How the Israel boycott movement struck

major blows in 2015

Despite Israels counteroffensive, boycott movement won some key victories in 2015. Mark EsperPolaris

Ali Abunimah-30 December 2015

In September 2014, on the eve of the Jewish new year, Israels leading financial daily
named Omar Barghoutiamong the 100 people most likely to influence the countrys
economy in the following year.
Calcalist, the business supplement of the mass circulation newspaper Yediot
Ahronot, said that the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, which Barghouti

helped found, was already worrying the government.

It cited government studies warning that Israel would lose billions of dollars a year in
exports and GDP and thousands of jobs if current boycott trends continued.
The credit and honor go to the entire BDS movement, of which I am a modest part, to
each and every BDS activist in Palestine and around the world who has contributed to
making BDS one the most effective forms of resisting Israels regime of occupation,
settler-colonialism and apartheid, Barghouti told The Electronic Intifada this week.
And 2015 has proven Calcalist right.
As the year closes, Palestines Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee
(BNC), the broad coalition that backs the BDS movement, is pointing out some of the
successes of the last 12 months:
The authors of a United Nations report revealed in June that BDS was a key

factor behind the nearly 50 percent plunge in foreign direct investment in Israel
in 2014.
The World Bank cited consumer boycotts as a key factor behind a 24 percent
drop in Palestinian imports from Israel in the first quarter of 2015.

The international credit ratings agency Moodys warned in October that the
Israeli economy could suffer should BDS gain greater traction. Moodys reports
are used by corporations to assess the risk of doing business in a country.

A major European investor confirmed that BDS was already deterring companies from
entering the Israeli market.
During general meetings of the leading companies, even if they did examine investing
in Israeli companies, it will be off the agenda immediately because of the impact of
BDS,
Edouard Cukierman, founder of Catalyst Funds and chair of Cukierman & Co
Investment House, told Israeli media.
Running for the exit
In 2015, activists celebrated a major victory as the French multinational Veolia sold off
all its investments in Israel.

This followed a seven-year global campaign which cost Veolia billions of dollars in lost
municipal and government contracts. By the end, Veolia reportedly could not find any
international buyers for its Israeli businesses.
Perhaps alarmed by Veolias fate, the French multinational telecom
company Orange announced in June that it intended to end its relationship with its
Israeli affiliate.
Despite the Israeli governments outraged reaction, Orange amended its contract with
Israels Partner Communications so it could get out of the country as soon as 2017,
instead of 2025.

Orange providing free service to Israeli soldiers deployed near Gaza during the assault
in the summer of 2014 that killed more than 2,200 Palestinians. The Israeli affiliate of
the French telecom company has adopted a military unit that was in action in

locations where hundreds of civilians were killed. (via Frumline)

The campaign to end Oranges complicity with Israeli human rights abuses it
operates extensively in Israels West Bank settlements started in France several years
ago and gathered pace in May when activists in Egypt called for a boycott of its
subsidiary Mobinil.
The Electronic Intifadas April report revealing the extent of Oranges direct
complicity in Israels summer 2014 attack on Gaza galvanized the campaign.
In November, the European Union finally took the step of requiring labels clearly
marking goods that come from Israeli settlements built on occupied Palestinian and
Syrian land in violation of international law.
This was a minimalist step taken only after years of dithering and delay, and has to be
seen in the context of massive ongoing EU complicity with Israels war crimes and its
deepening apartheid.
But at the time, Mahmoud Nawajaa, general coordinator for the BNC, said the move
was a sign that European governments are reacting to public opinion, civil society
campaigning and Israeli intransigence and are becoming more willing to take some
basic action against Israeli violations of international law.
Israels furious reaction many politicians compared EU officials to Nazis belies its
real fear: that this is only the first step of more action to come.
A sure sign of the mainstreaming of Palestinian rights came in September with Jeremy
Corbyns landslide victory in the election for leader of the UKs main opposition
Labour Party.
Despite intense Israel lobby smears, Corbyn trounced the establishment candidates.
A month earlier, Corbyn, a lifelong champion of Palestinian rights, had told The
Electronic Intifada he backed the boycott of Israeli universities involved in weapons
research.
Faith and labor
In 2014, after a decade-long campaign, the Presbyterian Church USA voted by a
narrow margin to divest from companies that profit from Israels military occupation
of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

This prompted Israel and its lobby groups to step up their efforts to co-opt or
intimidate church activists.
But in June this year a resounding answer came from the United Church of Christ. The
one million-strong US denominations assembly voted by a huge margin to divest as
well.
Where churches are going, labor is following. Several major labor federations in North
America joined the dozens of unions, especially in Europe, that already support the
movement.
In August, the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America known as
UE voted to back BDS, becoming the second US national union to do so.
We reached a breaking point when Israel launched the war on Gaza in 2014, killing
over 2,000 people, including 500 children, Carl Rosen, a member of UEs national
executive board, explained.
In November, the Connecticut branch of the AFL-CIO, representing 200,000
workers, voted to back key elements of the Palestinian call for BDS.
And Quebecs confederation of trade unions, representing 325,000 workers in the
Canadian province, also backed BDS, including the cultural boycott and a boycott of all
Israeli goods.
It pledged to work with civil society groups to organize campaigns to turn this support
into action in coming months.
This year Israel also suffered from a sustained and deepening decline in tourism,
especially from Europe.
There is no direct evidence that the sharp decline, which began during the 2014 attack
on Gaza, is due to boycotts.
But the fact that the BDS movement especially the cultural boycott has been so
strong in Europe undoubtedly makes it harder for Israel to market itself as a carefree
destination for sunseekers.

Going mainstream
This was the year when Lauryn Hill and Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth said they
wont perform in Israel, and more than 1,000 artists across Ireland, the UK, the US
and Belgium have said they support the cultural boycott of Israel, the BNC notes,
highlighting that the campaign is gaining ground everywhere.
Israeli universities play a key role in planning and whitewashing Israels crimes but
now academics across the world are taking effective action, the BNC states.
Examples from 2015 include landslide votes to back the academic boycott of these
complicit institutions by theAmerican Anthropological Association and the National
Womens Studies Association.
Counterattack
In 2015, Israel and its lobby groups intensified their counterattack against the growing
global movement for Palestinian rights.
This included crackdowns and intimidation on campuses and efforts to legislate and
litigate against BDS in North America and Europe.
They had plenty of help from complicit governments and lawmakers, including
in France, Italy, the United Kingdom, Canada and the US.
But the BNC even sees this backlash as a sign of success, as an increasingly desperate
Israel resorts to exporting its mentality of repression and getting its allies in the west
to run McCarthyite attacks on free speech.
Israel knows it is losing the argument and is throwing everything it has at sabotaging
our movement, dedicating money, government staff and apparently even its security
services to undermining BDS, the BNC says.
Theres no doubt Israels efforts to obstruct and sabotage campaigns for justice will
continue and, flush with new cash, intensify.
With dozens of student bodies on US campuses having voted to back divestment in
recent years, we can expect campaigns to shift toward pressuring administrations to
implement those demands. They will face determined opposition, but that will only
help keep Palestine front and center.

Theres also every sign that BDS could become a big issue in the 2016 US presidential
campaign already Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton and Republican
hopeful Jeb Bush have launched attacks on the movement.
But that might only serve to educate more people that BDS exists and is an option for
them too.
The passing year, which also marked the 10th anniversary of the Palestinian civil
society call for BDS, shows clearly that this diverse and decentralized movement
founded and led by Palestinians is a growing match for Israel.
Amid so much difficult news from Palestine and the region, thats a bright ray of hope
for 2016.
Posted by Thavam