Miriam Shaviv has the latest on the case being brought by Ronnie Fraser against the University and College Union (UCU). Yesterday Fraser himself appeared before the employment tribunal:
Much of the discussion in the afternoon concerned a vote taken by the UCU Congress in 2011 to reject the working definition of anti-Semitism formulated by the European Union Monitoring Centre (EUMC) on Racism and Xenophobia, which is often used in universities. The EUMC definition categorizes several anti-Zionist arguments as anti-Semitic, for example claiming that the state of Israel is a racist endeavor.
In his witness statement, Fraser said that "this decision was the tipping point and a step too far, leading me reluctantly to bring this claim. Their rejection was not accompanied by the adoption of any other definition, nor even by the promise of one. To me, as a Jewish member of UCU, this felt like a muzzle. If I couldn't talk to the union about the anti-Semitism I saw around me, then I would have to talk about it to the Tribunal..."
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He spoke of his increasing isolation as almost all of the academics who had supported him in opposing the boycott motions resigned in protest, over a period of years.
For more on UCU's rejection of the EUMC definition of anti-Semitism see these two posts by Eve Garrard.
See, further, this report in the JC.
