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"...because of their Israeli origin..." I realise why you've said this, but when you take a step back, surely you can see this kind of sentiment is bordering on
by wmboy 8y ago
"...because of their Israeli origin..." I realise why you've said this, but when you take a step back, surely you can see this kind of sentiment is bordering on anti-Semitism?
- secfirstmd 8y agoHow is it borderline anti-Semitism to advocate that Sodastream goods which were being made on illegally occuipied territories of the West Bank should be boycott? Israel is unfortunately decending ever future into apartheid and authoritarianism these days. From the ongoing building of settlements, to drip feeding of Gaza, to attempts to block human rights organisations and journalists - things are pretty dam bad these days for many of my friends there.
- dogma1138 8y agoThe factory employed mostly Palestinian workers and offered them Israeli wages and full benefits the documentary on the factory paints a very different picture than what the BDS did. According the the actual investigation the idea of the factory was to build a small plant for the sake of coexistence now you might say that the idea was bad but at the end it was more expensive for them to run the factory there due to higher payroll taxes, higher insurance and security costs and after the whole campaign drama they just closed it as the their factories in Israel proper were cheaper to run operated at a larger scale and received tax benefits. Overall I’m really not sold out on the idea that the closure did anyone but the BDS activists any good.
- secfirstmd 8y agoSo it's ok to violate the Fourth Geneva Convention if you setup the rare well paying factory?
- dogma1138 8y agoI’m not an international law expert but I suspect you are not one either. The truth is that the only real way to crawl out of this situation is by improving the economic standards of the Palestinians and like it or not that will not happen without cooperation with Israel including building shared industrial zones like those that were prospering before their Libyan overlord Arafat decided that enough was enough and started a mess that has been going on for 2 decades. Before the 2nd Intifada the Palestinian economy was one of the fastest growing in the world what is it today?
- petra 8y agoMaybe in the past, improving the economic situation would have been enough, given enough time. Today, Hamas and the Israeli right wing leadership prevent any chance of advancement. Now it's possible to see the right wing leadership changes, but it won't be easy. It's much harder to see Hamas, a religious extreme based dictatorship, change, without some drastic action, be it an internal revolution or a specific type of war from Israel, aimed at toppling down Hamas. And it's really hard to believe Hamas will change of it's own - extreme religions don't do that. Both actions would be extremely bloody. A revolution often creates a new type of mess, and how the hell do you start a revolution? And an external war, if you could convince the Israeli public(a big if), even if it's for the Palestinians benefit, is a pretty terrible way to create the necessary goodwill.
- secfirstmd 8y agoLook HAMAS are awful but they are democratically elected in Gaza at least and have shown themselves to be a rational actor when it comes to deal making. For example offering as a negotiating tactic to remove parts of it's charter etc. It was similar in Northern Ireland where the people on the extreme edges ended up being the ones who made the deal. In theory it might have been the same in Israel but Bibi is weak and a coward.
- petra 8y agoHamas was democratically elected. they don't rule democratically. they break the knees of people whoe speak against them, for example.
- grumpydba 8y agoAnd yet it's still the best place to live in in the middle east. By far.
- throwawaymanbot 8y agoNot sure why you think we in the west care about this point, or this phrase. As if by saying this you absolve Israel of all wrong doing against women and children.
- AdmiralAsshat 8y agoAre you taking issue with the parent comment's phrasing, or with the sentiment itself?
- wmboy 8y agoThe phrasing mostly, he/she was painting with very broad brush strokes.
- skrebbel 8y agoYou're shooting the messenger. GP describes what BDS is about, without taking a stance. It's undeniable that there are people who boycott anything that comes from the Israel because they think that doing so helps the Palestinian cause. Nothing in GP's comment shows that they're one of those people. Finally I'm not convinced that calling for boycotts of products from a country immediately implies contempt for the races or religions of the inhabitants of that country.
- throwawaymanbot 8y agoThis BDS thing came from the Anti-Apartheid movement who used to get Musicians to boycott playing South Africa and boycotting South African goods to as a non violent means to affect change. It eventually worked.