Divestment Defeated at UC San Diego - Congratulations Tritons for Israel!

In yet another defeat for BDS, a proposed divestment initiative was just defeated at UC San Diego - Congratulations are in order to the Tritons for Israel!

From the blog, an All-American Girl for the Restoration of Values

StandWithUs salutes the Tritons for Israel for their strategy and dedication to defeating BDS on their campus.

On April 13th, 2011, the Associated Students (AS), the official student representatives at UC San Diego, passed a resolution authored by Academic Senator Adi Singer, stating that it was not the place of the Associated Students to pass resolutions that will divide the campus community and alienate specific groups. The resolution called for neutrality of the student senate, and reinforced the mission statement of building a cohesive campus community, and representing a diverse but unified voice. Two weeks ago, Student for Justice in Palestine (SJP) submitted a resolution calling upon the UC Regents to divest the retirement and pension funds from General Electric and Northrop Grumman, specifically because of their business dealings with the Israeli Defense Forces. Through intense lobbying of elected representatives an direct, peaceful dialogue with SJP, the Tritons for Israel, a pro-Israel student group at UCSD, were able to achieve great success when last night, April 27th, SJP actually withdrew their divestment resolution, and it was not raised for consideration at the student senate.

In an opinion piece published in the campus paper today and authored by Tritons for Israel student leadership, "Tritons for Israel has always and will continue to stand for peace, dialogue, and justice. Divestment is not the way to a durable peace. Only by speaking to one another can we achieve a true understanding, and build the bridges necessary for a sustainable coexistence. Tritons for Israel hopes that we will someday have a willing partner in the struggle to achieve a sustainable end to the conflict, both in the Middle East and here on our campus."

StandWithUs campus professionals and Board of Directors are very proud of the Tritons for Israel for this tremendous effort and achievement.

Thank you for being excellent role models for other campuses!

Jon at Divest this just reminded us:

"After all, we are now entering the 11th year of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions project and, despite tireless campaigns on campuses across the country, the number of schools that have divested from Israel stands where it did a decade ago: at zero."

Its still zero, Omar. Still zero.