Sixties Fan
Diamond Member
- Mar 6, 2017
- 53,527
- 10,409
- 2,140
The last month may have set a record for BDS failures.
Start with Unilever reversing the Ben & Jerry's boycott of Judea and Samaria. B&J tripled down on its anti-Semitic position in response; however, its parent company learned that anti-Semitism does have a price as it was put on several state lists of companies prohibited from receiving state government investments. Some divested their shares of the company. The notion that denying Israelis a particular brand of ice cream would bring the government to its knees was indicative of the often-comic absurdity of the BDS movement.
Speaking of state anti-boycott laws, the antisemites have been pinning their hopes on the ACLU to convince the courts that they violate the First Amendment. The ACLU has successfully intimidated congressional Democrats to prevent enacting federal legislation. The friends of antisemites suffered a devastating loss, however, when a federal appeals court upheld the law's constitutionality. The 9-1 ruling reversed a February 2021 decision the BDSers thought would undo all the state laws. Judge Jonathan Kobe said the law did not prevent criticism of Israel or the law. "It only prohibits economic decisions that discriminate against Israel. Because those commercial decisions are invisible to observers unless explained, they are not inherently expressive and do not implicate the First Amendment."
Touché.
That was not all. The BDS movement thought it had won another big victory, declaring its pressure campaign "works even on the largest corporations" when General Mills' Pillsbury brand announced it had sold its stake in a plant in Atarot, which activists characterize as an illegal settlement.
Alas, the cheers turned to boos when General Mills responded. "We have made clear the global business strategy that drove this decision. Any claims by others taking credit for [it] are false," said the company in a statement. "We continue to sell our products in Israel and look forward to continuing to serve Israeli consumers with our other brands."
As JNS reporter Mike Wagenheim noted, Pillsbury still makes products in Atarot that are sold in Israel. He added that General Mills also sells Häagen-Dazs ice cream, which gained customers protesting Ben & Jerry's decision.
The BDS campaign suffered its own goal (apologies to non-fans for the sports metaphors) when BDS Boston published a map showing the locations of 30 Jewish organizations, many nonpolitical, which it accused of "supporting the colonization of Palestine" and "violence worldwide." The organization's goal in publishing what a Boston Globe headline called "A roadmap for Jew-haters" is "to reveal the local entities and networks that enact devastation, so we can dismantle them."
This so-called "Mapping Project" was so blatantly anti-Semitic that even "Squad" congress member Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said, "It is not acceptable to target or make vulnerable Jewish institutions or organizations, full stop."
After initially keeping silent, the embarrassment of seeing the backlash to the movement's transparent anti-Semitism, the BDS National Committee was compelled to deny any connection to the project. It still condemned attacks on the project, as did 15 pro-Palestinian groups that objected to "attempts to censor this useful educational tool."
----
Indicative of the overall failure of the cultural boycott, while these B-list performers pulled out, international superstar Andrea Bocelli, who has sold 90 million albums, sang to a sold-out crowd in Tel Aviv. Oh, and he also visited the Western Wall.
No trumpets from the BDS crowd.
(full article online)
Start with Unilever reversing the Ben & Jerry's boycott of Judea and Samaria. B&J tripled down on its anti-Semitic position in response; however, its parent company learned that anti-Semitism does have a price as it was put on several state lists of companies prohibited from receiving state government investments. Some divested their shares of the company. The notion that denying Israelis a particular brand of ice cream would bring the government to its knees was indicative of the often-comic absurdity of the BDS movement.
Speaking of state anti-boycott laws, the antisemites have been pinning their hopes on the ACLU to convince the courts that they violate the First Amendment. The ACLU has successfully intimidated congressional Democrats to prevent enacting federal legislation. The friends of antisemites suffered a devastating loss, however, when a federal appeals court upheld the law's constitutionality. The 9-1 ruling reversed a February 2021 decision the BDSers thought would undo all the state laws. Judge Jonathan Kobe said the law did not prevent criticism of Israel or the law. "It only prohibits economic decisions that discriminate against Israel. Because those commercial decisions are invisible to observers unless explained, they are not inherently expressive and do not implicate the First Amendment."
Touché.
That was not all. The BDS movement thought it had won another big victory, declaring its pressure campaign "works even on the largest corporations" when General Mills' Pillsbury brand announced it had sold its stake in a plant in Atarot, which activists characterize as an illegal settlement.
Alas, the cheers turned to boos when General Mills responded. "We have made clear the global business strategy that drove this decision. Any claims by others taking credit for [it] are false," said the company in a statement. "We continue to sell our products in Israel and look forward to continuing to serve Israeli consumers with our other brands."
As JNS reporter Mike Wagenheim noted, Pillsbury still makes products in Atarot that are sold in Israel. He added that General Mills also sells Häagen-Dazs ice cream, which gained customers protesting Ben & Jerry's decision.
The BDS campaign suffered its own goal (apologies to non-fans for the sports metaphors) when BDS Boston published a map showing the locations of 30 Jewish organizations, many nonpolitical, which it accused of "supporting the colonization of Palestine" and "violence worldwide." The organization's goal in publishing what a Boston Globe headline called "A roadmap for Jew-haters" is "to reveal the local entities and networks that enact devastation, so we can dismantle them."
This so-called "Mapping Project" was so blatantly anti-Semitic that even "Squad" congress member Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said, "It is not acceptable to target or make vulnerable Jewish institutions or organizations, full stop."
After initially keeping silent, the embarrassment of seeing the backlash to the movement's transparent anti-Semitism, the BDS National Committee was compelled to deny any connection to the project. It still condemned attacks on the project, as did 15 pro-Palestinian groups that objected to "attempts to censor this useful educational tool."
----
Indicative of the overall failure of the cultural boycott, while these B-list performers pulled out, international superstar Andrea Bocelli, who has sold 90 million albums, sang to a sold-out crowd in Tel Aviv. Oh, and he also visited the Western Wall.
No trumpets from the BDS crowd.
(full article online)
