When I woke up Saturday morning, March 28, I found the following email in my inbox:

March 27, 2015

Dear Fellow Members of the Virginia State Bar,

Certain members of the Virginia State Bar and other individuals have expressed objections to the VSB’s plan to take the Midyear Legal Seminar trip in November to Jerusalem. It was stated that there are some unacceptable discriminatory policies and practices pertaining to border security that affect travelers to the nation. Upon review of U.S. State Department advisories and other research, and after consultation with our leaders, it has been determined that there is enough legitimate concern to warrant cancellation of the Israel trip and exploration of alternative locations.

Undoubtedly, this news will disappoint some VSB members. But we are a state agency that strives for maximum inclusion and equality, and that explains this action. Fortunately, we still anticipate being able to find a suitable location for the November seminar trip, and we will send out further news very soon.

Finally, we are pleased that our members and citizens feel able to express concerns and look to us to protect rights. In the end, we are all part of the same team, and the VSB will continue to stay focused on advancing its primary objectives—public protection, access to justice, and improvement of the profession.

As always, I appreciate having the honor of serving as your president.

Best regards,

Kevin E. Martingayle
President, Virginia State Bar

This message is, with respect, the most disheartening I have ever received from the Virginia State Bar in my 24 years as an active member.  I have served as Secretary of its Section on the Education of Lawyers, and received a commendation from the VSB for my service.  I shall, with regret, henceforth have nothing to do with the Bar beyond payment of my annual dues, until leadership has repudiated what clearly amounts  to a boycott of Israel.

People wave Israeli and US flags during a ‘New York Stands with Israel’ rally at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza across from the United Nations July 28, 2014 in New York. AFP PHOTO/Stan HONDA (Photo credit should read STAN HONDA/AFP/Getty Images)

The State Bar exists principally to promote ethical behavior among the Commonwealth’s attorneys.  Ethical behavior requires courage.  Yet, this action by the state bar is cowardice.  As my colleague David Bernstein has noted, the only public discussion of this issue before Martingayle’s letter was a petition circulated three days earlier by a tiny group known anonymously as “Concerned Members of the Virginia State Bar”  To quote David,

“It’s hard to imagine that the Martingayle and colleagues canceled a planned event that already had a hotel booked, a CLE program, and even optional tours set up based on those objections. Who are the “other individuals” mentioned by Martingayle who objected?”

It’s easy to debunk the defamatory anti-Israel insinuations in the Martingayle letter (sent Friday night in time-honored “media black hole” fashion, and with snide use of passive tense to disclaim personal responsibility):

1. There is no apartheid or invidious state discrimination in Israel.  Israel allows Arab citizens full human and civil rights in all areas of life, including as full members of Israel’s Knesset.  As black South African Rev. Kenneth Meshoe, founder of the African Christian Democratic Party, has noted, branding Israel as a discriminatory state trivializes the real suffering of those who DO live under discrimination.  Israel is the only state in the Middle East whose Christian population (and whose Muslim population; and whose Jewish population) is growing.
2. Meanwhile, Israel’s surrounding enemies, including notably the Palestinian Authority, seek to obliterate it in accordance with their genocidal founding charters.
3. Bethlehem’s Christians accounted for over 85% of its population in 1948.  That percentage, under Palestinian Authority rule, has now dwindled to 12%.  Under both PA and Hamas rule, Christian Arabs have been victims of human rights abuses and have massively left the area.  Mahmoud Abbas has proudly declared that a future Palestinian state will be judenrein (free of all Jews). Israeli Arab citizens, when polled, massively state that they prefer Israeli citizenship to Palestinian citizenship.   Yet Martingayle accuses Israel of discriminatory practices.
4. More than 250,000 Muslim and Arab visitors from countries that do not even recognize Israel  have arrived as tourists since 2009.  This does not include the multiples of that number of Muslim visitors from other nations.   Yet those with Israeli passports, or who (like me) have Israeli entry stamps in their US passports, are not allowed entry into numerous Muslim states with which Virginia lawyers have profitable business relations.   But Martingayle accuses Israel, besieged by genocidal neighbors and with tremendous national security needs, of heinous entry policies.  US border security and entry policies are in fact discriminatory depending on what state an individual is traveling from, and those policies continue to change and have changed radically over the past 15 years and affect all visitors – and citizens returning – here.  Will the VSB be exploring a new location for its head office, or take a public stand urging a border policy of  maximum inclusivity without regard to security, for the United States?
5. On Monday, March 23, Israeli Prime Minister elect Netanyahu apologized profusely, and publicly, to a group of Israeli Arab community leaders for encouraging his party, one week earlier, to “get out the vote” to counter Arab voters.  [Here's a link to the video -- click on CC to get English subtitles].  But as the Boston Globe’s Jeff Jacoby has pointed out, President Obama has still not apologized, four and one half years later, for exhorting Latinos to vote massively to “punish our enemies and … reward our friends.,” or for Joe Biden’s 2012 campaign claim to African Americans that the Republicans wished to “put y’all back in chains.”  Divisive rhetoric?  Search 50 other countries, including the United States, and you will find far more divisive political rhetoric than is used in Israel.  Perhaps Mr. Martingayle should cancel all VSB meetings in the United States.

Mr. Martingayle, organizing the mid-year meeting in Jerusalem, an extremely safe city and one of the world’s treasures, visited by millions of Americans of all faiths every year, made you look Churchillian.  Canceling the trip because a tiny number of Israel-hating zealots want to wage “lawfare” against the Jewish state makes you look like Neville Chamberlain.

We in academe have to deal with that rot daily:  it is so sad to see it spread to the practicing bar.