Israelis explain why they joined the Boycott Divestment Sanctions movement.

A Palestinian activist holds Israeli bread products being sold in a shop in the West Bank town of Ramallah [EPA]

It was Egypt that got me thinking about the Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement in a serious way. I was already conducting a quiet targeted boycott of settlement goods – silently reading labels at the grocery store to make sure I was not buying anything that came from over the Green Line.

I had been doing this for a long time. But, at some point, I realised that my private targeted boycott was a bit naïve. And I understood that it was not enough.

It is not just the settlements and the occupation, two sides of the same coin, which pose a serious obstacle to peace and infringe on the Palestinians’ human rights. It is everything that supports them – the government and its institutions. It is the bubble that many Israelis live in, the illusion of normality. It is the Israeli feeling that the status quo is sustainable.

And the settlements are a bit of a red herring, a convenient target for anger. Israelis must also face one of the major injustices that have resulted from their state – the nakba, the dispossession of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.

While BDS addresses that, among other concerns – the three principles of the movement are respect for the Palestinians’ right of return, as outlined in UN resolution 194, an end to the occupation and equal rights for Palestinian citizens of Israel – I remained reluctant to get involved.

I have to admit that I was frightened by the movement. I did not think it would help. I was sure that BDS would only encourage Israel to dig its heels in deeper. It will only make things worse for everyone, I reasoned.

Egypt was the tipping point for me. I was exhilarated by the images of people taking to the streets to demand change. And while the Palestine Papers prove that the government seems intent on maintaining the status quo, I know plenty of Israelis who are fed up with it.

There are mothers who do not want to send their children to the army; soldiers who resent guarding settlers. I recently spoke with a 44-year-old man – a normal guy, a father of two – who told me he wants to burn something he is so frustrated with the government and so worried about the future.

And Egypt is on many Israeli lips right now. So, what can be done to help bring it to Israeli feet? What can be done to encourage Israelis to fight for change, to fight for peace, to liberate themselves from a conflict that undermines their self-determination, their freedom?

BDS has stacked up a number of successes, which is one reason the Israeli Knesset is trying to pass a bill, known as the Boycott Law, that would effectively criminalise Israelis who join the movement, subjecting them to huge fines.

And some of those involved with BDS are already feeling an immense amount of pressure from the state.

‘Israel’s mask of democracy’

Leehee Rothschild, 26, is one of the scores of Israelis who have answered the 2005 Palestinian call for BDS. Recently her Tel Aviv apartment was raided. While the police did this under the pretense of searching for drugs, she was taken to the station for a brief interrogation that focused entirely on politics.

“The person who came to release me [from interrogation] was an intelligence officer who said that he is in charge of monitoring political activity in the Tel Aviv area,” Rothschild says. It was this officer who had requested the search warrant.

Since Operation Cast Lead, Israeli activists have reported increasing pressure from the police as well as General Security Services – known by their Hebrew acronym, Shabak.

The latter’s mandate includes, among other things, the goal of maintaining Israel as a Jewish state, making those who advocate for democracy a target.

House raids, such as the one Rothschild was subjected to, are not uncommon, nor are phone calls from the Shabak.

“Obviously [the pressure] is nothing compared to what Palestinians are going through,” Rothschild says. “But I think we’re touching a nerve.”

When asked about the proposed Boycott Law, Rothschild comments: “If the bill goes through, it will peel off, a little more, Israel’s mask of democracy.”

Tough love

As for her involvement in BDS, Rothschild remarks that she was not aware of the movement until it became a serious topic of discussion within Israel’s radical left, which she was already active in. And even after she heard about it, she did not jump onboard right away.

“I had reservations about [BDS],” Rothschild recalls. “I thought about it for a very long time and I debated it with myself and my friends.

“The main reservation I had was that the economic [aspects] would first harm the weak people in the society – the poor people – the people who have the least effect on what’s going on. But I think that the occupation is harming these people much more than the divestments can.”

Rothschild points out that state funds that are poured into “security and defence and oppressing the Palestinian people” could be better used in Israel to help those in the low socioeconomic strata.

“Another reservation I have had is that it might make the Israeli public more extremist, more fundamentalist,” Rothschild adds. “But I have to say that the road it has to go to be more extreme is very short right now.”

As an Israeli, Rothschild considers joining the BDS movement to be an act of caring. It is tough love for the country she was born and raised in.

“I hope that, for some people, it will be a slap in their face and they will wake up and see what’s going on,” Rothschild says, adding that the oppressor is oppressed, as well.

“The Israeli people are also oppressed by the occupation – they are living inside a society that is militant; that is violent; that is racist.”

‘Renouncing my privileges’

Ronnie Barkan, 34, explains that he took his first step towards the boycott 15 years ago, when he refused to complete his mandatory military service.

“There’s a lot of social pressure [in Israel],” Barkan says. “We’re raised to be soldiers from kindergarten. We’re taught that it’s our duty [to serve in the army] and you’re a parasite or traitor if you don’t want to serve.”

“What is even worse is that people are raised to be deeply racist,” he adds. “Everything is targeted at supporting [Jewish] privilege as the masters of the land. Supporting BDS means renouncing my privileges in this land and insisting on equality for all.”

Barkan likens his joining of the boycott movement to the “whites who denounced their apartheid privileges and joined the black struggle in South Africa”.

When I cringe at the “a-word,” apartheid, Barkan counters: “Israel clearly falls under the legal definition of the ‘crime of apartheid’ as defined in the Rome Statute.”

‘Never again to anybody’

Some oppose BDS because it includes recognition of the Palestinian right of return. These critics say that the demographic shift would impinge on Jewish self-determination. But Barkan argues that “the underlying foundation [of the movement] is universally recognised human rights and international law”.

He emphasises that BDS respects human rights for both Palestinians and Jews and includes proponents of a bi-national, democratic state as well as those who believe a two-state solution is the best answer to the conflict.

He also stresses that BDS is not anti-Semitic. Nor is it anti-Israeli.

“The boycott campaign is not targeting Israelis; it is targeting the criminal policies of Israel and the institutions that are complicit, not individuals,” he says.

“So let’s say an Israeli academic or musician goes abroad and he is turned away from a conference or a venue just because he’s Israeli … ” I begin to ask.

“No, no, this doesn’t fall under the [boycott guidelines],” Barkan says.

“Because that’s not a boycott. It’s racism,” I say.

“Exactly,” Barkan responds, adding that the Palestinian call for BDS is “a very responsible call” that “makes a differentiation between institutions and individuals and it is clearly a boycott of criminal institutions and their representatives”.

“Whenever there is a grey area,” he adds, “we take the gentler approach.”

Still, Barkan has faced criticism for his role in the boycott movement.

“My grandmother who went to Auschwitz tells me, ‘You can think whatever you want but don’t speak up about your politics because it’s not nice,’ I tell her, ‘You know who didn’t speak up 70 years ago.’”

Barkan adds: “I think that the main lesson to be learned from the Holocaust is ‘never again to anybody’ not ‘never again to the Jews.’”

Mya Guarnieri is a Tel Aviv-based journalist and writer.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.

Adam Horowitz, Mondoweiss, March 24 2011

Haaretz, March 3 2011

Former Pink Floyd frontman urges fellow artists to join ban until Israel to ends the occupation, grants full equality to Israeli Arabs, and allows all Palestinian refugees to return to their homes.

Roger Waters, founding member, vocalist and bassist of the iconic rock band ‘Pink Floyd’ has voiced his support for a cultural boycott of Israel.

The British musician performed in Israel in 2005, ignoring calls from Palestinian rights advocates to cancel. While in Israel, Waters visited Jerusalem and Bethlehem. He was taken to the controversial separation fence in the West Bank, which he called “an appalling edifice to behold.”

Waters said he was extremely affected by his tour of the West Bank, scrawling “We don’t need no thought control”, lyrics from one of Pink Floyd’s most popular songs, on the wall, and cancelling his performance in Tel Aviv. Instead, the British star held the concert in Neve Shalom, a cooperative village founded by Jews and Arabs.

In the letter Waters wrote announcing his support of a cultural boycott of Israel, he said that in his “view, the abhorrent and draconian control that Israel wields over the besieged Palestinians in Gaza, and the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, coupled with its denial of the rights of refugees to return to their homes in Israel, demands that fair minded people around the world support the Palestinians in their civil, nonviolent resistance.”

He concluded the letter, saying that he is joining the campaign of Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel, until it satisfies three basic human rights he claims are demanded by international law.

He called on Israel to end the occupation of the West Bank and dismantle the separation fence, recognize the rights of Arab citizens of Israel and granting them full equality and allow all Palestinian refugees to return to their homes.

Waters stressed in his letter that he is not anti-Semitic, and his solidarity with the Palestinians stems from his belief that all people deserve basic human rights.

Last week, American folk music legend Pete Seeger officially joined the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign – an international movement to pressure and sanction Israel through economic means.

Seeger, 92, one of the fathers of American folk music, is a veteran political and peace activist. In the 1950s he was interrogated by the McCarthyist House Unamerican Activities Committee and two years ago performed for U.S. President Barack Obama’s inauguration concert.

Artists, academics and celebrities throughout the world have supported and participated in the cultural boycotting of Israel.

Earlier this year, French pop star Vanessa Paradis cancelled her concert in Israel only a month before she was supposed to arrive in the country with her partner, Hollywood actor Johnny Depp, leaving fans and pundits speculating as to the reasons for the cancellation.

Although Paradis’ agent David Stern claimed that the cancellation was due to professional reasons, insiders who organized the concert claim that the singer acceded to calls to cancel the show made by Palestinian solidarity groups.

According to the same sources, it was apparently the planned visit of Paradis’ partner Johnny Depp that drew the attention of the groups that advocate BDS.

(Attachment – Image of vandalized signboard)

BERKELEY, CA – A student group signboard belonging to Students for Justice in Palestine at UC Berkeley was defaced with anti-Islamic, anti-Palestinian, and anti-ally stickers, the latest in a  pattern of continuing anti-Palestinian and anti-Muslim acts on UC campuses.  Among the stickers was one which read “Fight Islamic Terrorism” and another stating “Celebrating 62 Years of Israel”, placed directly on top of the sign’s image of a small boy holding a teddy bear.  Another sticker bears the faces of Osama Bin Laden, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, Hugo Chavez, and Fidel Castro, each with a target symbol superimposed over their faces.  The message of the vandalism is clear— a direct threat to Palestinians and their supporters.

Days earlier, a similar act of hate-fueled vandalism occurred on the UC Davis campus, where the campus’s historic Third World mural was defaced to cover a Palestinian flag and peace dove.  Additional anti-Mexican graffiti was also discovered on the UC Berkeley campus during the week.  The UC Berkeley anti-Palestinian vandalism targeted the second signboard the group has displayed; the first was smashed to pieces and destroyed in a similar hate-fueled attack in 2007.  The latest two incidents are only the most recent in a pattern of hate actions against Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims, as well as their supporters, including:

- a 2008 occurrence anti-Palestinian hate graffiti in Dwinelle Hall, one of the major lecture halls on campus
- an attack on three Palestinian students during a silent protest in 2008
- an attack on a student senator during SJP’s divestment drive in Spring 2010
- a 2004 hate crime assault against eight Muslim women near the UC Berkeley campus
- Jewish SJP members receiving anonymous harassing phone calls and emails

and several other incidents.

SJP is co-sponsoring a panel discussion titled “‘Ground Zero Mosque’ or Zero Mosques in America: Islamophobia and Critical Race Theory” on October 12 2010 at 7pm as part of its response to these crimes.  The event will take place at 155 Dwinelle Hall on UC Berkeley campus.

Students for Justice in Palestine calls on the University of California and UC Berkeley administrations to investigate these hate crimes fully and to take immediate action to stop the anti-Arab, anti-Palestinian, and Islamophobic atmosphere on campus, including issuing statements condemning these attacks from both the UC Berkeley Chancellor’s office as well as the UC Office of the President.  In addition, SJP calls on the UC Office of the President to ensure the safety of Palestinian, Arab, Muslim and allied students in the face of these hate crimes.

A project by Students for Justice in Palestine at UC Berkeley, Facing Apartheid is part of an effort to educate the campus community on its connection to and responsibility for illegal military occupation and apartheid policies which directly and systematically impede access to higher education for Palestinian students in the West Bank, Gaza and 1948 Palestine. Click here to see the whole display.

“Pessimism comes from reality, because reality is tragic. Optimism comes from action, because action changes reality.”
~Jose Mariategui

We Students for Justice in Palestine stand in solidarity and support the actions of the UC Berkeley Hunger Strikers. We find their stand against the racist and violent Arizona law SB 1070 to be courageous, demonstrating a commitment to human welfare and social justice. We recognize that it is not enough to denounce this particular law. We must instead condemn the rules and norms that criminalize and dehumanize migrants especially the Latino people in this country and on this campus.

Our intimacy with the situation of the Palestinian people, who face similar racist laws geared at preserving the ethnic purity of Israeli space and government, moves us to note the similarities of oppression here and there. Since 1948, the return of Palestinian refugees to their land in what became Israel has been criminalized. In their own homes Palestinians have been called “infiltrators.” Like Latino people here, Palestinians did not cross the border: it crossed them. The situation has endured to the present, where a recent Israeli military order has authorized the occupying military to detain and deport any person defined as an “infiltrator” – even on their own lands.

Last month the Israeli government issued two military orders, like SB 1070, which legalizes human transfer. The Israeli military orders are in grave violation of the 4th Geneva Convention as it alters the law and allows an occupying power to prosecute, detain and deport any Palestinian defined as “infiltrator.” The Israeli military and Arizona police can use the law to abuse power secretly without public debate or judicial review. Such laws legalize, mandates even, racial profiling, and necessitates the dehumanization of migrants. Like the Latino and indigenous peoples in the America’s the Palestinians have been oppressed legally. The paradox is law is ideally supposed to the mechanism that protects people from injustice. What then are we to do when law is used to facilitate racist agendas?

We believe that this system of control on movement, whether by Israel, Arizona, or the United States government, is inhumane and invasive. That SB1070 legalizes the use of racial profiling points to the motivations of this bill. Egregious ramifications of such racist laws are already apparent and are part of a larger pattern of legalizing oppression. We believe that both policies insidiously mask their unjust core because they are laws—laws that create double standards, laws that facilitate injustice, laws that break up families, laws that advance the powerful over the powerless even as the laws claim all persons should be equal under the law.

Inspired by the energy and sacrifice of our brother and sister hunger strikers, we remain optimistic and steadfast in our solidarity with the Raza students who have acted with great courage to change and challenge power with what little they have, the truth and the righteousness of their cause. During our campaign urging the university to divest our efforts were actualized at the expense of what little we had, like the hunger strikers, we understand that confronting power requires sacrifice.

It was with great joy that I learned of the recent 16-4 vote at UC Berkeley in support of divesting the university’s money from companies that enable and profit from the injustice of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and violation of Palestinian human rights. Principled stands like this, supported by a fast growing number of U.S. civil society organizations and people of conscience, including prominent Jewish groups, are essential for a better world in the making, and it is always an inspiration when young people lead the way and speak truth to power.

Despite what detractors may allege, these students are doing the right thing. They are doing the moral thing. They are doing that which is incumbent on them as humans who believe that all people have dignity and rights, and that all those being denied their dignity and rights deserve the solidarity of their fellow human beings.

I have been to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, and I have witnessed the racially segregated roads and housing that reminded me so much of the conditions we experienced in South Africa under the racist system of Apartheid. I have witnessed the humiliation of Palestinian men, women, and children made to wait hours at Israeli military checkpoints routinely when trying to make the most basic of trips to visit relatives or attend school or college, and this humiliation is familiar to me and the many black South Africans who were corralled and regularly insulted by the security forces of the Apartheid government.

In South Africa, we could not have achieved our freedom and just peace without the help of people around the world, who through the use of non-violent means, such as boycotts and divestment, encouraged their governments and other corporate actors to reverse decades-long support for the Apartheid regime. Students played a leading role in that struggle, and I write these words of encouragement for student divestment efforts cognizant that it was students who played a pioneering role in advocating equality in South Africa and promoting corporate ethical and social responsibility to end complicity in Apartheid. I visited the Berkeley campus in the 1980′s and was touched to find students sitting out in the baking sunshine to demonstrate for the University’s divestment in companies supporting the South African regime.

The same issue of equality is what motivates the divestment movement of today, which tries to end Israel’s 43 year long occupation and the unequal treatment of the Palestinian people by the Israeli government ruling over them. The abuses they face are real, and no person should be offended by principled, morally consistent, non-violent acts to oppose them. It is no more wrong to call out Israel in particular for its abuses than it was to call out the Apartheid regime in particular for its abuses.

To those who wrongly allege unfairness or harm done to them by this call for divestment, I suggest, with humility, that the harm suffered from being confronted with opinions that challenge one’s own pales in comparison to the harm done by living a life under occupation and daily denial of basic rights and dignity. It is not with rancor that we criticize the Israeli government, but with hope, a hope that a better future can be made for both Israelis and Palestinians, a future in which both the violence of the occupier and the resulting violent resistance of the occupied come to an end, and where one people need not rule over another, engendering suffering, humiliation, and retaliation. True peace must be anchored in justice and an unwavering commitment to universal rights for all humans, regardless of ethnicity, religion, gender, national origin or any other identity attribute. These students are helping to pave that path to a just peace and I heartily endorse their divestment vote, encourage them to stand firm on the side of what is right, and urge others to follow the lead of the youth.

God bless you richly,

Desmond Tutu. Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town.

Huffington Post 4/13/2010

**********CALL TO ACTION**********

***************PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY***************

Blessings Community! We hope our words find you in good health and spirits! As you may all know Berkeley’s Students for Justice in Palestine have been fighting to uphold Senate Bill 118A, calling for divestment from two companies that support the Israeli Occupation of Palestine.

SJP is calling on all supporters to

join us in a DIRECT ACTION!

What: Silent Direct Action!
When: Wednesday April 14, 2010 at 11:30am-2:30pm
Where: Sproul Plaza University California Berkeley

How:

Please Respect the following wishes from SJP Berkeley:

1. Please do not bring any outside literature or fliers for other groups and organizations you may be affiliated with.
2. Please do not engage in any debate or argument with the organizations, student groups, or individuals that will try and engage and antagonize you (they will be there for the very purpose of provoking us we do not want to engage them for any reason!)
3. We ask that you please remain SILENT.
4. We ask that you find one of the three SJP members Dina Omar, Gazi Mahmud, or Mahaliyah Ayla O and they will instruct you when you show up to Sproul at 11:30am

Sincerely in Struggle,

CAL SJP

*As special thanks to the Middle East Children Alliance, Jewish Voices for Peace and the Arab Resource and Organizing Center

*****************

In Commemoration of Palestinian Political Prisoners Day

& In Support of the UC Berkeley Divestment from Israel Resolution Join us:

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

6:30 PM

UC Berkeley Boalt Hall 105

Palestinian Political Prisoners in the Context of Colonial Occupation

& Resistance, Displacement and the Struggle Against Israeli Apartheid

Speakers:

Lena Meari: belongs to a Palestinian refugee family from Al-Birweh village which was destroyed in 1948. Born and raised in Haifa and later worked and lived in Jerusalem and Ramallah. Graduated and worked in the Institute of Women Studies at Birzeit University. Currently a PhD candidate in the Department of Cultural Anthropology at the University of California- Davis. Conducted her research on the interrogation encounter between Palestinian political activists and the shabak.

Ziad Abbas: a Palestinian refugee from Dheisheh Refugee camp in the West Bank. He is the cofounder of the Ibdaa Cultural Center in Dheisheh where he served as Co-Director from 1994 to 2008. Ziad is also a journalist who has worked with Palestinian and international media and has participated in the production of several documentary films. He recently completed his Master of Arts in Social Justice in Intercultural Relations from the School for International Training Graduate Institute. Ziad is the Associate Director of the Middle East Children’s Alliance in Berkeley.

Following the event we will be attending the UC Berkeley Senate meeting where they will vote on the Divestment Resolution.  We encourage all to attend and support the efforts the Students for Justice in Palestine.

Sponsored By:

Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), Al-Juzoor, Al-Awda SF, Bay Area Campaign to End Israeli Apartheid, Free Palestine Alliance, Middle East Children’s Alliance, Muslim Student Association – Berkeley, Palestine Youth Network (PYN), Students for Justice in Palestine – Berkeley, Sunbula: Arab Feminists for Change, US Palestine Community Network (USPCN), Voices of Middle East and North Africa-KPFA

For more info:  www.freepalestinianprisoners.com

**********************

ASUC Senate Debate on Divestment: Round II
Wednesday 4/14/2010  7th floor Eshleman Hall UC Berkeley

This Wednesday night you have a chance to stand up for universal human rights standards and to object to Cal’s profiting from war crimes and occupation. Following the veto by the ASUC President’s of a 16-4 vote in the student senate in support of the “UC Divestment from War Crimes” bill, there will be a vote to override the veto this Wednesday night starting at 7:00 PM on the seventh floor of Eshleman Hall. The bill calls for the removal of ASUC and UC investments in companies that supply the Israeli government with weaponry used to commit violations of international law, human rights law, and, in the judgment of the UN, war crimes. It also establishes an ASUC committee to look into a comprehensive divestment policy targeting companies that enable war crimes throughout the world. Come speak and show your support.

The previous debate lasted till 3AM, so be prepared.

Information on the original debate and full text of the bill:

http://www.kabobfest.com/2010/03/uc-berkeley-student-senate-passes-divestment-resolution.html

Letter of Support by Archbishop Desmond Tutu:

http://www.salem-news.com/articles/april112010/desmond-tutu-dt.php

Statement of support from internationally best-selling author, journalist, and cultural critic Naomi Klein, author of No Logo and the Shock Doctrine:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/naomi-klein/open-letter-to-berkeley-s_b_520328.html

Where: 7th floor of Eshleman Hall, (near Bancroft and Telegraph), UC Berkeley

UC Berkeley Divestment Task Force
UCB Students for Justice in Palestine

Download the PDF Document

Published on Wednesday, March 31, 2010 by CommonDreams.org

On March 18, continuing a long tradition of pioneering human rights campaigns, the Senate of the Associated Students of the University of California, Berkeley (ASUC) passed “A Bill In Support of UC DIVESTMENT FROM WAR CRIMES.” The historic bill resolves to divest ASUC’s assets from two American companies, General Electric and United Technologies, that are “materially and militarily supporting the Israeli government’s occupation of the Palestinian territories”-and to advocate that the UC, with about $135 million invested in companies that profit from Israel’s illegal actions in the Occupied Territories, follow suit.

Although the bill passed by a vote of 16-4 after a packed and intense debate, the President of the Senate vetoed the bill six days later. The Senate is expected to reconsider the bill soon; groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace are asking supporters of the bill to send letters to the Senators, who can overturn the veto with only 14 votes.

Here is the letter I just sent:

Dear members of the ASUC Senate,

I am writing to urge you to reaffirm Senate Bill 118A, despite the recent presidential veto.

It comes as no surprise that you are under intense pressure to reverse your historic and democratic decision to divest from two companies that profit from Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory. When a school with a deserved reputation for academic excellence and moral leadership takes such a bold position, it threatens to inspire others to take their own stands.

Indeed, Berkeley–the campus and the wider community–has provided this kind of leadership on many key issues in the past: not only Apartheid in South Africa but also sweatshops in Indonesia, dictatorship in Burma, political killings in Nigeria, and the list goes on. Time and again, when the call for international solidarity has come from people denied a political voice, Berkeley has been among the first to answer. And in virtually every case, what began as a small action in a progressive community quickly spread across the country and around the world.

Your recent divestment bill opposing Israeli war crimes stands to have this same kind of global impact, helping to build a grassroots, non-violent movement to end Israel’s violations of international law. And this is precisely what your opponents–by spreading deliberate lies about your actions–are desperately trying to prevent. They are even going so far as to claim that, in the future, there should be no divestment campaigns that target a specific country, a move that would rob activists of one of the most effective tools in the non-violent arsenal. Please don’t give into this pressure; too much is on the line.

As the world has just witnessed with the Netanyahu government’s refusal to stop its illegal settlement expansion, political pressure is simply not enough to wrench Israel off its current disastrous path. And when our governments fail to apply sanctions for defiant illegality, other forms of pressure must come into play, including targeting those corporations that are profiting directly from human rights abuses.

Whenever we take a political action, we open ourselves up to accusations of hypocrisy and double standards, since the truth is that we can never do enough in the face of pervasive global injustice. Yet to argue that taking a clear stand against Israeli war crimes is somehow to “discriminate unfairly” against Israelis and Jews (as the veto seems to claim) is to grossly pervert the language of human rights. Far from “singling out Israel,” with Senate Bill 118A, you are acting within Berkeley’s commendable and inspiring tradition.

I understand that there is some debate about whether or not your divestment bill was adopted “in haste.” Not having been there, I cannot comment on your process, though I am deeply impressed by the careful research that went into the decision. I also know that in 2005 an extraordinarily broad range of Palestinian civil society groups called on activists around the world to adopt precisely these kinds of peaceful pressure tactics. In the years since that call, we have all watched as Israeli abuses have escalated dramatically: the attack on Lebanon in the summer of 2006, a massive expansion of illegal settlements and walls, an ongoing siege on Gaza that violates all prohibitions on collective punishment, and, worst of all, the 2008/9 attack on Gaza that left approximately 1,400 dead.

I would humbly suggest that when it comes to acting to end Israeli war crimes, the international response has not suffered from too much haste but from far too little. This is a moment of great urgency, and the world is watching.

Be brave.

Yours sincerely,

Naomi Klein

Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist and syndicated columnist and the author of the international and New York Times bestseller The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism , now out in paperback. Her earlier books include the international best-seller, No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies (which has just been re-published in a special10th Anniversary Edition ); and the collection Fences and Windows: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Globalization Debate (2002). To read all her latest writing visitwww.naomiklein.org