By Hadassa Kalatizadeh
Roughly 50 professors from the City University of New York have resigned the faculty union to protest a resolution condemning Israel for alleged attacks on Palestinians. The resolution, approved by delegates of the faculty union, namely the Professional Staff Congress, also threatens to support the movement to boycott and divest from the Jewish state. As reported by the NY Post, in response to the controversial resolution, many CUNY professors, some of whom are descendants of Holocaust victims or have relatives in Israel, have resigned.
“With the PSC CUNY resolution you have chosen to support a terrorist organization, Hamas, whose goal (`From the River to the Sea’) is to destroy the state of Israel and kill all my relatives who live there,” said Professor Yedidyah Langsam, chairman of Brooklyn’s College’s Computer and Information Science Department, in a letter of resignation to PSC President James Davis. “You do NOT represent us and I will not be a part of an organization that supports those who wish to destroy us,” Langsam added.
The resolution, which was passed in June, says, “PSC-CUNY condemns the massacre of Palestinians by the Israeli state’’ — while decrying Israel’s “expansionism and violent incursions into occupied territories.” PSC-CUNY “cannot be silent about the continued subjection of Palestinians to the state-supported displacement, occupation, and use of lethal force by Israel,” the union’s resolution adds.
“Your unbalanced motion fails to address the over 4000 rockets fired from Gaza into residential areas.” Langsam responded in his letter of resignation. “You equate the careful bombing by the Israeli Air Force in order to minimize any collateral damage with the actions of the Palestinians who use their own civilian women and children, hospitals, and schools as shields for their launching sites.”
A group named “PSC Exit” has launched a campaign to help professors legally quit the union. The anti-PSC group said the union has grown “unrecognizable”. “They now spend money and time on activities that have nothing to do with our careers. Instead they focus on foreign politics even when much of the membership has no interest in these activities.” The exodus of more faulty members will likely hurt the union’s finances, as most professors payout about 1.05 percent of their salary to be members.
Davis, who recently took over as PSC president, responded to the Post, saying, “Many members are absolutely sincere in their distress, but we also know that a pressure campaign has been launched by people who were not PSC members in the first place and have been waiting eagerly… to peel members away from the PSC.”
