Dear Faculty Colleagues,
Last week, the British Committee for Universities for Palestine (BRICUP) circulated a letter signed by some 500 academics, mostly from Europe, asking Baroness Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy for the European Union, not to postpone the implementation of the EU Guidelines on Israeli Settlements (http://www.bdsmovement.net/files/2013/09/EU-BRICUP-AURDIP-letter-to-Catherine-Ashton-final.pdf).
We invite you to sign and circulate the following letter to faculty colleagues to demonstrate that “academic opinion” does not uniformly favour the EU guidelines. When signing, it is vital that you place your institutional affiliation and thenoffer any comments.

The Rt. Hon. The Baroness Catherine Ashton of Upholland Vice-President High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy European Union Dear Lady Ashton:
Unlike Ivar Ekelund of AURDIP, Jonathan Rosenhead of BRICUP, and their followers, who wrote to you on September 11, we, the undersigned, were favourably impressed by the news that you were reconsidering implementation of the recently issued EU Guidelines on Israeli Settlements, scheduled to take effect in 2014. Such reconsideration is a courageous and constructive step on your part. The Guidelines ban all EU cooperation with entities beyond the Green Line, including East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. They appear to make universities and other institutions and their projects in those territories ineligible for EU funding. Directly or indirectly, the loss of EU funding would adversely affect established scientific collaborations of Israelis and Palestinians, creative efforts to develop new initiatives in the region, and cooperation between Israeli and other academic institutions. It would harm those whom the Guidelines are, at least in theory, intended to help, and would benefit no one. We were moved to write to you because other academics had done so in support of the Guidelines. Such support, not least because of its effects on scientific cooperation and scientific progress, is diametrically opposed to academic values. It is important that you hear from those who uphold those values. Because we uphold them, we ask you to repeal the Guidelines.

Cc: José Manuel Barroso, President of the EU Commission Herman Van Rompuy, President of the EU Council Martin Schulz, President of the EU Parliament