IV

107TH CONGRESS

2D SESSION H. RES. 499

Condemning attempts to boycott Israeli scientific institutions and scholars.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

JULY 24, 2002

Mr. CAPUANO submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the

Committee on Education and the Workforce

RESOLUTION

Condemning attempts to boycott Israeli scientific institutions

and scholars.

Whereas scientific progress and the advancement of human

knowledge depend upon the free exchange of ideas;

Whereas peace everywhere depends upon the ability of individuals and governments to recognize, respect, and discuss our differences;

Whereas an organization calling itself the Coordination of

Scientists for a Just Peace in the Near East (‘‘Coordination des Scientifiques pour une Paix Juste au ProcheOrient’’) has appealed for an international boycott of

Israeli scientific institutions;

Whereas more than 700 European academics have already

endorsed this international boycott;
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•HRES 499 IH

Whereas 2 Israeli scholars, Gideon Toury and Miriam Schlesinger, the latter of whom is a former head of Amnesty

International in Israel, were fired from the board of The

Translator, published under the auspices of the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology,

for no reason other than their nationality;

Whereas Donald Kennedy, President Emeritus of Stanford

University, warned in a June 7, 2002, editorial that

Science, the journal of the American Association for the

Advancement of Science, would, if necessary, impose

‘‘penalties with regard to future publication’’ upon contributors who refused reasonable requests to share data

or materials with Israeli researchers;

Whereas Professor Stephen Greenblatt of Harvard University, the President of the Modern Language Association

of America, in an open letter dated June 26, 2002, deplored the Manchester firings as ‘‘particularly grotesque’’

because the journal in question was ostensibly devoted to

intercultural communication;

Whereas a petition initiated by scholars at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology denounced attempts to turn the scientific community into

a political battlefield as ‘‘irresponsible and counter-productive,’’ and quickly gathered support from 70 of the

most illustrious names in mathematics and physical

science here and abroad;

Whereas another petition, initiated by professors at the University of Chicago, states their belief that a cultural and

scientific boycott of Israel is ‘‘immoral, dangerous, and

misguided, and indirectly encourages the terrorist murderers in their deadly deeds’’, and more than 2,500 scholars from all over the world have signed this document,
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•HRES 499 IH

which was published in the British newspaper, The

Guardian; and

Whereas other campaigns that insist upon academic freedom

and dialogue among all the world’s peoples gain adherents daily: Now, therefore, be it

1 Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Rep2 resentatives that—

3 (1) attempts to boycott Israeli scholars will nei4 ther advance truth nor achieve peace;

5 (2) attempts to treat Israeli scholars as pariahs

6 cannot fail to recall horrifying precedents such as

7 the Nazi effort to ‘‘purify’’ German universities

8 (make them ‘‘Judenrein’’) by expelling Jewish stu9 dents and faculty and the Stalinist slaughter of Yid10 dish intellectuals; and

11 (3) scholars in the United States and abroad

12 are to be commended for their prompt and resolute

13 defense of their Israeli colleagues and for their com14 mitment to the free exchange of ideas.

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