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image via Padraic Ryan

B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement:
 
New York University President Andrew Hamilton is forthrightly rejecting the call of a graduate student union for the school to sever ties with Israel.
 
In a statement, Hamilton wrote: “A boycott of Israeli academics and institutions is contrary to our core principles of academic freedom, antithetical to the free exchange of ideas and at odds with the University’s position on this matter, as well as the position of [the student group]’s parent union.”  Further, he notes: ““NYU will not be closing its academic program in Tel Aviv, and divestment from Israeli-related investments is not under consideration,” the statement continued. “And to be clear: whatever ‘pledges’ union members may or may not have taken does not free them from their responsibilities as employees of NYU, which rejects this boycott.”
 
The vote by the Graduate Student Organizing Committee (part of the United Auto Workers) passed with more than 66 percent in favor of the measure that includes a demand for NYU “to close its program in Tel Aviv University,” among other things.
 
B’nai B’rith recognizes Hamilton’s strong and unequivocal rejection of the student-led effort to delegitimize the Jewish state. The global BDS campaign does nothing to advance peace and calls into question the real objectives of those who push the BDS agenda.