Texas and Laws Opposing Boycotts of Israel

-         20-12-2018

-        Ms. Bahiyya Amawi is American. She is an elementary school teacher supported by the government of the State of Texas in the United States of America. This school is private for children of immigrants who speak Arabic. She holds a master’s degree in 1999 in the specialization of child speech, early assessment of potential impairment or psychological conditions in children’s speech, and early detection and treatment of speech difficulty cases (Speech Pathologist). Ms. Bahiyya is fluent in Arabic in addition to English and German, as she was born in Austria. She became an American citizen thirty years ago and has four children born in the United States of America. She worked with the school in Austin, the capital of the State of Texas, since 2009 under a yearly contract that renews automatically. However, shortly before the renewal this year, which fell on August 13, 2018, the school asked Ms. Bahiyya to sign a pledge in which she swears that she is not currently boycotting Israel and will not undertake any action or support any activities to boycott Israel during the term of the employment contract, in addition to pledging that she will refrain from supporting any action intended to punish Israel or harm economic relations with it or with any person or institution working in Israel or in areas controlled by Israel..!!

-        The school made the continuation of the contract for another year contingent on her signing this pledge – the oath – yet teacher Bahiyya was surprised by such a matter, in which one swears to protect the economy of a foreign state – Israel – while one’s own country’s constitution – the United States – is not being protected, where freedom of expression is enshrined in the American Constitution. She stated that she sympathizes peacefully with the Palestinians whose lands Israel has occupied for decades. This is a freedom protected by the American Constitution..!!..

-        The children, ages 3 to 12, are in urgent need of such a specialist teacher. But the insistence of the school administrators on the necessity of the teacher Bahiyya signing the pledge led her to refuse to sign such a pledge, and consequently her services ended and she lost her job as a result. The children lost their specialist teacher who knew their cases individually, having stayed with them for about nine years..!!
 This was not surprising: in the State of Texas in November 2017 and after Hurricane Harvey, which swept the southeastern region of Texas, those responsible for distributing aid to the hurricane victims conditioned receiving aid on beneficiaries signing a pledge not to boycott Israel, which astonished the afflicted people — what relation do hurricane relief aids have to a foreign state...!!
 Also, the Governor of the State of Texas, Greg Abbott, signed a bill prohibiting the State of Texas from contracting or investing in companies that boycott Israel, in other words... "that any anti-Israel policy is an anti-Texas policy".!!.. This came at a celebration held at the Austin Jewish Community Center in Texas. State Senator Brandon Creighton traveled to Israel and gifted the pen with which the referenced bill was written and enacted to Prime Minister of Israel Netanyahu!

-        There are more than 27 American states that have enacted laws to boycott and penalize any person or institution or company that boycotts Israel...

-        Yesterday the Washington Post published an opinion article by Ishaan Tharoor, stating that two cases occupied American public opinion this week: the death of the girl Jacqueline Cal, age 7, from Guatemala, at the southern American border while accompanying her father attempting to cross into the United States; it was said that her death at the border was due to dehydration and shock from U.S. Immigration officials at the border who refused to provide any service to her or her father on the pretext that their presence or entry into the interior of the United States was prohibited and illegal, and they blamed the child’s father, saying he should not have brought her in those circumstances..!! Humanitarian and social organizations in the United States demanded an investigation into the circumstances of the girl’s death and whether the reason was the immigration officers’ refusal to provide assistance to her..?

-        There is the case of the American child of Yemeni origin, Abdullah Hassan, who is two years old, and his American-citizen father of Yemeni origin, Ali Hassan. For several weeks they have been trying with the U.S. administration and immigration officials to bring the child’s Yemeni-national mother, Shaimaa Suweilih, who lives in Egypt, and who wants to see her son Abdullah, who is ill with a rare brain disease and is on his deathbed. The mother cannot apply for a visa to enter the United States due to an entry ban on nationals of six Muslim countries including Yemen, which was issued by the U.S. President last year. However, after several attempts by American institutions and immigrant attorneys, she was exempted from the ban, especially since her child cannot be moved or sent to her by plane to Egypt...

-        Despite these sad cases, there is on the American scene freedom of opinion and institutional effort to defend immigrants’ rights, and courts stand against the U.S. administration to annul the effect of laws that violate humanitarian principles and ideals; their reference in that is the American Constitution which everyone respects. Recently we have seen how Congress has struggled to end the war in Yemen and stop the killing of children, elders and women of the Yemeni Arab people as a result of the war led by Saudi Arabia and supported by the U.S. administration — a war of Arab Muslims against the Arab Islamic state of Yemen!

-        The Palestinian child Mohammad Wahbeh, who died as reported in the news due to not being admitted for treatment in a Lebanese hospital; it is clear from what the news agencies circulated that there was negligence and a lack of responsibility by any party, as the Lebanese hospital claims that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) is responsible for his treatment, while the agency denies that and says it completed all procedures to admit the late child Wahbeh to the Lebanese hospital. It is clear that the Lebanese official side and the Palestinian embassy in Lebanon did not clarify the sad truth and the reasons that led to the death of the Palestinian refugee child. It is negligence that reeks of carelessness and indifference. Lebanese and Palestinians alike await clarification, and we hope matters do not escalate and lead to repercussions and incitement that will have regrettable consequences for everyone...

·       From information published on the Facebook page of the well-known journalist friend Hisham Abdullah. + The Intercept bulletin dated 17-12-2018 + Humanitarian cases on the American scene (the Yemeni child Abdullah and the Guatemalan girl Jacqueline)...from the Washington Post dated 19-12-2018, by Ishaan Tharoor