Alwaght- The apartheid Israeli regime is increasingly becoming isolated globally as more European countries back their citizens' rights to join an international campaign that calls for the boycott of Israeli products.
The Netherlands Foreign Minister Bert Koenders said on Thursday that his government has explained to the Israeli regime that people joining the campaign was an issue of free speech, to which the Dutch people are entitled.
The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is an effort to pressure the Israeli regime to end occupation of Palestinian territories. The campaign is not limited to the West Asia region - it has been sweeping America's college campuses at a remarkable rate and is gaining support in Europe.
“Statements or meetings concerning BDS are protected by freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, as enshrined in the Dutch Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights,” Koenders said Thursday during a debate on the situation in Palestinan conflict at the Dutch parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee in The Hague.
As expected, Israeli regime's Foreign Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nachshon denounced the decision.
The racists regime in Tel Aviv has been pressuring the US and European countries to introduce legislation and take other repressive measures to confront the BDS movement.
Netherlands is the second country in the European Union to have announced its support for people’s right to join the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel.
Sweden, however, supported the right to join the BDS in March 2016, saying the movement is "a civil society movement” and that “governments should not interfere in civil society organization views.”
Sweden went as far as denying claims that Foreign Minister Margot Wallström has promised to publicly denounce the Palestinian-led boycott, BDS movement.
By acknowledging the legitimacy and independence of the BDS movement as a civil society phenomenon, Sweden is setting itself apart from some Europeans governments.
Leaders in France and the United Kingdom, for instance, have shown themselves ready to smear, prosecute and censor their own citizens exercising their free speech rights in solidarity with Palestinians.
In recent months, Wallström angered the Israeli regime for taking basic positions in support of Palestinian human rights that her security officials had to investigate apparent death threats directed against her in Zionist media outlets.
Wallström also drew the ire of the Israeli regime by connecting the kind of radicalization behind the November attacks in Paris that killed 130 people to the situation in the Middle East, “where not least, the Palestinians see that there is not a future.”
Her unwillingness to submit to Israeli regime's bullying over BDS is an example that her counterparts around the world should emulate.
Earlier this month, more than 300 groups in Europe urged the EU to hold Israel regime accountable for its human rights violations and join the global campaign for boycott of Israeli products.
Recently a British academic has turned down an Israeli award and £225,000 ($300,000) in prize money for “political” reasons, in what appears to be the latest attempt by Western activists to boycott the racist Israeli regime.
Catherine Hall, a history professor at University College London (UCL) was due to receive a third of The Dan David Foundation £690,000 ($1 million) prize for her work’s “impact on social history, as a pioneer in gender history, race, and slavery.”
Hall, however, declined to attend the award ceremony in Tel Aviv on Sunday, saying her rejection of the prize was “an independent political choice” after engaging in “many discussions” over the 'Israel-Palestine' conflict.
Her stance appears to be inspired by the international Boycott, Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which several prominent British academics have joined since 2005.
Attempts to criminalize BDS activism internationally is one of the greatest threats to free speech and assembly rights in the West. The threat has become particularly acute on US college campuses, where official punishments for pro-Palestinian students are now routine.
Meanwhile in South Africa, the ruling party, African National Congress has made the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions on Israeli regime part of its official policy.
In 2005, with Israel’s occupation, colonization, discrimination, human rights a buses, violations of International Law and illegal Israeli settlement activity increasing, Palestinians (inspired by the successful boycott and isolation of Apartheid South Africa) called on the international community to support a non-violent campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against the Israeli regime until it complies with international law and respects human rights.
