Anti-BDS Legislation Passes Preliminary Reading

The Knesset voted Wednesday (14 July) in favor of a bill meant to discourage participation, particularly by Israelis, in boycotts of Israel. The bill, passed in a preliminary reading, was first submitted in early June 2010 by 25 Knesset members and endorsed by members of various factions. Wednesday’s vote was nearly unanimous.

Under the new law, any group could sue for damages of up to NIS 30,000 from anyone who launched a boycott against them, or incited a boycott, without having to prove that damage was indeed caused, according to the Israeli news daily Haaretz. An additional sum could then be demanded once damages were proven.

The bill comes in response to the growing boycott movement within Israel and the West Bank, in the economic, academic, and social sectors.

Zeev Elkin of the right-wing Zionist Likud party, and chairman of the bill’s coalition, said Tuesday that "we mustn't accept boycotts against Israel, whether academic or economic. The state must protect itself from the increasing processes of delegitimization, and provide compensation to those harmed by it."

The bill makes it illegal to initiate or encourage the boycott of individuals, factories, firms and organizations anywhere within Israel. It pertains to boycotts by Israeli citizens, by citizens of other countries, or by foreign governments, according to Israel’s Ynet News.

The bill aims to target those in the 1948 Palestinian community participating in the Palestinian Authority economic boycott of goods manufactured in West Bank settlements. The bill also aims to deter academics participating in international academic boycotts of Israel. such vocal boycott proponent Neve Gordon, a professor of politics at Ben-Gurion University.

Gideon Sa'ar, the Israeli Minister of Education, who threatened the government would act during the summer against academics who joined the call for a boycott against Israel,  welcomed the bill and says he backs sanctions against pro-boycott professors who serve at public universities, according to an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

"If a person calls for an academic boycott of the institution in which he teaches, the institution should address this," the minister told Israel Radio.

In response to his support of the bill, more than 500 Israeli academics, including former education ministers, signed a petition that declared: "Freedom of expression and academic freedom are the oxygen of the Israeli academic system."

It continued: "Israeli academia will suffer great damage if politicians dictate to it what is right and wrong to say, think, research, and teach, and force it to adopt these kinds of criteria for accepting, promoting, or rejecting researchers and professors."

The proposed legislation initially applied also to boycotts promoted by Palestinians in the West Bank, although this clause was omitted during the drafting of the current bill.

Knesset member Aryeh Eldad said: “The Knesset declared a war of legislation today against the Palestinian Authority and the Jewish collaborators who partner with [PA heads] Abu Mazen and Salam Fayyad in boycotting Judea and Samaria products. Even though the government prefers to surrender to the boycott so as not to interfere with the negotiations with Abu Mazen, and despite the Justice Minister's attempts to delete the law's most important components, it passed today in the preliminary reading as it was originally phrased.”

The bill will have to pass through a Knesset committee and then be presented for first, second and third readings before it becomes law.

"I doubt it will pass, and even if it does it's unclear it will pass the High Court of Justice because I think it is in contradiction with two of Israel's Basic Laws concerning freedom of employment and freedom of speech," said Professor Gordon.