Copying my response to an unlisted communication. Highly recommend reading Ora Herman's "The Furnace and the Reactor: Behind the Scenes at the Eichmann Trial"

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@[…] you raise important questions but I’m not sure what you mean by building bridges. Israel, in a way, is the #golem Europe created and now is in full control, destroying everything in its wake and it’s not limited to Palestinian resistance.

Apropos investment in Israel’s economy, science and military, in the 1960s #Germany used #Holocaust guilt to justify funding Israel's nuclear program while demanding the #Eichmann trial not implicate ordinary Germans in genocide. Today's Europe uses "shared values" rhetoric to justify continued research cooperation.

Ben-Gurion insisted on "Nazi Germany" versus "Germany" to protect German sensibilities and secure nuclear funding. Today's discussions about Horizon Europe carefully avoid confronting Europe's role in enabling Israeli capabilities used against Palestinians. The program has provided Israeli institutions with billions in research funding, much of which has enhanced dual-use technologies, surveillance systems, and military applications now deployed in Gaza and the West Bank.

IMHO Suspending Horizon Europe participation wouldn't just be about current Israeli actions - it would force Europe to confront how its historical and ongoing support has made those actions possible. The current framing avoids this uncomfortable truth about European complicity.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

See Ora Herman's "The Furnace and the Reactor: Behind the Scenes at the Eichmann Trial"

Maybe the solution is to encourage brain drain. Support Israeli scientists who will come and work in Europe, make them sign a cooling-off period preventing them from working with any industry complicit, supporting or enabling the occupation in any way. The world will benefit from continued investment in research, and #Israel will be left to deal with the consequences of adopting messianic #Zionism.

Regardless, polling shows that most Israelis support the continued occupation, and now more than ever, they also support population transfer - I believe the figure is around 86% of the Jewish population. There's little reason to assume that scientists and academics are somehow exempt from these broader societal attitudes.

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[Follow up] "Shin Bet and university, university and Shin Bet. What does that remind me of?" ...

Prof. Idan Landau discusses how Israeli academics' collaboration with the state compromises academic freedom and values by facilitating state surveillance and oppression, particularly of Palestinians. This collaboration also normalizes practices reminiscent of dictatorial regimes (e.g., the #Stasi) and makes universities such as Tel Aviv and Bar Ilan complicit in human rights abuses.

From Prof. Landau's 2021 post:

[...] Did you know that secret research is conducted in Israeli universities, under the auspices and for the benefit of the Shin Bet, the results of which are kept at the Shin Bet headquarters and are not open to public review? Again, more slowly: there are people who use the university's research resources for years, receive a doctorate from it with all the tangible and symbolic capital that goes with it, without leaving any documented trace behind, because all their work is absolutely secret? Read, for example, about the mysterious doctorate written by former Shin Bet member, Dr. Nachman Tal, at the University of Haifa, on "Changes in Security Policy towards the Arab Minority 1948-1967," in the Department of the History of the Jewish People at the University of Haifa. How much of the process was a standard academic process? Well: "The Shin Bet set several preconditions. The work will be defined as 'classified.' That is, it will not be published for public review... Towards the date of the examination of the work, the university submitted to the Shin Bet a list of candidates for the position of judges. The Shin Bet disqualified some of them, and others, who were found to have the appropriate security clearance, were approved."

Here are several examples of collaboration between Israeli academia and security services:

- Joint Programs and Investments:

The Shin Bet and Tel Aviv University collaborate to identify start-ups, with TAU Ventures investing $50,000 in each of the six selected start-ups for "acceleration" within a program called The #Xcelerator: Tel Aviv University helps the Shin Bet develop more sophisticated espionage and surveillance technologies"

- University-Security Career Fairs:

Universities allow Shin Bet representatives to attend career fairs as if they were recruitment companies: "All the universities open their gates to Shin Bet representatives who come to 'career meetings' as if they were placement companies in its service."

Transfer of Graduate Information:

Universities provide the Shin Bet with lists of graduates, including names, ID numbers, and contact information: "The universities transfer to the Shin Bet lists with the names of graduates, ID numbers and ways to contact them."

Prof. Landau in fact questions how this aligns with privacy laws, noting the Shin Bet interprets the law to allow them to "receive information for the purpose of fulfilling its role," which they extend to include recruitment: "The law exempts the Shin Bet... and allows the Shin Bet to 'receive information for the purpose of fulfilling its role,' and the Shin Bet interprets this also as information that will help them recruit manpower."

- Secret Research: see opening quote

- Monitoring of Arab Students:

University security departments monitor Arab activists, both on campus and on social networks, with the approval of the administration: "It is well known that in all the campuses the security departments conduct ongoing monitoring of Arab activists, on the ground and also on social networks, and things come to threats and harassment, all with the approval and with the blind eye of the administration."

- Tel Aviv University asking help from the faculty to identify students during the 2011 protests:

"Tel Aviv University then sent a letter to the lecturers in which it asked for their help in identifying and handing over students from their departments (what Stas!i), who participate in protest activities on campus; a video documenting a student demonstration was attached to the letter, in order to make it easier for the lecturers to do the work of informing."

Hebrew https://idanlandau.com/2021/12/23/%D7%A9%D7%9E%D7%97%D7%A0%D7%95-%D7%9C%D7%AA%D7%AA-%D7%A9%D7%99%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%94%D7%90%D7%95%D7%A0%D7%99%D7%91%D7%A8%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%98%D7%90%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%91%D7%99%D7%A9%D7%A8%D7%90%D7%9C/

Idan Landau was born in the US, immigrated to Israel in 1969, and served as an IDF officer (1985-1989). He earned degrees from Tel Aviv University and MIT, specializing in generative syntax. A professor of Linguistics at Tel Aviv University since 2023, he has been imprisoned multiple times for refusing to serve in the occupied territories, causing a media controversy in 2011 when his salary was docked for this reason.

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