Above: Israeli Independence Hall, in Tel Aviv, is the location where David Ben-Gurion declared Israel's Independence on 14 May 1948. |
Initiatives
Each year, Students for Israel focuses its attention on a small number of initiatives, therefore concentrating its activities toward making an impact
on certain key critical issues.
For the 2007-2008 academic year, we have chosen the following three concerns to be our intiatives:
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The Iranian Nuclear Threat
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The Facts:
Continuing to defy laws set forth by the international community, Iran is pursuing production of Nuclear Weapons. Invariably, a Nuclear Iran will destabilize the Middle East, and inaugurate a regional nuclear arms race. Furthermore, it is alarming that the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has frequently made remarks calling for the annihilation of Israel, and more subtly, of the United States as well. The United States has passed the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act of 2007 [HR 2347], and the Iran Counter Proliferation Act of 2007 [HR 1400] is currently pending in congress. The UN Security Council has passed two resolutions [1737 and 1747] installing international sanctions on Iran, calling it to cease nuclear weapons development.
What We Plan to Do:
We want to educate MIT students on the threat, encourage our campus and the state of Massachusetts to divest from Iran, and enable students to contact their congressmen, asking them to support HR 1400.
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Israel and Technology
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The Facts: Israel leads the world in developing technologies for medicine, alternative energy, bio-computing, nanotechnology, green chemistry, and many other fields; it has the highest number of scientific papers published per capita in the world.
What We Plan to Do: We want to increase study abroad opportunities for MIT students at Israeli universities to strengthen the academic connection between our university and Israel's technical departments. We will also plan an "Israel and Technology week," which will feature Israeli scientists and engineers and their work.
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Getting the Facts Straight: Learning and Dialogue
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The Facts: In many scenarios, Israel's story is misconstrued. Sometimes, Israel is judged against a utopian standard, and the way in which it responds to security threats is unrealistically criticized. While some of these criticisms are genuine, others are bred from ignorance, and unfortunately yet, some are the product of anti-Semitism.
What We Plan to Do: We plan to hold informal discussion meetings in order to give students the tools to argue The Case for Israel by teaching each other history and current events. The best way to defend Israel is with the Facts. We also will run informational campaigns to raise awareness around campus, and be quick to call out speakers and events that fail to uphold standards of historical honesty and authenticity.
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