"The Palestinian Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) condemned on Thursday the participation of Arab figures from Egypt, Jordan and Qatar in the 12th annual Herzliya conference.
The Herzliya conference is considered the most important annual event for Israel's military intelligence as it is concerned mainly with the promotion of Israeli "national security," and thus forms a major threat to the Palestinian cause, the committee said in a statement Thursday. The Herzliya conference will be held between 31 January and 2 February under the name “In the Eye of Storms: Israel and the Middle East." Al-Quds Al-Arabi, a London-based Arabic daily, reported on Thursday that among participants in the conference are Riad al-Khoury, a Jordanian economist, Salman al-Sheikh of the Doha-based Brookings Institute, Sherif al-Diwany, chairman of Marsad (Observatory) Inc. in Egypt, and Saeb Erekat, former chief Palestinian negotiator. The BNC called on Arab figures participating in the conference to withdraw." And there is a Lebanese Zionist likudnik but no one has ever heard of him. (thanks Khalid)
