February 7, 2010

Lawfare

By Lawrence J. Siskind
Last month, Baroness Patricia Scotland, Attorney General of the United Kingdom, addressed the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and promised her audience that she would try to stop her country's police from arresting visiting Israeli dignitaries. The fact that a high British official deemed it necessary to provide such an assurance illustrates the latest manifestation in the sixty-year campaign to isolate the State of Israel: "lawfare."Throughout the West, Israel's opponents have taken to the courts to obtain arrest warrants aimed at visiting Israeli political and military officials in a campaign whose origins may be traced back to the U.N. World Conference Against Racism, held in Durban, South Africa in 2001. A forum of non-government organizations (NGOs) drafted a "Declaration and Programme of Action" which branded Israel "a racist, apartheid state" engaged in "crimes against humanity." The Declaration called upon the attendees to seek "the...(Read Full Article)