Noenoe Silva

Overview

Noenoe Silva has demonized Israel and is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.

She is a professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Hawaii, Manoa (UH-M).

Demonizing Israel

Silva 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.

Supporting BDS

Silva signed a petition, published on February 23, 2014, of University of Hawaii faculty condemning the university’s condemnation of the passage of a piece of BDS legislation by the American Studies Association (ASA).

Signatories of the petition argued that in opposing the academic boycott of Israel,“they support academic institutions that participate in the denial of human rights, including the right to education, experienced by Palestinians who, like Native Hawaiians, live under conditions of occupation.”

At the Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS) Annual Conference in April 2013, Silva signed the proposed resolution to boycott Israeli academic institutions which it alleged have “been directly and indirectly complicit in the systematic maintenance of the occupation.”

The petition called for the AAAS to join in “opposing US military occupation in the Arab world and U.S. support for occupation and racist practices by the Israeli state” and went on to call upon the organization to “honor the call of Palestinian civil society for a boycott of Israeli academic institutions.”

Silva was one of several “Indigenous Scholars” who authored a letter in 2013 to Navajo Nation President, Ben Shelly, condemning his decision to promote partnership opportunities for the Navajo Nation to share Israel’s agricultural technology and for Israeli university students to experience Navajo culture.

In their letter, Silva and fellow scholars wrote, “Your public and political engagement with [Israeli] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli officials sends a message that you endorse the continued occupation of the West Bank... as well as the ongoing settler colonial situation.”

Conflating the Native American struggle with that of the Palestinians, the scholars claimed that “Israel demolition of the homes of Palestinian families is not all that different than the Long Walk your people endured in 1864. Your collusion with the Israeli government is a betrayal of that shared history and of the wisdom that has helped all Indigenous Peoples survive for centuries.”

Silva also signed her name to a list of individuals endorsing the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI).

On May 3, 2012, Silva signed “An Open Letter from Native American and Indigenous Studies Scholars in defense of UCLA Professor David Shorter and other scholars who support the academic and cultural boycott of Israel.”

The letter was published by Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), and expressed support for professors who advocate boycotting Israel.

Silva signed an open letter, published on February 2, 2009, which accused Israel of carrying out a “longtime racist jurisprudence against its indigenous Palestinian population, during which the Israeli state has systematically dispossessed, starved, tortured, and economically exploited the Palestinian people.”

Signatories of the letter went on to “reject as untrue” that Hamas “is an irredeemable terrorist organization” and to “call on all people of conscience to join us in boycotting Israeli products and institutions.”

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:http://www.politicalscience.hawaii.edu/faculty/silva.html