Harvard University’s Undergraduate Council has approved funding for the 2019 “Israel Apartheid Week,” which will feature programs from anti-Israel activists.
According to CBN News, the weeklong event is meant to raise support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel.
The council voted 21-13 to earmark $2,050 for the college’s Palestine Solidarity Committee.
Israel Apartheid Week started March 30 and ends April 4.
The event happens nationwide at college campuses. According to the event’s website, Israel holds “illegal occupation and apartheid regime over Palestinians partly due to its arms sales and the military support it receives from governments across the world.”
Council Rep. C Scott Courvoisier said the Palestine Solidarity Committee met the requirements to receive the funding.
“I think it’s important in our vote that we completely divest our personal opinions and vote just based on policy,” he said. “It seems to me that these people have met our requirements for getting the grant, and therefore, I think we should fund it.”
Council member Michael Shadpour, however, voted against the funding.
“I don’t think that the UC should start to approve or not approve different speakers based on their views, but I do think that that line is the incitement of violence,” Currier Representative Michael A. Shadpour said. “I’ve heard uncontested that there are speakers [at IAW] that have advocated violence in the past.”
One of the speakers for this year’s event is Omar Barghouti, who is one of the founders of the BDS movement and says he supports armed resistance against Israelis.
Photo courtesy: Getty Images/Jannis Werner
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