Tag Archives: Nakba

Anthropology and the Boycott of Israeli Academic Institutions: Rosemary Sayigh

Anthropologists for the Boycott of Israeli Academic Institutions is pleased to present Part 2 of our series of essays. This piece by Beirut-based anthropologist Rosemary Sayigh joins earlier statements by Steven Caton, Talal Asad, Mick Taussig, and J. Lorand Matory in support of the boycott until Israeli higher education ends its complicity in the violation of Palestinian rights as stipulated under international law.

Why I Signed
Rosemary Sayigh
Visiting Professor at CAMES, American University of Beirut
Beirut, Lebanon

I have long supported the BDS campaign because I believe in its principles and aims. I do so in three capacities: i) as a citizen of the country that promised Palestine to representatives of the Zionist movement as a national home for Jews; and ii) as a resident in Lebanon, living close to Palestinian refugees, and witness of the ‘ongoing Nakba’; iii) as an anthropologist.

As a British citizen I feel obliged to work against the morally wrong and politically shortsighted decision taken by the British government when it issued the Balfour Declaration. By pledging itself itself to facilitate” “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”, Britain initiated the displacement of Palestine’s indigenous inhabitants, a process it continued after gaining the mandate over Palestine.  Betraying its promise of national independence to Arabs who helped the Allies to defeat the Turks in World War 1, Britain also backed out of the promise made in the Balfour Declaration to do nothing  “which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine”. Though the Declaration’s definition of Arab Palestinians as “non-Jewish communities” was a first step towards their displacement, yet the statement contains a promise of protection that was betrayed throughout the Mandate, and particularly by the way it was terminated. By supporting the BDS campaign I hope to bring nearer the time when a broad segment of the British people will acknowledge a historic mistake and need to make amends.

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