19 aug 2017
The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) has condemned Berlin’s Pop-Kultur festival for spreading “outrageous lies” about the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement for Palestinian rights, in a desperate attempt to divert attention from the group describes as shameful acceptance of Israel’s sponsorship and its resultant complicity in whitewashing Israel’s regime of occupation and apartheid:
Frustrated that its insistence on accepting sponsorship from Israel, despite its egregious human rights violations, led to the withdrawal of all Arab artists, the Pop-Kultur organizers claimed that the goal of the cultural boycott of Israel is “to boycott completely any cooperation with Israeli artists and intellectuals.”
This is a straight lie.
BDS, which is called for by the overwhelming majority of Palestinians, including artists, calls for an institutional boycott of Israel and institutions that are complicit in its denial of Palestinian human rights. It does not target individuals. Palestinians are appealing to all conscientious artists to boycott Israel as many had boycotted apartheid South Africa.
Many leading Jewish artists and intellectuals, including Israelis, have endorsed the cultural boycott of Israel as a form of nonviolent pressure to bring about an end to its policies of military occupation, institutionalized racism, ethnic cleansing, siege and denial of refugee rights.
PACBI’s objection to this year’s edition of Pop-Kultur was explicitly mentioned in the statement released by the campaign two days ago: “We call on all participating artists to be on the right side of history, the side of the oppressed, by cancelling their performances unless the festival rescinds this shameful [Israeli] sponsorship.”
Frustrated that its insistence on accepting sponsorship from Israel, despite its egregious human rights violations, led to the withdrawal of all Arab artists, the Pop-Kultur organizers claimed that the goal of the cultural boycott of Israel is “to boycott completely any cooperation with Israeli artists and intellectuals.”
This is a straight lie.
BDS, which is called for by the overwhelming majority of Palestinians, including artists, calls for an institutional boycott of Israel and institutions that are complicit in its denial of Palestinian human rights. It does not target individuals. Palestinians are appealing to all conscientious artists to boycott Israel as many had boycotted apartheid South Africa.
Many leading Jewish artists and intellectuals, including Israelis, have endorsed the cultural boycott of Israel as a form of nonviolent pressure to bring about an end to its policies of military occupation, institutionalized racism, ethnic cleansing, siege and denial of refugee rights.
PACBI’s objection to this year’s edition of Pop-Kultur was explicitly mentioned in the statement released by the campaign two days ago: “We call on all participating artists to be on the right side of history, the side of the oppressed, by cancelling their performances unless the festival rescinds this shameful [Israeli] sponsorship.”
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The Israeli government is compiling a list of BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) activists who are not allowed to travel to Israel. Asa Winstanly of the Electronic Intifada talks about the effort to expose this secret list.
TRNN transcript: SHARMINI PERIES: It’s The Real News Network. I’m Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore.Measures by the Israeli authorities against the BDS movement, which is the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, continue to intensify. The newly approved law, which was passed in July, bans BDS supporters from entering Israel. The problem with the law, however, is that it is not simple, of course, to ban people based on their thoughts or opinions, so how are they deciding who they are banning? |
The Minister of Strategic Affairs, Gilad Erden, admitted that his ministry is compiling a list of BDS activists, and indeed, last month a group had been barred from boarding a Lufthansa flight to Israel, because the airline received a list of banned people.Now, Asa Winstanley published a piece in The Electronic Intifada, titled How is Israel Compiling Its BDS Blacklists?, in which he explains the appeal to the Israeli high court to expose the secret lists. Now joining us from London is Asa Winstanley. He is an investigative journalist and associate editor at The Electronic Intifada.Asa, thank you so much for joining us today.
ASA WINSTANLEY: Good to be with you.
SHARMINI PERIES: Asa, tell us about the appeal to the high court and who is Eitay Mack?
ASA WINSTANLEY: Eitay Mack is an Israeli lawyer and human rights activist. Him and a group of colleagues, other activists, Palestine solidarity activists, recently launched a freedom of information request to the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, which is Gilad Erden’s ministry, asking for details of how Israel is compiling these BDS blacklists. They have basically stonewalled the request and they’re in the process of trying to pass a law which will exempt them from freedom of information law anyway. So they’ve lodged an appeal with the district court in Jerusalem, trying to overturn this decision and make it required for them to reveal the procedures by which they are not only compiling these lists, but sharing them with entities outside of Israel.
SHARMINI PERIES: All right. Now the group of the interfaith activists, who were forbidden from boarding the Lufthansa flight to Tel Aviv, reported that the Israeli intelligence availed their emails. That’s the only way they could have known that they were BDS campaigners. What makes them think that? How do we know their emails were tampered with or actually monitored?
ASA WINSTANLEY: So the reason that they think this is because, although some of the people on the delegation were well known. Alissa Wise is the Deputy Director of Jewish Voice for Peace, which is a Palestine solidarity group in the U.S. of Jewish activists who are critical of Israel. There were seven names on the list, on the blacklist, on the list of people that the Lufthansa staff read out to the group and they said, “These seven people are not going to be able to board this flight.” Only five of those people were actually on the delegation, who were actually having flights. The other two, who they read out on the blacklist, had never bought tickets. They had never been finally involved. They’d never confirmed their involvement in the delegation. They’d been through the initial stages of registering and then realized they had other plans and had to cancel. So those two people had never had tickets with Lufthansa.There was no way those names could have gotten to Israel apart from somebody hacking into or intercepting the emails of Jewish Voice for Peace and the other two groups involved in this interfaith delegation. That’s what Rabbi Alissa Wise strongly suspects, and it seems credible to me.
SHARMINI PERIES: The Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs, Gilad Erden, said that, actually last year, he said that supporting the BDS will no longer be worth it. What does he actually mean by that?
ASA WINSTANLEY: I suppose they want to put what they might call, or Israeli settlers might call, a price tag on it, making it difficult to be involved in BDS activism. They’ve pushed for changes in the law in the U.S. and the U.K. and Europe to make supporting BDS even illegal. There’s this bill that AIPAC has strongly pushed for in the U.S. to make even a federal offense, potentially even jail, to support BDS. It looks like this law is not going to go ahead, but they’re trying to … They see what BDS … the effects that it has and the successes that it has and in raising awareness as well of Palestinian human rights and Israeli violation of Palestinian rights. It’s had enough successes that it’s considered a strategic threat of the first order, according to the President of Israel, he said last year, I believe.Erden’s ministry, the Strategic Affairs Ministry, was started over a decade ago as a semi-covert, or semi-militarized agency, or semi-security ministry. It was initially focused on Iran and combating the Iranian nuclear energy program. As we know, the Israelis were involved in all sorts of covert action against Iran, including indirect support for people who assassinated Iranian nuclear scientists. We know it was involved in the Stuxnet virus, for example, which destroyed several Iranian nuclear centrifuges. But a couple of years ago, this Ministry was refocused on BDS, with the Iran nuclear deal changing matters. They’ve decided their whole focus is going to be BDS. So we can already see the outlines of a covert campaign.
SHARMINI PERIES: I’m a little confused as to how they are actually implement this law in terms of banning people from entering Israel through its borders. Now one could say, for example, a country has a right to ban people that they consider undesirable from entering the country. It’s not unlike, say, having visa restrictions placed and various countries do that. But this particular law also applies to people who are local and Israeli citizens and so forth, and does it, and how do they actually justify that?
ASA WINSTANLEY: Well, for the time being, the law only applies to non-citizens of Israel, but of course, it does apply to Jewish supporters of BDS who are not Israeli citizens. Rabbi Alissa Wise was the first Jewish person that we know of who was banned from the country and of this particular law. Of course, before this law was passed earlier this year, in the spring, Israel was implementing this in practice anyway. But this law kind of makes it more formalized, and so there has been talk … Erden has been pushing to move towards implementing similar measures again Israeli citizens. Obviously he can’t really ban them from the country, but the first steps towards that are he wanted to start creating a database of Israeli supporters of BDS, who there are, some. They’re a minority, obviously, but there are this great number of dissidents who do support BDS, and of course, the Palestinian citizens of Israel.So we already see things like measures against Omar Barghouti, the Palestinian intellectual who was the co-founder of the BDS movement, who’s had movement restrictions placed on him. At one stage there was a ban from him leaving the country. He lives in present day Israel in the north, with his wife, who is a Palestinian citizen of Israel. Because he’s such a prominent personality in the BDS movement, they’ve tried to make life very hard for him.
SHARMINI PERIES: Asa, I should add that Omar Barghouti was awarded the Gandhi Prize at Yale University just recently and he was allowed out to go receive that price, so all of this adds a very complicated element to the ban on BDS activists.I thank you so much for joining us today, Asa, and look forward to any followups you might have in terms of the court case.
ASA WINSTANLEY: Thanks for having me on.
SHARMINI PERIES: And thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
ASA WINSTANLEY: Good to be with you.
SHARMINI PERIES: Asa, tell us about the appeal to the high court and who is Eitay Mack?
ASA WINSTANLEY: Eitay Mack is an Israeli lawyer and human rights activist. Him and a group of colleagues, other activists, Palestine solidarity activists, recently launched a freedom of information request to the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, which is Gilad Erden’s ministry, asking for details of how Israel is compiling these BDS blacklists. They have basically stonewalled the request and they’re in the process of trying to pass a law which will exempt them from freedom of information law anyway. So they’ve lodged an appeal with the district court in Jerusalem, trying to overturn this decision and make it required for them to reveal the procedures by which they are not only compiling these lists, but sharing them with entities outside of Israel.
SHARMINI PERIES: All right. Now the group of the interfaith activists, who were forbidden from boarding the Lufthansa flight to Tel Aviv, reported that the Israeli intelligence availed their emails. That’s the only way they could have known that they were BDS campaigners. What makes them think that? How do we know their emails were tampered with or actually monitored?
ASA WINSTANLEY: So the reason that they think this is because, although some of the people on the delegation were well known. Alissa Wise is the Deputy Director of Jewish Voice for Peace, which is a Palestine solidarity group in the U.S. of Jewish activists who are critical of Israel. There were seven names on the list, on the blacklist, on the list of people that the Lufthansa staff read out to the group and they said, “These seven people are not going to be able to board this flight.” Only five of those people were actually on the delegation, who were actually having flights. The other two, who they read out on the blacklist, had never bought tickets. They had never been finally involved. They’d never confirmed their involvement in the delegation. They’d been through the initial stages of registering and then realized they had other plans and had to cancel. So those two people had never had tickets with Lufthansa.There was no way those names could have gotten to Israel apart from somebody hacking into or intercepting the emails of Jewish Voice for Peace and the other two groups involved in this interfaith delegation. That’s what Rabbi Alissa Wise strongly suspects, and it seems credible to me.
SHARMINI PERIES: The Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs, Gilad Erden, said that, actually last year, he said that supporting the BDS will no longer be worth it. What does he actually mean by that?
ASA WINSTANLEY: I suppose they want to put what they might call, or Israeli settlers might call, a price tag on it, making it difficult to be involved in BDS activism. They’ve pushed for changes in the law in the U.S. and the U.K. and Europe to make supporting BDS even illegal. There’s this bill that AIPAC has strongly pushed for in the U.S. to make even a federal offense, potentially even jail, to support BDS. It looks like this law is not going to go ahead, but they’re trying to … They see what BDS … the effects that it has and the successes that it has and in raising awareness as well of Palestinian human rights and Israeli violation of Palestinian rights. It’s had enough successes that it’s considered a strategic threat of the first order, according to the President of Israel, he said last year, I believe.Erden’s ministry, the Strategic Affairs Ministry, was started over a decade ago as a semi-covert, or semi-militarized agency, or semi-security ministry. It was initially focused on Iran and combating the Iranian nuclear energy program. As we know, the Israelis were involved in all sorts of covert action against Iran, including indirect support for people who assassinated Iranian nuclear scientists. We know it was involved in the Stuxnet virus, for example, which destroyed several Iranian nuclear centrifuges. But a couple of years ago, this Ministry was refocused on BDS, with the Iran nuclear deal changing matters. They’ve decided their whole focus is going to be BDS. So we can already see the outlines of a covert campaign.
SHARMINI PERIES: I’m a little confused as to how they are actually implement this law in terms of banning people from entering Israel through its borders. Now one could say, for example, a country has a right to ban people that they consider undesirable from entering the country. It’s not unlike, say, having visa restrictions placed and various countries do that. But this particular law also applies to people who are local and Israeli citizens and so forth, and does it, and how do they actually justify that?
ASA WINSTANLEY: Well, for the time being, the law only applies to non-citizens of Israel, but of course, it does apply to Jewish supporters of BDS who are not Israeli citizens. Rabbi Alissa Wise was the first Jewish person that we know of who was banned from the country and of this particular law. Of course, before this law was passed earlier this year, in the spring, Israel was implementing this in practice anyway. But this law kind of makes it more formalized, and so there has been talk … Erden has been pushing to move towards implementing similar measures again Israeli citizens. Obviously he can’t really ban them from the country, but the first steps towards that are he wanted to start creating a database of Israeli supporters of BDS, who there are, some. They’re a minority, obviously, but there are this great number of dissidents who do support BDS, and of course, the Palestinian citizens of Israel.So we already see things like measures against Omar Barghouti, the Palestinian intellectual who was the co-founder of the BDS movement, who’s had movement restrictions placed on him. At one stage there was a ban from him leaving the country. He lives in present day Israel in the north, with his wife, who is a Palestinian citizen of Israel. Because he’s such a prominent personality in the BDS movement, they’ve tried to make life very hard for him.
SHARMINI PERIES: Asa, I should add that Omar Barghouti was awarded the Gandhi Prize at Yale University just recently and he was allowed out to go receive that price, so all of this adds a very complicated element to the ban on BDS activists.I thank you so much for joining us today, Asa, and look forward to any followups you might have in terms of the court case.
ASA WINSTANLEY: Thanks for having me on.
SHARMINI PERIES: And thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
12 aug 2017
Ambassador of South Africa to Lebanon and Syria Sean Benfeldt said his country would boycott the upcoming African-Israeli summit to be held in Togo, describing the event as a step to normalize African relations with the occupation state.
The ambassador made his remarks during his meeting on Friday in Beirut with a delegation from the general secretariat of the Popular Conference of Palestinians Abroad.
He received a file from the delegation about the summit and another one on the latest report issued by ESCWA about Israel’s apartheid practices.
Benfeldt affirmed that his country would not participate in the summit and would make contacts with other countries to urge them to boycott the meeting.
He highlighted Israel’s inhumane blockade on the Gaza Strip, stressing the need for practical solutions to the humanitarian suffering of the population in the besieged territory.
The ambassador also adopted the delegation’s proposal to invite ambassadors of the African countries in Lebanon to a special meeting soon to talk about the summit with Israel and the need to boycott it.
At the end of the meeting, the delegation expressed its thanks for South Africa for its strong support for the Palestinian cause and its intention to boycott the summit.
The ambassador made his remarks during his meeting on Friday in Beirut with a delegation from the general secretariat of the Popular Conference of Palestinians Abroad.
He received a file from the delegation about the summit and another one on the latest report issued by ESCWA about Israel’s apartheid practices.
Benfeldt affirmed that his country would not participate in the summit and would make contacts with other countries to urge them to boycott the meeting.
He highlighted Israel’s inhumane blockade on the Gaza Strip, stressing the need for practical solutions to the humanitarian suffering of the population in the besieged territory.
The ambassador also adopted the delegation’s proposal to invite ambassadors of the African countries in Lebanon to a special meeting soon to talk about the summit with Israel and the need to boycott it.
At the end of the meeting, the delegation expressed its thanks for South Africa for its strong support for the Palestinian cause and its intention to boycott the summit.
10 july 2017
Members of the Mennonite Church USA voted overwhelmingly in support of a resolution condemning Israel’s violations of Palestinian rights. (Mennonite Palestine-Israel Network)
Members of the Mennonite Church USA voted overwhelmingly to condemn Israel’s military occupation and to support divestment from companies that profit from violations of Palestinian rights.
The resolution [PDF] was approved by 98 percent of delegates at the church’s convention in Florida on Thursday.
The Christian denomination has about 95,000 members in 875 congregations across the United States.
Everence, the denomination’s asset manager, will be directed to screen its investment and dump holdings in companies that profit from Israel’s occupation.
The Mennonites pointed to precedents when the church barred investing in companies that profit from military production and the alcohol industry.
In response to a previous resolution about human trafficking and child slavery, the Mennonites say, “Everence served as a primary force in leading American chocolate companies to shift towards child labor-free cocoa-sourcing, which especially impacts communities in West Africa.”
In addition to supporting divestment, the Mennonites encourage their members to work with elected US officials to advocate to end military aid and arms sales to Israel as well as to pressure Israel to freeze settlement construction in the occupied West Bank.
The resolution calls on the faithful to urge US lawmakers to “respect the civil rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel and the rights of refugees, end the occupation, and work for a just peace in accordance with international law.”
Members are also being urged to critically “engage” with Christian Zionism within their own church and the broader Christian community, condemn anti-Semitism, strengthen ties between Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Palestinian groups and to study the 2009 Kairos Palestine document.
That document challenges churches to take action for Palestinian rights, including support for boycott, divestment and sanctions.
“This resolution is a long overdue response to the Palestinian Christian call to the global church,” said Joy Lapp, professor at Iowa Wesleyan University and one of the founders of the Mennonite Palestine-Israel Network.
“Today we stand in solidarity with their courageous and nonviolent efforts for justice and equality,” Lapp added.
A similar resolution failed to pass at the last Mennonite convention in 2015, where members failed to reach a consensus on the BDS movement.
The overwhelming vote this week indicates that lingering concerns have been overcome.
The Mennonite Church USA joins a growing number of Christian denominations that have taken action to support Palestinian human rights in the last few years, including the United Church of Christ – which last week demanded Israel end its systematic abuses of Palestinian children in military detention – as well as the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Quakers, the Unitarian Universalists and the Evangelical Lutheran Church.
Members of the Mennonite Church USA voted overwhelmingly to condemn Israel’s military occupation and to support divestment from companies that profit from violations of Palestinian rights.
The resolution [PDF] was approved by 98 percent of delegates at the church’s convention in Florida on Thursday.
The Christian denomination has about 95,000 members in 875 congregations across the United States.
Everence, the denomination’s asset manager, will be directed to screen its investment and dump holdings in companies that profit from Israel’s occupation.
The Mennonites pointed to precedents when the church barred investing in companies that profit from military production and the alcohol industry.
In response to a previous resolution about human trafficking and child slavery, the Mennonites say, “Everence served as a primary force in leading American chocolate companies to shift towards child labor-free cocoa-sourcing, which especially impacts communities in West Africa.”
In addition to supporting divestment, the Mennonites encourage their members to work with elected US officials to advocate to end military aid and arms sales to Israel as well as to pressure Israel to freeze settlement construction in the occupied West Bank.
The resolution calls on the faithful to urge US lawmakers to “respect the civil rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel and the rights of refugees, end the occupation, and work for a just peace in accordance with international law.”
Members are also being urged to critically “engage” with Christian Zionism within their own church and the broader Christian community, condemn anti-Semitism, strengthen ties between Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Palestinian groups and to study the 2009 Kairos Palestine document.
That document challenges churches to take action for Palestinian rights, including support for boycott, divestment and sanctions.
“This resolution is a long overdue response to the Palestinian Christian call to the global church,” said Joy Lapp, professor at Iowa Wesleyan University and one of the founders of the Mennonite Palestine-Israel Network.
“Today we stand in solidarity with their courageous and nonviolent efforts for justice and equality,” Lapp added.
A similar resolution failed to pass at the last Mennonite convention in 2015, where members failed to reach a consensus on the BDS movement.
The overwhelming vote this week indicates that lingering concerns have been overcome.
The Mennonite Church USA joins a growing number of Christian denominations that have taken action to support Palestinian human rights in the last few years, including the United Church of Christ – which last week demanded Israel end its systematic abuses of Palestinian children in military detention – as well as the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Quakers, the Unitarian Universalists and the Evangelical Lutheran Church.
July 9, 2017 marks 12 years since the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement was born. It’s been 12 years since an impressively large and diverse coalition across Palestinian civil society surmounted incredible odds to unify around three basic Palestinian rights and a nonviolent, inclusive, anti-racist path of struggle to achieve them. Despite the fragmentation, military occupation, segregation and dispossession, we came together to assert our people’s right to freedom, justice, equality and dignity.
The 2005 BDS Call embodies overwhelming Palestinian support for demanding an end to Israel’s military occupation and the dismantling of its illegal wall, an end to its institutionalized and legalized system of racial discrimination which meets the UN definition of apartheid, and the right of refugees to return to their homeland as stipulated in international law.
Inspired by the South African anti-apartheid movement and the American Civil Rights Movement, entities representing Palestinians everywhere called on people of conscience worldwide to adopt pressure tactics in support of our struggle for rights. BDS calls for boycott and divestment initiatives in the academic, cultural, economic and sports fields and for pressuring states to implement meaningful sanctions against Israel until it fully complies with its obligations under international law.
BDS: “You have not let us down.”
As BDS turns 12 this week, here are 12 indicators of the movement’s growing impact from 2017 which mark the occasion:
Also from the BDS National Committee — Coming Up on Facebook Live: A Conversation with Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters
The 2005 BDS Call embodies overwhelming Palestinian support for demanding an end to Israel’s military occupation and the dismantling of its illegal wall, an end to its institutionalized and legalized system of racial discrimination which meets the UN definition of apartheid, and the right of refugees to return to their homeland as stipulated in international law.
Inspired by the South African anti-apartheid movement and the American Civil Rights Movement, entities representing Palestinians everywhere called on people of conscience worldwide to adopt pressure tactics in support of our struggle for rights. BDS calls for boycott and divestment initiatives in the academic, cultural, economic and sports fields and for pressuring states to implement meaningful sanctions against Israel until it fully complies with its obligations under international law.
BDS: “You have not let us down.”
As BDS turns 12 this week, here are 12 indicators of the movement’s growing impact from 2017 which mark the occasion:
- A UN report established that Israel has imposed a system of apartheid on the entire Palestinian people and called for BDS measures to end this apartheid regime.
- The Mennonite Church USA just voted by a 98% majority to divest from companies that profit from the Israeli occupation, following several mainline churches that have adopted similar policies in recent years, including the Presbyterian Church USA, the United Church of Christ and the United Methodist Church. The Mennonite resolution also urges church members to boycott products produced in illegal Israeli settlements built on stolen Palestinian land.
- Right to Boycott wins: The Spanish parliament affirmed that the right to advocate for Palestinian rights through BDS is protected under freedom of speech and association. The UK government was defeated in court by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and its allies in a ruling that deems it unlawful for the government to restrict the right of local authorities to divest from companies complicit in Israel’s violations of Palestinian human rights. The Swiss parliament blocked Israel lobby efforts to criminalize support for BDS.
- Norway’s largest trade union federation, representing close to one million workers, endorsed a full boycott of Israel to achieve Palestinian rights under international law.
- The Lebanese doctors’ syndicate dropped G4S, the world’s largest private security company, following a campaign by boycott activists in Lebanon concerned with the company’s ongoing complicity in Israeli violations of Palestinian human rights.
G4S also suffered its first loss in Ecuador, where a research institute dropped its contract with the company following a BDS campaign. A California transportation board dropped its contract with G4S after a human rights and labor coalition, including BDS activists, highlighted the company’s role in violating human rights in Palestine and the United States.
These developments follow many BDS successes in previous years against G4S in Jordan, Colombia, Finland, UK, South Africa, the European Parliament, among other countries and institutions, which compelled the company to sell most of its illegal Israeli operations. - Israel’s largest public transportation operator lost a 190 million euro contract to run public transportation in the Netherlands.
- The Barcelona city council adopted ethical procurement guidelines that exclude companies involved in Israel’s military occupation. In the past year, dozens of city councils across the Spanish state declared themselves Israeli “Apartheid Free Zones.”
- A Palestinian coalition of Christian organizations called on the World Council of Churches to support the BDS movement for Palestinian human rights.
- A wave of boycotts hit the Tel Aviv International LGBT Film Festival as artists from around the world showed respect for the Palestinian cultural boycott picket line. An award-winning South African filmmaker, whose film was scheduled to be the festival’s opening film, was among the artists who canceled their participation in the festival.
- Two Chilean universities cancelled events sponsored by the Israeli embassy, and students governments in several US and other universities passed various BDS measures.
- The Israeli government suffered an embarrassing blow after six out of eleven National Football League (NFL) players in the US turned down an all-expenses paid propaganda trip organized to improve Israel’s fast deteriorating image.
- BDS campaigns grow among Palestinian citizens of Israel. In coordination with BDS partners in South Korea, the BDS Committee of Palestinian Citizens of Israel (BDS48) launched a campaign to boycott and divest from Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) until the company ends its complicity in Israel’s violations of Palestinian human rights, particularly in Jerusalem and the Naqab (Negev).
Also from the BDS National Committee — Coming Up on Facebook Live: A Conversation with Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters
