Some of his points about how important it is going to be moving forward i want to really hold that up because you know, palestine and my view will continue to be a central issue, but we are going to see so many communities under direct attack and what has happened with the Real Movement for a cognitive real organizing between communities will demand this kind of support, this kind of standing up for the most vulnerable among us. And finally common you know, eds is a tactic i shifted the way folks here are active on the issue of palestine. So i will talk a little bit more about bds specifically in the u. S. Its global and theres a lot going on all over the world. We know that boycott are not a new tactic necessarily. Palestinians have used it before and during the british mandate during the first thing to fontana, et cetera. The bds movement which dates to 2005 in the calls from over 170 Palestinian Civil Society organizations to the International Community has created an a new level of engagement on espn you know, the demand of the movement are also important to recognize and how instrumental those demands have been in widening the focus for palestinian rights. It is about ending the occupation and taking down the walls, but also guaranteeing equal rights for palestinians of israel and recognizing the apartheid like regime that currently exists in both the respect and rates of return for Palestinian Refugees. The fact that it encompasses all of these demands is really important in the way that it has shaped activism and the kind of political conversation that is happening. Since 2005, this call for boycott divestment and sanctions has been heated by organizations and groups around the world and weve seen significant bit therese. Weve seen just in the u. S. Academic boycotts. Academic associations go into years of organizing to resolve in the end to accept resolution to call for an academic boycott of institutions. The american studies and ossetian, the National Association of chicano and chicano studies. Native and indigenous studies. There are many of them in this been a Significant Development i think just in the last three years really. Church is ,com,com ma divestmendivestmen t resolutions have been passed in several churches. The United Church of christ, the lutherans recently called for an end to military aid to israel. And universities. There are over 30 student governments at universities that have passed resolutions calling on their universities that divest from companies that profit from human rights violations. These are huge therese. They have caught the attention of israel and its allies. The cultural boycott as well. Artists and musicians and actors speaking out on this issue. So lets talk about the response to this movement and i think what is most what is most important to realize here is that, you know, this is a testament to how successful the movement has become, how much it has changed Public Discourse to the point where president ial candidate can say what he said. And you know, the backlash we are seeing originates with israel itself, which has pledged millions of dollars to combat team bds specifically and is supported by dozens of groups in the United States that specifically support israel and the zionist agenda. So we have Sheldon Abelson racing over 20 million to combat palestine activism on campuses and millions and millions of dollars dedicated by organizations to undermining this growing movement. I think the thing that when we are thinking about the u. S. Role and miss, what is dictating how the u. S. In the form of government officials and the forum of Public Institutions like universities and the form of Government Agencies is responding to face. There are a few things to think about. It seems that the u. S. And his officials are really listening to the israeli alarmism about bds. That is the bogeyman that represents a larger movement. What has resulted is that israel has labeled bds as a strategic threat of the first order and it has labeled bds as antisemitic and attempted to link it to terrorism or imply that its just as bad. We have seen that it has followed suit and we will discuss some of the ways in which it has done that. My organization palestine legal put out a report last year documenting what we have seen around the country to the suppression of speech palestine of activities and palestine. Return to the palestine exception to free speech. It seems like you can talk about basically anything in this country, but if you criticize israel, hold on, youre vulnerable to a lot of attacks. And so, it has really presented a challenge to our First Amendment right in the enforcement of these rate. So you know, what we see is just in the last since 2014 we have documented nearly 600 incidents of suppression. A lot of these have been on campuses, but not all of them. The way that this plays out is in several ways. We see Academic Freedom suspended. How many of you have heard about the case of Stephen Sakai test fired, terminated. He hadnt yet started teaching, but he had a contract and was getting ready to start teaching at the university of illinois at champaign nirvana and his contract was terminated because he was tweaking in the summer of 2014 about terroristic attack on gaza. How many of you have heard about the recent incident about the university of california berkeley . A student proposed a course on palestine through it colonial settler analysis and an administrator arbitrarily suspended at after of course significant pressure Israel Advocacy groups. It was reinstated a week later after a lot of uproar and pressure and that a significant. We see that kind of thing all of the time for any talk or any study of palestine is immediately biased, is immediately onesided, propaganda, et cetera. That is how its being painted. We are seeing this in legal complaints and lawsuits. So we have several organizations filing complaints under title six of the civil rights act, claiming that universities are discriminating against jewish students by allowing hostile antisemantic environment and, you know, the basis of these claims are that lectures and Film Screening and protests threaten jewish students and leaves them vulnerable. So you know, just the most recent comeback to these, talking about palestine are painted as threatening to jewish students of antisemantic and requiring some of these university intervention. And we see students disciplined all the time, charged again with being antisemantic, threatening jewish students, et cetera but then said disciplinary prophecies and investigation and inevitably we found when we intervene that when universities investigate, they find this is political speech. This is not an attack on jewish students. Thats really important in the same has happened with the title takes complaints with the department of education that investigates them has found over and over the First Amendment attacks these activities, that this is political speech amounts of the First Amendment is for, thank god. And then, very important that we stay more recently is smear campaigns against individuals. How many of you have heard about canary mission, for example, a website that, you know, has profiled hundreds is too dense and academics, claiming that they are antisemantic and proterrorist with the aim of preventing them from getting jobs. So we see hundreds of students very worried about this. Their careers hang on it. Their future employers will google them and this is football, period you know, we have things that David HorowitzFreedom Center plastering posters all over college campuses, naming individual student and saying the students are terrorist supporters. If you support them, you support hamas. This kind of public blacklisting is going on a lot and then you have legislation. I think the legislation we are seeing around the country is particularly representative of the length that government officials will go to oppose bds in particular. Lets talk a little about that. The alarmism about bds is evident in the legislation we are seeing and is justified by calling bds discriminatory, antisemantic. In the case in the case of new York Governor Andrew Cuomo calling it even worse than terrorism that golf. So he seen a couple recent days. The first was starting in 2014 in response to the American Studies Association academic boycott resolution. You have several states proposing legislation that tried to defense universities that support or participate in an academic boycott meaning and a universituniversit y that pays, subsidizes a faculty to go to a conference for example. These all failed partly because of the huge opposition, even the New York Times editorialized against it. And more recently, we had to hear cries of legislation is posted in the state. We are doing a few things. First you have resolutions that are nonbinding but merely condemn boycott and the is this should legislation a position about bds comes to bear her and pulled and effect they have for people who want to talk about this. And then we have bills that are proposed and they do one or all of the following. They create blacklists of companies, nonprofits, institutions. It depends on what hill, but individuals in some cases to participate or promote bds spirit they required the state to those companies on the blacklist or some dont have a black list but they create a list. And then some prohibit the state from contract and with companies that engage in media. So what have we seen . 13 states that have passed these laws, including new york through an executive order of the governor. You know, it is hard to say what the impact that these laws are. They think in practical terms it may not be so vague, but a telling effect is huge. People think this bds has been criminalized. If i do this i will put myself that is their intention to scare people off for engaging on this issue and then we have congressional legislation as well, a few bills and we are bound to see more. So trump, and shari to show you this picture. I feel like weve seen him a lot and were going to see him a lot more. But we expect the assault on palestine to continue and one theme that solicited mentioned that he has said for his adviser has said as they plan to ask the department of justice to investigate campus activism. So this is a step beyond the department of education. This is reinforced the surveillance, targeting the smearing of that diverse. There is hope, so ill end on this note. You know, there is increasing support for palestinian rights as phyllis talked a lot about. You know, the opinion polls are showing that. The young people are more and more supportive and theres a shift. But in order to keep factoid, we we have to remove the stigma that this legislation is helping to show that all these conservative attacks on palestine activism by making possible and we have to push back against that. It is possible at and they think its helpful because there is such an important history of boycott used to further social justice. It is a time honored tactic in the u. S. And globally and has been used in the most important social Justice Movements in the u. S. And then theres the law. We have the First Amendment. It is very clear Supreme Court precedent said boycotts are protected First Amendment activity. Boycotts affect Political Economic and social change which is what bds is. You know, it is our duty, responsibility to make sure that those rights are good. If we dont, they will be forsaken. That is a palestines legal rule lives. That is how we see our role. If we are able to do that, if we are able to keep the space for this movement to grow, and for the Public Opinion to keep shifty and, we can have an effect on u. S. Policy in the long run. Thank you. [applause] thank you very much. Thank you to the Palestine Center in Jerusalem Fund for recognizing this inviting me to thank you of the panelists in all of you for attempting. My comments are about the issue of palestine, the arab uprisings in the area political scene. They follow pretty smoothly from the historical background premise of the the time is getting tight. I will stick to 10, 15 minutes to give the men in bullet point ideas and then you can have any discussion you want. My basic point that the following. The struggle for Arab National right viable statehood, legitimate statehood and true sovereignty and Citizenship Rights all across the arab world was manifested master manically by the arab uprising six years ago. Weve never had such a deep widespread and ongoing expression of the quest for statehood and citizenship across the arab world as we did six years ago and is continuing in many forms. This is the latest manifestation of the struggle that started in the 1920s as junot pointed out. The palestinian side and request for legitimate, credible and lasting statehood sovereignty and citizenship are part of the same historical quest and they reflect a common sentiment and culminates that permeate every arab country without exception. The fact that neither of them have been fully attained with the possible exception that the first south determined arab citizenry. The fact that these rights have been attained reflects a combination of factors, organizational, institutional, international, counterrevolutionary forces, counter Democratic Forces from the arab world, from the Zionist Movement as many Different Reasons we know why we have been achieved either the palestinian nationhood and citizenship or arab true sovereignty and citizen shipwrights across the arab world. The important thing to recognize this season or two dimensions at the same struggle. The reason the palestine issue continues to resonate that just across the arab world, but across the entire world and you see this now perhaps the most common signal of it is goofy. Two people struggling in china and belgium in chile and forever they dont do this because its a fashion statement. They do it because it is a symbol of a common human struggle for right better anchored both in the modern institutions of citizenship, the u. N. Declaration of human rights promote global selfdetermination. An instrument you want to use. Derosa anchored in the ancient orality if youd like to go that way, too, the quest for justice as god told moses to talk the hebrews to tell the world. That quest for justice is manifested most romantically across the entire world or the symbolism of the palestine issue and this is one reason why continues to grow. It is not come to fruition and have the results that we want, but the fact is growing and you heard from the previous speakers all the fascinating and important trends within the United States among students, the media, some politicians, the mainstream churches, professional associations, academic groups. But most importantly the demographic trends among the American People of the Jewish American community is the younger people under the age of 40 are clearly more evenhanded. Roughly 50 50 sane palestinians and israelis had equal rights to the statehood to citizenship for security and integrity of the national consciousness. This is something that is now widespread and anchored in this political sentiments in the value systems of americans under the age of 45. Among older americans, it is still problematically tilted to a brand proisraeli position without giving the palestinians equal rights. But the trend over time, even among Jewish Americans and we shouldnt be surprised because young Jewish Americans are manifesting as americans and as shoes and both of those characterizations are anchored in peace, justice and equality whether its dictated by the american constitution and the Young Americans are the Critical Community we should reach out to understand, talk to and form alliances with for the wellbeing of all americans, particularly Jewish Americans because of people are worried about islam a phobia and the immigrant feeling another problems and they should remember that antisemitism is the oldest one of these criminal deeds and it is already rearing is already rearing its head a little bit and there needs to be a Strong Alliance between american is and all americans of good conscience and integrity. One of the tanks, by the way that i would recommend is i think we in the palestinian American Community with others, we should Start Holding conferences to antisemitism is a crime and a cancer and where its ultimate fate guns as well as the jewish people and we need to raise that issue with our jewish brothers and sisters and really understand it and try to cut it before it grows. The arab political world today is the issue of palestine in the uprisings is very clear. We have a lot of evidence which we didnt have 20 years ago, but we have it now because of poland, which is now more common across the arab world. We have a lot of evidence repeatedly confront year after year that the palestine issue and Justice Without onions resonates deeply across the arab world with ordinary people. A reso