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Students in Brussels defeat Israeli embassy’s attempt to silence apartheid week events
Students filled a lecture hall for a lecture via Skype by Palestinian leftist parliamentarian Khalida Jarrar at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Free University of Brussels, VUB) on Wednesday evening, March 4, after student organizers defeated an attempt by Israel’s ambassador to Belgium to cancel Israeli Apartheid Week at the Dutch-speaking university in the Belgian capital.
A small media firestorm erupted at the university after news reports that Israel’s ambassador to Belgium and Luxembourg, Jacques Revah, had complained to the VUB’s Rector, Paul De Knop, about the organizing of Israeli Apartheid Week on the campus. In particular, Revah, following earlier complaints by a Zionist lobby organization, the Belgian League Against Antisemitism, complained about Jarrar’s presentation as well as a planned talk by former Israeli fighter pilot Yonatan Shapira. Joel Rubinstein of the BLAA had earlier threatened legal action against the university for allowing Jarrar, a leader in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a leftist Palestinian political party listed as a “terrorist organization” by the European Union, to speak.
Even more troubling, De Knop stated that the IAW events would be cancelled, or, in the alternative, be permitted to continue, but only with the inclusion of a speaker from the Israeli embassy or another pro-Zionist voice. IAW at VUB was organized by COMAC, the youth movement of the Workers’ Party of Belgium, along with Palestinian groups and other student organizations, all of whom immediately rejected this proposal.
Source: mondoweiss.net