Pro-Israel academic fails to hamper Palestine solidarity activity

A pro-Israel lecturer has lost his case against Britain’s largest trade union and professional association for academics for the alleged anti-Semitism, media reports say.

Freelance mathematics lecturer Ronnie Fraser, founding director of Academic Friends of Israel organization, had argued that the Universities and Colleges Union (UCU) was institutionally anti-Semitic because the union had voted to boycott Israel.

Claiming that he was a victim of “unlawful harassment” at the hands of the UCU, Fraser accused the union of having a “relentless” focus on boycott attempts that created a “horrendous” situation for Jewish academics.

But after a lengthy hearing, a London employment tribunal said the complaints were “without substance” and “devoid of any merit”.

Fraser also called some witnesses, including British Labour MP John Mann and former MP Denis MacShane.

However, the tribunal said both gave “glib evidence, appearing supremely confident of the rightness of their positions.”

“Lessons should be learnt from this sorry saga. It would be very unfortunate if an exercise of this sort were ever repeated,” the tribunal’s conclusion said.

“We are also troubled by the implications of the claim. Underlying it we sense a worrying disregard for pluralism, tolerance and freedom of expression.

The UCU, which represents lecturers, trainers, researchers and academic-related staff in colleges and universities in the UK, passed new policies in 2010 supporting boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against the Israeli regime.

The union also voted in 2011 to reject the working definition of anti-Semitism formulated by the European Union Monitoring Centre (EUMC) on Racism and Xenophobia, which categorizes some anti-Zionist arguments as anti-Semitic.