((Infobox person
Neve Gordon | |
---|---|
ניב גורדון | |
![]() Gordon in 2018 | |
Born | |
Nationality | Israeli |
Occupation | Professor |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | University of Notre Dame |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Politics and Government |
Institutions | Ben-Gurion University of the Negev |
Neve Gordon (Hebrew: ניב גורדון; born 15 June 1965) is a Professor of Politics and Government[1] at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, who writes on issues relating to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and human rights.
A third-generation Israeli, Gordon did his military service in an IDF Paratrooper unit, and suffered severe injuries in action at Rosh Hanikra, as a result of which he has a 42% disability. During the first Intifada he served as director of Physicians for Human Rights, Israel. He is an active member in Ta'ayush, Arab-Jewish Partnership.[2] He identifies himself as a member of the Israeli peace camp, has described Israel as an 'apartheid state' and supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel movement.[3]
Gordon received his doctorate at the University of Notre Dame in 1999, and has been a visiting scholar at University of California, Berkeley, University of Michigan, Brown University, the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, and at SOAS, University of London.
Gordon has participated in the 'Humanitarian Action in Catastrophe' group at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute.[4]
Gordon's articles have been published in LA Times, The Washington Post, The Nation, The Guardian, Ha'aretz, The Jerusalem Post, The Chicago Tribune, Boston Globe, London Review of Books, Al Jazeera, In These Times, The National Catholic Reporter, The Chronicle of Higher Education and CounterPunch.
Gordon was co-author, together with Ruchama Marton, of Torture: Human Rights, Medical Ethics and the Case of Israel and editor of From the Margins of Globalization: Critical Perspectives on Human Rights. His book Israel's Occupation was published by the University of California Press in late 2008, and his co-authored book The Human Right to Dominate was published by Oxford University Press in 2015.
Gordon describes himself as a supporter of the one state solution[5] and as a member of the Israeli peace camp.
Directly after the February 2009 Israeli election, Gordon stated that it would have "devastating effects". He also stated that the new Yisrael Beiteinu party possessed 'neo-fascist' tendencies. He concluded that the Obama administration should pressure the Likud-based government coalition economically and politically to adopt the two state solution.[6]
Gordon wrote in an Los Angeles Times editorial on August 20, 2009 that he had decided to support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel movement. He stated that Israel had become so right wing and 'an apartheid state' that he felt he had no choice but to support this course of action.[3] This led to threats by some US donors to withhold funds from Ben-Gurion University, and to a heated debate within Israel over the rights of academics to freedom of expression.[7]
The Ben-Gurion University management responded by denouncing Gordon's views. The President of the University, Professor Rivka Carmi, said, "We are appalled by Dr. Neve Gordon's irresponsible remarks, that morally deserve to be completely and utterly condemned. "We disapprove of Gordon's disastrous views and reject his cynical exploitation of the freedom of speech in Israel and the university." Israeli Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar called Gordon's article "repugnant and deplorable.[8] Religious Affairs Minister Ya'akov Margi called on the university to immediately suspend Gordon from his job and to publicly condemn his article.[9]
Aside from his vocal criticism of Israeli policies, Gordon was well known in a high-profile controversy involving Steven Plaut in which Gordon sued Plaut for libel. In May 2006, the Israeli magistrate court in Nazareth ruled in favour of Gordon, and ordered Plaut to pay Gordon 80,000 shekels in compensation plus 15,000 shekels in legal fees.[10] Both sides appealed to the District Court in Nazareth and in February 2008, the court upheld a libel judgment relating to a publication in which Plaut called Gordon a "Judenrat Wannabe" but reduced the damages to 10,000 shekels (about $2,700) because the court reversed three out of four of the libel claims.[11][12] The Supreme Court of Israel rejected Plaut's request to review the case.[13]
In April 2018, Gordon was one of 40 senior academics who wrote an open letter to The Guardian condemning what they called anti-Corbyn bias in media coverage of the antisemitism debate saying it was "framed in such a way as to mystify the real sources of anti-Jewish bigotry and to weaponise it against a single political figure just ahead of important elections."[14]