US House To Penalize Universities That Participate in Boycott of Israel, Passes Bill

Universities in the United States participating in boycott of Israel or preventing students from taking part in exchange programmes will be penalized according to a Republican backed bill passed in the US House of Representatives.

The bill, Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act, was passed in the US house with 237 votes wherein 33 Democrats voted in the favour of the bill. Now, the bill will be transferred to the Senate for approval. The bill simply states that the colleges and universities which participate in student federal programmes should not participate in boycotts of Israel and also the institutes which are receiving funding for these programmes have to certify every year that they are not imposing restrictions on students from Israel studying in their colleges.

Tim Walberg, Republican Chair of the House Education Committee said, “This legislation is about a simple principle: our colleges and universities should not discriminate against Israel, Israeli institutions or Israeli students, and federal taxpayer dollars should never support institutions that engage in such discrimination.”

Members of the US House who supported the bill said that no student or teacher should be discriminated against on grounds of education, academics and have equal access to study abroad opportunity, academic programmes and research options. Josh Gottheimer, a congressman from New Jersey said, “No student, no professor should be shut out of research, study abroad opportunities, or academic partnerships or feel unwelcome in the classroom because of where they are from or what religion they practice. Yet that’s exactly what the boycott-divest-sanction movement seeks to do – targeting one country and one religion: Israel and Judaism.”

While some democrats praised and supported the bill, Bobby Scott in the Democrat education committee criticized it and said, “No college or university has embraced the BDS movement anyway. So, we should combat antisemitism wherever it occurs, but we should not do so by punishing protected speech or conflating a student’s view with university policies.”

The war has divided the US House of Democrats in two parts in recent months. In July, over 100 Democrats supported a bill to cut off military aid to US allies amid accusations its military’s actions in Gaza constituted a genocide.

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