Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS): an important part of the dialogue process

“Why pick on Israel, when it’s the only democracy in the Middle East?!” It’s one of the most common objections to the campaign for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, started ten years ago by a coalition of Palestinian civil society groups. It overlooks the many structural obstacles to any actual influence, over important policy questions in Israel, for non-Jewish voters or their elected representatives. And it became more difficult to sustain during  the recent election which confirmed Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for another term in office. In Washington, President Obama told Huffington Post that the reputation of Israeli democracy had been “eroded” by Netanyahu’s racist scaremongering, his election-day statement that “Arab voters are streaming in huge quantities to the polling stations”.

Another card the Likud leader played in the final round of electioneering was to disavow any possibility of a Palestinian state being created by agreement with Israel. And here, Obama’s words may be much more portentous. In a phone conversation the two had following the count, the President said he indicated to Netanyahu that “it is going to be hard to find a path where people are seriously believing that negotiations are possible”. Netanyahu has since attempted to row back, but the White House is making it clear that the damage cannot be so easily undone.

Negotiations, in the US-sponsored ‘peace process’, were supposed to resolve the conflict, and have been cited many times as a reason why Washington invariably blocks any resolution critical of Israel at the UN Security Council: it will make negotiations “more difficult”. The political saleability of this line has depended on – as Obama put it – sustaining the belief that such negotiations are possible. Now Netanyahu has declared that they are not, time is running out. As Obama’s Secretary of State, John Kerry put it during the last unsuccessful American-led attempt to broker dialogue, Israel risks being seen as an “apartheid state”, which can only lead to “more boycotts”.

Everyone can agree that, ultimately, dialogue will be needed if the people of Israel and Palestine are to move forward in peace with justice. And that dialogue will have to involve both Israelis and Palestinians, along with – no doubt – international actors. It has failed up to now because US diplomatic protection and military funding, together with a reluctance by other countries to push the issues of Israel’s serial breaches of international law, has sent an implicit message that the Occupation, settlements and militarism are something the world can live with. 

This deadly combination amounts to collusion with bullying by Israel; which in turn encourages extremist elements among the Palestinians, particularly those in Gaza responsible for firing rockets, an indisriminate weapon whose use I also deplore, while it should not be seen as in any way equivalent to the massive military onslaught against them.

It is, above all, my long experience as a psychotherapist that convinces me that boycotts are not an alternative to dialogue but a necessary pre-requisite, at this point, to bringing about conditions where such dialogue could ultimately prove fruitful.

As a psychotherapist when I work with couples where one partner is violent I first name the violence, then set a boundary around the violent behaviour and will not proceed with therapy until the violence stops. To proceed with therapy whilst violence is happening would be tantamount to condoning such behaviour.

Consider for a moment the thinking of abusive men – men whose thinking, I believe, has direct parallels with powerbrokers and military decision makers in Israel: "The first challenge with an abusive man is to motivate him to work on himself. Because he becomes attached to the many rewards that his controlling and intimidating behaviors bring him, he is highly reluctant to make significant changes in his way of operating in a relationship,” writes psychologist Lundy Bancroft, who runs programs for abusive men. Is there are parallel with Israel becoming attached to the rewards of funding and support from the USA, support and funding that comes with no consequences for Israel’s violence against the Palestinians or regular seizure of land? So there is an equivalent reluctance amongst the power brokers of Israel to ameliorate their violent responses. Bancroft goes on to suggest how to challenge such reluctance:

This reluctance cannot be overcome through gentle persuasion, pleading, or cajoling by the woman. I am sorry to say that I have never once seen such approaches succeed. The men who make significant progress in my program are the ones who know that their partners will definitely leave them unless they change, and the ones on probation who have a tough probation officer who demands that they really confront abusiveness. In other words, the initial impetus to change is always extrinsic rather than self-motivated.

I believe BDS is capable of contributing to the extrinsic impetus to challenge Israel’s direct, structural and cultural violence towards the Palestinians. That includes the repeated bombardments of Gaza, which have killed thousands of civilians; the ongoing illegal occupation of Palestinian territory, and the routine dehumanisation of Palestinians in Israeli culture – which Netanyahu invoked with his inflammatory comments. By supporting BDS we join a movement that says we will not work with the state of Israel until the violence and the occupation ends.

Just as the therapist setting a boundary around a violent man’s behaviour empowers a woman in a violent relationship, that the third party will not tolerate the violence, she can then trust the process.

 To me, quietism about Israel’s illegal occupation and endless violence is tantamount to endorsing the behaviour of the abuser.

Mahmoud Abbas told the UN that Israel “perpetrated genocide” in its most recent assault on Gaza, he has called on the United Nations security council to support a resolution setting a clear deadline for Israel’s withdrawal from the occupied territories as he in effect declared the US-sponsored Oslo peace process over.

Each time moderate voices such as this go unheard it mobilises more Palestinians to turn to violence. I believe this is the very fuel used by extremists in Gaza to justify their rocket attacks on Israel. 

With growing Jewish support for the boycott a prominent Israeli politician, Avrum Burg, a former chair of the Knesset,recently declared that BDS is best option there is for ultimately bringing peace, because it supports non-violence: “if anyone is asking us or has to care what we think – boycotts and sanctions are actually the most kosher. Silencing and repression are bad, and violence is worse”, said Burg who was also chair of the Jewish Agency and the World Zionist Organization.

I do agree with Stephen Zunes that occupations everywhere deserve to be boycotted, that means Morocco’s occupation of Western Sahara, and Armenia’s occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh, as well.

In the interests of peace and security in the whole region, for Israelis and Palestinians I think the next right step is for the world to recognise Palestine.

For clarity I support the kind of BDS that objects to Israel’s militarism, Occupation and settlements. In this, at least, I agree with Rabbi Michael Lerner, of the US-based Network of Spiritual Progressives, who favours a targeted BDS. A form of BDS that affirms the right of the State of Israel to exist but within the borders agreed by the UN in 1967. That means I do not consciously buy or allow for sale products that have been produced by West Bank settlements. Nor will I support the sale or research of military equipment to Israel that is used primarily to enforce the Occupation or to build settlements.

However, I disagree with Lerner on the academic boycott. It is specifically because Israeli universities, such as the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Technion University, are directly complicit with the Occupation, that we should avoid engaging in institutional links with them such as joint Fellowship schemes. That is the best way to apply extrinsic pressure for a change of approach, which will ultimately create conditions for a dialogue with a genuine chance of succeeding.