US: University demands speaker disavow anti-Israel group

By Safvan Allahverdi

WASHINGTON

Last year, in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, a contract for Texas government’s disaster aid that linked the assistance to support for Israel caused widespread controversy as residents were recovering from one the most powerful hurricanes ever to hit Texas.

Less than two months after Hurricane Harvey ravaged the city of Dickinson, southeast of Houston, the local authority insisted that anyone who received relief supplies should confirm that they were not in any way engaged in the boycott of Israel.

Amid the devastation, the city’s imposition of anti-boycott certification angered those campaigning for a boycott of Israeli goods over its occupation of Palestinian lands.

After passing a bill to prohibit any type of boycott against Israel, Arizona State, a prominent Texas university, followed through with its plan and put the bill into effect even though this was a violation of the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech.

Hatem Bazian, a Muslim academic invited by the Muslim Student Association of Arizona State to speak at an event in April, required by the university to sign a contract that would prevent him from criticizing Israel.

"I was invited to speak at Arizona State University and they sent me a contract to sign with various items," Dr. Bazian, a professor of Near Eastern and Asian American Studies and Asian Diaspora Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, told Anadolu Agency on Wednesday.

He said one of the articles clearly meant a prohibition on boycotting Israel and assurance that the undersigned was currently not engaged in a boycott of Israel.

"I said that I cannot sign this in full conscious, being one of the key BDS (The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement which promotes various forms of boycott against Israel) organizers, an academic who writes on BDS, and an activist on Palestine that holds BDS to be a non-violent human rights movement focused on addressing Israel's continued violations of international law," he added.

Last year in May, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed the state's anti-BDS bill, saying "Anti-Israel policies are anti-Texas", thereby setting the stage for a greater controversy to unfold.

A bill in Congress to criminalize BDS support with likely legal consequences such as 20 years in prison and up to $1 million in penalties has sputtered amid backlash. The Senate sponsors of the bill are seeking to amend it.

Israeli lobby defends the indefensible

Bazian, who is also a columnist for the Turkish newspaper Daily Sabah, said AIPAC (American-Israel Public Affairs Committee) and its regional affiliates "worked overtime" to push for legislation across the U.S. to restrict free speech on BDS and even to criminalize advocacy for Palestinian human rights.

Slamming the legislation for attempting to "defend the indefensible" by restricting freedom of speech and academic freedom, Bazian said the purpose of the effort was to rescue and protect Israel and its continued occupation through “the use of legislation, targeting individuals, structured and systematic defamation as well as working to recruit voices that normalize Zionism among segments of Arab and Muslim communities through the Shalom Hartman Institute Muslim Leadership Initiative and fictitious interfaith projects that are focused on silencing Palestine.”

against Arizona State University

A leading Muslim advocacy group, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has sued the university for demanding professors to disavow BDS before allowing them to speak on its premises.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency, Gadir Abbas, an attorney of CAIR, said the contract presented to Hatem Bazian was against the U.S. and the university illegally blocked him from speaking on campus because of his political beliefs.

Abbas said the U.S. was considered one of the biggest champions of freedom of expression, but the contract that Arizona State University had imposed was not in line with that spirit, adding that that was the reason why the advocacy group filed a lawsuit against the university.

The lawsuit has been filed in the name of Dr. Bazian and a verdict is expected in April.

In addition to the Bazian case, there are at least three known cases regarding the University of Houston, which also reportedly required such a disavowal from its own members, as well as visiting speakers.

The state of Kansas also attempted to adopt a similar law last month in order to prohibit boycotts against Israel. A federal judge in Kansas, however, blocked the proposal.

* Muhammed Bilal Kenasari contributed to this report