Anti-Jewish-State Protests Follow New Israeli Ambassador’s Meeting With Director of London University
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by Andrew Pessin
SOAS. Photo: Wikipedia
Anti-Israel graffiti appeared on the campus of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) following protests, Thursday, against the meeting of Mark Regev, Israel’s new ambassador to the United Kingdom, with SOAS Director Baroness Valerie Amos earlier in the week, The Algemeiner has learned.
The graffiti included the slogan “F—k Regev, Amos and Israel. BDS [Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions] or else!” daubed across the university’s main building, according to The Jewish Chronicle.
Earlier on Thursday, the SOAS campus was the scene of several protests against the Wednesday meeting between Regev and Amos. A group called “Friends of Al Aqsa” tweeted a video of students demonstrating outside Amos’s office. Dozens of students separately gathered outside the campus, according to the anti-Israel blog The Electronic Intifada, chanting: “BDS go! Amos and Regev no!” A coalition of student groups also issued a statement condemning the meeting “as an act of normalization with Israel,” calling it a “flagrant violation of the principles of the BDS movement,” which the student government endorsed in 2015, and demanding an apology from Amos.
In addition, a Facebook page set up by protest organizers stated that “by accepting the ambassador’s visit, Amos and SOAS are complicit in the ongoing [Israeli] colonialism and apartheid.” It, too, rejected any normalization with Israel.
The statement concluded, “We call for BDS; down with the Israeli State.”
In an emailed response to the student union, according to an SOAS spokesperson, Amos said: “I met the Israeli ambassador to follow up on a letter I had sent him about the detention and treatment of an SOAS research student at Ben Gurion airport.” She added that she saw this “as an important part of my responsibility as director.”
On Wednesday, Regev posted on Twitter a photo of himself posing with Amos after their meeting. He assumed his post as ambassador this week, having previously served from 2007-15 as spokesperson for the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office.
A request for comment from Amos was not immediately returned.
