Brendan Sullivan

Brendan Sullivan promoted the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement at the University of Maryland (UMD) in 2017 and 2019.

Sullivan has also supported an anti-Israel agitator.

In February 2017, Sullivan was reportedly the president of UMD Socialists. In 2019, the group supported the Divest UMD campaign, which called on UMD to divest from companies that do business with Israel. 

In April 2019, Sullivan said in a Facebook video that he was a Civil Engineering senior at UMD.

Promoting BDS

On April 24, 2019, Sullivan was featured [00:00:49] in a video posted on Facebook by Divest UMD, speaking before the UMD Student Government Association (SGA). In the video, Sullivan stated [00:00:49]: “My name is Brendan Sullivan and I support the BDS movement.”

The clip was taken from a video, shared on Facebook by the UMD SGA on November 17, 2017, where Sullivan was featured [01:48:14] speaking in support of a divestment bill at an SGA meeting.

On November 20, 2017, UMD’s online student magazine Unwind reported that the UMD SGA Student Affairs Committee voted against a BDS bill in a 1-21 vote.

On April 25, 2019, Sullivan was featured [03:37:11] in a video posted on Facebook by the UMD SGA, urging the SGA to pass a divestment bill launched by Divest UMD.

That day, Divest UMD announced on Facebook that following a UMD student government vote, the BDS bill failed to pass with “a vote of 9 for, 25 against, and 2 abstentions.”

Promoting Anti-Israel Agitator

On February 5, 2019, UMD Socialists shared a Facebook photo of Sullivan with activists in front of a screen with the words “#WeStandwithIlhanOmar” projected onto it. UMD Socialists commented: “We stand with Ilhan Omar! #FreePalestine.”

BDS

The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by Omar Barghouti in 2005 to challenge “international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.” BDS is an allegedly “Palestinian-led movement,” although leading BDS activists have admitted [00:01:01] this is not true. 

One of the demands of BDS includes [point 3] what is generally known as the “right of return,” a demand discredited as a way to eliminate Israel. Barghouti said the “right of return” is a means to “end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.”  

Barghouti has said that BDS “aims to turn Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.”

In his activism, Barghouti has also said [00:05:55] regarding Israel: “Definitely, most definitely, we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No…rational Palestinian, not a sellout Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”

The movement has been linked to numerous terrorist organizations and received a public endorsement from Hamas in 2017.

BDS initiatives include calling on institutions and individuals to divest from Israeli-affiliated companies, promoting academic and cultural boycotts of Israel, and organizing anti-Israel rallies, protests and campaigns.

The movement’s most notable achievement has been the infiltration of university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments and student groups, backed by their own anti-Israel members and affiliates, have proposed resolutions on some form of boycott of, or divestment from, Israel and Israeli-affiliated entities.

Boycott resolutions, although non-binding, have been passed by student governments on numerous North American campuses.

BDS activity is often aggressive and disruptive. It has been noted that universities that pass BDS resolutions see a marked increase in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. On one campus, when the student government debated a BDS resolution, reports emerged of violent threats against those opposing it.

Social Media and Weblinks

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/100001620145360