EU academic body votes to boycott Israel universities
Tehran (KNA) - The European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) has approved with an overwhelming majority a motion to boycott Israeli academic institutions that are based in the West Bank.
The EASA voted in favor of the motion in an online poll "in overwhelming numbers to express their solidarity with colleagues in occupied Palestinian territories," the body reported on its website on Friday.
As many as 830 participants supported the move in the poll, while only 21 voted against it, and 37 abstained.
The motion had been presented at the body's annual general meeting in Stockholm in August when it received 164 votes in favor, and zero against.
It argues that the institutions solely serve the Israelis, something that warrants the EASA's "non-cooperation."
The motion also seeks "to express its solidarity with Palestinian academics and students suffering the brunt of these discriminatory policies as well as with the Israeli colleagues of the Israeli Sociological Association and Israeli Anthropological Association, who oppose the same policies."
The EASA's Israeli counterpart, the Israeli Anthropological Association (IAA), thanked the European body for the support after the meeting.
The IAA had itself decided in June to refuse cooperation with the three institutions of higher education in the illegal settlements built across the West Bank, namely Ariel University, Orot College, and Herzog College.
Source: PressTV