“More than 5,000 signatures were collected and presented to Ann Arbor’s city council” for a resolution to withhold U.S. aid to Israel

By Nick Meyer

Courtesy of Arab American News

The city of Ann Arbor has long been a hotspot for the Boycott Israel movement, and a group of the most fervent Palestinian rights activists continued that tradition Wednesday, protesting a meeting between Starbucks employees and CEO Howard Schultz. Read the full story

By Salim Nazzal

Courtesy of thepeoplesvoice.org

In the wake of the crisis after a Swedish newspaper revealed the heinous, and criminal activity, of Israel which has been harvesting organs and body parts from murdered Palestinians and selling them on to the USA it seems that Israel is facing another crisis, this time with Norway. The Norwegian Government Pension Fund, which has $400 billion in assets under management, has sold its $5.4 million holding in Israeli defense contractor Elbit Systems Ltd. Read the full story

Courtesy of Desertpeace

Jane Fonda, Danny Glover and Eve Ensler have joined the growing list of artists who are boycotting the Toronto film festival over a program honoring Tel Aviv’s 100th anniversary, gossip blogger Perez Hilton reported on Friday.

The three have added their names to a letter aimed at festival officials claiming that Tel Aviv was built on violence, ignoring the “suffering of thousands of former residents and descendants,” Hilton reported. Read the full story

Dr. Neve Gordon of Ben-Gurion University in Be'er Sheva, a veteran peace activist, branded Israel as an apartheid state and said that a boycott was "the only way to save it from itself." (Photo courtesy of amazon.com)

By Barak Ravid
Courtesy of Haaretz

Members of the Los Angeles Jewish community have threatened to withhold donations to an Israeli university in protest of an op-ed published by a prominent Israeli academic in the Los Angeles Times on Friday, in which he called to boycott Israel economically, culturally and politically.

Dr. Neve Gordon of Ben-Gurion University in Be’er Sheva, a veteran peace activist, branded Israel as an apartheid state and said that a boycott was “the only way to save it from itself.”

Gordon, a political scientist, said that “apartheid state” is the most accurate way to describe Israel today.

“3.5 million Palestinians and almost half a million Jews live in the areas Israel occupied in 1967,” Gordon wrote, “and yet while these two groups live in the same area, they are subjected to totally different legal systems. The Palestinians are stateless and lack many of the most basic human rights. By sharp contrast, all Jews – whether they live in the occupied territories or in Israel – are citizens of the state of Israel.”

“It is indeed not a simple matter for me as an Israeli citizen to call to suspend cooperation with Israel,” he further wrote. “The words and condemnations from the Obama administration and the Read the full story

By Raphael Ahren, Courtesy of Haaretz

Local and international anti-boycott groups said this week they are monitoring the growing academic boycott movement in the U.S. but currently do not deem it a serious threat. The U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel said recently it has more than tripled its membership since it was launched about half a year ago, receiving endorsements from a number of prominent individuals and groups.

About 85 people joined the movement in the first weeks after a group of 15 Californian academics founded it in the wake of Operation Cast Lead. Today, its Web site lists more than 325 academic signatories from American and some 60 from international universities – ranging from Egypt and Tunisia to Canada, England, Sweden and Brazil. Another 95 “cultural workers” and organizations have also joined. Among the most prominent signatories are Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu, the former archbishop of Cape Town, and the U.S. Green Party.

David Lloyd, an English professor at the University of Southern California and one of movement’s founding members, recently told Haaretz, “Given that the call for the boycott only went out in late January, and that – unlike the ADL, Hillel, or AIPAC – we lack funding for PR, we consider this a considerable Read the full story

Census Ethnic Media Briefing Breakfast: 
Date:  Thursday, May 28, 2009 
Time: 9 to 11 am 
Place:  Rancho Santiago Community College
2323 North Broadway,
Santa Ana California 92706
Continental Breakfast will be served. The event is hosted by Southern California Edison.
 
For More Info Please Contact:
Rashad Z. Al-Dabbagh
Partnership Specialist
US Census Bureau
626-375-2537 cell
rashad.z.al-dabbagh@census.gov