Tom Wilson 10.12.2014
The campaign to boycott Israel–the BDS (boycott,
divestment, sanctions) movement–is undoubtedly a fringe campaign. But where
this small band of anti-Israel extremists have experienced some traction is
among those whom they have been able to convince that BDS is only against
settlements. The argument goes that a boycott of Israeli settler produce will
somehow persuade the Israelis to abandon their security concerns and bring an
end to their so-called occupation of the West Bank. Yet one only has to look to
how BDS conducts its campaigns in practice to see that this alleged concern
with the “occupation” is just one of many disingenuous claims from what is, at
its heart, an entirely disingenuous movement.
Listening to the words of BDS
leaders such as Omar Barghouti you soon realize that the end goal of BDS is
nothing less than the total elimination of the Jewish state. But unlike
Barghouti, most of the BDS movement has the common sense not to state this so
publicly. As such, BDS efforts have been ostensibly focused around boycotting
settlements; although in practice this still allows campaigners to attack most
Israeli companies by making flimsy arguments about guilt by association. So for
instance the Israeli national theater company Habima was targeted on the
grounds that it had previously performed in settlements. In Europe this
argument is beginning to take hold. Supermarket chains, churches, city
councils, and now EU diplomats are all coming round to the idea that boycotting
the Jewish state outright may be going too far, but boycotting Jews who dare to
live on the “wrong side” of a defunct armistice line is perfectly acceptable.
For BDS, SodaStream was the ideal target. This
high-profile company, with its popular products and Super Bowl commercials
featuring Scarlett Johansson, had one of its factories just to the east of
Jerusalem in the West Bank. The fact that SodaStream boasted of being the
largest commercial employer of Palestinians in the world did nothing to
dissuade BDS from its efforts. Indeed, just a few months back when it was
announced that SodaStream would relocate its factory from the West Bank to the
Israeli Negev, BDS expressed no remorse for the Palestinian workers losing
their jobs, but only exuberance at their own apparent victory.
Still, now that SodaStream is
relocating from the West Bank BDS will be dropping the boycott, right? Wrong!
As if proof was needed that fleeing the settlements will do nothing to appease
those who simply hate the Jewish state in its entirety, BDSniks have said that
they will continue to boycott SodaStream. Now the pretext for boycotting isthe allegation that
the new factory will be based “close to” a town being built to provide local
Bedouin with housing. And supposedly this renders SodaStream “implicated in the
displacement of Palestinians.” One can scarcely believe that the movement’s
leaders believe such claims, but then these are the feeble excuses of bigots
trying to hide and justify their unacceptable agenda.
The true character of BDS is becoming increasingly
apparent as the boycotters shift their attention toward targets that even they
can’t bracket in with settlements and “stolen land,” except of course for the
fact that BDS clearly considers all of Israel stolen land and any Jewish
enterprise on that land to be a pollution. Israeli-Arabs are of course exempt
from boycotts. Because at its core BDS is a movement that makes ethnicity the
dividing line that determines who is to be boycotted and who isn’t. As such, it
comes as no surprise that BDS activists in the UK have launched action against
Sabon, an Israeli cosmetics company that has always been based within Israel’s
pre-1967 borders.
Sabon opened its first luxury
cosmetics store in London at the beginning of November and BDSers were
demonstrating outside within just four days of its arrival. Over the weekend
activists staged a particularly aggressive gathering, in which one of the
ringleaders was heard employing the most shameless blood libel language,
barking coldly down the megaphone: “you don’t want to be going into this shop,
buying beautiful smelling lotions to smear over your
body, because if you do you will be smearing yourself in the blood of
Palestinians.” And yet this particular Saturday morning protest appears to have
been spearheaded by the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network, the
extremist fringe of an already extremist sect.
As can be seen in the video, the
activists are few in number and their efforts have consistently failed to
persuade consumers to reject Israeli products. Yet by standing in front of the
entrance of Israeli owned stores, intimidating shoppers from stepping inside,
it only takes a handful dedicated fanatics to get a stranglehold on a small
store. Just a few streets over from the new Sabon outlet is the storefront that
was once home to London’s Ahava Dead Sea spa. But in 2011 BDS activists
succeeded in hounding Ahava out, not by persuading customers with their
arguments, but rather by creating so much noise and disturbance on the
salubrious Covent Garden street that–under pressure from surrounding
businesses–the building owner eventually discontinued Ahava’s lease. The
protesters now seek to do the same to Sabon simply because it, like Ahava and
SodaStream, is owned by Israeli Jews.
A few years ago the fierce critic of Israel Norman
Finkelstein attacked some on his own side, calling BDS “a cult.” It is a cult,
but more than that, it’s also a fundamentally racist movement, and that is what
the world needs to be hearing about BDS.
