University student government calls on other universities to boycott Israel.

"University of Sussex students vote to boycott Israeli goods"

By Elham Asaad Buaras

The Muslim News

November 27, 2009

On the Web at:

http://www.muslimnews.co.uk/paper/index.php?article=4378

Students at the University of Sussex voted to boycott Israeli goods on November 5. The decision follows the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel, which calls upon the Israeli state to respect international law and end the occupation of Palestine.

In a campus-wide referendum, 56% of students voted in favour of the boycott.

The referendum was held by the University of Sussex Students’ Union (USSU), which represents the institution’s 11,000 students.

Goods from Israel will no longer be stocked in USSU shops on the university campus, and USSU will be lobbying the University administration to observe the boycott.

USSU President, Tom Wills, told The Muslim News, “Israel has broken more UN resolutions than any other state. No other Western-backed democracy has committed such egregious violations of international law, but the international community has failed to hold Israel to account.

“Sussex was one of the first universities to boycott South Africa during apartheid, and we hope that this will help kickstart an international movement on a similar scale to put pressure on Israel to end its oppression of the Palestinian people.

“We call on students at other universities to table boycott motions in their own unions.”

Earlier this year, the Israeli attack on Gaza triggered resurgence in student activism when hundreds of students in 30 universities occupied theatre rooms across the country in January and February (see The Muslim News issue 238).

The student boycott comes after the Trades Union Congress (TUC) backed a boycott of Israeli settlement goods in September.


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Israel arrests Black bus passengers; Israel spies on Blacks & Muslims in airports.

"Dhoruba and Naji were ordered off the bus before Israeli border officials had any idea of their country of origin or personal histories. They only knew that they were Black."

Interview on YouTube at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOmhGCwZBe0

"The NLG NYC Condemns the Israeli Government for the Detention of African American Political Activists"

MONTHLY REVIEW

25 November 2009

On the Web at: http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/israel261109.html

The New York City Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild condemns the actions of the Israeli government for its unlawful and racially motivated detention of two African-American political activists.

On November 23, 2009, Dhoruba Bin Wahad, a former U.S. political prisoner and leader of the Black Panther Party, and Naji Mujahid, a student-activist from Washington D.C., were on a tourist bus en route from Amman, Jordan to the West Bank of occupied Palestine.

Both had been invited to attend a conference on political detention in Jericho that was sponsored by the Palestinian Authority.

As the bus crossed the King Hussein Bridge that connects Jordan with the Israeli-occupied West Bank, it stopped for a border inspection by Israeli officers.

Of the numerous individuals on the bus, only Dhoruba and Naji were ordered to disembark. Significantly, both were the only Black people on the bus. Within a short time, the border officials searched under Dhoruba's name on the Internet. They discovered that he is Muslim, a former Black Panther leader, and someone who spent 19 years in prison for a crime he did not commit.

(Dhoruba, a target of COINTELPRO, was arrested in 1971 and sentenced to life in prison. His conviction was overturned in 1990).

Both Dhoruba and Naji were interrogated, strip-searched, and their property confiscated and searched. Despite their cooperation and offer to return into Jordan, their detention continued for over 12 hours.

They were ultimately released but denied permission to enter occupied Palestine and returned to Jordan.

The treatment accorded Dhoruba and Naji would be outrageous if it occurred to anyone. And as Naji Mujahid himself stated shortly after returning to Amman, "the humiliation and frustration that we endured was a small taste of what we can be sure the Palestinians go through on a daily basis." But the incident is rendered even more shameful because its genesis appears to have been racial profiling.

Dhoruba and Naji were ordered off the bus before Israeli border officials had any idea of their country of origin or personal histories. They only knew that they were Black.

Moreover, the incident occurred only days after it was reported that the South African government deported an Israeli official following allegations that a member of Shin Bet, the Israeli secret police, had infiltrated the airport in Johannesburg in an effort to get information on South African citizens, particularly Black and Muslim travelers (Reuters, November 22, 2009)...

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Israel spies on Black and Muslim passengers in airport:

Video:

"Israeli Shin Bet spies uncovered in South African Airports working for EL AL airlines"

On YouTube at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGwBXIPUW5E

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Israel spies on thousands of Black and Muslim South African travelers.Now its agents face deportation from South Africa.

"Israeli spies ‘infiltrate’ Johannesburg airport"

by Jonathan Cook
Foreign Correspondent
THE NATIONAL (UAE)

At:

http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20091123/FOREIGN/711229870/1184/enewsletter/retry=a0db9a9f4c7af5a03692


* Last Updated: November 22. 2009

Photo: Television footage shows an undercover reporter being interrogated by an El Al official at the airport in Johannesburg.

--------------------------------------------------


NAZARETH, Israel // South Africa deported an Israeli airline official last week following allegations that Israel’s secret police, the Shin Bet, had infiltrated Johannesburg international airport in an effort to gather information on South African citizens, particularly black and Muslim travellers.

The move by the South African government followed an investigation by local TV showing an undercover reporter being illegally interrogated by an official with El Al, Israel’s national carrier, in a public area of Johannesburg’s OR Tambo airport.



The programme also featured testimony from Jonathan Garb, a former El Al guard, who claimed that the airline company had been a front for the Shin Bet in South Africa for many years.

Of the footage of the undercover reporter’s questioning, he commented: “Here is a secret service operating above the law in South Africa. We pull the wool over everyone’s eyes. We do exactly what we want. The local authorities do not know what we are doing.”



The Israeli foreign ministry is reported to have sent a team to South Africa to try to defuse the diplomatic crisis after the government in Johannesburg threatened to deport all of El Al’s security staff.


Mr Garb’s accusations have been supported by an investigation by the regulator for South Africa’s private security industries.

They have also been confirmed by human rights groups in Israel, which report that Israeli security staff are carrying out racial profiling at many airports around the world, apparently out of sight of local authorities.

Concern in South Africa about the activities of El Al staff has been growing since August, when South Africa’s leading investigative news show, Carte Blanche, went undercover to test Mr Garb’s allegations.

A hidden camera captured an El Al official in the departure hall claiming to be from “airport security” and demanding that the undercover reporter hand over his passport or ID as part of “airport regulations”. When the reporter protested that he was not flying but waiting for a friend, El Al’s security manager, identified as Golan Rice, arrived to interrogate him further. Mr Rice then warned him that he was in a restricted area and must leave.

Mr Garb commented on the show: “What we are trained is to look for the immediate threat – the Muslim guy. You can think he is a suicide bomber, he is collecting information. The crazy thing is that we are profiling people racially, ethnically and even on religious grounds … This is what we do.”

Mr Garb and two other fired workers have told the South African media that Shin Bet agents routinely detain Muslim and black passengers, a claim that has ignited controversy in a society still suffering with the legacy of decades of apartheid rule.

Suspect individuals, the former workers say, are held in an annex room, where they are interrogated, often on matters unrelated to airport security, and can be subjected to strip searches while their luggage is taken apart. Clandestine searches of their belongings and laptops are also carried out to identify useful documents and information.

All of this is done in violation of South African law, which authorises only the police, armed forces or personnel appointed by the transport minister to carry out searches.

The former staff also accuse El Al of smuggling weapons – licensed to the local Israeli embassy – into the airport for use by the secret agents.



Mr Garb went public after he was dismissed over a campaign he led for better pay and medical benefits for El Al staff.



A South African Jew, he said he was recruited 19 years ago by the Shin Bet. “We were trained at a secret camp [in Israel] where they train Israeli special forces and they train you how to use handguns, submachine guns and in unarmed combat.”

Mr Garb claimed to have profiled 40,000 people for Israel over the past 20 years, including recently Virginia Tilley, a Middle East expert who is the chief researcher at South Africa’s Human Sciences Research Council. The think tank recently published a report accusing Israel of apartheid and colonialism in the Palestinian territories.

“The decision was she should be checked in the harshest way because of her connections,” Mr Garb said.

Ms Tilley confirmed that she had been detained at the airport by El Al staff and separated from her luggage. Mr Garb said that during this period an agent “photo-copied all [her] documentation and then he forwarded it on to Israel” – Mr Garb believes for use by the Shin Bet.



Israeli officials have refused to comment on the allegations. A letter produced by Mr Garb – signed by Roz Bukris, El Al’s general manager in South Africa – suggests that he was employed by the Shin Bet rather than the airline. Ms Bukris, according to the programme, refused to confirm or deny the letter’s validity.

The Israeli Embassy in South Africa declined to discuss evidence that it, rather than El Al, had licensed guns issued to the airline’s security managers. Questioned last week by Ynet, Israel’s largest news website, about the deportation of the airline official, Yossi Levy, an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman said he could not “comment on security matters”.



A report published in 2007 by two Israeli human rights organisations, the Nazareth-based Arab Association for Human Rights and the Centre Against Racism, found that Israeli airline staff used racial profiling at most major airports around the world, subjecting Arab and Muslim passengers to discriminatory and degrading treatment in violation both of international law and the host country’s laws.

“Our research showed that the checks conducted by El Al at foreign airports had all the hallmarks of Shin Bet interrogations,” said Mohammed Zeidan, the director of the Human Rights Association. “Usually the questions were less about the safety of the flight and more aimed at gathering information on the political activities or sympathies of the passengers.”



The human rights groups approached four international airports – in New York, Paris, Vienna and Geneva – where passengers said they had been subjected to discriminatory treatment, to ask under what authority the Israeli security services were operating. The first two airports refused to respond, while Vienna and Geneva said it was not possible to oversee El Al’s procedures.


jcook@thenational.ae


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Protests against government assassination of Imam Luqman: "End FBI Death Squads"

"Groups call for DOJ investigation of FBI raid"

By Khalil AlHajal
ARAB AMERICAN NEWS

Saturday, 11.21.2009

http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/index.php?mod=article&cat=Community&article=2663



Several major rights advocacy organizations sent a letter to the U.S. Justice Department on Monday calling for an investigation into potential civil rights violations commiteed during the Oct. 28 FBI raid conducted in Dearborn in which a religious leader was killed.




Photo: Demonstrators protest the Oct. 28 FBI killing of Imam Luqman Abdullah at the federal building in downtown Detroit on Nov. 5.

Imam Luqman Abdullah, leader of the Detroit-based Masjid Al-Haqq made up primarily of African Americans, was killed during a raid in a Dearborn warehouse where undercover agents lured members of the group in a sting operation involving stolen goods.

The groups who signed the letter included the Council of American-Islamic Relations—Michigan, The American Civil Liberties Union—Michigan, the National Lawyers Guild, the Congress of Arab American Organizations, the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality, the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice and The Michigan Emergency Committee Against War and Injustice.

The groups asked for an investigation specifically seeking clarity on nine points in which there have conflicting accounts of what happened that day, including "the number of times Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah was shot, as well as how many rounds were fired at him by the federal agents;" "whether excessive use of deadly force was employed by the federal agents under the circumstances;" whether an FBI canine killed at the scene "was trained and subsequently directed by the FBI agents to attack Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah," and "whether Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah was dead at the time he was handcuffed."




Photo: CAIR Executive Director Dawud Walid speaks during a press conference in Southfield on Tuesday on a joint letter sent to the Justice Department requesting an investigation into the Oct. 28 FBI raid in which an imam was killed. PHOTOS: Pan-African News Wire


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Shooting of Detroit Imam is protested:

The Michigan Citizen, 1055 Trumbull, Detroit, MI 48216 (313) 963-8282


"Muslims protest FBI’s ‘terrorism’ "



Imam Abdullah demonstration -
DIANE BUKOWSKI PHOTOS

"Imam Abdullah’s family, followers and allies protest FBI raid" By Diane Bukowski The Michigan Citizen November 15, 2009 On the Web at: http://michigancitizen.com/default.asp?sourceid=&smenu=1&twindow=&mad=&sdetail=7983&wpage=1&skeyword=&sidate=&ccat=&ccatm=&restate=&restatus=&reoption=&retype=&repmin=&repmax=&rebed=&rebath=&subname=&pform=&sc=1070&hn=michigancitizen&he=.com DETROIT — “The community loves us, and they are wondering who will be there to feed and clothe them now that my father is dead,” said Omar Regan, son of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, 53, who was shot to death in an FBI raid Oct. 28. “People there trust Muslims more than they trust the police.” Regan, with his brother Jamil Carswell by his side, spoke at a demonstration of at least 75 people outside the federal McNamara Building in Detroit, Nov. 4. A town hall meeting that drew several hundred took place the next day at the Muslim Center of Detroit on East Davison. The Imam’s mosque is located in one of Detroit’s poorest neighborhoods, on Clairmount near Linwood. It is 98.6 percent African American, with only half of its residents over 16 working, and 31 percent living under the poverty level, according to the most recent figures from the U.S. Census. “Of my father’s 13 children, none of us have criminal records,” Regan said. “That was how my father taught us. It is not right for people to set up traps to lure innocent people. They want to shoot us down — for what? Because we want to stand up and say stop hurting us? My father was targeted — he knew they were going to kill him. It’s not just Muslims, but any organization that is fighting for freedom and justice for the people is trying to overthrow the government.” Clayton Dafney, a lifelong friend of Imam Abdullah, said everything Abdullah said or did was about Allah and Islam. “I once got put out of the mosque because I went astray and started drinking,” said Dafney. “But Luqman said, ‘As long as this brother is coming to the mosque to worship, he is welcome.’ Luqman was not the type of brother to come out and open fire on the U.S. government. They do not understand Islam. They murdered him because of his beliefs.” One of the speakers at the town hall meeting was Imam Dawud Walid, head of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR). He earlier told The Michigan Citizen that members of Muslim and African communities across the world have expressed extreme concern about Imam Abdullah’s death. “I’ve been on Al Jazeera three times, and on South African radio, and we have also been contacted by Muslims in Iran,” he said. “We are calling for an independent investigation ... There are many unanswered questions and irregularities involved. There is a long history in our nation, in Detroit in particular, of African American men being subjected to unnecessary and sometimes lethal force by law enforcement.” Imam Walid questioned the use of agent ‘provocateurs’ and informants in houses of worship, particularly where there has been no evidence of criminal activity. He said the event calls to mind the activities of the FBI’s COINTELPRO program against the Black Panthers and other groups in the 1960s and 70s. A total of 12 alleged members of Imam Abdullah’s Masjid El-Haqq Mosque remain charged with offenses including dealing in stolen goods, weapons possession and sales, and mail and insurance fraud. Attorney Jeffrey Edison, who represents one of the men, said preliminary examinations will happen soon. “Preliminary exams in federal court are not the same as in state courts,” Edison said. “They allow hearsay, and usually only have the case agent testify regarding what is in the reports.” Many believe Imam’s murder and arrests of members of his mosque are part of a rash of recent FBI set-ups of African American Muslims in the U.S. In May, four New York City residents were indicted by a grand jury and later arrested on charges of “conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction” against synagogues in the Riverdale section of the Bronx and to down a plane. The FBI admitted its undercover agents supplied the men with plastic explosives and a Stinger missile — all phony — then arrested them as they allegedly sought to use the weapons. Meanwhile, the Council of Islamic Organizations in Michigan (CIOM), headquartered in Warren, revealed recently that they met with Detroit FBI Director Andrew Arena, FBI Spokeswoman Sandra Berchtold, and U.S. Attorney Terence Berg the day after the raid. The Imams Committee of CIOM issued a statement: “We emphasize that no criminal acts be confused with what Islam and Muslims stand for. Our religion stands for justice and we hope justice will be served. We support the law of the land. ...” Arena is scheduled to co-chair a banquet Nov. 19 for ALPACT, a group including numerous law enforcement agencies and community organizations, many of them from the Arab-American community. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder will attend.

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Dublin, Ireland: Hundreds Rally against Israeli Apartheid, and for Boycott against Israel:

Click on photo of rally, to enlarge it.

Click on poster to enlarge it.

14 Nov 2009


"Dublin: Hundreds Attend Rally Against Israeli Apartheid in Palestine"


http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/ipsc/displayRelease.php?releaseID=175



Today Saturday 14th November 2009 hundreds of Palestinians and solidarity activists rallied in Dublin to protest against Israel’s apartheid practices in Palestine.

The rally - part of an international week of global mobilisation against the walls of apartheid in Palestine from November 9th to 16th 2009, called by the Palestinian Grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign – was compèred by Freda Hughes (IPSC PRO), Caoimhe Butterly (renowned Irish human rights activist), Ger Cassidy (Viva Palestina), Sameh Habeeb (Gazan Journalist and human rights activist), John Hurson (Where Do the Children Play?), Pete St. John-Jones (International Solidarity Activist in Bil’in).



Speakers highlighted the brutality of the Israeli occupation of Palestine, with particular reference to the Siege of Gaza and the Israel’s Apartheid Walls in Palestine. They spoke of their efforts, both in Ireland and in Palestine, to raise awareness among civil and political society, as well as their various efforts to help people on the ground in Palestine. Freda Hughes, the IPSC PRO, stressed the need to build a broad based social mass-movement to convey the reality of the situation in Palestine to mainstream society.

Following the speeches protestors marched around the central reservation on O’Connell Street chanting slogans in support of the Palestinian people, carrying colourful flags, placards and banners in a loud and spirited demonstration.

After the rally, an IPSC press conference was held in the Teachers’ Club. The reason for the conference was to raise awareness of the ongoing media difficulties surrounding the occupation of Palestine, to highlight the impressive role the Irish trade union movement has played in pushing for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel, and to launch the IPSC’s campaign aimed at building public support to convince Irish multinational CRH to divest from Israel [1].

Peter McLoone, General Secretary of IMPACT, who was a member of the ICTU delegation that visited Palestine in November 2007, spoke of his experiences in Palestine during the trip. Mr. McLoone said: “There is no doubt that the people of Palestine are suffering. There is no doubt that people are dying and there is no doubt that people are living in fear. No amount of Israeli propaganda can counteract what I have seen on the ground.”

Mr. McLoone continued: “The trade union movement in Ireland is determined to take Palestinian solidarity activism to a new level. We are determined to engage with other trade unions to encourage them to adopt a policy of boycott, divestment and sanctions.”

Sameh Habeeb, Gazan journalist and human rights worker who reported prolifically and bravely during the Israeli onslaught in Dec 2008 /Jan 2009, gave an emotive account of the current situation in Gaza. He spoke of the dire medical conditions and the fact that the economy has completely collapsed. He also talked about the difficulties faced by those in education and the cripplingly high unemployment rate in the beleaguered coastal strip which is home to 1.5 million Palestinans.

Mr. Habeeb stated: “The war on Gaza was not a retaliation against Hamas rockets, the ceasefire was breached by Israel on November 4th 2008 – a fact that has been openly admitted by Israeli military sources. This was a pre-planned war. Israel’s denials regarding its targeting of civilians is propaganda and fabrication and is abhorrent in a time of such unequal conflict.”

Harry Browne, journalist and lecturer in DIT, spoke of the mainstream media bias in favour of Israel and its official sources which he said were often accepted at face value without the application of critical analysis on behalf of reporters. He stressed that some of the best and most honest reporting from Gaza came from Gazans themselves, like Sameh Habeeb, because very few Western media outlets had a presence there when the war was launched. He referred to this as “real reporting”. He also made reference to the importance of New Media such as blogs, social networking sites and independent media outlets in delivering genuine and unfiltered news coverage on an international scale.

John Dorman, the IPSC’s Divestment Officer, officially launched the IPSC’s campaign aimed at building public support to convince Irish multinational CRH to divest from Israel (For background see Note 1).

Mr. Dorman outlined the steps the IPSC are taking in this multifaceted and long-term campaign which include research, education, legal and civil aspects. He urged those concerned with CRH’s role in Israel to get involved in the campaign by contacting the IPSC, and at the very least to sign the IPSC’s petition - http://www.ipsc.ie/crhdivest

Mr. Dorman concluded: “CRH boast on their website that they adhere “to the highest standards of corporate and social responsibility” and that they state that the support the UN Declaration of Human Rights and consider human rights implications where applicable in all contracts. In light of this, we the undersigned call for CRH to immediately divest from the Mashav Group and to end its collusion with Israel’s Apartheid Regime.”

Concluding the meeting David Landy, Chair of the IPSC, encouraged people to get involved, either at home by getting involved in the IPSC and the BDS campaign, or by visiting Palestine to see the suffering of the people first hand and getting involved with grassroots and NGO campaigns there.


Notes:

1. CRH’s Israeli subsidiary the Mashav Group is to acquire Hanson Israel, Israel's 2nd largest building materials company, which operates illegal quarries, asphalt, aggregate and cement factories in the Occupied West Bank.

Added to this CRH (through Mashav) owns a 25% stake in the Nesher Cement company that provides 85% of all cement in Israel. Therefore, the Irish company CRH is currently complicit in the violation of international law through illegal mining activities in Palestine, as well as the construction of Israel's Apartheid Wall in the West Bank, checkpoints and settlement-colonies.


Related Link: http://www.ipsc.ie/


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University of Michigan silences debate about Palestine.

All demands for boycott against Israel have been officially silenced, at all meetings of the Michigan Student Assembly (University of Michigan; Ann Arbor, Michigan).

Click on today's article in the "Arab American News", in the November 14-20, 2009 issue:

Here is the same "Arab American News" article, from the November 14-20, 2009 issue, as it appears online:



"UM silences debate about Palestine"

By Nick Meyer

Tuesday, 11.17.2009, 09:55pm

On the Web at:

http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/index.php?mod=article&cat=Community&article=2624

The University of Michigan in Ann Arbor has long been a haven for political movements, and many times, they've been started at least partly by non-students.

But the right for non-students to speak at Michigan Student Assembly meetings has been compromised since the MSA passed a controversial resolution on Oct. 27 that will restrict "community input" at its weekly meetings, with preventing political talk about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict suspected by many to be a key motive.

The resolution required a two-thirds majority and passed on its second vote by a 23-7 count after amendments were added to the first failed proposal requiring a written report each time community members are turned away from speaking. The first proposal failed by a 17-16 vote.

Now, the MSA will require that speakers show a valid, non-expired "MCard" confirming that they are affiliated with the university first. Non-affiliates must request permission from the executive board before speaking and their time will be shortened from five minutes per person to three minutes and from an hour to a half hour total for the segment.

The official explanation for the ruling was that the MSA wanted to limit the amount of time spent on "community concerns," now titled "community input," so it could focus more on campus-specific issues.

But MSA Representative Kate Stenvig of the Rackham Graduate School on campus, who voted against the resolution two separate times, said she believed that silencing political discussion was the main objective behind its passing.

"Really, I think what prompted this was the debate around Gaza," said Stenvig. "I think they use it is an excuse to limit any political debates they possibly could…there's a particular fear of debate around Israel and any political issues."

Stenvig said that the topic of Gaza and a potential divestment from Israel resolution is brought up often at meetings.

Blaine Coleman is one non-student who has pushed for a resolution regarding Gaza and divestment from Israel from the MSA on and off for the last nine years, as well as from the Ann Arbor City Council, which once was presented with a list of 1,000 signatures. He's seen the community comments segment shut down temporarily in the past, most notably in October 2000 when he said about 100 students asked the MSA for a divestment from Israel resolution.

Coleman doesn't believe that time is as big of an issue as the MSA has made it out to be.

"Why do they spend all semester working hard to shut these people up when it's just a lousy five minutes?" he asked. "They call it community concerns, and now they have just effectively banned the community from community concerns."

Also raising a few eyebrows was the MSA's decision to move the meeting from its usual place on the third floor of the Michigan Union Building to the Laurie Engineering Center on the north end of UM's campus.

Stenvig has been on campus since 1999 and said that the only other time such a move occurred was when it was moved to a larger venue to accommodate a large expected turnout.

This time, however, the meeting was held in seclusion away from students and community members, where Stenvig said some voting members of the MSA were locked out before being let in.

Stenvig agreed with Coleman that the time restriction explanation wasn't enough justification for the resolution and said she believes the MSA has more influence than it has let on in the political sphere.

"Any argument that our student government can't have an effect on political issues is historically wrong and it's cynical and it's ridiculous," she said.

Stenvig said that many of the student organizations on campus have non-student members who deserve to speak and she plans to fight the resolution, having filed a case with the central student judiciary and saying that it violates the student constitution.

"What me and other people have really argued is that they're limiting free speech rights and political participation of students who want them to take action on the issue," she said.

"Student government should be playing a role to make campus more welcoming to minority students and immigrant students and this resolution was an expression of a whole series of attacks on basic democracy."

--END--

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As you can see, at first the Michigan Student Assembly refused to do it.

Quickly, a second meeting was held at a locked, distant location. Even members of the Assembly were locked outside. Finally the Assembly agreed to eliminate all community speakers, except those granted advance approval by an "executive board".

This move was in total defiance of the Constitutional "Right to Free Speech", and of the Open Meetings Act.

Yet the Zionists are so frantic to kill the Boycott-Israel movement, they will openly choke off your freedom of speech to do it.

You may not believe it, but that famous campus newspaper, the "Michigan Daily", has thrown its weight behind the effort to silence even the word "Gaza" from being spoken:


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MICHIGAN DAILY
Editorial, October 11, 2009--

At: http://www.michigandaily.com/content/daily-assembly-required


"Some students may recall the mockery that the Michigan Student Assembly made of itself last winter when it spent several meetings debating the passage of a resolution on the conflict in Gaza. In light of the derailment of MSA that resulted from discussing these issues at length, MSA is now considering a resolution that would focus debate by changing the policies for hearing community concerns. MSA should approve the proposal..."


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