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The Perils of BDS at UK’s Bates College
Anti-Israel demonstration supporting the BDS movement, Paris France, June 8, 2024. Photo: Claire Serie / Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect
At Bates College, we pride ourselves on cultivating critical thinkers equipped to tackle the world’s challenges, and to help humanity.
Yet, the local chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) seems determined to undermine these principles by championing the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. BDS is not a campaign rooted in justice; it is an effort to destroy the Jewish State, through the use of economic harm, divisiveness, and intellectual dishonesty.
Last year, SJP urged Bates President Garry Jenkins to mark the beginning of his tenure by disclosing the college’s investment portfolio and divesting from what they call “systems of oppression and genocide.” While their rhetoric may resonate with the uncritical, it collapses under scrutiny — because Israel does not commit genocide, and does not operate under a system of oppression.
The BDS movement draws its inspiration from the international pressure that helped end apartheid in South Africa. But in completely distorting the meaning and history of apartheid, BDS is not only dangerous, but spreading historical falsehoods.
The term “apartheid,” as defined by the United Nations, refers to policies designed to establish and maintain racial domination. To equate this with Israel’s treatment of its citizens and its handling of territorial disputes is an egregious distortion. Since its founding in 1948, Israel has granted full citizenship, legal equality, and access to state institutions to all its Arab citizens. Israeli Arabs vote, serve in the Knesset, and hold prominent positions in society — a reality that utterly contradicts the claim of systemic racial domination.
Critics, including SJP, often point to the Gaza Strip and the West Bank as evidence of Israel’s so-called apartheid policies. But these claims ignore the historical and legal context.
Under the Oslo Accords, Palestinians in these territories have self-governance. Their status is not the result of racial discrimination, but of the unresolved conflict and their own leadership’s persistent refusal to negotiate in good faith. And just as Americans and Canadians do not have the same rights — it is absurd to suggest that people inside and outside of Israel should all be covered by the same set of laws. To suggest that Israel owes full citizenship rights to individuals outside its recognized borders is as absurd as expecting Americans to vote in Canadian elections.
In practice, BDS’ initiatives have also inflicted serious economic hardship on Palestinians. Consider the 2014 closure of SodaStream’s West Bank factory, where 90% of the workforce was Palestinian. Workers lost jobs offering wages and benefits far superior to local alternatives — all because BDS advocates prioritized ideological purity over pragmatic solutions.
Before the current war, over 100,000 Palestinians enjoyed similar employment opportunities in Israel. If BDS advocates had their way, how many Palestinian families would be left to suffer under the weight of their society’s self-wrought economic failings?
Even prominent Palestinian voices reject BDS. Human rights activist Bassam Eid has labeled the movement counterproductive, arguing that it fosters “hatred, enmity, and polarization” rather than advancing Palestinian nationhood. He’s right. BDS isn’t about building a future; it’s about tearing one down, regardless of the collateral damage.
At its core, the BDS movement is antithetical to the ideals of a liberal arts education. Rather than promoting intellectual rigor and open dialogue, it traffics in ideological conformity and intellectual censorship. By embracing BDS, SJP pushes Bates toward a path of illiberalism, where complex geopolitical realities are flattened into simplistic slogans and dissent is stifled. This is not progress — it is regression.
As the new semester begins, Bates College has a choice to make. Will it remain a place where critical thinking and genuine dialogue flourish, or will it succumb to the pressures of a movement that substitutes propaganda for policy and division for dialogue? If SJP’s agenda prevails, Bates will fail its mission and betray the very principles it claims to uphold.
David King is a recent graduate of Bates College and a fellow with CAMERA on Campus, which works to promote fair and accurate coverage of Israel and the Middle East in academic settings.
The post The Perils of BDS at UK’s Bates College first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.