU leadership does not support a boycott.

But Tom Hickey, the chairman of BrightonUniversity’s UCU branch and proposer of the motion, said that it would enhance the international reputation of British academics.

Taking a stand

– John Howard, the Australian Prime Minister, has ordered his country’s cricket team to boycott the Zimbabwe side in protest at President Mugabe’s actions

– The EU imposed a boycott on the Hamas-controlled Palestinian Government last year, after Hamas’s victory in elections. The ban was suspended temporarily to allow talks over the fate of Alan Johnston, the kidnapped BBC journalist

– The United States economic, commercial and financial embargo against Cuba was imposed in 1962 and still stands

– 60 countries boycotted the 1980 Olympics, hosted by Moscow, over the invasion of Afghanistan