Israel Apartheid Week

Israel Apartheid Week gains momentum
By SHERI SHEFA, Staff Reporter
Thursday, 07 February 2008
The fourth annual Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) lecture series was launched at universities last week across Canada, the United States, Europe and Africa, and the event, which promotes the idea that Israel takes part in “ethnic cleansing” and the “colonization of all Arab lands,” seems to be gaining momentum.

Since IAW first launched in February 2004 at the University of Toronto, organizers – including the Arab Students’ Collective, Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights and the Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid (CAIA) – have managed to spread the event to campuses in about 20 cities, including Ottawa, Montreal, Peterborough, New York, Oxford, London, Johannesburg and Durban, as well as in the West Bank and Gaza.

A website promoting the week-long event, which runs in Toronto until Feb. 9, provided a schedule for the events taking place at York University, Ryerson University and U of T.

The schedule included a full day of radio programming on York’s radio station, CHRY 105.5 FM, under the banner “Anti-Apartheid Frequenceies,” (sic) as well as a lecture titled “Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement against Israeli apartheid: Lessons from South Africa” featuring addresses from Salim Vally of the Palestine Solidarity Committee of South Africa, Katherine Nastovski of CUPE Ontario, and Heather Kere, Ryerson Students’ Union vice-president of education.

Orna Hollander, executive director of Betar Canada, said the fact that IAW is gaining momentum shows that the Jewish community can’t afford to ignore it.

“The strategy has been… from an organized community end, to not lend credibility, to be quiet about it, not bring press around it… Four years later, I think we definitely learned that we can keep our heads in the sand, but it’s going to go on with or without us. [IAW organizers] very much control the PR and rhetoric on campus, and its time to stand up and take responsibility,” Hollander said.

She said that the event’s organizers have been able to gain credibility because of their efforts to build coalitions on campus and throughout the community.

“For example, at Ryerson, you not only have the Coalition against Israeli Apartheid and the Students against Israel Apartheid, but you have environmental networks, you have black students’ associations… They’ve not only branched out with campus groups, but in community-based organizations that they can find support with as well,” she said.

“This year, for the first time, there is a founding conference for high schools against Israeli apartheid – HAIA for short. That is something that we do need to be nervous about. Not only is there support on university campuses for this, they are sponsoring a conference exclusively for high school students.”

Ben Feferman, the Hasbara Fellowships campus co-ordinator headed a program, sponsored by Betar, called Islamic State Apartheid Week.

From Feb. 5 to 7, students at York presented images and videos that depict human rights abuses such as stoning, honour killings, Muslim-only highways and executions of homosexuals in various Middle Eastern countries.

“We want to remove the connection that modern-day students have to the word apartheid and Israel and refocus it to the countries that we think really exemplify the definition of apartheid, being a policy of separation and segregation. Through a week which encompasses the themes of gender, sexual and political apartheid, we hope to get out a new message,” Feferman said in advance of the event.

“As much as it is important to talk about the fact that Israel is a democracy, we really believe that we need to talk about the… atrocities that go on [in Islamic states]. People don’t talk about them because they are afraid to upset Muslims… and it is because of our obsessiveness with being politically correct that these countries are suffering because of it,” Feferman added.

Jewish student groups say they’re also hoping to balance out the negative images of Israel on campus with positive ones.

Last week, in conjunction with the Canada Israel Experience and the Toronto Birthright Alumni Community, Zionists at U of T held an event at on the downtown campus called Israelis on Israel.

Four Israel Defence Forces soldiers who had spent time with Canadian youth in Israel as part of the birthright israel program answered questions to teach students about Israeli culture and life.

“We feel that one of the best ways to combat those hateful claims put forth by Israeli Apartheid Week is to bring forth those people who are being accused,” Hollander said.

Tilly Shames, Hillel of Greater Toronto’s associate director, said that Hillel has focused on education, dialogue and peace-building on campus to make Jewish students feel good about Israel during this week.

She said that when the IAW first launched four years ago, there was more of an opportunity to try to talk with the organizers of the event about the atmosphere they were creating on campus.

“But since then, for the last three years, dialogue is not part of their vocabulary, it is not part of their approach… It is very difficult to create a space of dialogue for those who don’t want to find that common ground,” Shames said.

“What we found is that the organizers of this event are very marginalized on campus… and we feel that it is more effective to focus on the 90 per cent of students who are not interested in politicized events and want to come together to find a common ground for dialogue.”

Shames said that this year, Hillel put months of thought into the kind of programming it wanted to present.

She said that last semester, Hillel held a program during which students could play a video game called Peacemaker, which simulates the challenges of solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The goal is for the player, taking on the role as either an Israeli or Palestinian leader, to achieve peace.

“Our intention is to have it on three different campuses during the week in very public spaces so students can come together and try their hand at peace… It shows that these are really complex issues that can’t be narrowed down to slogans,” Shames said.

Eva Zucker, 22, a fourth-year religious studies student at York and Hillel at York’s president, said she is looking forward to the programming.

“We have a wide array of Israel advocacy programming, that is bringing forth a positive message. We’re doing a full-day teach-in at the Wolfond Centre [for Jewish Campus Life, at U of T], we’re having a wide array of different speakers on Israel advocacy to teach people about the situation, because a lot of the time, that education is kind of lacking,” Zucker said.

The teach-in – titled “Drown out the hate. Educate!” and held Sunday at the Wolfond Centre – featured professors and Jewish community leaders who led workshops including “What’s left of the Zionist left?” “Media Awareness: How to use the media to your advantage,” and “Jewish and Democratic: Diversity in Israel.”

“We obviously don’t value the negative sentiments on campus, which is why Hillel is trying to take the attention away from the negative activities and really put the focus on celebrating Israel and being proud of Israel and standing up for Israel,” Zucker said.