By MOHAMMED MAR’I | ARAB NEWS

Published: Sep 1, 2010 01:53 Updated: Sep 1, 2010 01:53

RAMALLAH: Some 150 Israeli academicians signed a petition supporting the boycott cultural performances in West Bank settlements, as did some 53 actors, directors and playwrights.

In their petition published Tuesday, the faculty members from universities across Israel vowed not to lecture or participate in any discussions in settlements, and voiced support for the theater artists who have said they would refuse to perform in the West Bank settlement of Ariel, to the southwest of Nablus.

On Saturday, following media reports that several major theater houses are scheduled to perform at the center, 36 professional theater actors and workers issued a letter in which they vowed not to perform there because it is in the West Bank.

“We will not take part in any kind of cultural activity beyond the Green Line, take part in discussions and seminars, or lecture in any kind of academic setting in these settlements,” the academics wrote.

The signatories of the academic petition included Zeev Sternhell, Yael Sternhell, Nissim Calderon, Anat Biletzki, Ziva Ben-Porat, Yaron Ezrachi, Aeyal Gross, Shlomo Sand, Dan Rabinowitz, Neve Gordon and Oren Yiftachel.

Israeli authors David Grossman, A.B. Yehoshua and Amos Oz; writer and editor Ilana Hammerman; sculptor Dani Caravan; poet Dori Manor; filmmakers Hagai Levi and actress Orly Silbersatz joined the boycott call.

Professor Ariel Rubinstein, Israel Prize laureate in economics, said that “as long as Israel is mired in the swamp of occupation, we cannot say we had a good year.”

Rubinstein added that “the petition’s objective is to undermine the normalization in the relationship between Israel and the occupied territories.”

“We are dealing with a catastrophe whose implication is a failure to partition the land; this may threaten the state’s existence as a Jewish entity”, he added.

Rubinstein added that he does not dismiss the possibility of imposing an academic boycott similar to the one imposed against South Africa during the apartheid era. ¬