An online petition is demanding that the political science department at Brooklyn College rescind its sponsorship of an anti-Israel divestment event.
The campaign has received wide support from Jewish students and local activists, who say the speakers of the event, Omar Barghouti and Judith Butler, are “virulently anti-Israel.”
Barghouti is the founder of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Campus Boycott of Israel and Butler, is a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, is a supporter of the BDS (boycott, divestments and sanctions) movement.
Emily K. Alhadeff, recipient of the Daniel Pearl Investigative Journalism Initiative, explored the nation’s first boycott initiative in Olympia Washington, the hometown of Rachel Corrie, in Moment’s July/August 2012 issue. Read about the origins of the movement here.