Pro-Israel donor pulls Trinity College Cambridge funding over investments row

 

US corporate executive Ivan Berkowitz is angry that Cambridge's richest college was considering divesting from arms companies

An American donor has withdrawn funding from Cambridge University's richest college, accusing it of failing to properly investigate the defacing of a painting of Lord Balfour - and of considering divesting from arms companies linked to Israel.

This is the latest in a series of controversies that have hit Trinity College Cambridge over the past year because of its ties to companies complicit in Israel's war on Gaza.

Middle East Eye revealed in February that the prestigious college, which is one of the UK's wealthiest landowners, had $78,089 invested in Israel's largest arms company, Elbit Systems, which produces 85 percent of the drones and land-based equipment used by the Israeli army.

MEE further reported that the college also had millions of dollars invested in other companies arming, supporting and profiting from Israel's war on Gaza.

In response to these revelations, students organised several protests over the following months.

In March, two weeks after the MEE report, an activist from Palestine Action spray-painted and slashed a 1914 painting of Lord Arthur Balfour at Trinity - sparking condemnation from senior British politicians.

Now Ivan Berkowitz, a Jewish-American corporate executive and the son of Holocaust survivors, has accused Trinity of failing to properly investigate the incident.  (more...)

Pro-Israel donor pulls Trinity College Cambridge funding over investments row

Related:

British charities referred to UN for 'aiding crimes against Palestinians'