Leslie M. Harris

In April 2024, more than 2,800 Northwestern University faculty, staff, and students signed an anti-Israel resolution that denied Israel’s legitimacy, promoted hatred of Israel, and endorsed the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, according to the AMCHA Initiative.

The “Northwestern People’s Resolution” was published in response to Israel’s war against Hamas terrorists. Israel launched the war after the October 7, 2023, terror attacks, in which Hamas murdered approximately 1,200 Israelis, took over 250 hostages, and injured thousands.

Two claims that appeared repeatedly in the resolution were that Israel was carrying out [pp. 1-4] "genocide" and “ethnic cleansing” during its war against Hamas. Israel was also accused [pp. 1-4] of “apartheid” throughout the text.

The resolution further referred to [p. 3] Israel as “the settler colony of Israel,” a claim that implies Jews are not indigenous to the Land of Israel. This is a tactic used by anti-Israel activists to spread antisemitism and deny Israel’s legitimacy.

The first line of the text also accused [p. 1] Israel of “apartheid and occupation.” One section, titled [p. 2] “ONGOING ATROCITIES,” accused “US diplomatic, military, and top academic institutions” of supporting alleged Israeli “terror.”

The resolution called on [p. 1] Northwestern to “cease the IIP [Israel Innovation Project] and other collaborations with Israeli institutions” and “divest from all defense stocks and investments and from all companies that support Israeli apartheid.”

The text of the resolution was drafted by NU [Northwestern University] Educators for Justice in Palestine, as well as the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) chapters at Northwestern, known as NU SJP and JVP NU. It was also adopted by Northwestern’s Associated Student Government Senate.

On Saturday, October 7, 2023, thousands of heavily armed Hamas terrorists breached Israel’s border with Gaza. They executed numerous war crimes on civilians, including mass murder, beheadings of children, rape of men and women, torture, kidnappings and mutilation.

Hamas broadcast videos of their butchery on social media, often to victims’ accounts for families to see. Israel retaliated with a war called “Swords of Iron.”

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 has said that 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 [p. 10], 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.