Last month the US House of Representatives voted by an overwhelming 398 to 17 margin to pass a resolution condemning the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel’s violations of Palestinian human rights.
BDS is nonviolent pressure on Israel to respect Palestinian rights and to enter into negotiations to settle the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.
As a veteran of the anti-apartheid boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement in the 1970s and 1980s, I feel strongly that the sanctions imposed on apartheid South Africa by the US in 1986, which led to a democratic transition over the next several years, shows that this kind of nonviolent economic pressure can work. In both countries there was broad support among the oppressed group for the call for economic sanctions to promote equal rights and democracy.
The US should use escalating BDS to pressure Israel to end the blockade of Gaza, stop expanding West Bank settlements, and respect Palestinian human rights and equality under the law. The first step should be a comprehensive military embargo against Israel.
The Palestinian BDS National Committee calls for “immediate international action towards a mandatory comprehensive military embargo against Israel similar to that imposed against apartheid South Africa in the past.” The military embargo should cover governments, companies, and research centers that cooperate with and support Israel’s military and security industry.
Israel acts with impunity because the United States has given Israel a blank check diplomatically and militarily for more than 30 years during the administrations of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump. The United States must end its unconditional support for Israel by stopping aid to Israel as long as it continues to violate international law and the human rights of Palestinians.
I have long supported BDS pressure on Israel. In 2002, as the Green candidate for New York Comptroller, I called for divestment of state pension funds from companies involved in the occupation of Palestinian territories as Israel began constructing its Separation Barrier, dubbed the “Apartheid Wall” and the “Berlin Wall” by Palestinians. In 2005, as a Green Party national committee member, I voted in favor of the BDS policy adopted by the Green Party of the United States. In my 2006 campaign for US Senate against Hillary Clinton, I called for a cut-off US military and economic aid to Israel after its military attacks on Gaza. In my three campaigns against Governor Andrew Cuomo, I called for BDS in criticizing Cuomo’s unconditional support for Israel as it again and again bombed the Gaza Strip, already besieged by the Israeli embargo, during each of my campaigns in 2010, 2014, and 2018.
Israel is currently arresting immigrants and their children and holding them in prisons. Trump’s policy of imprisoning immigrant children is now being copied by Israel, and I am strongly opposed to both.
With the passage of the Nation State Law last year, Israel has further codified its nature as an “apartheid state.” The US will never play a positive role as a neutral broker in negotiating an Israeli/Palestinian settlement until it ends its unreserved support for Israeli government violations of international law and Palestinian rights.
US policy in the past was not always as submissive to Israeli demands as it has been in the last 30 years. For instance, President Eisenhower threatened military and economic sanctions against Israel, France, and the UK when the three countries invaded Egypt to seize the Suez Canal in 1956. The three countries withdrew after Eisenhower’s threat. In 1991, President Bush delayed $11 billion in loan guarantees to Israel until it halted its settlement building in the West Bank and Gaza and entered a peace conference with the Palestinians.
It is a sad commentary on American politics today that almost all the Democrats and Republicans today are far less willing to challenge Israeli wars and human rights abuses than were Dwight Eisenhower and George H.W. Bush, both of whom were traditional imperialists who presided over US-led coups and military interventions in several countries during their administrations. That’s another reason why we need the Green Party.
Thank you for being a true advocate for human rights.
Hey Howie, although I am sympathetic to the Palestinian narrative in the form of the two state solution (which has been rejected by the Palestinian leadership three times) and I am extremely appalled by Israel’s settlement policies, I must declare that the BDS movement is immoral, hypocritical and counterproductive towards the liberating goal of achieving a peaceful and democratic Palestinian State; particularly because many of its leaders do not accept Israel’s right to exist as the nation state of the Jewish people within the 1967 borders- no wonder the BDS tactics are featured on the sinister websites of Neo-Nazi and Holocaust Denial hate groups. Also, it seems totally hypocritical for American politicians to focus disproportionately on Israel’s violations of human rights while there is little or no movement to reign in other heinous violators such as Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Turkey and Myanmar- more to the point of gross hypocrisy: How do we (Americans) take a moral high ground against the right-wing government of Israel when our two evil war parties have committed many more thousands of war crimes than any other country has since the inception of the CIA? We can’t because the American War Machine has zero credibility in the Middle East already; supporting the extortionate tactics of the BDS will only increase the collective hatred involved and do more harm to the Palestinian workers who will lose their jobs as a result of the economic sanctions while making a peaceful resolution much more difficult. The concept of boycott and divestment will only yield positive results at this time if it is applied by the American masses against the war profiteers and other corporate plunderers (who own both sides of the rotten aisle) until We The People have free and fair elections instead of just having Grandstanding Oily Parasites in high office perpetually engaged in destructive maneuvering on behalf of our Fascist Rulers.
Hi Herk, I think whether a solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is a one-state or two-state solution should come out of negotiations between the two sides. I defer to them.
I don’t think it is fair say the BDS movement — led by the Palestinian BDS National Committee which issued the BDS call — does not accept Israel’s right to exist. They take no position on a one- or two-state solution. Their stated objectives are (1) end the occupation back to the 1967 borders, (2) equal fights for Palestinian citizens of Israel, and (3) the right of Palestinians to return homes from which they have been displaced. The second demand implicitly assumes a state of Israel.
The three proposals for a separate Palestinian state in 1948, 2000, and 2008 had problems from the Palestinian point of view. Not least was internal Palestinian politics. What was proposed wouldn’t fly with many Palestinians. The BDS call came from a new generation of leaders not tied to the old factions.
The Palestinian BDS Committee has broad support. That organization — and those of us who support their BDS call — cannot be held responsible for anti-Semites who support BDS for their own twisted reasons. The Palestinian BDS National Committee explicitly condemns anti-Semitism.
I agree that we should also withdraw military support from Saudi Arabia and Turkey for their gross violations of human rights in their own countries as well as Syria, Yemen, and, for that matter, Iraq and Bahrain. Aid to Myanmar is humanitarian and gives us leverage to address the treatment of the Rohingya, not that the Trump administration gives a damn.
The US could play a positive role as a neutral broker in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict if it stopped deferring to whatever Israeli’s leaders want. Of course, that won’t happen until we beat the two war parties politically. But a US policy of BDS, like we took toward apartheid South Africa in 1986, could be productive nonviolent pressure on Israel to respect Palestinian human rights. How else to pressure the Israeli far right? Netanhayu says “no Palestinian state on my watch.” How else to pressure the Israeli side to negotiate in good faith?
–Howie
Hey Howie, thanks for your reply, particularly because it helped me realize some errors I made in my commentary to you that I wish to incorporate into a long one-act play that focuses on the differences among Liberalism, Libertarianism and American Fascism. Personally, I don’t think the one-state secular solution proposed by the co-founder of the BDS movement, Omar Barghouti, is the least bit viable for the Jewish people, but I am with you on what you wrote, “I defer to them,” much like they should defer to me on how We (Americans) take back our fixed elections from our Fascist Rulers.
I apologize for my error of writing that “many of its leaders do not accept Israel’s right to exist as the nation state of the Jewish people within the 1967 borders” because I was unaware of the current shift in thinking with the new Palestinian leadership going away from Barghouti’s unreasonable attitude.
‘Politics makes strange bedfellows’ is the adage I would use for hateful characters like David Duke being advocates for the BDS movement- obviously liberals and many other supporters of the BDS have good intentions in wanting to achieve good faith negotiations that ends (or at least curtails) this bloody conflict.
Although I believe this should be a main function of the United Nations, I am glad that you clarified a possible U.S. positive role as a neutral broker with “Of course, that won’t happen until we beat the two war parties politically” because this mentality coincides with mine and I have an open agenda of calling for a national strike of not working, not buying gasoline and no watching TV- first on a Presidential Election Day, then an Election Week Strike four years later, an Election Month Strike four years after that and then the nuclear option would be an indefinite strike until We The People have free and fair elections.
I don’t know how to answer your questions of how else to pressure the Israeli far right into good faith negotiations but I do have the striking answer on how We non-violently force our so-called representatives to finally make real the promises of a True Democracy! How else will the Greens, the Libertarians and anti-war Independents gain high office without catering to the war profiteers and other corporate plunderers?!