German-wide teachers union says BDS anti-Semitic

From the Jerusalem Post:

The teachers’ union in Oldenburg, Germany, has formally apologized for its publication of a pro-boycott Israel article in its September magazine.

“With the publication of this article from the field of the so-called BDS campaign, we made a big mistake,“ Heinz Bührmann, chairman of the of Education and Science Workers’ Union (GEW) in Oldenburg, wrote on Monday. The local union’s parent-teacher organization termed BDS “anti-Semitic” on its Twitter feed.

After The Jerusalem Post first reported on Saturday that the GEW’s paper advocated BDS, the union reversed its position and removed a statement from its website that suggested a defense of the publication of the article.

The monthly paper was sent to the GEW’s 1,200 members in the area of Oldenburg in the state of Lower Saxony.

“Not one member of the Oldenburg GEW district executive board is... racist or anti-Semitic,“ said Bührmann, claiming the BDS “campaign was, for us, completely not known as problematic. Our lack of knowledge is to blame.“ The union leader said the executive board did not author the article, but was responsible for its publication.

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