While the voices of the academic boycott against Israel continue to grow at universities across the globe, there is, indeed, something special and exciting about the good news emanating from Israel’s southern region. The Sami Shamnoon College of Engineering (SCE)’s Tech-Fest 25, a large technological conference, will be held this month on both its Ashdod and Beersheba campuses.
It is attracting internationally renowned lecturers, senior industrialists, and leading researchers, not only from Israel but also from abroad. They choose to come despite the calls to boycott Israel.
Their actions show the genuine bravery of those academicians, since this boycott is a negative and dangerous phenomenon. The academic boycott currently being imposed on Israel is not merely political – it is damaging the very foundations of academia itself.
Universities are meant to be islands of sanity, places for free, unimpeded research, spaces for the free exchange of opinions, truth seeking, and finding solutions that make this world better for humanity. By boycotting academic institutions or an entire state, this vital essence is harmed.
Science recognizes no political boundaries. For example, when a vaccination was discovered for the COVID-19 virus, the following question never arose: “What passport was the researcher who discovered that vaccine carrying?” Neither was any other groundbreaking technology dependent on the political position of the laboratory in which it was created.
By boycotting the Israeli academic community, we are not the only ones being harmed – the progress of all humankind is being impeded.
Academia is meant to promote tolerance and cooperative dialogue – not to deepen disputes. Within the walls of universities and colleges, people having different perspectives are meant to meet, to debate, challenge new ideas, and grow from this interaction. The present academic boycott is doing the opposite – it builds walls, rather than tearing them down.
These researchers and lecturers who are coming to Israel now, despite the sociopolitical pressure in their homelands, are proving that they understand; they know that knowledge and research are much more important than ephemeral politics.
Flaws in the academic boycott of Israel: The importance of placing academia over politics
As such, the SCE Tech-Fest 25 to be held in parallel in Ashdod and Beersheba is much more than a merely academic event – it is a declaration. Its message is that science continues, progress never ceases, and there is still a place in the world for genuine academic dialogue.
SCE, located in southern Israel – the region that has suffered the most during this past period – is proving that, especially in such difficult times, it is important to carry on and invest in education, research, and the promotion of knowledge.
This is a real contribution to the State of Israel in these dire straits – not just economically or technologically, but rather in support of national robustness. While the world is trying to isolate us academically, institutions such as SCE prove that we are not “a people that dwells apart” (Numbers 23:9), but rather that we have a great deal to offer the world, a world that needs what we are developing, inventing, creating, and contributing.
I’m most certain that the current academic boycott on Israel will pass, as others have in the past, and, in its wake, will remain insightful knowledge, more research developments, and newly woven human connections.
The researchers and lecturers who choose to come to Israel now are ambassadors of academic truth – the truth affirming that knowledge is more important than politics, and that higher education must remain the domain of open dialogue.
Ultimately, real bravery is not boycotting – but in showing up, teaching, learning, and sharing the search for solutions to humanity’s problems. That’s exactly what’s happening this month in southern Israel.
The writer is rector and founder of SCE, the Shamoon College of Engineering.