Selective Divestment

Liat Weingart

Some members of Jewish Voice for Peace raised the question of how to escalate our activism, and the possibility of calling for sanctions against the Israeli government. Many of us are frustrated by the contrast between the horrors of the situation and our relative powerlessness. Still, we have to keep reminding ourselves that frustration alone is not sufficient foundation for policy, as it provides no useful way to evaluate competing strategies. Moreover, the question is not whether the Israeli government deserves sanctions: it has deserved sanctions for a very long time. Nor can we make our decision based on whether we will be attacked: we will be attacked no matter how we choose to proceed.

Instead, our criterion has to be "does this strategy build or undermine the movement for justice and peace?" To evaluate this, we need to first acknowledge that we are not anywhere near being able to build an economic pressure movement that could actually force the hand of the Israeli government. The sanctions against South Africa were a tactic at the tail end of a decades-long movement, when the South African government was thoroughly isolated in the US population. As of now, the Israeli government has powerful allies in the United States. Not only the US government, not only the military-industrial complex, not only both major parties, not only the Christian right, but also millions of ordinary citizens, many of them liberal and progressive. Not everyone by a long shot, but enough that it is a significant obstacle to any forward motion, and a guarantee that economic power against the Israeli government is not yet within our reach.

Our central task by far, and for the foreseeable future, is to educate the public. Our strategic criterion needs to be whether a given campaign helps us educate people, or whether instead it helps our enemies� disinformation machine. On this score, we face a more hostile environment than our European comrades, and thus we cannot uncritically adopt the decisions of the European Social Forum. (They approved an economic sanctions platform, at the urging of Palestinian activist Mustafa Barghouti.)

A look at recent campaigns is instructive:

-On-campus "Divest from Israel" campaigns have crashed and burned, generating fantastic opportunities for our opponents to collect thousands of signatures in defense of the Israeli government (e.g. Harvard) while our allies struggled to collect hundreds. On the other hand, campaigns to "divest from companies that deal with the Israeli military" met with some limited success (Oberlin, University of Pennsylvania).

- A campaign to get a San Francisco grocery store (Rainbow) to boycott Israeli goods completely failed, and ended up being a great opportunity for our opponents to portray its sponsors as anti-Semites, a spurious charge, but one that worked for them.

- The academic boycott of Israel has likewise been a total bust, while inviting pro-justice Israeli academics has proven useful.

In other words, the situation in Palestine has indeed gotten much worse, but the political situation here in the US is mostly unchanged as far as Israel/Palestine. Choosing a strategy that plays into the hands of our opponents is just wrong: when they attack us, and they will, we want to win the fight and have more supporters, not fewer. The problem is not at all that being attacked is rough going for us -- we can stand a little rough going. The problem is that an effective attack sets us back.

How we frame our campaigns has an enormous impact on the outcome of the fight. If divestment from Israel or a boycott of Israeli goods could speed up the end of the occupation, I would unhesitatingly champion those tactics. (I do not have a particular financial or emotional stake in the Israeli economy.) However, let's face it, we're not there yet. At this point, generic anti-Israel campaigns only weaken our movement and in fact perpetuate the occupation by shifting the debate away from it and towards the phony issue of "Israel's right to exist" and the like. This is a debate we do not need.

Just saying that such sanctions are not aimed at Jews or the Israeli people does not solve the problem. Better keep the focus of our campaigns laserlike on the occupation itself (and other human rights violations.) A boycott of goods from settlements does precisely that. Likewise, campaigns against companies that do business with the Israeli military, such as Caterpillar. If we maintain that sort of focus, they cannot attack us effectively. Every attempt they make to defend the settlements and the occupation further exposes them. Every attempt they make to dodge specifics reveals their corruption.

Of course, even though we do not think generic sanctions campaigns are effective at this time, we continue to reject the absurd charge that they are inherently anti-Semitic. Yes, anti-Semites may call for sanctions against Israel, but most supporters of Palestinian rights are motivated by a humanistic solidarity impulse, and they are our allies in the struggle for justice and peace.

Opposing generic anti-Israel campaigns at this time does not mean we cannot build campaigns that have teeth�quite the opposite. The campaign against the Caterpillar sales of weaponized bulldozers to the Israeli military is one example. We are pursuing this through shareholder resolutions and direct actions, and a divest-from-Cat campaign is definitely a possibility. Another example is the campaign led by the International Solidarity Movement last year, asking the City of Berkeley to support the call for an investigation of Rachel Corrie's death. They did excellent work lobbying the city council, mobilizing allies (including JVP), and actually showing up at the council meetings.

Of many such attempts, this was the first to succeed in Berkeley. All the experts were warning ISM to not expect a victory, and yet they won. Because the campaign was focused on a specific human rights violation, rather than generically anti-Israel, it left the pro-Israeli government forces with nothing effective to do or say -- they raised generalities about anti-Semitism which were just not credible and clearly irrelevant, especially given the presence of a strong Jewish voice for peace at the council meetings. Even if the ISM proposal had not passed, the campaign would still have been a success, because the focus was on justice and human rights, not Zionism and terrorism -- and many people were educated in the process.

The selective sanctions strategy is quickly gaining adherents. In Israel, the feminist and anti-militarist organization New Profile has endorsed selective sanctions. Here in the US, the Presbyterian Church resolved to explore "selective divestment of church funds from those companies whose business in Israel is found to be directly or indirectly causing harm or suffering to innocent people, Palestinian or Israeli". (Note that they wisely "did not approve a blanket divestment from companies that do business in Israel".) This was the first in what may soon be a torrent of church-based activism: the gigantic World Council of Churches has recently spoken in support of the Presbyterians. The genie is out of the bottle, and we may be entering an entirely new phase in the movement for justice and peace in Palestine/Israel. American Jews have a key role to play in it.

JVP Statement on the Boycott of Israeli Goods 2003

A Jewish Voice for Peace opposes the Israeli government's  illegal and immoral occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East  Jerusalem. JVP also stands strongly for the civil and human rights of  all people in the Middle East. We support all ethical actions designed  to achieve the goal of ending the occupation and securing and protecting  the rights of Israelis and Palestinians. A Jewish Voice for Peace calls for the boycott of Israeli  products manufactured in the occupied territories, or distributed by Israeli  companies based there, such as Ahava cosmetics. (While Ahava products are manufactured near the Dead Sea, the company is headquartered in Kedumim,  an illegal settlement on the West Bank.) JVP does not now endorse a boycott of all Israeli products,  but we disagree with claims made by some members of the Jewish community  that such a boycott would necessarily be anti-Semitic. * It is not anti-Semitic to oppose the large and growing  number of well-documented human rights violations by the Sharon government.  In fact, opposition to Sharon and the crimes of the Israeli occupation  is in the best tradition of Jewish solidarity with those who are oppressed.  Information on these violations can be found on the web site of B'Tselem,  the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights: http://www.btselem.org/ * It is not anti-Semitic to criticize Israel even though  there are other violators of human rights. Indeed, it is legitimate to  challenge human rights violations wherever they occur without having to  simultaneously take on every offense on the planet. Furthermore, because  Israel gets far more financial support from our government than any other  country, our responsibility there as Americans is greatest. A Jewish Voice  for Peace opposes human rights violations anywhere, but as Jews we are  especially concerned about the situation in Palestine-Israel, especially  the thousands of Israeli and Palestinian deaths which are the direct and  indirect result of the occupation. We encourage shoppers and retailers  to listen to their conscience on this issue and not be swayed by bogus  charges of anti-Semitism. As Jews, we have no tolerance for anti-Semitism,  but we also find it offensive when the historical suffering and persecution  of the Jewish people is used as a shield for the crimes of the Israeli  occupation. The boycott of products from the settlements of the West  Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem (which was initiated by Gush Shalom,  the Israeli Peace Bloc) is an effective educational tool. It puts the  spotlight on a main obstacle to peace: the existence of the settlements,  which violates the Geneva Conventions and numerous UN resolutions. Despite  assurances from numerous Israeli governments that settlement activity  would cease or slow down and despite massive opposition to settlements  by the Israeli public and the international community, this illegal land  grab has increased in recent years. For a detailed discussion of Gush  Shalom's arguments for such a boycott, see: http://gush-shalom.org/archives/faq.html JVP is also continuing with its campaign to suspend US  military aid to Israel until the end of the occupation.  In addition, we have joined with others in marketing Palestinian  olive oil, as a way to support Palestinian farmers whose income has been  devastated by the Israeli government's policies of closures, economic  strangulation, and war. In addition to supporting the Palestinian economy,  portions of the proceeds from each bottle will benefit Ta'ayush, an Arab-Jewish  partnership in Israel (http://www.taayush.org/),  and the International Solidarity Movement (http://www.palsolidarity.org).  Both groups work for a just peace and offer direct support to the Palestinian  people living under occupation. We encourage all Americans and, in particular, all Jews  to act for peace and justice and not to be intimidated by the apologists  for the Israeli government's policies. We urge everyone to remember the  historical crimes committed against the Jewish people, but not to allow  those crimes to become justifications for crimes against the Palestinians. --A Jewish Voice for Peace, April 2003