The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement has recently turned 10. When it was launched in 2005, the BDS movement had one goal: to defend the Palestinians cause. Now as it is gaining momentum with tens of thousands of activists taking part globally, Tel Aviv is becoming aware of the threat it poses to its livelihood.
The Beginning
In a bid to pressure the Israeli regime into fulfilling the Palestinians' rights and complying with international law, the worldwide campaign opened the doors for everyone to join the chorus calling for justice.
According to BDS official website, a decade ago the majority of the Palestinian civil society " called upon their counterparts and people of conscience all over the world to launch broad boycotts, implement divestment initiatives, and sanction Israeli regime until Palestinian rights are recognized in full compliance with international law".
This was a reaction to the constant letdown that the Palestinians have been facing since the Israeli regime began denying their fundamental rights.
From this rights-based concept an international network with thousands of volunteers was mushroomed, lobbying against the Israeli regime. It was endorsed by more than 170 Palestinian parties, organizations, trade unions and movements. Over the past year, there was a 33 percent rise in traffic to websites associated with BDS.
"We are now beginning to harvest the fruits of 10 years of strategic, morally consistent and undeniably effective BDS campaigning," said Omar Barghouti, one of the group's co-founders. "BDS is winning the battles for hearts and minds across the world, despite Israel's still hegemonic influence among governments in the U.S. and Europe," he continued.
BDS is a three-pronged approach based on cultural, political, economic, and academic levels. The campaign described each as follows:
Boycotts target products and companies that profit from the violation of Palestinian rights, as well as Israeli sporting, cultural and academic institutions.
Divestment means targeting corporations that complicit in the violation of Palestinian rights and ensuring that the likes of university investment portfolios and pension funds are not used to finance such companies.
Sanctions are an essential part of demonstrating disapproval for a country’s actions...By calling for sanctions against Israeli regime; campaigners educate society about violations of international law and seek to end the complicity of other nations in these violations.
BDS Power
Although Tel Aviv has endeavored to diminish the effectiveness of the BDS movement on its economy, it has recently admitted that it poses a "strategic threat."
A Rand Corp. study claimed BDS "has not yet had a significant negative effect" but it is mounting as Israeli regime's leaders are expressing fear of future "substantial detrimental effects" on the economy.
"The concern is that there will be a spillover to a much wider phenomenon that will become widespread and erode support for Israel," the regime's Foreign Ministry declared.
Meanwhile, the Financial Times cited Calcalist, an Israeli financial paper that leaked a government report maintaining that BDS could cost the Israeli economy $1.4bn a year. This could be the case if a much-dreaded plan to label products imported from the occupied territories is implemented by the European Union.
As per usual, the Israeli regime pulled the "anti-Semitic" card to delegitimize the July 2005 call.
"We are in the midst of a great struggle being waged against the state of Israel, an international campaign to blacken its name. It is not connected to our actions. It is connected to our very existence," were the recent words of PM Benjamin Netanyahu.
But, this time, apparently it is not working. It has been nearly impossible to counter BDS' decentralized organization and calls for human rights.
Counter-campaigners
In a letter dated July 2, Hillary Clinton wrote “the BDS campaign is counterproductive to the pursuit of peace and harmful to Israelis and Palestinians alike.” Not only did she condemn the movement but even pledged to "fight back against further attempts to isolate and delegitimize Israel”.
The presidential hopeful's motives seem clear: joining the counter-campaign at this time is conveniently timely with her own campaign as she tries to rally contributors.
Clinton is not the only one, however.
Former Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has voiced her country's "firm opposition" to the BDS movement. More recently, the Dutch Parliament passed a motion in 2014 undermining BDS in response to water company Viten's BDS support.
Britain's Newly-appointed Business Secretary, for his part, rejected Britain’s National Union of Students' support for BDS as unrepresentative of the UK. "I do not believe in boycotts, nor, I am proud to say, does my party, my prime minister or, for the most, part my country,” he justified.
Advocates
BDS prides itself in achieving victories through popular support. Activists across Europe, the Co-Operative Group in the UK which introduced a policy to end trade with companies linked to illegal Israeli settlements, retailers in Canada, the UK, Japan and other countries have played a major role in BDS.
At the academic level, the University of Johannesburg became the first to sever ties with Ben-Gurion University in 2011 while other campaigns are active worldwide.
Most notably, the cultural boycott has been adopted by many artists and prominent figures who refused to perform in or visit occupied Palestine, including American author Alice Walker.
Governments are also backing BDS. Norway, for example has decided to suspend military relations with Tel Aviv. Venezuela, Mauritania and several other states have also taken action against the Israeli regime. Bolivia has even declared "Israel" a terrorist state.
Nobel Peace Prize winners Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire, Betty Williams and Adolfo Pérez Esquivel in addition to civil society groups have backed a call by Palestinian civil society for a comprehensive military embargo on Israeli regime.
Churches are also ringing their bells in support with the Quaker Friends Fiduciary Corporation in the US divesting $900,000 in shares of Caterpillar, over its sale of bulldozers to the Israeli regime which uses them to demolish Palestinians' homes. The United Methodist Church and the Presbyterian Church in the US have urged their members to boycott produce exported from illegal Israeli settlements.
