The western leaders who praise Desmond Tutu are ignoring a central legacy. His brief tours of Palestinian communities aching under the weight of Israeli tyranny quickly led him to condemn Israeli apartheid. His understanding of the essence of the Christian message as one that actively sides with the downtrodden drove him to support the Palestinian boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement.

If there was no other way to have Judaism exist without Apartheid Israel, I would have to go against Judaism, Jonathan Ofir writes. But that’s not the case. There is a way out. Judaism and Jews can exist without Apartheid – and therefore, I fight against Apartheid and for Judaism simultaneously.

What does the end of South African apartheid tell us about how Israeli apartheid can end? That sanctions on Israel are required, and that a civil society mass movement is the only way to get there.

Mainstream media tends to focus on politicians, but the contours of what’s possible are determined outside of Washington. Despite the tragedies of 2021, the movement for Palestinian rights continued to grow in surprising and profound ways.

Palestinian human rights activist Fadi Quran describes his detention by Homeland Security at the Dallas airport in October at the behest of the Israeli government as a supposed terrorist– a US lieutenant told Quran his hands were tied to interrogate Quran after an ally filed the claim. While Lara Friedman of the Foundation for Middle East Peace says the Biden administration will spend no energy on Palestinian rights.

Given that there were so many important BDS fights in 2021, here are some products you probably won’t be interested in this holiday season, and the activists you can thank for it.

German police removed a campus Palestinian advocacy group from a student government meeting after the pro-Palestinian students staged a protest over a bill that prevented students who support BDS from renting rooms at the university.

South Florida’s Jewish press has not published articles explaining Palestinian history to Jews who would actually be open to such information. Instead, we see accusations of antisemitism hurled at supporters of Palestinian human rights, an attempt to derail the message of justice for a people who have been denied their rights for far too long.

“Today’s vote clears a path for our full membership to collectively determine how we can do our part to support the academic freedom and education rights of Palestinian scholars and students, not to mention Israeli scholars facing attacks from their own government for criticizing its policies,” said MESA President Dina Rizk Khoury.

DSA is overhauling its endorsement process over Bowman saga, but they won’t expel him from the organization.