BDS Movement Debate | Oxford Union 

Sadly, they can't do these debates anymore because people get disruptive and start screaming.

Why did the spokesman for the BDS showed a map that ended in 2005? well, because in 2005 Israel removed it's settlements from GAZA strip, boy did that blowed up in our faces.

Bds is wrong

Great debate. There CAN be dialogue.

summery: israel: why you pick on us? bds: we put pressure so you'll want to negotiate peace israel: we want to negotiate peace bds: .... israel: as a matter of fact, since you came along the Palestinians think they can get stuff without negotiations bds: ... israel: the official bds leader state specifically they don't want peace bds: ... israel: we're even willing to make a very generous offer bds: ... israel: I think bds just want to delegitimize israel bds: we just want you to negotiate peace

didn't take him long to mention the holocaust to score points, Its kind of obvious a posh and elite university would vote against it, he also qoutes the luntz document at every turn

If only Israel would be as commited to peace, secularism and coexistence as Hamas is ...

Its like someone going to your house, robbing you then asking you( the victim) to compromise with them and give them concessions.

Dershowtiz is a skillful advocate sometimes. He knows the rhetorical questions to pose. But the lack of response on the accusation of singling out Israel was quite shameful. Which other country has been able to completely subjugate its adversaries like Israel, while dragging out a conflict for half a century? Well, there are some historical cases which are reminiscent of such power asymmetries, namely Western colonial projects. Compared to those situations, yes Israel adheres much more to human rights. It would be politically impossible, however, not to mention unnecessary, to carry on in a similar fashion. You see that when Israel bombs what basically is the world's largest open air prison every now and then (which is quite a unique crime in modern times), the world actually reacts (you can also see that when Israel does engage in those full scale attacks, it does not differ much from the violations of, say, Saudi airstrikes, which target hospitals, ambulances and other civilian objects). So, it seems counterproductive to the cause of settling the West Bank, if Israel were to carry on like a traditional colonial power. It is nonetheless a shame that the other case of colonialism in MENA, Western Sahara, is getting so little attention, especially in Europe where we're thriving off of that occupation.

one problem- there never was, is not, and never will be a "palestinian people"

One elephant in the room that was not mention was the demographics. Arafat & Co. wanted to establish demographic facts. Thus they told their people to have as many children as possible. You cannot blame Israel for that. E.g. the water supply for the Palestinians was negotiated in Oslo (Oslo Accords). However, the population has doubled since then. As the amount of water was an absolute number the water per person had to be halved. This is entirely the fault of the Palestinian leadership. They even excel in the poverty of their people to build even more pressure via public opinion. No people has received so much money as the Palestinians in the last decades from foreign aid. Where has the money gone? Corruption, weapons, terror tunnels etc.

Peter you embraced yourself so deeply...

Actually in 1832 Jewish people were the minority in Jerusalem, Arabs were the absolute majority and Muslims were the relative majority.

poor thatchell ......he sweated in that suit ...and got obliterated on the debate....he tried his best but as all things with hateful roots....juice was made out of them....

Alan Dershowits: 137 votes Peter Tatchel: 101 votes Alan Dershowits wins the debate!

As someone who is also critical of the functionality and objectivity of BDS, I also despise Dershowitz in every sense and cannot comprehend how some people deem him to be a model scholar. The guy is odious in every sense and also misleads in almost every argument. Disgusting man.

And what about the 100,000 jews kicked out from Jerusalem by the jordanians??? And the jews who lived in the West Bank before 1948?

Here we are five years on and things are worse than ever. :/

I disagree with him, but I gained a whole new level of respect for Peter in this debate.That said, he totally got his butt kicked. He had no facts to back up his arguments.

I’ve boycotted many Israeli products and establishments. I love BDS

Bottom line: businesses do not have the right to refuse service to consumers because of who they are. On the other hand, consumers have a First Amendment right to withhold their patronage from businesses in order to express their political beliefs.

He did a terrible job debating why Palestinians rejected the offers by Israel. The reason why Arafat rejected the offer by Barak, was that they were demanding more than they were offering. Israel was demanding that Palestinians renounce all claim to East Jerusalem, which at the time had 90% Palestinian population (now less due to Israeli state policies). Jerusalem was never granted to Israel in the partition plan. It was supposed to be subject to negotiations between both sides. Jordan took half, Israel took half, then Israel took Jordan's half. Israel is occupying all of Jerusalem illegally. Secondly, Israel was demanding that Palestinians renounce their right of return. In 1948, Israel confiscated 500,000 hectares of Palestinian land from refugees fleeing the war and gave it to European immigrants, Holocaust survivors. This is a massive unresolved injustice. 700,000 Palestinian refugees were created when this happened. Their decsendants now number in millions among Palestinians and the Palestinian diaspora. This is a massive concession demanded of Arafat in return for ending the occupation of the West Bank. And lets be clear, state recognition was not being offered, the PLO did recognise the Israeli state based on 1967 borders back in 1992. Israel never offered to recognise any Palestinian state. The fact is, Israel needs to offer the return of all lands not granted to Israel in the 1948 partition plan, and even that would be a massive demand placed on the shoulders of Palestinians, that they renounce the 55% Britain unilaterally gave to Zionist immigrants in 1948. Israel has never, and will never withdraw to the borders granted to it by the UNR181 partition plan (itself awash with corruption, Zionist threats, pressure and terror attacks on the Truman whitehouse, which then pressured other nations to vote likewise. A quick search into UNR181 will reveal just how even the initial partition, let alone the lands seized since, was a massively corrupt political move and injustice against the Palestinian people.

I think both sides presented an excellent case. But I was convinced by Professor Dershowitz's argument. He made excellent points.

Incredible. Any debate that I've ever watched on this subject just goes around in circles interminably LOL. Absurd.

When Israel has stolen 90 % of Palestinian's land and moved its people into the houses that were legally owned by Palestinians what is there left to negotiate. The Israelis have broken every law mandated since 1947 and before, the UN has condemned them, most of the world leaders have condemned them. Negotiate What exactly?

Tatchell got dismantled. UTTETLY dismantled.

How can Muslims claim heritage to Israelite prophets and also deny that Jews lived in Israel long before the 1948 establishment?

I recently viewed three young idf soldiers taking pot shots across the fence if they hit a palisinien .man women or child.they simply found it humours and were full of laughter! !the dead and injured at the fence at the moment I couldn't tell you but its pretty much constant ! Its a heart rendering fact .

1:06:21 "What happened to the Jewish people in Muslim countries is wrong. No excues, no ifs and no buts. But..." Oh boy, even god himself couldn't help this guy win a debate.

Listening to Dershowitz speak makes me want to throw up

m r lolita express is biased and disgusted ,sad for Harvard law school

Thatchell would last about 10 minutes in Gaza or the West Bank, silly little man.

Why dont you talk of Catalonia and Spain ? I d love to see a debate !

Tatchell: "It is a democracy based upon the displacement of another people from land they have historically settled and lived in. So when you have a democracy based on that principle of dispossession and occupation the values of that democracy are flawed and undermined because it is based upon that fundamental injustice." And this is the crux of the BDS debate: because it's easy to go after Israel and not go after, say, the United States which is based on the complete displacement of Native American populations who still live in dire, abject poverty and lack basic resources, healthcare, or economic options. On American University campuses, the same students protesting for BDS are hardly willing to hand over their family vacation homes in the Hamptons to the Shinnecocks, or give back their 529 college fund money that was earned through investing in natural resource companies drilling and mining on land stolen from reservations. The backbone of this movement is ultimately a bunch of armchair liberals who would rather lazily take a vote to divest than lobby for actual change in their own backyards.

The fact is that the Israeli government has no intention of rolling back the illegal settlements unless they are forced to. In fact, they continue to build such settlements. Netanyahu and his cohorts claim that the West Bank is "Judea and Samaria" and that it belongs to the Jews as per Biblical bullshit. The only way to libertate the West Bank and Gaza is to force Israelis with BDS . War is not practical because US support of Israel will doom any military solution.

Israel regained Judea and Samaria in 1967 ! The occupation by Jordan ended. East-Jerusalem is also part of Israel. Gaza and the Sinaï are Egyptian. The Sinaï was returned to Egypt. Gaza received autonomy, which is clearly a mistake !

How about letting me back into my house in Egypt. Where's my law of return when my family was kicked out in 1963. What about my family from syrian, Iran, iraq, Jordan and the rest of the arabian peninsula. It's a double standard. You can't boycott Israel without boycotting egypt, syria, Iran, iraq, Jordan and the rest of the arabian peninsula.

this was 2015. Israel has done a lot more settlement building since then.

@15:00 Peter Tatchell show map and comment on 1946 as white area are "Israeli" and rest is Arabs..... what a moron, what a liar. Starting that Israel did not exist at time and places marked as white are just *private property* owned by jews and if you want to compare jews and arabs then you have to show *private property* owned by Arabs Last map show opposite misinformation. It show land occupied or privately own by Arabs and the rest as occupied by Israel. Note Gaza part of the map. Gaza is totally controlled by Hamas but map shows white inside Gaza sector. Totally dishonest presentation.

Dershowitz is a lawyer. He is so disingenuous.

I thought this was a BDSM video.....

It would be nice if the Oxford Union posted the results of the vote in the description.

Peter Tatchell is clearly misinformed about the subject.

Under the rule of law? What law is that sir? The law of the jungle

i am deeply moved by the high intellect and fact-knowing in this comment section! Shalom and love from israel

The BDS suffers from OCD.

The map Tatchell shows at the 15 minute or so mark is wrong in that in 1967 Israel held the Sinai Peninula as well which it gave back to Egypt when they agreed to make peace. It also seems to be missing the Golan Heights although admittedly that part of it is on the edge. A wider map - or look at a globe - would put this in more context showing the huge areas of surrounding Arab / Muslim lands and a map showing that (Trans)Jordan was formerly a part of the British then UN mandate and took up 2/3rds of the area would also have added some arguably key context here.

Pakistan's occupation of Balochistan What about India occupation of Kashmir This man does not represent BDS Pakistan is the biggest supporter of BDS and Palestine Balochistan joined Pakistan by a overwhelming majority supporting it in referendum and its a province not a disputed area

Dershowitz wiped the floor with this putz. Dershowitz won so easily against the twit.

BDS 🎉😊

Oxford Audience are example to follow! (Cambridge take note)

58:49 BDS is antisemetic !!! 1:00:14 But you don't represent yourself, you represent BDS, which singles out Israel!

He reads from the paper lmao

Israel as full right to defend their nation from enemy...Israel is a beacon of Peace and democracy in Middle East..

those maps lol. there wasn't a single palestinian state throughout history

Those zoot suits- weren't they designed to hide illegal weapons?!

Giving away land worked real well in 2005...

“….. A desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds… a silent mournful expanse…. a desolation…. we never saw a human being on the whole route…. hardly a tree or shrub anywhere. Even the olive tree and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country.” Mark Twain 1867

I recently discovered I am severely allergic to the garlic they add in commercial hummus- if anyone's interested here.

Q: how many international law has israel broken. ?

bds wrong

Damn Israel took everything 😂😂😂😂

They don't present the results. I can't believe it!

if you want to see isreal aggression, just listen to their spokesperson. he reflects what isreal government are really all about.

KHARTOUM SUDAN IS AFRICAN BLACK COUNTRY NOT ARAB.

If university people are intelligent and educated,they would know that there has never been an arab only Palestinbe, Israel was renamed Palestine by the Romans in 135 A/D. this arab Palestine was created in the 1960s by the arabs.

Love Israel from india

"לא חשוב מה יגידו הגויים. חשוב מה יעשו היהודים." דוד בן גוריון. Translation: It doesn't matter what the gentiles say. The only thing that matter is what the Jews will do." David Ben Gurion

I'd very much like to get the results of the vote/exit poll/audience enumeration on these videos, if possible. It just feels incomplete without them.

Anyone slse here after the latest war between the two? 2021

this guy is a joke the negev is not even Palestinian

That map is so misleading. True israel as a country grew part from the legitamet desigion to make israel a jewish state and part by a deffensive war. But before 48 jews lived there as well (they were palestinians as well )and the land was mostly vacent and poor. The negev, for example, is a desert, 60% of what u see in the map it was completely vacent. One would think there were millions of palestinians well no. In 1922 there were less then 500,000 arabs. When the palestinians talk about the right of return they think the grandchildren of the arabs that lived in israel should return. Well that means a majority of muslims, well we all know what that means for the jews. Why are the israel haters and bds sapporters ignore what that means. Didnt jews leave europe and arab nations because they cant be a minority. Its not hard to realize it, when you realize it you understand that israel haters and bds===antisemitism.

BDS movement is the most legal, peaceful, democratic way of compelling Israeli tyrant to do a just full solution of the problem. BDS must and will be flourishing.

Jews have a right to peace and a right to land they can call their home. There is abundant Arab land surrounding Israel ,if every Arab country also donated a peace of their own land to the Palestinians and Israel had to do likewise then that result in a justified sacrifice by all who border existing Palestinian land. Syrian refugees have mostly escaped to Europe because their surrounding Musli neighbors did not open their hearts and accept them it stands to reason that Muslim countries are sympathetic towards conflict between Arab and Jew but not towards really creating a peaceful solution which demands some form of self sacrifice.

The poor Palestinians were more screwed by their own leaderships. BDS won't help them. - A bystanders (if Gazans were Chinese population, it might have become a Singapore already.

No wonder Barghouti chickened out and refused to debate Dershowitz.

31:30 wow

Book of GENESIS Chapter 12 & 15 The Sovereign GOD gave the land to Abraham's Seed which became the nation of Israel...........NOT PALESTINE........

Alan destroyed this guy. To be fair, it's hard to defend BDS. Even Norman Finklestein opposes BDS, which says something. If you actually want to see a more balanced debate between pro-Israel/pro-Palestine, I suggest you watch Alan Dershowitz and Peter Beinart talk.

south african here. Israelis, dont give an inch.

East-Jerusalem is part of the State of Israel. There is no valid Arab claim on Jerusalem, as much as there is no justification for the Arab-occupation of Hebron, as well a Jewish city !

Take a shot every time the term "BDS" is used.

God promised them 3000 years ago!😂😂😂

Dershowitz did well against these amateurs but he got his soul shagged when he went against Noam Chomsky

When you get Epstein lawyer to......

between June 5 and June 10, 1967, Israel invaded and occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and the Golan Heights. The Six-Day War, as it would later be dubbed, saw the Jewish David inflict a humiliating defeat on the Arab Goliath, personified perhaps by Gamal Abdel Nasser’s Egypt. “The existence of the Israeli state hung by a thread,” the country’s prime minister, Levi Eshkol, claimed two days after the war was over, “but the hopes of the Arab leaders to annihilate Israel were dashed.” Genocide, went the argument, had been prevented; another Holocaust of the Jews averted. There is, however, a problem with this argument: It is complete fiction, a self-serving fantasy constructed after the event to justify a war of aggression and conquest. Don’t take my word for it: “The thesis according to which the danger of genocide hung over us in June 1967, and according to which Israel was fighting for her very physical survival, was nothing but a bluff which was born and bred after the war,” declared Gen. Matituahu Peled, chief of logistical command during the war and one of 12 members of Israel’s General Staff, in March 1972. A year earlier, Mordechai Bentov, a member of the wartime government and one of 37 people to sign Israel’s Declaration of Independence, had made a similar admission. “This whole story about the threat of extermination was totally contrived, and then elaborated upon, a posteriori, to justify the annexation of new Arab territories,” he said in April 1971. Even Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, former terrorist and darling of the Israeli far right, conceded in a speech in August 1982 that “in June 1967 we had a choice. The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai approaches did not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.” theintercept.com/2017/06/05/a-50-year-occupation-israels-six-day-war-started-with-a-lie/

He said this land Israelis owned before 3000 year. In these 3000 years others was farming and building . If you came back after 100 year not 3000 years naturally they will reject you. And will not recognise your own this land or as citizens. It's natural even 300 year is to much. And no human low will give you. Only force low will give you. That is what is going today between Arabic and Israelis.

Dershowitz finished him.

Pete Tachell doesn't seem to live in the world .He keeps on making false equivalencies between Palestine and South Africa, and has some utopian vision of what the BDS movement actually is. He keeps on going on about the 'global' BDS movement outside Palestine and Israel as though they are the ones that actually are relevant.Principles are all well and good but it's leaders are the ones that have the real power and influence.

It's a fundamental right of ALL sovereign nations to boycott, divest and sanction countries who behave in ways WE don't agree with. Hence sanctions against Iran, Afghanistan, Syria, Qatar, Venezuela, Yemen, North Korea, and Russia. All under sanctions bc of their GOV's actions NOT bc we dislike their ppl OR think they shouldn't be a country.

Nobody is denying that Palestine existed. Of course Palestine existed but it wasn’t an Arab country (or state) but rather it was a geographic region, controlled under the British mandate, and who named it “Palestine”. The name “Palestine” was officially revived by the British after the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1920 when the British civil administration - the British Mandate of Palestine - was in control until 1948. The residents of Palestine held British Passports for Palestine and were referred to as “Palestinians” whether Jews or Arabs. The word “Palestine” (or “Palestinian”) is purely a geographical term which was originally used by the Greeks, the Romans and other peoples to refer to this region - i.e. the Holy Land, or the Land of Israel - in Biblical times. People seem to think that because someone calls himself a “Palestinian” he originates from an Arab country called Palestine. They seem to think that because the maps show Palestine before 1948 therefore this land belonged to the Arabs! Palestine never belonged to the Arabs. Palestine was Ottoman, was British, but it never was Arab! In fact, the British gave 75% of British Palestine to the Arabs which eventually became Jordan. In 1948 the Arabs turned down the “Partition Plan” which offered the Arabs yet another Arab state alongside the new Jewish state. The Arabs refused it and instead, they waged a war against the new Jewish state with the intention of destroying it. Then Jordan took and illegally occupied the West Bank. In 1967, in a war of self-defense, Israel then took and occupied the West Bank when it was already OCCUPIED by Jordan in the first place! The West Bank was part of an area called “Palestine” before 1948, but it never belonged to the Arabs. In fact Jordan stole the West Bank in 1948 and gave the West Bank residents Jordanian citizenship. The Arabs in the West Bank identified as Jordanians, not Palestinians. In 1988, however, the King of Jordan abandoned his Jordanian citizens in the West Bank and handed their fate over to the Palestine Liberation Organization, the PLO terrorist organization. Since then there have been peace talks, intifadas, suicide bombings and more peace talks to find a solution to this area. Just because the Palestinian Authority wants to name their future state “Palestine” (with its capital Jerusalem) this does not mean that this land belonged to them beforehand. Neither does it mean that their heritage goes back thousands of years to ancient Palestine. It is just a play on words! but it wasn’t an Arab country (or state) but rather it was a geographic region, controlled under the British mandate, and who named it “Palestine”. The name “Palestine” was officially revived by the British after the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1920 when the British civil administration - the British Mandate of Palestine - was in control until 1948. The residents of Palestine held British Passports for Palestine and were referred to as “Palestinians” whether Jews or Arabs. The word “Palestine” (or “Palestinian”) is purely a geographical term which was originally used by the Greeks, the Romans and other peoples to refer to this region - i.e. the Holy Land, or the Land of Israel - in Biblical times. People seem to think that because someone calls himself a “Palestinian” he originates from an Arab country called Palestine. They seem to think that because the maps show Palestine before 1948 therefore this land belonged to the Arabs! Palestine never belonged to the Arabs. Palestine was Ottoman, was British, but it never was Arab! In fact, the British gave 75% of British Palestine to the Arabs which eventually became Jordan. In 1948 the Arabs turned down the “Partition Plan” which offered the Arabs yet another Arab state alongside the new Jewish state. The Arabs refused it and instead, they waged a war against the new Jewish state with the intention of destroying it. Then Jordan took and illegally occupied the West Bank. In 1967, in a war of self-defense, Israel then took and occupied the West Bank when it was already OCCUPIED by Jordan in the first place! The West Bank was part of an area called “Palestine” before 1948, but it never belonged to the Arabs. In fact Jordan stole the West Bank in 1948 and gave the West Bank residents Jordanian citizenship. The Arabs in the West Bank identified as Jordanians, not Palestinians. In 1988, however, the King of Jordan abandoned his Jordanian citizens in the West Bank and handed their fate over to the Palestine Liberation Organization, the PLO terrorist organization. Since then there have been peace talks, intifadas, suicide bombings and more peace talks to find a solution to this area. Just because the Palestinian Authority wants to name their future state “Palestine” (with its capital Jerusalem) this does not mean that this land belonged to them beforehand. Neither does it mean that their heritage goes back thousands of years to ancient Palestine. It is just a play on words!

Result of vote: Anti-BDS: 137 BDS: 101

51:19 Legent Derschowitz destroys Tatchell like boom!

Just because it's a democracy hence it's righteous by default? Lots of democratic countries treat their natives and minor poorly. United States, Canada, Australia, Israel, the list goes on and on. Not to mention their colonial past.

Can this old man tell where his great great grandparents lived 2000 years before

No you can't undo the mistakes of the past but you can avoid people who run with stupid ideas until they are forcibly cornered and stopped. before they continue to ruin everything for everyone else.

Stand against the people that are against Israel. Israel will stand always,....these people will be eventually turned into dust

The US cannot be in charge of the negotiation between Israel and the Palestinians because it is not a neutral. It is like having a boxing referee who sleeps with one of the two competing boxers.

I have finally found someone better at roasting than ricegum, the Jew on the left

Why not try BDS on Saudi Arabia China or Russia first, since it will work so well to solve the injustices? The answer: They're too big. Let's pick on the little guy. Is that a fair reason to target Israel and let the biggest violators free? As Alan said prosecute the worst violators first, and then you can work on harming Israel for it's own violations. That would be fair.