Bay Area Campaign to End Israeli Apartheid » other BDS campaigns

Action Alert: Support the Olympia Food Co-Op’s Historic Boycott!

hkornst1 — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 19:50:06 +0000

Take a look below at the action alert from our allies up in Olympia, Washington! The Olympia Food Co-op is the first US grocery store to publicly deshelve Israeli products in support of the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions!

But, we’ve been hearing reports of major push-back. The main rabbi in Olympia is publicly boycotting the Co-op. Stand With Us is calling for others to boycott the Co-op and is initiating a letter-writing campaign to the local paper. Co-op staff have received harassing phone calls, and there is a major protest against this decision being planned as well.

Please take a moment to write to the Co-Op board and sign the petition — see below for more details!

Olympia Food Co-op Boycotts Israeli Goods!
Now We Need Your Help!

Just last week the Board of Directors of the Olympia Food Co-op in Olympia, WA, the hometown of Rachel Corrie, took the courageous step of instituting a boycott of Israeli goods, the first grocery boycott of Israel in the US.

Already, there is a movement afoot to condemn the Co-op for taking this important stand. Please help us thank the Olympia Food Co-op and its board of directors for supporting human rights in Palestine!

Send brief emails of thanks to board@olympiafood.coop
Show your support for this boycott by signing our petition!
Visit us at www.OlympiaBDS.org to learn more.

More Information

Olympia BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) is a grassroots network of community members in Olympia, WA, joining the call by Palestinian civil society for a non-violent, global movement of boycott, divestment, and sanctions of Israel, until it meets the requirements of human rights and international law.

In answering to the Palestinian Call, we stand with Desmond Tutu, Naomi Klein, Elvis Costello, Richard Falk and many, many others. The failure of elected officials to hold Israel accountable for its atrocious actions forces global civil society to act, for a non-violent solution and justice for Palestinians and Israelis alike.

Olympia BDS
www.olympiabds.org
contact@olympiabds.org

Pixies Cancel Concert in Israel

hkornst1 — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 05:47:29 +0000

The BBC reports that the Pixies have canceled their concert in Israel, citing “events beyond our control.” They report:

The group did not specify why they were pulling out of the show, which was due to take place in Tel Aviv on 9 June.

However, organisers said the decision was linked to Israel’s deadly raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla last week.

Read the complete BBC article here.

Boycott From Within originally published an Open Letter calling on the Pixies to boycott Israel.

Elvis Costello Agrees Not to Play in Israel

hkornst1 — Tue, 18 May 2010 04:59:28 +0000

Another important victory in the cultural boycott! Elvis Costello has heeded the call from the British Palestine Solidarity Campaign and others not to play a concert in apartheid Israel. He has posted the following statement:

It is after considerable contemplation that I have lately arrived at the decision that I must withdraw from the two performances scheduled in Israel on the 30th of June and the 1st of July.

One lives in hope that music is more than mere noise, filling up idle time, whether intending to elate or lament.

He continues:

Sometimes a silence in music is better than adding to the static and so an end to it.

Read the complete statement here.

This follows in the footsteps of a similar decision by Gil Scott-Heron. Let’s continue to put pressure on others including Elton John and Joan Armatrading!

Flashmob Video from the Netherlands

hkornst1 — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 04:46:56 +0000

Another inspiring Land Day action, this time from Utrecht, Netherlands: “Follow Me, do as I do: Don’t buy Israeli Apartheid.”

More Guerilla Street Art: Out Against Apartheid/Israel out of Palestine

hkornst1 — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 04:41:14 +0000

More ads have been jammed in the Bay Area recently, this time targeting the “Out In Israel” film series being sponsored by the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival and the Consulate General of Israel. They’ve been spotted in the Mission and the Castro. See photos below:

Original poster in the Mission

New poster in the Mission

Detailed view (click for more detail)

Poster in the Castro

Note: BACEIA can in no way take credit for these redecorations, however we can’t say we don’t like it!

American Apparel = Zionist Apparel

hkornst1 — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 23:22:12 +0000

From some allies up in Seattle:

American Apparel (AA) bills itself as a socially conscious producer and vendor of “hip” clothing but there’s nothing progressive or admirable about supporting Israeli apartheid. On AA’s web site it is proudly asserted that AA “is part Israeli, literally.” When a pro-Israel blogger produced a parody “Zionist Apparel” ad, AA’s webmaster thought it was great and added it to their web site.

More importantly, contrary to the 2005 call of Palestinian civil society for “broad boycotts … against Israel,” AA has opened two stores in that country, one in Tel Aviv and another in al-Quds (Jerusalem) with plans to open another in Haifa. As the authors of the 2009 Toronto Declaration noted: “Tel Aviv is built on destroyed Palestinian villages, and … the city of Jaffa, Palestine’s main cultural hub until 1948, was annexed to Tel Aviv after the mass exiling of the Palestinian population.” The Tel Aviv store is in the Dizengoff Center, named after Meir Dizengoff, the first mayor of Tel Aviv. Dizengoff, who was born in Imperial Russia, first traveled to Palestine under the auspices of Baron Edmond de Rothschild’s colonization scheme.

While scouting locations for the al-Quds store, an AA employee took time out to mug for the camera with two armed soldiers from North America serving in an Israeli combat unit. The al-Quds store is located in/near the historic Mamilla district, “one of seven mixed or mainly Arab neighborhoods” that was “emptied of its Arab inhabitants” during the 1948 war (Bernard Wasserstein, Divided Jerusalem, p. 163). Today, despite protests and lawsuits a branch of the Museum of Tolerance is being built in an historic Muslim cemetery a couple of hundred meters south of AA’s al-Quds store (see mamillacampaign.org).

The planned location of AA’s third store is Haifa, one of the largest cities of Palestine to be ethnically cleansed during the Nakba–”Out of the 61,000 Palestinian Arabs who used to call Haifa home, only 3,566 Palestinians were allowed to stay.

And here’s more from American Apparel’s own website:

American Apparel is part Israeli, literally. Sylvia Safdie, mother of company founder Dov Charney, is from Israel. She moved with her family to Canada when she was 11 years old. Today she is an internationally known artist based in Montreal. Dov’s uncle, Israeli born Moshe Safdie, is a world known architect with a flourishing architectural practice which includes an office in Jerusalem. He has designed numerous public and private buildings of note in Israel which includes the Museum at Yad Vashem, Mamila Development Project, Ben Gurion Airside Terminal, David’s Village in Jerusalem and many more.

Dov’s mother’s family connection to Israel gives the Israeli stores special meaning for American Apparel.

We currently have a location in both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, with plans for more. We’re also working on an Israeli Online Store so that our customers there will have the convenience of shopping in shekels. Eventually we also hope to open a store in Haifa, where Dov’s mom grew up.

And then there’s this quote from owner Dov Charney:

We believe in a new American imperialism. We are American imperialists who believe in life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness for every man worldwide, including prisoners in Guantanamo.

Gross! Many of us have had our doubts about American Apparel for years now, due to their sexist ads and dubious labor practices, but this is just the icing on the cake.

Read more about American Apparel (note: some of these may be triggering!)

American Apparel gives Palestinian student a laptop for winning “History of Zionism” contest (Jewlicious)
American Apparel Opens in Tel Aviv (Jewlicious, with photo off their staff member posing with IDF while scouting for sites in Jerusalem)
Porn Stars In My Underwear (SF Gate)
American Apparel to Be Sold to Investment Firm (NY Times)

Danish Bank and Pension Fund Divest from Israel

hkornst1 — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 21:38:55 +0000

Via the US Campaign to End the Occupation:

Yesterday we reported that Dankse Bank has decided to exclude Elbit Systems and Africa Israel from its investment portfolio due to the companies’ involvement in the Israeli occupation.

Now there’s more good news–one of the largest Danish pension funds has divested from Elbit as well as two U.S. companies that are involved with Israel’s Apartheid Wall. Note that Elbit also has half of the contract on the Wall being built by the United States government on the Mexico border.

Read the entire press release from Stop The Wall on the US Campaign’s blog!

Carleton University Divestment Campaign

hkornst1 — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 06:31:45 +0000

Check out this video from Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA) at Carleton University in Ottawa. They’ve recently launched a campaign to divest the university’s pension fund from 5 profiteering companies: Motorola, BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman, L-3 Communications and Tesco supermarkets. They’re also encouraging the university to adopt a Socially Responsible Investment plan.

Local Guerilla ads highlight PG&E’s connections to Israeli Apartheid

hkornst1 — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 22:16:24 +0000

Here’s an exciting story from Mondoweiss — one that happened in our neck of the woods:

An ad campaign of sorts ran in Berkeley and San Francisco at the end of 2009 drawing attention to Pacific Gas & Electric’s relationship with the Israeli company Solel and the growing BDS movement. Several of PG&E’s “Solar Power” bus shelter billboards were modified to read “Making planets orbit and bagels toast … and fueling Israeli apartheid.” PG&E has a 25-year contract with Solel to develop the Mojave Solar Park in California’s Mojave Desert.

The modified ads were rehung in bus shelters in downtown Berkeley and San Francisco’s Union Square, and stayed up for several weeks through November and December.

In response to the question “why target Solel?” the artist — identified as K.R. — replies:

Every large Israeli company finances the Israeli government through taxes, and thus its wars and aggression, and its apartheid system, are financed by the money that comes into the country through its manufacturing and exports. In 2008, the company’s CEO received an Outstanding Exporter Award from President Shimon Peres. It is one of the leading solar thermal producers in the world. At the time divestment from South Africa was being debated, divestment was definitely not limited to companies that were “doing bad things” directly for the South African government; it was understood that in order to affect the South African state, we needed to hurt its economy.

You can read the complete article here.

Also, we should say that BACEIA wasn’t involved in this action, but of course we’re excited to see more people responding to the call for BDS!

Victory in Motorola Boycott!

hkornst1 — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 02:07:48 +0000

Our friends at the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation have some good news this week: progressive cell phone service provider Credo Mobile has stopped offering Motorola phones to its customers!

Here’s what the US Campaign has to say:

Hang Up On Motorola organizers have been contacting Credo about joining our boycott for over a year. Last week US Campaign member group CODEPINK met with Credo and was assured that Motorola phones would no longer be offered. We’re thrilled that people looking for a progressive phone service now have a Motorola-free option!

What does Credo will no longer offering Motorola phones mean?

It means that Credo will no longer be supporting a corporation that is responsible for providing infrastructure to West Bank settlements and facilitating Israeli military attacks on Palestinians. Click here to thank Credo for dropping Motorola. Find out more about Motorola’s involvement in Israel’s occupation by watching our new video. We were inspired to ask award-winning documentary film-maker Adam Shapiro to make this video after seeing Motorola’s outrageous new commercial for its Droid phone. In this advertisement, Moto shows its phones being shot to Earth from stealth bombers. This commercial is shockingly close to reality; as our video shows, bombs enabled with Motorola fuzes were actually dropped by Israel on Gaza from F-16s. Click here to watch our video or click here to send it to a friend.

This is a big step, not only in the campaign targeting Motorola, but also a step towards incorporating Palestine solidarity within a broader “progressive” agenda.

>> Take a minute to thank Credo by clicking here!