Volume 8, Number 5 Summer 2018
THE
Serving the Local New Orleans, Northshore, and Baton Rouge Jewish Communities
Louisiana Makes It Illegal for State to Contract With Companies That Boycott Israel or Settlements (JTA) — Louisiana has become the 25th state to make it illegal to do business with companies that boycott Israel and its settlements. Gov. John Bel Edwards signed an executive order on Tuesday that prohibits the state from contracting with any company that participates in a boycott of Israel “or Israelicontrolled territories.” The order specifically names the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. “Israel is America’s closest ally in the Middle East and a beacon of democracy in the region,” Edwards, a Democrat, said in a statement. “The United States, and by affiliation Louisiana, have benefited in innumerable ways from our deep friendship with Israel. Any effort to boycott Israel is an affront to this longstanding relationship. I am pleased that Louisiana will join
what is now a critical mass of states in supporting our closest ally.” Pro-Israel activists have celebrated the spread of anti-BDS laws as a blow against efforts to isolate Israel with one-sided and discriminatory boycotts. But some civil libertarians say the laws muzzle free speech; the ACLU last year filed a federal lawsuit challenging an anti-BDS law in Arizona. Liberal pro-Israel groups also object to the failure of most such orders and laws to distinguish between boycotts of Israel within its 1967 borders, which they reject, and boycotts of settlement good. Under the Louisiana order a vendor must certify in writing that it is not engaging in a boycott of Israel and will refrain from any boycott of Israel for the duration of its contract. The order also calls on the state to terminate existing contracts with
BDS supporters protest in New York, October 2015. (BDS Facebook page)
companies if they are boycotting anti-Israel activists that would have Israel or supporting those who do. prohibited investment with human Earlier this year, the New Orleans rights violators. City Council passed and then rescinded a resolution drafted by
Abraham, Moses, David and Solomon Might Get Cut From the AP World History Curriculum By Charles Dunst
Moses would get cut out of the AP World History curriculum if the College Board follows through on a proposed change. (Providence Lithograph Company/Flickr)
(JTA) — The College Board recently proposed a controversial change to the AP World History curriculum: start at the year 1450, not the dawn of civilization. The idea, aimed at limiting the amount of material covered in the course, has prompted criticism from educators since it was announced last month. Time pointed out that if that new curriculum goes into effect, an array
of significant world figures would miss the course’s cutoff. With the help of astrophysicist Michael H. Hart and the MIT Pantheon project, the magazine compiled a list of 200 of the most influential individuals in documented history, from the Pharoah Menes, born in 3201 B.C.E., to President George W. Bush, born in 1946. Going by this list, students in the
course would no longer study 40 percent of the history’s influential people. Not surprisingly, among those missing the cutoff on the Time list are some of the most important figures in Jewish history: Abraham, Moses, David and Solomon (although some feature more prominently in the course than others). (If you’re curious about the Jewish figures who still make the 1450 cutoff on the Time list, they’re Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein and Gregory Pincus, co-inventor of the birth control pill.) Critics have noted that the change appears to shift the focus largely to Western history. “They couldn’t have picked a more Eurocentric date,” World History Association president Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks told The New York Times. Other teachers expressed similar concerns. “In a world that is fueled by
quick reactions on social media, bias news (in all directions) and people responding on passion rather than facts, AP World History is needed more than ever,” Tyler George, who teaches the course in Michigan, told Politico. “Students need to understand that there was a beautiful, vast and engaging world before Europeans ‘discovered’ it.” Due to the vocal opposition, the organization, according to it’s AP program head, Trevor Packer, is reconsidering its decision, weighing moving the start date to “several centuries earlier” than 1450. The College Board will announce its final decision in July. “I have a lot of trust and respect for what they do,” Packer said of history teachers. “And so when I heard these concerns expressed so powerfully, I felt like we needed to pay attention.”