Know Your Professor: New website targets anti-Israel lecturers

“Israeli academics, who receive their salaries courtesy of the Israeli taxpayer, work to promote boycotts and international pressure on Israel, accusing the IDF of perpetrating war crimes,” says Im Tirtzu. 

By World Israel News Staff 

The Im Tirtzu organization has launched a campaign to call out professors who use the right of freedom of expression in the Israeli democracy to speak out in a way that the organization views as contrary to Israeli interests.

The new Im Tirtzu effort is called: “Know Your Professor.”

Im Tirtzu describes itself as a non-profit organization “working to strengthen the values of Zionism in Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.”

On its website, it says: “Did you know? Israeli academics, who receive their salaries courtesy of the Israeli taxpayer, work to promote boycotts and international pressure on Israel, accusing the IDF of perpetrating war crimes, and encourage refusing to serve in the IDF. Now, their anti-Israel activities are available for everyone to see.”

“There is no parallel in the world to this phenomenon of hypocrisy and ungratefulness, in which these professors earn their living at the expense of the Israeli taxpayer yet at the same time work to boycott and slander them,” says Im Tirtzu CEO Matan Peleg in a statement.

“This display of moral bankruptcy is something that should be known to every citizen in Israel. The website is an important step that will strengthen Israeli academia and make it more pluralistic and unbiased,” Peleg argued.

The organization maintains that its goal is not to attack individuals who possess left-wing views, only those who are “radical-left activists.”

Im Tirtzu argues that “many professors in Israeli academia”  fall into that category.

The website breaks down its list of professors into nine Israeli institutes of higher learning. Listings include a phone number and email address to easily access the professor.

Clicking on each name provides a background to the problematic activity of the particular professor, such as support for an anti-Zionist organization or opposition to the inclusion of Ariel University in the Israel Council for Higher Education because of its location in Samaria, as listed in the case of a professor at Haifa University, or canceling a class to show respect for Gazan Palestinians “massacred” by Israel and displaying a map of “Palestine” on Israeli territory, as in the case of a Tel Aviv University professor.

To date, dozens of professors are listed on the new Im Tirtzu site.