The boycott campaign against Israeli apartheid heats up – Sodastream and the Batsheva Dance Company

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The parting of the ways between actor Scarlett Johansson and aid agency OXFAM was inevitable.

Johansson is advertising Sodastream which operates a factory in a Jewish-only settlement on occupied Palestinian land. Under international law such production is illegal and Johansson should be supporting a boycott of Sodastream but she’s doing the opposite – for money of course.

Here in New Zealand a boycott campaign of Sodastream is just getting underway and it’ll be a big job because major retailers like Harvey Norman, the Warehouse, Farmers, Foodtown, Countdown, Pak n Save, New World, Briscoes, Noel Leeming and Mitre 10 are among the companies which sell these boycott-breaking contraptions.

In the meantime the boycott debate is heating up further with the Israeli Batsheva Dance Company due to perform at the New Zealand Festival of the Arts in Wellington later this month.

Palestinian human rights groups have written to the government asking that visas be denied to this group because it also breaches the international boycott campaign called by Palestinian groups.

No-one’s holding their breath that our obsequious Foreign Minister Murray McCully will step in despite the United Nations General Assembly proclaiming 2014 “the International Year of Solidarity with the Palestinian People so a protest is being organised for the Batsheva performances. (If you are in Auckland then come down in the bus to Wellington for the 22nd February protest)

Israel is subject to an international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign because of its unashamedly racist treatment of its Arab-Israeli citizens (See www.adalah.org/eng/ for the more than 50 laws which discriminate against Arab-Israelis); the on-going construction of illegal Jewish-only settlements on Palestinian land; its brutal military occupation of the West Bank Palestinian territory and its inhuman blockade of the Gaza Strip.

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Even the US Department of State has criticised Israel’s system of “institutional, legal, and societal discrimination” against its Palestinian citizens.

The BDS campaign was launched in 2005 by some 260 Palestinian civil society organisations as the best way for the international community to support the Palestinian struggle for justice and human rights.

It is similar to the calls for an international boycott of South Africa which were made by black South African organisations from the late 1950s. So for the same reason New Zealanders called for the end to rugby links with apartheid South Africa we are calling for the cutting of ties with apartheid Israel – economic, academic, cultural, political and sporting links are all in the frame.

What makes Batsheva so much worse is that it is part of the Israeli propaganda effort to deflect criticism of its appalling policies towards Palestinians.

The Dance Company is largely funded by the Israeli Ministry of Culture & Sport, the City of Tel Aviv and the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs who praise the troupe as “ambassadors of Israeli culture”. The company’s participation in the NZ Arts Festival is also partially sponsored by the Israeli Embassy in Wellington.

We stood alongside black South Africans in the struggle against South African apartheid – now it’s time to stand beside Palestinians in the struggle against Israeli apartheid.

13 COMMENTS

  1. Yes fuck sodastream and the batshit dance company. As for Scarlett Johannson I’m not suprised but very disappointed. With all the money that she makes I was hoping she might do the right thing. Angelina Jolie she is not.

  2. John Minto, with all due respect, you are wrong on this one. Perhaps a deeper understanding on the exact Sodastream circumstances would help, and instead of general Israel-bashing – no doubt popular amongst your supporters – you could have produced a more thoughtful piece.

    No one denies that Israel is occupying illegally the West Bank, that the Palestinian people deserve their own land, and that there is racism in the way Israel treats its Arab citizens.

    However, how is this Sodastream’s fault? They’re an Israeli company. They have a great product and must manufacture it. They could do so anywhere in the world, they could do it in China for cheaper, I’d say. They have chosen to open a factory in the West Bank. There are arguments (better written than anything I could come up with) over many blogs showing why companies such as Sodastream actually make West Bank people lives a little bit better by providing employment at better conditions/rates of pay than the average there. In fact, they are showing Israel that it is possible to work together with the Palestinians.

    I’d rather buy Sodastream products than products of companies who trade under the perception that they are local but in fact outsource most of their design and manufacture in South-East Asia sweatshops.

    I’m afraid Scarlett is right on this, and you (and Oxfam) are wrong. I am hoping (optimiscally I may add) that the Sodastream boycott will fail miserably.

    • You seem to have missed the point. The Palestinian people have called for an international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign. Just as the black majority called for sanctions on the government of South Africa back in the day. Who do we listen to and act for, the oppressed or the oppressors.

      • What about the Palestinian people employed by Sodastream, are they also calling for a BDS campaign.
        The BDS campaign has been discredited by various organisations far more informed than I am, including the United Nations Human Rights Commission, due to, amongst others, not being a campaign voted for by the majority of Palestinian people (no democratic vote for this campaign). So I wouldn’t take the BDS campaigners’ word as gospel when it comes to effective action against the illegal occupation of Palestinian territories.

        Sodastream are neither oppressed nor oppressor, sorry but the black and white view of this situation is wholly inappropriate.

        The Tibetan people are not calling for a BDS campaign so are you ignoring their plight until they do. This is really silly reasoning.

        • Anyone with your extreme bias and deliberate blindness has to be a racist zionist themselves. The ongoing HOLOCAUST/ GENOCIDE is a disgrace to humanity and a slowly growing cancer. To deny that is exactly equal to denying the WW2 holocaust and I feel nothing but disgust and anger at your shameful denial. I’m so glad I have a soul maybe you should think about acquiring one? Now if you are as predictable as I think you are you will accuse me of being anti-semitic, I’m not. I have Jewish friends and NONE of them agree with the occupation.

          • You clearly have no idea what you’re talking about. I am not going to enter into a slanging match with you. Personal attacks? You don’t even know me. That’s all I’ll say.

      • “Who do we listen to and act for, the oppressed or the oppressors.”

        The very definition of those two terms “oppressed” or “oppressors” could fill pages of debate as well.

        I note that the hundreds of Palestinians employed by Sodastream have all repudiated the BDS movement.

  3. To REDM – You are using the same arguments white South Africans used to try and undermine the international boycott of South Africa. They always said it would hurt blacks more than whites; that black leaders were terrorists anyway – or communists or whatever; that apartheid was necessary; that the situation was very complicated and those outside shouldn’t voice opinions till they had been to see for themselves.

    We see all these same arguments now put forward by Zionists such as yourself to justify ongoing oppression of Palestinians.

    As I pointed out above “Even the US Department of State has criticised Israel’s system of “institutional, legal, and societal discrimination” against its Palestinian citizens.

    We must stand alongside Palestinians and face down the racist ideology of Zionism just as we did the racist ideology of apartheid.

    • I don’t disagree about the end target John (which is to stop Israel’s illegal settlements and the more global aim to give Palestinians their own lands, freedoms and rights), and I’m certainly no Zionist (seriously? Where did that come from?). I just disagree with your immediate targets and means: Sodastream and BDS generally.

      You cannot argue that the campaign against Apartheid was 100% flawless from the outside world point of view. It was just, it was necessary, it eventually achieved the right outcome, but errors were committed along the way (as expected, nothing is perfect in this world) and we need to learn from these. Some of the things we did hurt the oppressed black people, like collateral damage, and we need to learn from this. We can do better now. We should not harass the few israeli entities/individuals/companies that are making an effort to bring Israelis and Palestinians closer and to cooperate. What we need to hurt is the rest of Israel.

      By punishing Sodastream, you risk alienating the few rare israeli entities that are not as bigoted and brutal as their government. When you’re fighting an enemy, you try and learn about it first, and you don’t strike what could be your allies in the fight.

      I just think that the campaign against Sodastream is a completely indiscriminate strike, and I thought that only America at war does that sort of thing. Well, it takes an American (Scarlett Johansson – part american at least) to show us what’s right. We should be better than this.

      • So it was okay and right that we listened to the majority of black South Africans and took our lead from them in their request for a boycott of everything SA but with Palestine it is different. We’re not suggesting that everyone in Palestine supports a boycott but that has been the general call, why would we be so arrogant as to say ‘we know better’. The SA stance was we want our shackles removed not loosened.

        • You do know that no less a man than Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has rejected the BDS, right? This is from a man elected by the Palestinian people.

          BDS supporters are the ones saying to the Palestinian people “we know better”. This is arrogance of the highest order.

          A “general call”, this is certainly not. Just a few westerners who have never been there thinking they know what to do about Israel.

          The BDS is harmful to Palestinians and the whole thing would be actually quite funny if it didn’t have tragic consequences for the everyday lives of the very people it purports to protect. Disgraceful.

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