Thinking about BDS differently — and strategically

Not long ago, along a stretch of Venice boardwalk, I watched a weightlifter stroll over from Muscle Beach to where the chess hustlers play. One of them asked him to sit and play. The bodybuilder complied and was quickly defeated. His failure? He was playing a game chosen by someone else — someone far better at the game than he.

This is the problem with the Jewish community’s response to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement on campuses. The game is fixed, yet the Jewish community continues to engage naively in a futile effort, expecting “justice” but receiving none. It is time for us to disengage from this game and instead offer up a different idea — one committed to meaningful academic inquiry.

American Jews tend to see the BDS debate being played out on campuses across the country as a thoughtful debate by knowledgeable opinion leaders about the fate of university divestment from Israel. And we willingly engage in this debate on the merits. But the game really is a series of carefully orchestrated show-votes that result in win after win for BDS proponents and, importantly, far more publicity than is warranted.

I submit that we are going about this all wrong. This is a fight that ought not be joined and cannot be won. I am not suggesting that we shy away from celebrating Israel, educating people or engaging in conversations about the Middle East. I am merely suggesting that the response to the BDS movement’s obsession with vote after vote — as if the imprimatur of student governments is the critical factor in the conflict — is wrongheaded and counterproductive.

Let’s consider the problem with continuing along the current path.

First, the body adjudicating the battle is fixed, as is the voting process. Many years ago, I was active in USC’s student government. The fact is that student governments are populated by those who try hardest and care the most. The dirty little secret is that few students either care to vote or pay much attention to the actions of the student government. Because of this, supporters of BDS can manipulate the composition of the very body being asked to vote on the resolution. And they need to win only once. Even in defeat, there is another chance the next year, with a newly elected student government. At Stanford, it was even easier. There, sufficient pressure was applied and a “re-vote” took place weeks later, yielding the desired result. Not only is the process fixed, but the very impartiality and motivation of Jewish participants is suspect. As we have seen at UCLA and Stanford, if a student government official might dare to be Jewish or have visited Israel or, even worse, be a Zionist, that individual will find himself or herself delegitimized.

Second, supporters of the BDS movement are of singular purpose, enabling them to be better organized and prepared. Their supporters are primarily motivated by joining the political battle and securing student government support. The Jewish students, be they Hillel, AIPAC or J Street supporters, are engaged in a multiplicity of activities, including social justice projects, worship and community building. And this is as it should be. We cannot urge our children to become foot soldiers in a futile battle, changing the very nature of their college and Jewish experiences.

Third, we cannot prepare enough students on enough campuses to effectively engage to do battle in a hostile environment. I have been party to a number of conversations among Jewish leaders about how to deal with BDS on campus. Inevitably this leads to someone concluding that “we aren’t preparing our kids for the battle they’ll face in college.” And this is true: Our students are poorly armed. But arming them poses the risk of turning them away from love of Israel. So why fight? Teach them instead to celebrate their heritage, live their Jewish values, and pursue Israeli advocacy in forums of their choosing, and not the suffocating confines of student government hearings where student representatives have been appointed as arbiters of Middle Eastern policy. 

Fourth, let’s remember that the pro-Israel response focuses on the notion that there are “two narratives” that can exist simultaneously. All but the most extreme supporters of Israel acknowledge that the Arab-Israeli dispute is complex and nuanced. The BDS objective is not to pursue a clearer understanding of the challenges and propose meaningful compromises. They do not buy into the idea that there is “another side.” Until Palestinian supporters accept the “two-narrative” proposition, there really is no point to the conversation.

Critically, we confuse the objective of the BDS movement. We all know that the boards of trustees of major universities are not likely to follow a student government election with divestment or sanction. The BDS movement’s objective is not necessarily to achieve divestment; they know the likelihood of success as well as we do. Their objective is publicity and the achievement of a single “up or down” vote — a single dispositive rejection of Israel and further delegitimization of the Jewish state. Since we know that’s the case, why would we voluntarily engage in a battle before a kangaroo court? 

Finally, we must consider the damage being done to the interests of Israel — and of Jews — on college campuses. Supporters of Israel increasingly are being stigmatized and categorized as “colonialists” and “oppressors” by their peers. Other interest groups on campus have been co-opted through a conflation of past historical injustices inflicted on other groups (groups that often lacked the political and economic power that the Palestinians and their Arab benefactors possess). We have seen this in the “us and them” paradigm of the oppressor and the oppressed being played out at places such as Northwestern University. By seeing their support of Israel as ostracizing them from the mainstream on campus, Jewish students are faced with the Hobson’s choice of marginalization versus abandonment of Israel. By using an impending resolution vote as a tool, the BDS movement is able to co-opt other groups. And the vote itself, particularly if hard fought, may be one of the singular most significant events of a student’s college life. And these students will later be the trustees of the future, who may well view BDS through a different lens than current leadership.

So, what to do? Two things.  

First, stop playing the game as it has been created. If pro-Israel supporters stop attending these votes and refuse to fight a battle that is lost before it begins, the publicity aspect is removed. The votes of student governments will again be the stuff of page six news in the campus paper. 

Second, we need to change the game. Stop being suckered into playing a game that’s fixed and instead play a game that might make sense.  

The game that should be supported by Jewish leaders is to urge engagement in constructive debate, and universities are the perfect forums for this. We should construct a template program to be offered nationwide, a “plug and play” symposium on the Middle East. It should include the Palestinian-Israeli issue, but also the challenges to liberal democracy in the Middle East, the role of women, the social stigmas of political and economic suppression of gays. We should offer the pro-Palestinian movement the opportunity to co-host and co-fund these symposiums. We should invite scholars and thought leaders to conduct meaningful seminars and dialogs on great issues and, if possible, come forth at the end with joint resolutions.

Universities are supposed to be places of intellectual discourse — of probing great issues and proposing, if not solutions, then ways in which to reconsider these difficult issues. Let’s be the proponents of dialogue that involves risks — the risk that we and the supporters of BDS might be forced to address uncomfortable facts and alternative narratives — risks that we challenge those with whom we disagree to share with us. It is only through the university — qua university — that we can adjust the playing field to a game that is neither stacked against us nor for us, but for the future.

Glenn Sonnenberg is president of Stephen Wise Temple. He also serves on the boards of The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles and Bet Tzedek — the House of Justice. He is a former member of the Board of Trustees of USC.