The sixth annual “Israeli Apartheid Week” is taking place next
week on campuses in Toronto and in dozens of cities worldwide. If it’s
anything akin to previous years, it will be replete with the
much-anticipated demonizing and delegitimizing of Israel. Much
discussion will surround the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement
with an aim to cripple Israel economically.
Coincidentally, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty recently announced
that he will travel to Israel in May with a consortium of business
leaders. His goal is to exchange ideas on life sciences and bring
Israel ’s expertise in high-tech advancements to Ontario .
“[Israel ’s] medical treatment as well as technology and advanced
manufacturing match up well with our strengths,” said Mr. McGuinty. He
called Israeli advances in the last 15 to 20 years “a miracle of
innovation and innovative capacity.”
In the book Start-Up Nation: The Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle,
Dan Senor writes that there are more Israeli companies on the Nasdaq
than any other foreign country in the world, and more global venture
capital on a per-capita basis going into Israel than any other country.
In fact, the Toronto Stock Exchange and Tel Aviv Stock Exchange this
month formalized co-operation between the markets.
In recent years Israelis have developed heart tissue and pacemakers
from stem cells, created muscle tissue that the body doesn’t reject,
and invented an electronic monitor that can diagnose cancer. Israeli
scientists developed the first fully computerized, non-radiation
required, diagnostic instrumentation for breast cancer. Israeli
researchers invented a pill-sized camera that helps doctors diagnose
cancer and digestive disorders. Then there’s the new device that helps
those with heart failure — an artificial blood pump.
That might in part explain why, in 2005, Ontario and Israel signed a
Memorandum of Understanding on industrial and technological development
co-operation. In 2008, trade between Ontario and Israel totaled $1.1
billion — up by 86 per cent since 2004, more than tripling since 1996.
Ontario 's exports to Israel have grown by over 70 per cent since 2004.
This is not to suggest exclusion of fair critique on policy. But in
addition to any conversation about whether Israel deserves to be
singled out for opprobium, there are millions of ordinary citizens who
have nothing to do with government policy, simply helping to make the
world a better place. Those boycotters who admonish Israel for
collective punishments, are themselves collectively punishing Israelis
— Arab, Chrisitan and Jew alike — and punishing anyone who could
benefit from progress.
Israel, for example, sent more manpower and aid to Haiti after the
earthquake than all of pan-Arabia’s 22 countries, the UK and China
combined. More than 220 doctors, nurses, civil engineers, and a
portable field hospital, were among the first rescue teams to reach
victims. They were the first foreign backup team to set up medical care
at Port-au-Prince’s barely-operational main hospital. All this from a
country the size of New Jersey and an adult population of five and a
half million.
At home, Israel ’s neighbourly gestures haven’t gone unnoticed
either. Ziyaad Lunat reported in the pro-Palestinian Electronic
Intifada online magazine, “While there has been no progress on the
political front, security and economic cooperation with the
Palestinians has never been better.” That’s open, direct and high
praise for Israel ’s right-of-centre government. Why would anyone want
to undermine that?
While the Ontario-based attendees and organizers at the “Israeli
Apartheid Week” will be cheerleading a boycott of Israel, they may want
to consider moving their venue to a neutral location off territorial
waters. They’d be hypocrites, otherwise: the business these folks
conduct and money they spend within the Province of Ontario may very
well be channeled to an Israeli innovation somewhere along the line.
And Heaven forbid we wouldn’t want that to help underwrite any new
life-saving discovery.
| 
