On May 31 General Mills announced that it divested its stake in its Israeli subsidiary. For the last two years the company has been targeted by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) over the fact that some of its Pillsbury products are manufactured in an illegal Israeli settlement.
An important new documentary tells the story of anti-BDS laws and the people who have stood up to them.
Anger can move one to action, but bitterness? Nada Elia struggles with the world’s, and her own, reaction to the invasion of Ukraine.
The Western double standard when it comes to the Russian invasion of Ukraine is painful, enraging, and humiliating for people in the Global South, including for Palestinians. In addition to the hypocrisy, the speed with which all these Western-dominated entities boycotted, expelled or otherwise sanctioned Russia and ordinary Russians, only days after its invasion of Ukraine, sends a clearly racist message to Palestinians, Yemenis, Iraqis, Afghanis and many others, that our lives and rights as people of color do not count. Ironically, these acts and the statements that justify them also effectively demolish almost all the anti-BDS excuses propagated by Israel and its anti-Palestinian apologists in the West against us over 17 years to thwart our calls for accountability and justice.
An Israeli court issued an arrest warrant for Israeli anti-apartheid activist Neta Golan, after she refused to appear in court in solidarity with a months-long boycott of Israeli courts by Palestinian administrative detainees. Since January 1st, 500 Palestinian administrative detainees, who are being held in Israeli prison without charge or trial, have engaged in a collective and comprehensive boycott of Israeli military courts.
“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.
Media reports have implied that Sally Rooney rejected an Israeli publisher’s request to translate her newest novel because she is boycotting the Hebrew language, but a statement put out by the writer makes it clear that the issue is Israel’s system of apartheid.
While there is wide support for the political demands of the BDS movement throughout Palestine, the possibility of a boycott of Israeli goods is still debated. Here, Amal Nazzal refutes five of the arguments against boycott.
Five members of the Pillsbury family say the company should be boycotted as long as it operates in an illegal Israeli settlement.