(JNS.org) The AMCHA Initiative, an organization that investigates and combats anti-Semitism at academic institutions, released a list of 218 professors identifying as Middle East scholars who have called for a boycott of Israel (http://www.amchainitiative.org/middle-east-scholars-boycott-israel/). In August, about 200 professors on more than 100 U.S. campuses signed a petition calling “to boycott Israeli academic institutions,” and refuse “to collaborate on projects and events involving Israeli academic institutions, not to teach at or to attend conferences and other events at such institutions, and not to publish in academic journals based in Israel.”

Connecticut professors on the list include: James C. Faris, professor emeritus, anthropology; director emeritus, Program in Middle East Languages and Area Studies; University of Hartford, Robert Lang, professor of cinema; Yale University, Zareena Grewal, assistant professor of American studies and religious studies, faculty at Council on Middle East Studies, and Dimitri Gutas, professor of Arabic.

In addition, faculty members at 16 of 20 universities that received federal grants supporting Middle East studies signed the anti-Israel petition. Those schools are Yale University, Columbia University, Duke University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, Harvard University, New York University, Princeton University, University of California Berkeley, University of California Los Angeles, University of Chicago, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, University of Pennsylvania, University of Texas at Austin, and University of Washington Seattle.