Boycott Israel?

In an interesting article in the Guardian (14 August) Nathan Thrall sets out the way in which many Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) activists now view the Israel-Palestinian conflict and how they pose a solution. “BDS has challenged the two-state consensus … by undermining [the] central premise: that the conflict can be resolved simply by ending Israel’s occupation of Gaza, East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank… “… transforming the Israel-Palestine debate from a negotiation over the end of the occupation and the division of territory into an argument about the conflict’s older...

An open letter (printed in full below) is being circulated which calls on Labour’s National Executive to refuse to endorse the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) examples of antisemitism. Workers' Liberty thinks the Open Letter is based on a misunderstanding of the IHRA and thus will not help Labour's leadership deal with the controversy over the Party's new code on antisemitism. Despite what is said, no IHRA examples, exclude criticism of any racist actions of the Israeli government. Further, Labour’s code makes explicit that the sort of discussions the authors claim will be...

Five Labour Party members have written an article ‘The AWL, Zionism and the struggle for equal rights in Israel/Palestine’ ( bit.ly/20ma0WX ) in which they accuse the AWL of being a “Zionist front organisation” outside the Palestinian solidarity movement (defined as being the PSC, BDS campaigns, Jewish Voice for Labour etc). They accuse us of “justifying settler colonialism” and justifying “apartheid”. They accuse “powerful” organisations such as Labour Friends of Israel as organising a witch-hunt in the Labour Party. These writers oppose a two-state settlement and seem to be for a single...

Five Labour Party members have written an article ‘The AWL, Zionism and the struggle for equal rights in Israel/Palestine.’ They oppose the Two States solution; they are for BDS; they are “anti-Zionist”. They accuse the AWL of being a “Zionist front organisation” outside the Palestinian solidarity movement (defined as being the PSC, BDS campaigns, Jewish Voice for Labour etc) . They accuse us of “justifying settler colonialism” and justifying “apartheid”. They accuse “powerful” organisations such as Labour Friends of Israel as organising a witch-hunt in the Labour Party. These writers seem to...

Extracted here from the Engage website . I was born and brought up as an English Jew. The younger son of first and second generation immigrants. In my youth I thought of myself as Jewish rather than English and this self-consciousness has never gone away. For many years I have been involved in socialist organisations, academic research and teaching, and a personal life in which Jewishness has only played a bit part. I used to visit Israel, where I have relatives and friends, but I haven’t been back for some years now – in part because I disapprove of the occupation and the militarism that has...

In response to a tweet from Labour MP Kate Osamor supporting the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn clarified his own position on Israel/Palestine. He made clear, again, that he supports an end to Israeli occupation and a genuine two-states settlement; an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel. He also reiterated that while he supports targeted boycotts of settlement produce, he does not support a blanket boycott of Israel. There is much to criticise in Corbyn’s international politics, particularly in his politics on the Middle...

In response to a tweet from Labour MP Kate Osamor supporting the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn clarified his own position on Israel/Palestine. He made clear, again, that he supports an end to Israeli occupation and a genuine two-states settlement; an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel. He also reiterated that while he supports targeted boycotts of settlement produce, he does not support a blanket boycott of Israel. There is much to criticise in Corbyn’s international politics, particularly in his politics on the Middle...

Walking from Westminster to Trafalgar Square one afternoon in May or June 2002, I came upon a small picket-demonstration — a dozen people perhaps — waving Palestinian flags and placards on the pavement across the road from the entrance to the Prime Minister’s residence in Downing Street. I saw from a distance, and wondered at it, that half the demonstrators were dressed in the black hats and clothes and the beards that identified them as some sort of especially religious Jews. I had known, of course, that some devout Jews believe that the creation of the state of Israel is a monstrous act of...

The Charity Commission is investigating a number of student unions for their policies on boycotting Israel and may take action against them, amid right-wing calls for such boycotts to be banned. Successive governments, keen to head off organised opposition to their policies, have eroded students’ rights to take political action through their unions. Most student unions have been converted to charities, subject to regulation by the Charity Commission (in England) and to laws banning them from carrying out political campaigning that the Commission does not regard as furthering their “charitable...

A well organised coalition of aggrieved and right-leaning candidates prevailed against the left at this year’s conference of the National Union of Students (25-28 April). After three years of substantial shifts to the left on policy in the student movement, the mood of left delegates was, at times, one of exasperation and sadness. The political tone was set during the earliest debates, when liberal arguments for free education prevailed against left-wing counter-arguments. Conference was asked to vote for free education on the grounds that it would be “good for the economy” (i.e. big business)...