Leo Spitzer
Overview
Leo Spitzer has demonized Israel and is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.As of January 2020, he is a professor emeritus in the Department of History at Dartmouth College (Dartmouth).
Demonizing Israel
In July of 2014, Spitzer signed an open letter to Israeli academics, which claimed that “The government of Israel, having provoked the firing of rockets by its rampage through the West Bank, is now using that response as the pretext for an aerial assault on Gaza which has already cost scores of lives.”Signatories of the petition went on to posit that “An atmosphere of hysteria is being deliberately provoked in Israel, and whole communities are being subject to collective punishment, a war crime.”
Supporting BDS
In 2016, Spitzer signed an open letter calling for the academic boycott of Israel.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.”
Spitzer also signed an open letter to United States President Barack Obama and the American Congress, dated July 31, 2014, condemning “the disproportionate harm that the Israeli military, which the United States has armed and supported for decades, is inflicting on the population of Gaza.”
The letter exclusively blamed Israel for the Gazan civilian crisis and called upon the administration “to suspend US military aid to Israel, until there is assurance that this aid will no longer be used for the commission of war crimes.”
The letter was in response to Operation Protective Edge (OPE), which Israel commenced in July of 2014, to stop rocket fire targeting Israeli civilians and to destroy Hamas attack tunnels.
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/leo.spitzerPersonal Website:https://leospitzer.net/
University Website:https://history.dartmouth.edu/people/leo-spitzer
- Status:
- Professor
- University:
- Massachusetts-Dartmouth
- Organizations:
- BDS
- Related Profiles:
- Last Modified:
- 05/04/2026
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