Gillian Harkins
Overview
Gillian Harkins is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) and has demonized Israel.As of August 2020, Harkins was a professor of English at the University of Washington (UW).
Supporting BDS
In 2016, Harkins signed an open letter calling for the academic boycott of Israel.The open letter was addressed to the Modern Language Association (MLA), “calling on the association to pass a resolution endorsing the boycott of Israeli academic institutions.”
In January 2017, the MLA Delegate Assembly approved a resolution (2017-1) acknowledging “the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel contradicts the MLA’s purpose” and conflicted with another resolution (2002-1), that condemned boycotts against scholars. Therefore, the Assembly “resolved that the MLA refrain from endorsing the boycott.”
Harkins also signed a letter in 2009, published by the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI).
The USACBI letter accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing” and compared Israel to Apartheid South Africa and concluded that “Israel too maintains an apartheid regime.”
After charging Israel with inflicting “one of the most massive, ethnocidal atrocities of modern times,” the signatories called upon Obama to join in the BDS movement.
Demonizing Israel
Harkins signed an open letter, published by the Rachel Corrie Foundation (RCF) on June 12, 2013, to the UW class of 2013 and their commencement speaker, Jon Huntsman Jr.RCF was created to honor the memory of Rachel Corrie, a former International Solidarity Movement (ISM) member who was accidentally killed while interfering with an Israeli military operation in 2003 during the Second Intifada. A wrongful death suit brought by Corrie’s family was dismissed when the judge ruled that Corrie unreasonably chose to put her own life in danger.
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
University Website:https://english.washington.edu/people/gillian-harkins
- Status:
- Professor
- University:
- University of Washington (UW)
- Organizations:
- BDS
- Related Profiles:
- Last Modified:
- 05/04/2026
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