Colleen Jankovic

Overview

Colleen Jankovic has spread hatred of Israel and is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. 

As of March 2023, Jankovic’s LinkedIn said she had been working in development and finance at the Rawa Fund since September 2016. 

Also as of March 2023, Jankovic’s LinkedIn said she had been a “freelance copyeditor, writing project consultant, and grant writer for university professors, students, and non-profit arts and social justice organizations” since 2010. 

Jankovic received a PhD in critical and cultural studies, English, film, gender and sexuality studies from the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) in 2012. She graduated from Indiana University, Bloomington (IU) with a bachelor’s degree in communication and culture in 2004.

As of March 2023, Jankovic’s LinkedIn said she was located in Los Angeles, California.

Hatred of Israel

In 2021, Jankovic signed [no. 685] a “Pledge that Palestine is a Feminist Issue,” sponsored by the Palestinian Feminist Collective. The pledge called Israel a “Zionist settler colonial project,” promoted the “right of return” and claimed that Palestinians continued to face an “enduring Nakba (catastrophe).”

The “right of return” is a Palestinian demand discredited as a means to eliminate Israel. International law mandates no absolute right of return and UN Resolution 194, which defined principles for “refugees wishing to return to their homes,” was unanimously rejected by Arab nations following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.

The term “Nakba” is generally translated as “catastrophe” in Arabic, referring to the outcome of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. It is a term often used to delegitimize the creation of the State of Israel by defining it as a catastrophe.

In 2014, Jankovic published a scholarly article titled: “Houses without Foundations: On Belonging in Palestinian Women’s Cinema.” In the article, she accused Israel of “Zionist settler colonialism and Israeli occupation, apartheid, and institutionalized social inequality.”

In 2012, Jankovic wrote an academic paper titled: “CINEMATIC OCCUPATION: INTELLIGIBILITY, QUEERNESS, AND PALESTINE.”

In the article, Jankovic wrote about the alleged “harsh realities of Israeli occupation and its broad system of Apartheid-style segregation, ethnic cleansing, and injustice.” 

In the same article, Jankovic also alleged that Israel maintained “an ongoing occupation, a siege in Gaza, an Apartheid infrastructure holding the occupation in place, and an unjust situation for Palestinians.”

The United Nations approved [pp. 39–41] the Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza in 2011 as a security measure to stop Hamas from acquiring sophisticated rockets. Multiple flotillas have attempted to breach the blockade, with at least one flotilla initiating a violent confrontation with Israeli forces. 

Supporting BDS

On April 29, 2014, Jankovic signed a petition to “Boycott Israeli Cinema and TV Studies Conference at Tel Aviv University.” 

The petition called upon scholars to boycott an upcoming conference at Tel Aviv University (TAU) and provided a link to the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI). 

In an interview published on April 5, 2014, Jankovic described her activism for BDS. In the article, Jankovic said: “When I went to that film I made these flyers to hand out…And on the inside I had information about what BDS was and how you can get involved to support it.”

In the same interview, Jankovic went on to explain that “essentially I wanted people to know that they could and should educate themselves about BDS.”

In September 2013, Jankovic signed an “Open Letter Campaign to Boycott Hebrew University,” published by USACBI. The letter called upon scholars and academics not to apply for an open position at Hebrew University in Jerusalem (HUJI).

The letter began: “While all Israeli universities are complicit in the occupation, settler-colonialism, and apartheid, the Hebrew University is particularly noteworthy.”

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

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/colleenjankovic/ 

University Website: http://www.englishlit.pitt.edu/person/colleen-jankovic [Deleted]

Academia.edu: https://independent.academia.edu/ColleenJankovic/CurriculumVitae