Nina Tannenwald

Overview

Nina Tannenwald is a senior lecturer of Political Science at Brown University (Brown). She is also the Director of the International Relations Program and a Faculty Fellow at Brown's Watson Institute for International Studies.

Tannenwald is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. She has misleadingly likened American supporters of Jews who choose to live in Judea and Samaria as provided for under international law to “Islamic charities that support terrorist activities.”

On August 9, 2016, Tannenwald cynically portrayed anti-discrimination legislation adopted by the state of Rhode Island as “a loyalty oath to Israel.”  

Blaming Israel for Palestinian Terrorism

In a July 14, 2016 article titled “It’s the Occupation, Stupid,” Tannenwald blamed Israel for the brutal murder of 13-year-old Israeli Hallel Ariel, who was stabbed to death by Palestinian terrorist Muhammad Tarayra, while Ariel was sleeping at home. Tarayra’s mother later glorified her son’s murder of Ariel, in an interview with a local Hebron news network — and urged other Palestinian children to follow her son’s example: “My son is a hero. He made me proud. My son died as a Martyr defending Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa [Mosque]...Allah willing, all of them will follow this path, all the youth of Palestine.”

Tannenwald wrote that Ariel’s brutal murder provided “a window into everything that is wrong with the Israeli occupation” and called on the U.S. to block aid to Israel.

Tannenwald also referred misleadingly to “cycles of revenge killing, the settler colonialism enabled by Americans” — and wrongly excused Palestinian violence as a consequence of “despair.” Tannenwald then falsely equated terrorist child-murder with road closings and other effective deterrent measures, which she fraudulently implied constituted punitive terrorism. Tannenwald asserted: “[Israel] will also engage in its own acts of terrorism — demolishing the perpetrator’s house, withdrawing permits for family members to work in Israel, and closing roads to punish an attacker’s hometown or village.”

Following the outcry of readers who took offense at Tannenwald blaming Ariel for her own murder, Tannenwald responded with an off-topic clarification, writing— “Jews have a right to live in Hebron or anywhere else. They just don't have the right to call it Israel” On July 23, 2015, Tannenwald referred on Facebook to the outraged readers’ letters as “entertaining.”

Spreading Lies to Demonize Israel

During a November 19, 2014 interview, Tannenwald implied — fraudulently — that Israel is an “apartheid” state. Tannenwald also proposed advocating for “Palestinian civil rights” as a strategy to challenge "the predominance of the security narrative" — and change the governing policies of Israel, to thoroughly strip Israel of its Jewish character and force it to become “a secular, democratic state.”

On September 10, 2014 Tannenwald participated in a teach-in organized by Brown Middle East Studies and the Watson Institute for International Studies entitled "Why Gaza Matters." The teach-in occurred in the month following Israel’s Operation Protective Edge (OPE), which was implemented to destroy Hamas’ attack tunnels and stop Hamas rocket attacks from Gaza targeting Israeli civilians — that increased dramatically in the weeks prior to the Operation.

The live blog commentary of the event records Tannenwald to have stressed Hamas’ war crimes of rocket fire on Israeli cities “are not a military threat.” She also stated, without basis, that Israeli restrictions on Gaza “go beyond a strict military response” and are part of a “strategy” to make civilian life unbearable.

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/nina.tannenwald