SPME International Academic Network Being Asked to Contact UK Colleagues to Talk to UCU Delegates To Vote Against Boycott Motions

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The nearly 10,000 members of the Scholars for Peace in the Middle East International Academic Network are being asked to personally and colleagially contact their UK academic colleagues to meet with University and College Union (UCU) delegates to try to persuade them to vote against four policy motions which will have a direct impact on the academic boycott issues. The University and College Union (UCU) has distributed its initial motions document to branches on 5/4/07. To read the four motions click here .

A Counter-Boycott document has been prepared by Dr. Jonathan Rynhold, Bar Ilan University and member of the executive committee of the International Advisory Board On Academic Freedom of Bar-Ilan University , intended to assist academics and others in arguing against the campaign to boycott the Israeli academia. The aim is to mobilize British and other academics to publicly oppose the boycott.

Organized by the IAB and the UK Fair Play Campaign Group (FPCG), a delegation representing Israeli Academia and Faculty Unions will be arriving to the UK this week to meet with UCU members at branches that are pro-boycott or undecided. The delegation has two purposes: to explain why the boycott should be opposed, and to show the diversity and caliber of Israeli academia. The delegation represents Israeli Academia (and unions) and includes Dr. Jonathan Rynhold, Bar Ilan University; Prof. Miriam Shlesinger, Bar Ilan University; Prof. Zvi HaCohen, Ben Gurion University (Chairman of the coordinating committee of the Israeli Faculty Association); Prof. Daphna Erdinast-Vulcan, University of Haifa (very active member of the council of the union of Haifa). Two additional representatives are already in London and are planned to join some of the delegation activities: Prof. Zvi Ziegler, Technion (head of the Inter Senate Committee) and Prof. David Newman, Ben Gurion University (currently on sabbatical in the UK).

Please read the draft letter at: http://www.biu.ac.il/academic_freedom/Proposed_Letter_to_send_to_UK_Coleugues.docprepared by the IAB and send it to your colleagues in the UK with a request that they talk to their UCU delegates and persuade them to vote against the boycott.

Many thanks.

For the latest information about the UCU boycott and efforts to stop it go to:

SPME
IAB
Academic Friends of Israel
ENGAGE

SPME International Academic Network Being Asked to Contact UK Colleagues to Talk to UCU Delegates To Vote Against Boycott Motions

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