The Oxford Union has backed a motion proposed by prominent American lawyer Professor Alan Dershowitz opposing the boycott of Israel.
The motion, “Is the BDS movement against Israel wrong?”, was carried by 137 votes to 101 by the prestigious debating society on Sunday.
Prof Dershowitz, who spoke against human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, told the union: “I am a pro-Palestine and pro-Israel. The BDS movement is against the two-state solution.”
He added: “BDS is based on bigotry. If Israel was not the nation state of the Jewish people, then this debate wouldn't be happening today.
"BDS will absolutely not bring peace. If the BDS movement is desirous of peace, then why will its leaders not debate me?"
At a meeting later in the week,Prof Dershowitz explained that he had exposed "what the BDS is really all about".
He added: "I didn't win because of superior debating skills. I won because I was on the right side."
In conversation with Baroness Deech at the Zionist Federation's Balfour Lecture on Tuesday, Prof Dershowitz said that the true position of BDS was that there was no place for a nation state for Jews in the Middle East.
The BDS movement was a barrier to peace, he told the audience at the British Library, in central London.
"BDS is not an alternative to violence; it is a supplement to violence," he said.
One of its effects was to "disincentivise" the Palestinians from coming to the bargaining table. It sent the false message that a Palestinian state could be achieved without the need for compromise and negotiation with the Israelis.
