British PhD Candidate on Picnic with Sharon, Muslim Leaders

World leaders hailed it as a major breakthrough for world peace when Israel’s Ariel Sharon and Muslim leaders went on a picnic near the Israeli city of Tiberias, on the shores of the Sea of Galilee.

“I just kinda woke up this morning and got this idea,” explained a sunburnt Mr Sharon.

“Yeah! Ari like called me up out of the blue and my immediate thought was, ‘Uh oh! This can’t be good ... ’” chimed in Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, “But he was just like all ‘Hey! Let’s call up Moammar and the gang and go for a picnic!’ and I was like ‘Cool!’.”

Aside from small disagreements as to whose tabouleh was the best and who could grill the tastiest burger, the picnic was a success.

“I had no idea everyone was be so funny!” laughed Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade. “I mean, Ari and [Syrian President] Bashar [el-Assad] got together and were like wandering around threatening to “occupy” people’s condiments until Abu Mazen [Mahmoud Abbas] threw the relish at them! Then we had like this total food fight! It was hilarious!”

“My favourite part!” exclaimed Yemen’s Ali Abdallah Saleh, “was when [Kuwait’s Sheikh] Jabir [al-Ahmad al-Jabir al-Sabah], [Iraq’s] Ghazi [Yawer], and [Iran’s Ayatollah] Ali [Khamenei] were like pretending to blow up each other’s tumblers of Kool Aid! It was like soooooooo funny!”

“Quite frankly, Ahmet and some of the other non-Arab Muslim leaders had discussed this and we were a little worried about, y’know, whether we’d be welcome n’stuff seeing as how we’re Muslims but not Arab and we’re definitely not Israeli,” said Albanian Prime Minister, Fatos Nano, referring to Turkey’s Ahmet Necdet Sezer and the leaders of Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, several other Central Asian leaders, as well as several sub-Saharan African leaders, “But like everyone was so sweet and so welcoming. Moammar just walked up and gave me a great big hug!”

Not only was it fun, but the picnic also proved to be very productive. The leaders all agreed with very little prompting that Israel would withdraw to the 1967 borders, that Jerusalem would be the capital of both Israel and Palestine, that Palestinian militants would immediately cease and desist all violent activity, that Syria would withdraw unequivocally from Lebanon, and that free and democratic elections would be called in every single country that had not already done so.

And who is responsible for this amazing turn of events? “A little lady I like to call Sue,” answered Egypt’s Muhammad Hosni Mubarak, referring to British PhD candidate Sue Blackwell.

Ms Blackwell spearheaded the movement to boycott all Israeli academics except those “ conscientious Israeli academics and intellectuals opposed to their state's colonial and racist policies” as well as a complete boycott of three of that country’s most influential universities.

“There I was, wondering if the world would ever hear my voice,” said a clearly overwrought Ms Blackwell, “When I thought to muyself, ‘You know what would really turn things around in the Middle East? The destruction of the careers of a few academics based on what I consider to be the acceptability or lack thereof of their political thought, whether or not their political thought has any bearing on their academic research. And look! That was simply all it took!”

Asked whether she considers it somewhat hypocritical to censure the careers of academics based on their apparent beliefs whereas she protested vigorously at her employer’s, the University of Birmingham, closing of all personal websites on their system, hers on the Academic boycott of Israel included, she protested that the U of B had an “absolute responsibility” to allow her to broadcast her views even though they were completely unrelated to her field of research, as she is a lecturer there as well as a PhD candidate, whereas her larger goal was for the greater good and thus the Orwellian measures she proposed were therefore justified.

Asked whether it wasn’t closer to the truth that she simply wanted someone to pay attention to her, she responded that she was already “quite well known in the field of Forensic Linguistics, thank you very much” and will be even more so once she finally “gets around to finishing her bloody thesis!”