Museums should cancel these Israel Days of Science

While I condemn what Israel is doing in Gaza, and the collaborations to enhance the bombs, I personally feel to go all the way to boycott Israeli Universities from partaking in this event I have a problem with.
While I don't agree/nor like the intentions that some of these universities are doing for science exploration projects, I think that it is imperative to show what kind of work is going on these universities, and what the latest scientific discoveries they have, rather than not allow them at all. Maybe some of the scientists that work at these Israeli universities are very much against the occupation and the violence in Gaza? Maybe some of them love science, and want to live their lives in peace with their neighbors, and don't want to have to worry about politics?!
I feel this has gone too far.
And I feel that a lot of these British academics and activists have gone too far. Please, I am sure that the British government has several scientific projects at their universities for bombs and the like, that will be used in Iraq and Afghanistan. Oh and let's not forget the atrocities that the British Empire has done, colonizing much of planet.
And what about the US? Shouldn't the same be issued for US scientists who are promoting their scientific discoveries related to the field of nuclear science and the creations of bombs, endorsed by the US government, which will be used to bomb in Iraq and Afghanistan as well?
Why is it always about Israel, but the world will remain silent about bigger empires that have killed, colonized and oppressed millions of more people, such as the US?
Look what we've done to literally the whole South American continent.

Why the silence?


And how will not allowing these scientific exhibits prevent anything?

I am dissapointed in the way the world works, but I am hoping that things will change, and will apply war crimes to the governments that have committed them, rather than letting them run away with it.


Blessings

Stephanie



http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/feb/16/museums-israel-science

Museums should cancel these Israel Days of Science


Monday 16 February 2009




Quite extraordinarily, the Science Museum in London and the Manchester Museum of Science and Industry have both been made available (on 3 and 5 March respectively) for an event called "Israel Day of Science". The museums argue they are not sponsoring the event, but have merely hired out their premises. This subtle distinction is unlikely to be appreciated by the many thousands of all ages and faiths who have repeatedly taken to the streets round the country to protest against Israeli war crimes in Gaza.

The event is promoted by the Zionist Federation and is designed to showcase the scientific achievements of seven Israeli universities. But all of these are complicit in the Israeli occupation and in the policies and weaponry so recently deployed to such disastrous effect in Gaza. To take just one example, Tel Aviv University, in its most recent annual review, states that "the Israel ministry of defence is currently funding 55 projects at TAU", which "is playing a major role in enhancing Israel's security capabilities and military edge". The head of TAU's security studies programme was a former director of the R&D directorate of the Israel ministry of defence. He holds the rank of major-general in the Israel Defence Forces and is a member of the Knesset.

Israel Day of Science is aimed particularly at sixth-form students, who can be expected to come in parties from schools across the country. What reaction can be expected from the many young people, already disaffected from science, who will associate the science museums with this Israeli public relations exercise? The event is being billed as a celebration of science. In fact it is an attempted celebration of Israel.

In the immediate aftermath of the indiscriminate slaughter and attempted annihilation of all the infrastructure of organised society in Gaza, how can this "celebration" be allowed to borrow some respectability from the use of these distinguished institutions? The museums should cancel these unseemly events.
Charles Jencks, Mairead Maguire, Dr Ian Gibson MP, Walter Hain, Ahdaf Soueif, Professor RS MacKay (Warwick), Reem Kelani (Singer), Karl Sabbagh, Professor Steven Rose (Open University), Sabah Al-Mukhtar (Arab Lawyers Association), Professor Jonathan Rosenhead (LSE), Dr Sue Blackwell (Birmingham), Professor Jim Al-Khalili (Surrey) and 368 others