This week’s Fathom Highlight features Oxford University academic Michael Yudkin’s critique of the ‘Academic boycott’ promoted by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) and its UK partner the British Committee for the Universities of Palestine (BRICUP). Placing both under the spotlight, Yudkin finds that not only do they contradict the fundamental academic principle of universality but their true purposes are much more radical than their stated aims suggest. ‘I oppose both the policies of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government towards the Palestinians and the occupation of their territories’ he writes, but ‘in contrast to PACBI and BRICUP, however, I do not believe in imposing my views on others by force, I don’t believe in requiring people to pass a test of political orthodoxy before they are allowed to practise their profession, and I don’t believe in punishing academics and artists for the misdeeds of their government.’

Our voice of the week is Deputy Head of Mission at the Embassy of Israel Reuven Azar, Hudson Senior Fellow Michael Doran, and Foundation for Defense of Democracies Research Fellow Tony Badran discussing the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War and the prospect of resumed conflict.

Our photo of the week are two Christian nuns listening as friars speak about the first station of the cross during the weekly Way of the Cross walk on Via Dolorosa in the Old City of Jerusalem, 29 July 2016.

Lies, Damned Lies and the Academic Boycott of Israel

by Michael Yudkin