ANOTHER ATTEMPT TO BOYCOTT ISRAEL by the major British academic labor union is in the works, right on schedule.

British Academics’ Union Endorses Israel Boycott

By ALAN COWELL
Published: May 31, 2007 (NYT)

LONDON, May 30 — The main union representing 120,000 British college teachers voted Wednesday to endorse a Palestinian trades’ union call for a boycott of Israeli academic institutions.

The boycott resolution, approved at the inaugural congress of the University and College Union, called on British college lecturers to “consider the moral implications of existing and proposed links with Israeli academic institutions.”

In theory, a boycott could sever academic contacts and exchanges of personnel between British and Israeli academic institutions.

The union leaders insisted, though, that rules endorsed in a separate resolution earlier on Wednesday would forestall any immediate moves toward any action of that kind.

[...]

I don't think there's any way that there will be an actual academic boycott of Israel, but the union leaders will have their little annual anti-Israel political statement. In lieu of further comment (for the moment) I'll just quote some of what I said last year, which still applies.

I think the proper response ... [is] to heap international ridicule and scorn on the union for picking leaders who are more interested in making a cheap and cowardly political statement than in doing their actual job of representing the interests of British academics. In fact, those interests have been notably set back by this move. It's a pity, because there is a real need for such representation. But this isn't it.

For the earlier boycott attempts by earlier incarnations of the same union, see here and here.

UPDATE (1 June): More here.

UPDATE (6 June): Petition information here.

UPDATE (24 July): More here.

UPDATE (30 July): More here.