Photo: BDS Movement.

A Jewish academic used Nazi imagery to attack fellow scholars who were successful in preventing a BDS motion from passing at a conference over the weekend, according to a recording of the proceedings reported on by conservative blog Legal Insurrection.

During the Modern Language Association (MLA) Delegate Assembly vote Saturday on a resolution calling for an academic boycott against Israel, Nassau Community College professor Barry Fruchter announced, “I’m sick to death of hearing the divisive politics of those members of my ethnic group…It’s the same thing that people like you did back in the days of the Judenraten [Jewish administrative councils imposed by Nazis in ghettos] in World War II, where you stood up for yourselves against your fellows. It’s the same thing as those of you did in the 1950s, who made apologies for the McCarthyists. And it’s the same thing you always do and we’re calling you short on it.”  

Fruchter then blamed the “hounding and policing of self-appointed Zionist and Orthodox monitors” for his decision to quit his position as the coordinator of Nassau’s Jewish Studies program. “I couldn’t take it then and I can’t take it now,” he said.

An unnamed Palestinian professor also addressed the Delegate Assembly and criticized “Jewish-Americans” for allowing themselves to “harbor palpable hostility towards people who disagree with them.”

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“They should awaken to that fact and do something about it,” the professor said.

Both Fruchter and the Palestinian professor’s comments were met with applause from the audience.

The recording — posted on YouTube by the MLA — also revealed that some of the academics present accused the MLA of focusing on boycotting Israel at the expense of more pressing matters and slammed the organization for attempting to take action in the name of Palestinian human rights that would actually be detrimental to the many Arabs attending Israeli universities.

The motion, which called for an academic boycott of all Israeli universities, was defeated in a 113-79 vote. A second resolution opposing academic boycotts in general passed, 101-93.

As The Algemeiner reported ahead of the MLA 2017 Convention, prominent scholars called the organization’s boycott campaign a “shameful maneuver” that highlighted the politicization of academia.

Listen to the recording of Nassau Community College professor Barry Fruchter attacking fellow Jews below: