http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/167833Famed physicist, Professor Stephen Hawking, is joining the academic boycott of Israel by pulling out of the annual conference hosted by Israeli president Shimon Peres in Jerusalem. He says it is in protest of what he described as "Israel's treatment of Palestinians".
Hawking, 71, world-renowned theoretical physicist and Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge, had accepted an invitation to headline the fifth annual president's conference, Facing Tomorrow, in June, which features major international personalities, attracts thousands of participants and this year will celebrate Peres's 90th birthday.
Hawking had last visited Israel in 2006 at the invitation of the British Embassy there. He gave lectures in both Israeli and Palestinian universities.
After the 2009 Israeli attack on Gaza in 2009, Hawking condemned Israel publicly in strong terms.Hawking has been known to take anti-war positions in the past. In 2004, he joined an anti-Iraq war demonstration in London and addressed the demonstrators, calling the US led invasion of Iraq a 'war crime' and based on 'lies'.
Hawking suffers from a rare motor neuron disease called ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease. As a result he is confined to a computer-run wheel chair.