Boycott, Divestment And Sanctions

 

moon of alabama

Despite its utter cruelty and destructiveness Israel is far from achieving its goal of ethnic cleansing Gaza. It also has not even dared yet to attack Hizbullah in south Lebanon. This while Zionists settlers had to move out of the areas surrounding Gaza and from the ground near to the Lebanese border.

Netanyahoo is in a trap. He has to 'do something' to allow for the return of the internal refugees to their homes. But any action towards that will cause more death of his troops and may well hurt Israel's strategic viability.

It seems that the Zionist idea of a settler colony exclusively for Jews is coming, slowly but surely, to its inevitable end.

There have long be signs of this. The boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign (BDS) against Israel has been continuously growing.

I remember that some decades ago groceries in Germany were selling 'Jaffa oranges'. These were from Israel - good fruits by the way - but already back then a constant and more or less silent campaign was underway to shun Israeli products. 'Jaffa oranges' are no longer marketed here. I presume that are now used to produce orange juice which can be sold without naming the country from where the fruits in the juice came from.

There were other failed attempts to sell Israeli produce into European markets. A year or two ago some local Aldi store had potatoes for sale with the country of origin marked as 'Israel/Germany'. I talked to the sales manager and protested against that designation. He admitted that it was wrong to use two origins for one product but complained that if he would label the origin as 'Israel' nobody would buy them.

I have since seen no potatoes from Israel.

People check the country of origin when they buy tangerines. Others check the first three numbers of the barcode on canned products. Anything that starts with 729 comes from a company registered in Israel. I don't buy those neither should you.

During my time as an IT executive I had worked with network managers who would shun any equipment from Israel. Not only because there was a high risk that it could be used for espionage but out of principle concern over Israeli policies.

Back in October Starbucks had sued Workers United - the union organizing its employees — because the union had posted a pro-Palestinian message on social media. The result was a global call to boycott Starbucks. Its success is astonishing:

World's biggest coffee chain cuts sales forecast and misses market expectations amid boycotts - MSN, Jan 31 2024

The world's biggest coffee chain told investors on Tuesday night there was a "significant impact on traffic and sales" in the Middle East due to the Israel-Hamas conflict.

The impact was also felt in the US as boycotts of the chain took place, chief executive Laxman Narasimhan told attendees of a post-quarterly earnings conference call.

Some had avoided Starbucks in the Middle East and US after it took legal action in October against Workers United for using Starbucks's name and similar logo.

A post from the union's social media account in October expressed solidarity with the Palestinian people before being deleted.

Boycotting Israel related products is the one small thing each and everyone of us can do without much effort of strain.

Over time it will be successful.

Posted by b on February 2, 2024 at 15:18 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2024/02/boycott-divestment-and-sanctions.html