From The Arab-American News:
The University of Michigan-Dearborn Faculty Congress voted on Monday, March 7 [sic, should be April 7] against a resolution that calls for forming a divestment committee to look into the human rights records of companies that do business with the Israeli military.The tide has decisively turned against BDS on college campuses, venues that were considered lost causes only a year ago. It is clear that the Israel-haters are noisy and know how to get publicity, but their stunts have no substance behind them.
After a 30-minute debate, the faculty struck down the resolution in a 23-17 vote with two abstentions. Present faculty members voted via ballot box. The faculty also voted 32-7 against a resolution calling for the boycott of Israeli academic institutions. The yearly meeting, which was open to the public, was almost exclusively attended by UMD faculty.
The Student Government (SG) had passed the divestment proposal last week. [Actually, the student proposal was to create a committee to look at the topic, there was no call to divestment in the SG resolution, much to the consternation of SJP. - EoZ] According to campus newspaper, the divestment initiative was proposed by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and endorsed by eight student organizations. SG has called for divestment on four previous occasions in 2005, 2006, 2010, and 2012, according to campus newspaper The Michigan Journal.
Dr. John Poster, the chair of the Faculty Senate told The Arab American News that the resolution approved by SG is not reflective of the opinion of the student body because most students are not involved in the student government.
"It is difficult for us to focus on this, while [Syrian President Bashar] Assad has killed more than 100,000 of his own people, while the military in Egypt overthrew a democratically elected government," Poster said. "There is a number of problems in the world, and it is hard for us to focus on Israel only."
(h/t Dan C.)