PA Senate passes pro-Israel bill in response to campus encampments
Pro-BDS groups, led by CAIR, have emailed Pennsylvania legislators asking them to oppose the bill, according to the Pennsylvania Jewish Coalition
A new piece of legislation in Pennsylvania, Senate Bill 1260, would divest companies from state pension funds and colleges from state funds if they support a boycott, divestment and sanctions action against Israel.
Labeled the “Stand with Israel Bill,” the legislation passed the Senate by a 41-7 vote on June 27. It now moves to the House for potential passage during the fall session of the Pennsylvania General Assembly.
Introduced by Sen. Steve Santarsiero (D-Bucks), a convert to Judaism, and Kristin Phillips-Hill (R-York), the bill is a response to the encampments that broke out on college campuses this spring, according to the Pennsylvania Jewish Coalition. Protesters at those encampments, which broke out at the University of Pittsburgh, Drexel University and other colleges in and out of state, called for divestment from businesses operating in Israel, ending academic work with Israeli universities and even disbanding Hillel and Chabad houses on their campuses.
The legislation would give companies and universities cover against such threats.
“We’re hoping it could be a defense mechanism to protect the schools from being forced into antisemitic divestments,” said Hank Butler of the PJC.
The demands of the protesters made it clear that calls for BDS were not made in good faith, according to Santarsiero. Lumped in with demands to remove Jewish spaces on campus and for universities to endorse the statement, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” the BDS calls were antisemitic in nature. (“From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” is a well-known call for eliminating the state of Israel.)
“It’s a political movement by Palestinian partisans that seeks to blame Israel for every problem in the conflict and that also engages in antisemitic rhetoric and tropes,” Santarsiero said. “It needs to be understood in that light and confronted.”
Santarsiero, whose 10th district includes portions of central and lower Bucks County, said it was not a hard decision even as a Democrat.
“It’s a false statement to say that just because you’re pro-Israel and anti-BDS that you are somehow anti-Muslim. That is what these BDSers are trying to argue, and it is flat wrong,” he said.
Twenty-seven of 28 Republicans in the 50-member Senate voted for the bill. Fourteen of 22 Democrats voted in favor.
The senators who voted against it were Anthony Williams (Philadelphia), Art Haywood (Philadelphia), Nikil Saval (Philadelphia), Katie Muth (Montgomery), Timothy Kearney (Delaware) and Lindsey Williams (Allegheny). Republican Jarrett Coleman (Lehigh) also voted against it. Democratic senators Carolyn Comitta (Chester) and Sharif Street (Philadelphia) were not in attendance.
In 2016, Pennsylvania passed legislation that prohibited the state from doing business with a company that boycotted Israel. It passed the House 187-7 and the Senate 47-1.
Santarsiero hopes that similar bipartisan support comes together in 2024. He said he did not expect support for the bill to become a political problem for Democrats this fall.
“I don’t see this as a major departure from our current policy. If it were brought up for a vote, I think it would pass,” he said. “I believe that the majority of people in this state support Israel and would understand this is as a good public policy for the commonwealth of Pennsylvania.”
Santarsiero said that pro-Israel advocates sent a message just by getting this bill through the Senate.
“We’re not going to take this lying down,” he said.
Butler said the legislative effort has already transcended political divides.
“This is a Republican from York (Phillips-Hill) and a Democrat from Bucks (Santarsiero) coming together to do what is needed,” he added.
Pro-BDS groups, led by CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations), have emailed Pennsylvania legislators asking them to oppose the bill, according to Butler. But, as Santarsiero put it, those groups often do not involve voters in the representatives’ districts.
“CAIR put out an email in opposition to the bill. It had appended to it a list of organizations that join in its message,” he said. “Many were organizations that no one has ever heard of.” PJC
Jarrad Saffren writes for the Jewish Exponent, an affiliated publication where this first appeared.
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