Netanyahu derails debate on boycott, occupation

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with visiting Canadian Foreign Minister Rob Nicholson on June 3 and used the photo op at the start of the meeting as an opportunity to attack the United Kingdom’s National Union of Students. On the evening before the meeting, that group decided to support the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement and adopt the principles of the wide economic, cultural and academic boycott of Israel. In the position paper it issued, the organization explained, among other things, that the decision stemmed from "Israel’s ongoing illegal occupation of Palestine."

Thus, standing alongside the senior representative of one of the world’s friendliest countries to Israel, buoyed by his sympathetic presence, Netanyahu used his usual arguments to attack the decision by the British student organization and wondered how it was possible that just a year ago, it had refused to condemn the Islamic State.