OPINIONS

How can an Israeli support the BDS movement?

Op Ed

By: Op Ed

Why would an Israeli who loves Israel support the divestment movement at Stanford? It is either hypocrisy or stupidity to think that the current movement will be satisfied without a full-fledged boycott on Israel. Why then, would an Israeli support a boycott of his own people? I have been asking myself this question for the past few months. How can I, an Israeli whose soul is deeply rooted in Israel, support an act that may lead to harm for myself and my own people? As an Israeli scientist, I may find myself in the obscure situation in which my own funding will be cut off, I will not be able to present at conferences, my parents and friends may greatly suffer from the situation. Supporting the BDS movement should therefore be pursued only with the assumption that this is a necessary stage in ending the destructive situation in Israel.

For once, we should ignore the moral discussion related to the occupation. Moral arguments rarely influence people with different ideologies and often even polarize the discussion. Instead, we should have a practical discussion about the future of Israel. One fact which is almost irrefutable is that the current status quo is not a static situation but a dynamic process. Israel is constantly increasing its hold in the West Bank, building more houses and settlements, moving more people. This reality leads to an almost inevitable situation in which the land from the Jordan River to the sea will at some point officially become part of Israel.

This is not a radical prediction, it is the common belief among those who know the reality on the ground, both on the right and the left sides of the political map. Indeed, all facts support this prediction: There are almost 400,000 Jews living beyond the Green Line and the possibility of a territory exchange has become more and more impossible. The current political climate in Israel and Palestine does not allow true negotiations between the two sides. Thus the possibility of one state has become the most probable solution.

Let’s think for a minute about how this big country will look. Its majority will be Arab, some already citizens; others will strive for citizenship in any way they can. For a few years, Israel may be able to maintain the Palestinians’ second-grade, non-citizen status, but at great cost. Israel’s ability to stop this process will become extremely limited as soon as it officially incorporates the territories into its declared boundaries. The world, which is already pushing for a solution, will not accept a situation in which the new country has declared its borders, yet is treating some of its inhabitants as second-grade citizens. The question will then become: How democratic can the new, united country be? Ideally, the answer to this question is an equal, democratic state. Realistically, a combined state would probably lead to even more suffering for both Palestinians and Israelis. Therefore, in order to create a better future for both nations, the current reality in Israel must be changed.

For many years I spent my energy writing and demonstrating against the constant increase of Israel’s control in what could have been Palestine. I believed that external forces should not interfere in the internal processes within Israel. As the situation became more severe, I came to realize that this is not working. I was exposed again and again to the unbearable life of the Palestinians in the occupied territories and the increase of Jewish settlement at the expense of a possible Palestinian state. Without external pressure on the Israeli government to stop the occupation, our choice is already made. We are effectively choosing a one-state solution. The path to this solution is beset by the death and suffering of many Israelis and Palestinians. If a BDS process leads to a short-term inconvenience to me, my family and my people, so be it, if it also leads to a better future for the people and country that I love.

Amit Goldenberg

Amit Goldenberg is a second-year Ph.D. student in the psychology department. Contact him at amitgold ‘at’ stanford.edu.

Cole Manley

Thank you Amit for your words and for coming forward with your story. I think we all must support divestment as a means of envisioning a more peaceful and just future.
Sid Patel

I respect your courage in writing this Amit. Thank you for adding your voice to those calling for Stanford to stop investing in the occupation.
ak94

Thank you for sharing your opinion, Amit, but I don’t really follow the logic. The BDS movement seeks to boycott Israeli academic institutions– how will preventing free exchange of ideas help resolve the conflict? Also, as challenging as Israeli policy has been under Bibi Netanyahu, feelings of pressure and isolation from boycott and sanction will likely lead Israel into the arms of right wing elements like Naftali Bennett, who are much less amenable to a peace process. How will this help lead to a better future for Israel or Palestine? When BDS leaders like Ahmed Moor state that “BDS does mean the end of the Jewish State,” how can BDS be only a short inconvenience for your loved ones in the Jewish state?
Lassmiranda Dennsiewillja

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=516807418455086
Brownstudent

Amit asks if it’s either stupidity or hypocrisy that makes an Israeli support BDS.

The answer is stupidity. Amit has been deceived by the honeyed words of BDS into thinking that it is something that it is not. What it is a weapon against Israel designed to weaken it so that the Arab armies can return to finish the job they started in 1948. Its leaders don’t deny it, and neither does Amit. He just is stupid enough to think that his family and friends wouldn’t be lined up and shot as soon as the Arab jackboot descends.

If BDS were actually what it claims to be (a movement designed to pressure Israel into making concessions for peace) then it would still be wrong and bigoted, but there would be more of a debate. As it stands, BDS is opposed to everything Stanford stands for and should be rejected by everyone there, no matter how many Israelis it tricks into apologizing for it.
ThisIsPalestine

Even more proof that BDS’s objective is to destroy the Jewish state of Israel and deny the Jewish people their right of self-determination. Even their Israeli supporters don’t deny that.
Guest

Sid please read ThisIsPalestine’s comment below.
BDS wont lead 2 a Pal State

Amit, as an Israeli, you have the right and freedoms to support BDS, and while you will be criticized for it, you have that right and no one is going to take that away from you.

BDS, however, aims to silence the voices of Muslims and Palestinians who want to work with Jews and with Israel. Palestinian peace activists’ lives are threatened and they are arrested by the Palestinian government when they work with Israelis.

http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/faithwashing/

So, in your reaction to what you see as a failed Israeli government policy, you are supporting a policy that empowers an even more dangerous mindset.

In your frustration with a government policy, you are jumping in bed with a movement whose policies in all likelihood could lead to an even worse solution. The left wing in Israel has been marginalized because the Right Wing has been proven correct time and time again that the world is out to get Israel. BDS only reinforces that perspective from the right and from the Israeli electorate.

One of the big problems of the left, is that they haven’t thought creatively about solutions that could actually influence change, instead the left has simply jumped on to pre-packaged plans that are well-funded, not by Palestinian civil society, but by Arab backers who are hoping to distract from their own internal problems and get the world to see Israel as the root of all problems.

In supporting BDS, your voice is aiding that movement, which will only serve to embolden the right.

I don’t know you and so I don’t know whether you plan to go back to Israel, or if you are staying here. But a Naftali Bennet run government is what you are contributing to when you hop on with BDS. A Hamas (or similarly oppressive regime) run West bank is what you contribute to when you support BDS.

You may see this simply as external pressure, but its repercussions are more serious, long term and severe than perhaps you have initially considered.

Please read and respond.
You Support a 1 State Solution

Amit, I’m confused.

You are worried about a One-State solution. “Let’s think for a minute about how this big country will look.”

And then you support BDS, which advocates for a One-State Solution??????

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oJRriJ2tY8&feature=youtu.be
http://www.bdsmovement.net/2010/bds-and-the-right-of-return-6703

Do you even understand the movement you are supporting????
You Support a 1 State Solution

And if you DO support a 1-state solution, in which Israelis and Palestinians need to co-exist side-by-side, how do you reconcile that with BDS’s stance of intimidating, threatening and arresting Palestinians who try to cooperate with Israelis and promote greater mutual understanding?

How does your future 1 state solution work if Israelis and Palestinians have to get along in an equal society, but the BDS leadership does not allow those interactions?

BDS, is only compatible with a one state solution that silences and oppresses all of the people, Jewish Muslim Christian alike, which are the policies that it currently advocates for. Don’t believe the movement’s claims that once we end the occupation, then we can start getting along. They need to be in concert, because a movement that promotes hate and lies is not about to turn around after it achieves its goals and promote peace.
Eddie

You haven’t read the op-ed. He says its either stupidity or hypocrisy to think that the BSD will not be finished with a full fledged boycott.
http://bdslist.org BDSlist

Thank you for such a thoughtful piece. The author clearly outlines that boycotting Israel it is not an easy option to take up, and that the personal issues for Israelis joining the movement are even more difficult. But the Israeli government’s persistence in violating international laws with expanding settlements and discriminating against Palestinians despite the growing political pressure from almost all other governments leaves concerned citizens no other choice but to join BDS.
The numerous comments from anti-BDS here only prove the strength of the arguments offered as they rely on the strategy of misinformation favored by the Israeli government. BDS does not seek the destruction of Israel, any more than the boycott of South Africa called for the destruction of South Africa. As John Kerry said the peace process went poof when Israel declared it was building more settlements in direct violation of the last round of negotiations. Supporters of BDS variously argue for the benefits of a one or two state solution, but the movement itself does not define an endgame…. it merely calls for the establishment of just conditions for developing a negotiated solution. It is clear as day that Israel will continue its arrogant path of stealing land, violating Palestinian human rights and denying Palestinians any real political path to self-determination (clear with its illegal withholding of tax revenue because of the Palestinian joining of the ICC) until there is enough pressure for it to stop. We cannot trust politicians, particularly those in the US, to curb Israel’s crimes and move towards a real peace. It’s up to thoughtful citizens of the world, like the author of the article.
Brownstudent

Every BDS apologist says the same thing, and it’s always a lie.

BDS *does* have an endgame, their latest are unanimous and unambiguous in their goal, destroy the state of Israel and deprive the Jewish people of their basic human rights:

“Ending the occupation doesn’t mean anything if it doesn’t mean upending the Jewish state itself…BDS does mean the end of the Jewish state.”

-Ahmed Moor,
Pro-BDS Author

——————————————————————————————-

“BDS represents three words that will help bring about the defeat of Zionist Israel and victory for Palestine.”

-Ronnie Kasrils
BDS leader
——————————————————————————————-

“[Israel] was Palestine, and there is no reason why it should not be renamed Palestine.”

-Omar Barghouti

——————————————————————————————-

“The real aim of BDS is to bring down the state of Israel….That should be stated as an unambiguous goal. There should not be any equivocation on the subject. Justice and freedom for the Palestinians are incompatible with the existence of the state of Israel.”

-As’ad AbuKhalil

——————————————————————————————-

“Peace-or better yet, justice-cannot be achieved without a total decolonization (one can say de-Zionization) of the Israeli state.”

-Michael Warschawski, BDS activist

——————————————————————————————-

“[Palestinians have a right to] resistance by any means, including armed resistance. [Jews] aren’t indigenous just because you say you are….[Jews] are not a people…the UN’s principle of the right to self-determination applies only to colonized people who want to acquire their rights. ”

-Omar Barghouti

——————————————————————————————-

“I think the BDS movement will gain strength from forthrightly explaining why Israel has no right to exist.”

-John Spritzler, Pro-BDS Author

Your lies will not fly here.
http://bdslist.org BDSlist

Wow, that is a veritable flood of quotations (with only one name I recognize). I could reply with a list of quotations from Israeli politicians calling for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, but that would be as pointless as your list. Your list does not refute my point that BDS, as explicitly outlined in its call, seeks the ending of Israel’s occupation, and recognition of Arab rights, whatever anyone, from either side, claims for it. As Omar Barghouti clearly stated in his influential book on the movement, BDS: The Global Struggle for Palestinian Rights:

“While individual BDS activists and advocates may support diverse political solutions, the BDS movement as such does not adopt any specific formula and steers away from the one-state-versus-two-states debate, focusing instead on universal rights and international law, which constitute the solid foundation of the Palestinian consensus around the campaign. Incidentally, most networks, unions, and political parties in the BNC still advocate a two-state solution outside the realm of the BDS movement (pages 51-52)”

(See Ali Abunimah, ‘Why do Zionists falsely claim BDS movement opposes two-state solution?’, http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/why-do-zionists-falsely-claim-bds-movement-opposes-two-state-solution )

BDS is a grassroots movement. Here in Oakland we don’t ask some central body that has lots of money for guidance in our activities, becuase there isn’t one…. the same is true in Irealand and Australia and Brazil…. we connect by twitter, and emails. It’s as simple as people seeing Israel’s actions as grossly offensive and that they are conducted with impunity. They hear of the boycott movement and recognize it as a successful tactic from South Afrca. People are joining BDS because they want Israel to change its criminal behavior… when that happens, people will stop boycotting Israel.
Brownstudent

So you’re basically arguing that BDS won’t take a position on whether or not Israel should existence, when the basic demands of their movement call for concessions that will lead to Israel not existing. You’re not fooling anybody.

I remind you that there was never a point in which the Nazis sat down and wrote out a document or made a speech in which they explicitly said “We want to rid the world of Jewish people,” yet it was obvious from their private conversations and behavior that that was their intention.

BDS is exactly the same.
http://bdslist.org BDSlist

If you must resort to comparing the BDS movement to the Nazis, you are struggling. And I’d also note the Nazis, in countless speeches and public declarations made clear their disgusting plans. Your style of argument, which is so common among critics of BDS, relies on the difficult premise that you know the thoughts of supporters, like the author of the piece above or myself, better we know our own thoughts. You presume that all our explicit declarations of supporting peaceful, legal means for a just resolution is all a big con and that we are members of an anti-Semitic conspiracy that seeks the destruction Israel.
Arguing against positions like yours becomes pointless because you’re suggesting everything we say is deceitful. I’d just repeat BDS seeks a legal and non-violent means to pressure the Israel government to respect international law.
Brownstudent

It doesn’t matter what the supporters want. Just because they have been deceived into supporting a fucked up genocidal anti-liberal cause doesn’t mean a thing. BDS wants Israel gone. Their leaders have said so time and time again. Educate yourself.
David Tiffany

“How can an Israeli support the BDS movement?”
You’ve got me.
http://483years.blogspot.com/
NWBL

BDS is badly misguided. Israel provides employment for Palestinians. Because Sodastream was boycotted, they moved headquarters and 1,500 lost jobs, 500 of whom were Palestinians. If you support Palestinians’ well-being, rethink BDS.
NewtonGoat

Brownstudent, thanks for reminding everyone what the real goals and intentions of BDS are. All of the intellectualizing doesn’t mean crap when nations and people want to murder and destroy you because of your birthright. Am Yisrael Chai!
aviva1

Shame on you. Are you bragging about being a traitor. There are no peace partners, what do you not get.
aviva1

Am Israel Chai- TY
aviva1

The fact is that Amit, like many other so called activists feels completely comfortable openly supporting a movement whose single purpose is the destruction of Jews, and Israel, and they happily assist. Is that what a Stanford degree enables you to do Amit. What do you call that– plain talk, shameful.
Wayne Koppa

Israel is on a path of self destruction. You are for BDS because you want Israel to survive.