Sunday, June 7, 2015

Fight BDS through attack, not defense - Dror Eydar



by Dror Eydar

Here you have the rationale behind the BDS movement spelled out: The Palestinians "self-definition" is the annihilation of the State of Israel, once and for all. Not "occupation" or any of the other linguistic substitutes that the spokespeople of the Left among us like to deceive themselves with.

Orange International CEO Stéphane Richard folding embarrassingly in an apologetic conversation with Deputy Prime Minister Silvan Shalom won't erase the damage done by his statements. Neither will the hysteria about it here. The issue of BDS must be addressed quietly, not with noise. We don't need regular "emergency meetings" -- we need serious, ongoing action against entities like these at home and abroad. This needs to come along with activity aimed at the various world governments that fund groups like these. The most important thing is to spread the dialogue about our rights to the land, because that's exactly the subject the BDS propaganda is aiming at. 

In a one-sided discussion on Channel 2's "Friday Studio" news magazine, journalists Arad Nir and Amnon Abramovich repeated the Left's standard position, which holds that the story is the "occupation" and the "settlements in the territories." Abramovich went so far as to day that even if there was a sliver of hatred for Israel in the BDS movement (only a sliver?), "the main tier isn't about our existence, but about Israeli policy." In the "territories," of course. For balance, there was Labor Party Chairman MK Isaac Herzog. Yeah. ... In any case, their opinion isn't supported by what the BDS leaders themselves say, which has the full consensus of the Palestinians. 

In an interview in 2010 (on tape and available online), Omar Barghouti, one of the founders of the BDS movement, was asked: "If the occupation ends, will that put an end to your call for a general boycott of Israel?" His reply: "No, it wouldn't. Because the Palestinian people are not just suffering from occupation. ... They are suffering from denial of their right to come back home. The majority of Palestinians are refugees ... denied the right to return to their lands ... simply because they're not Jews. Israel, in its own system of apartheid, insists on having a Jewish majority in this land ... after ethnically cleansing the majority of the Palestinians in 1948." Barghouti added that the third segment of the BDS movement was that Israel's Palestinian citizens "live under conditions of apartheid." And also that "the right of Palestinian refugees to return home," which could "not be negotiated away" and was an "inalienable right ... that is part of our self-definition [as Palestinians], and this is something we cannot compromise on." 

Here you have the rationale behind the BDS movement spelled out: The Palestinians "self-definition" is the annihilation of the State of Israel, once and for all. Not "occupation" or any of the other linguistic substitutes that the spokespeople of the Left among us like to deceive themselves with. 

Two years after the interview quoted above, the Jewish American historian Norman Finkelstein -- one of Israel's biggest critics (haters?) and a fervent supporter of the BDS movement -- said straight out (in a filmed interview, also available online) that despite the BDS claims that it wants to apply international law to Israel, Israel was correct in its claim that the BDS wanted to destroy it: "They're talking about they want to destroy Israel. ... I'm not going to lie." 

Finkelstein added: "They think they're being very clever. They call it their three tiers ... We want the end of the occupation, we want the right of return, and we want equal rights for Arabs in Israel. And they think they are very clever, because they know the result of implementing all three is what? What's the result? You know and I know what's the result: There's no Israel." He also told the interviewer: "It’s not an unwitting omission that BDS does not mention Israel. You know that and I know that. ... They won’t mention it because they know it will split the movement. 'Cause there’s a large segment of the movement that wants to eliminate Israel."

The activity against Orange this past weekend was an introduction on how to deal with the BDS movement: by going on the attack, not on the defensive. We are the ones who are right, not the pack of lies those who hate us are spreading. The BDS movement is nothing new. Many companies boycotted Israel in its first decades. We got through it, and even prompted U.S. legislation [late] against them. 

We can bring lobbies to the various parliaments to push for counter-BDS legislation. Such efforts are already underway, although limited in scope, but it's definitely possible. Jews throughout the world are being called to the colors and can certainly help, both through taking financial action against BDS and by political lobbying. The international leftist organizations that operate against us are a model for how we should engage against their nations. We can do it.


Dror Eydar

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=12801

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

No comments:

Post a Comment