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http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/56cb5b92-10a7-11dc-96d3-000b5df10621.html?nclick_check=1

Harvard legal expert vows to sue lecturers boycotting Israel

By Jon Boone

Published: June 2 2007 03:00

A top American lawyer has threatened to wage a legal war against
British academics who seek to cut links with Israeli universities.

Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor renowned for his staunch
defence of Israel and high-profile legal victories, including his role
in the O.J. Simpson trial, vowed to "devastate and bankrupt" lecturers
who supported such boycotts.

This week's annual conference of Britain's biggest lecturers' union,
the University and College Union, backed a motion damning the
"complicity of Israeli academia in the occupation [of Palestinian
land]".

It also obliged the union's executive to encourage members to
"consider the moral implications of existing and proposed links with
Israeli academic institutions".

Prof Dershowitz said he had started work on legal moves to fight any
boycott.

He told the Times Higher Educational Supplement that these would
include using a US law - banning discrimination on the basis of
nationality - against UK universities with research ties to US
colleges. US academics might also be urged to accept honorary posts at
Israeli colleges in order to become boycott targets.

"I will obtain legislation dealing with this issue, imposing sanctions
that will devastate and bankrupt those who seek to impose bankruptcy
on Israeli academics," he told the journal.

Sue Blackwell, a UCU activist and member of the British Committee for
Universities of Palestine, said: "This is the typical response of the
Israeli lobby which will do anything to avoid debating the real issue
- the 40-year occupation of Palestine." Jewish groups have attacked
the UCU vote, which was opposed by Sally Hunt, its general secretary.

C The Financial Times Limited 2007