WaPo | When government takes sides on a particular boycott and criminalizes
those who engage in a boycott, it crosses a constitutional line.
Cardin
and other supporters argue that the Israel Anti-Boycott Act targets
only commercial activity. In fact, the bill threatens severe penalties
against any business or individual who does not purchase goods from
Israeli companies operating in the occupied Palestinian territories and
who makes it clear — say by posting on Twitter or Facebook — that their
reason for doing so is to support a U.N.- or E.U.-called boycott. That
kind of penalty does not target commercial trade; it targets free speech
and political beliefs. Indeed, the bill would prohibit even the act of
giving information to a U.N. body about boycott activity directed at
Israel.
The bill’s chilling effect would be dramatic — and that
is no doubt its very purpose. But individuals, not the government,
should have the right to decide whether to support boycotts against
practices they oppose. Neither individuals nor businesses should have to
fear million-dollar penalties, years in prison and felony convictions
for expressing their opinions through collective action. As an
organization, we take no sides on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But
regardless of the politics, we have and always will take a strong stand
when government threatens our freedoms of speech and association. The
First Amendment demands no less.
WaPo | The Israel Anti-Boycott Act would extend the 1977 law to
international organizations, such as the United Nations or even the
European Union, that might parallel the Arab League’s original
“blacklist” of companies doing business with Israel, which was the heart
of its boycott.
It couldn’t come at a better time. Already, the
U.N. Human Rights Council has passed a resolution last year requesting
its high commissioner for human rights to create a database of companies
that operate in or have business relationships in the West Bank beyond
Israel’s 1949 Armistice Lines, which includes all of Jerusalem, Israel’s
capital.
If the high commissioner implements this resolution, as
he appears determined to do, it will create a new “blacklist” that
could subject American individuals and companies to discrimination, yet
again, for simply doing business with Israel.
Moreover, the European Union has instituted
a mandatory labeling requirement for agricultural products made in the
West Bank and has restricted its substantial research and development
funds to Israeli universities and companies to only those with no
contacts with territories east of the Armistice Line. None
of the many U.N. member states that are serial human rights violators
are accorded similar treatment. Not Iran. Not Syria. Not North Korea.
Only Israel.
These kinds of actions do not create the right
atmosphere to prompt resumption of peace talks between Israel and the
Palestinians that the Trump administration is seeking to jump-start.
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