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Angela Davis Says She’s ‘Stunned’ After Award Is Revoked Over Her Views on Israel

The civil rights activist and scholar Angela Davis speaking at the University of Michigan-Flint in 2015. She is a supporter of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, which seeks to apply economic pressure to Israel in protest of its treatment of Palestinians.Credit...Jake May/The Flint Journal, via Associated Press

Angela Davis, the activist and scholar, said this week that she was “stunned” after a civil rights group in her native Birmingham, Ala., reversed its decision to honor her with an award amid protests over her support for a boycott of Israel.

Professor Davis, once a global hero of the left who has since earned renown for her scholarship, had been selected for the human rights award months ago by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, but the group’s board rescinded the honor on Friday.

In announcing the move, the institute did not offer an explanation, saying only that “she unfortunately does not meet all of the criteria on which the award is based.” But Professor Davis said in a statement on Facebook on Monday that she had learned it was because of her “long-term support of justice for Palestine.” The revocation of the award, she added, was “not primarily an attack against me but rather against the very spirit of the indivisibility of justice.”

In a statement expressing dismay at the controversy, Mayor Randall Woodfin of Birmingham said the decision had come amid “protests from our local Jewish community and some of its allies.”

The institute did say in its statement announcing the revocation that it had begun hearing from “concerned individuals and organizations” in late December, around the time the magazine Southern Jewish Life published a piece about the award by its editor, Larry Brook.

In it, he wrote that “for some in the community, there might be some indigestion” at the now-canceled February gala where Professor Davis, who retired from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 2008, was slated to be honored.

Mr. Brook noted that Professor Davis has supported the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, known as B.D.S., which seeks to apply economic pressure to Israel until it ends the occupation of the West Bank, treats Palestinians equally under the law and allows the return of Palestinian refugees.

Many Israelis and their allies oppose the movement, viewing it as anti-Semitic and an existential threat to the country. Supporters, including Professor Davis, describe it as a necessary response to what amounts to modern-day apartheid.

[A boycott drive put Israel on a blacklist. Now Israel has one of its own.]

Professor Davis, who has delivered that message on college campuses and elsewhere, has also joined prominent black celebrities and thinkers in comparing the struggles of Palestinians to those of African-Americans. Among those celebrities is the actor Danny Glover, who received the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s human rights award in 2003.

Israel and its allies have defended against the boycott movement around the world, including in the United States, where polls of young people show support growing for the Palestinian cause.

In recent years, more than a dozen states have passed laws to restrict contractors from boycotting Israel. Some of the laws are being challenged as violations of First Amendment rights.

[She wouldn’t promise not to boycott Israel, so a Texas school district stopped paying her.]

In his statement, Mayor Woodfin called on the institute and those who opposed its decision to engage in dialogue.

The institute’s reversal provided “an opportunity to engage in conversation about how we work together to resolve our differences constructively and continue to move our community forward,” he said. “I would be pleased to facilitate and participate in any such conversation, now and in the future.”

In her statement, Professor Davis said her activism often involved the linking of movements around the world to those within the United States.

“I support Palestinian political prisoners just as I support current political prisoners in the Basque Country, in Catalunya, in India, and in other parts of the world,” she said. “I have indeed expressed opposition to policies and practices of the state of Israel, as I express similar opposition to U.S. support for the Israeli occupation of Palestine and to other discriminatory U.S. policies.”

Professor Davis became a global progressive leader nearly half a century ago. At the time, she was agitating on behalf of three California inmates accused of murdering a white prison guard when guns she had purchased were used in an attack that was aimed at freeing the inmates but left four people dead, including the assailant.

She was not present during the attack and witnesses testified that the guns were purchased for defense, but Professor Davis nonetheless spent 16 months in jail before an all-white jury acquitted her of all charges. In the interim, “Free Angela” had become a rallying cry.

Since then, she has been recognized for her scholarship and activism around feminism and against mass incarceration. Last year, a Harvard University library acquired her personal archive.

In her statement, Professor Davis said she planned to be in Birmingham next month regardless of the institute’s decision.

“I look forward to being in Birmingham in February for an alternative event organized by those who believe that the movement for civil rights in this moment must include a robust discussion of all of the injustices that surround us,” she said.

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