Approved January 15, 2024
Purpose
The information, strategies and lists of targets below are all drawn from the BDS Campaign’s official website, which should be referred to annually to update our policy in harmony with the campaign’s goals and strategies.
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) campaign is a Palestinian-led movement for freedom, justice and equality. BDS upholds the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity.
Israel is occupying and colonising Palestinian land, discriminating against Palestinian citizens of Israel and denying Palestinian refugees the right to return to their homes. Inspired by the South African anti-apartheid movement, the BDS call urges action to pressure Israel to comply with international law.
BDS is now a vibrant global movement made up of unions, academic associations, churches and grassroots movements across the world. Since its launch in 2005, BDS is having a major impact and is effectively challenging international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.
Call for BDS (issued in 2005)
One year after the historic Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which found Israel’s Wall built on occupied Palestinian territory to be illegal; Israel continues its construction of the colonial Wall with total disregard to the Court’s decision. Thirty eight years into Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian West Bank (including East Jerusalem), Gaza Strip and the Syrian Golan Heights, Israel continues to expand Jewish colonies. It has unilaterally annexed occupied East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights and is now de facto annexing large parts of the West Bank by means of the Wall. Israel is also preparing – in the shadow of its planned redeployment from the Gaza Strip – to build and expand colonies in the West Bank. Fifty seven years after the state of Israel was built mainly on land ethnically cleansed of its Palestinian owners, a majority of Palestinians are refugees, most of whom are stateless. Moreover, Israel’s entrenched system of racial discrimination against its own Arab-Palestinian citizens remains intact.
In light of Israel’s persistent violations of international law; and
Given that, since 1948, hundreds of UN resolutions have condemned Israel’s colonial and discriminatory policies as illegal and called for immediate, adequate and effective remedies; and
Given that all forms of international intervention and peace-making have until now failed to convince or force Israel to comply with humanitarian law, to respect fundamental human rights and to end its occupation and oppression of the people of Palestine; and
In view of the fact that people of conscience in the international community have historically shouldered the moral responsibility to fight injustice, as exemplified in the struggle to abolish apartheid in South Africa through diverse forms of boycott, divestment and sanctions; and Inspired by the struggle of South Africans against apartheid and in the spirit of international solidarity, moral consistency and resistance to injustice and oppression;
We, representatives of Palestinian civil society, call upon international civil society organizations and people of conscience all over the world to impose broad boycotts and implement divestment initiatives against Israel similar to those applied to South Africa in the apartheid era. We appeal to you to pressure your respective states to impose embargoes and sanctions against Israel. We also invite conscientious Israelis to support this Call, for the sake of justice and genuine peace.
These non-violent punitive measures should be maintained until Israel meets its obligation to recognize the Palestinian people’s inalienable right to self-determination and fully complies with the precepts of international law by:
- Ending its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall
- Recognizing the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and
- Respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.
Application
The BSTC will endeavour to adhere to the four following strategies to pressure companies complicit in supporting Israel’s apartheid regime and illegal occupation of Palestine. In all cases, targets for each strategy are listed further below. The application of this policy should be considered on a moving forward basis. Past actions may or may not be retroactively undone.
- Consumer boycott targets – The BDS movement calls for a complete boycott of these brands carefully selected due to the company’s proven record of complicity in Israeli apartheid.
- Divestment targets – The BDS movement is pressuring governments, institutions and investment funds to exclude and divest from as many complicit companies as practical, especially weapons manufacturers, banks, and companies listed in the UN database of business involved in Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise, as well as the WhoProfits and AFSC Investigate databases of companies enabling the occupation.
- Pressure (non-boycott) targets – The BDS movement actively calls for pressure campaigns against these brands and services due to their complicity in Israeli apartheid. On strategic grounds, the BDS campaign has not called for a boycott of these brands and services. Instead, they strategically call on supporters and institutions to mount other forms of pressure on them until they end their complicity in Israeli apartheid.
- Organic boycott targets – The BDS movement did not initiate these grassroots boycott campaigns but is in support of them due to these brands openly supporting Israel’s genocide against Palestinians.
List of targets:
- Consumer boycott targets:
- Siemens
Siemens (Germany) is the main contractor for the Euro-Asia Interconnector, an Israel-EU submarine electricity cable that is planned to connect Israel’s illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory to Europe. Siemens-branded electrical appliances are sold globally.
- PUMA
PUMA (Germany) sponsors the Israel Football Association, which governs teams in Israel’s illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian land.
- Carrefour
Carrefour (France) is a genocide enabler. Carrefour-Israel has supported Israeli soldiers partaking in the unfolding genocide of Palestinians in Gaza with gifts of personal packages. In 2022, it entered a partnership with the Israeli company Electra Consumer Products and its subsidiary Yenot Bitan, both of which are involved in grave violations against the Palestinian people.
- AXA
When Russia invaded Ukraine, insurance giant AXA (France) took targeted measures against it. Yet, as Israel, a 75-year-old regime of settler-colonialism and apartheid, wages a genocidal war on Gaza, AXA continues to invest in Israeli banks financing war crimes and the theft of Palestinian land and natural resources.
- Hewlett Packard Inc (HP Inc)
HP Inc (US) provides services to the offices of genocide leaders, Israeli PM Netanyahu and Financial Minister Smotrich.
- SodaStream
SodaStream is actively complicit in Israel’s policy of displacing the indigenous Bedouin-Palestinian citizens of Israel in the Naqab (Negev) and has a long history of racial discrimination against Palestinian workers.
- Ahava
Ahava cosmetics has its production site, visitor center, and main store in an illegal Israeli settlement in the occupied Palestinian territory.
- RE/MAX
RE/MAX (US) markets and sells property in illegal Israeli settlements built on stolen Palestinian land, thus enabling Israel’s colonization of the occupied West Bank.
- Israeli produce in your supermarkets
Fruits, vegetables, and wines misleadingly labeled as “Product of Israel” often include products of illegal settlements on stolen Palestinian land. Israeli companies do not distinguish between the two, and neither should consumers. Boycott produce from Israel in your supermarket and demand their removal from shelves.
- Divestment targets:
- Elbit Systems
Elbit Systems is apartheid Israel’s largest arms company. It “field-tests” its weapons on Palestinians, including in Israel’s ongoing genocidal war on Palestinians in Gaza. On top of building killer drones, Elbit makes surveillance technology for Israel’s apartheid wall, checkpoints and Gaza fence, enabling apartheid. The US and EU use Elbit’s technology to militarize their borders, violating refugee and indigenous peoples’ rights.
- HD Hyundai/Volvo/CAT/JCB
Machinery from HD Hyundai (South Korea), Volvo (Sweden/China), CAT (US), and JCB (UK) has been used by Israel in the ethnic cleansing and forced displacement of Palestinians through the destruction of their homes, farms, and businesses, as well as the construction of illegal settlements on land stolen from them, a war crime under international law.
- Barclays
Barclays Bank (UK) holds more than £1 billion in shares of, and provides more than £3bn in loans and underwriting to nine companies whose weapons, components and military technology have been used in Israel’s armed violence against Palestinians.
- CAF
Basque transport firm, CAF, builds and services the Jerusalem Light Rail (JLR), a tram line that serves Israel’s illegal settlements in Jerusalem. CAF benefits from Israel’s war crimes on stolen Palestinian land.
- Chevron
US fossil fuel multinational Chevron is the main international corporation extracting gas claimed by apartheid Israel in the East Mediterranean. Chevron generates billions in revenues, strengthening Israel’s war chest and apartheid system, and exacerbating the climate crisis.
- HikVision
Amnesty International has documented high-resolution CCTV cameras made by the Chinese company Hikvision installed in residential areas and mounted to Israeli military infrastructure for surveillance of Palestinians. Some of these models, according to Hikvision’s own marketing, can plug into external facial recognition software.
- TKH Security
Amnesty International has identified cameras made by the Dutch company TKH Security used by Israel for surveillance of Palestinians. TKH provides Israeli police with surveillance technology that is used to entrench apartheid.
- Pressure (non-boycott) targets:
- Google and Amazon (US)
As the Israeli military bombed homes, clinics, and schools in Gaza and threatened to push Palestinian families from their homes in occupied Jerusalem May 2021, Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud executives signed a $1.22 billion contract to provide cloud technology to the Israeli government and military. By supporting Israeli apartheid with vital technologies, Amazon and Google are directly implicated in its entire system of oppression, including its unfolding genocide in Gaza. Join the #NoTechForApartheid campaign. While the campaigns targeting these corporations have not called for boycotts, other forms of pressure have been adopted to force them to end their complicity.
- Airbnb/Booking/Expedia
Airbnb (US), Booking.com (Netherlands) and Expedia (US) all offer rentals in illegal Israeli settlements built on stolen Palestinian land. While the campaigns targeting these corporations have not called for boycotts, yet, other forms of pressure have been adopted to force them to end their complicity.
- Disney
The Disney-owned Marvel Studios (US) is promoting in the next Captain America film a “superhero” that personifies apartheid Israel. Both companies are therefore complicit in “anti-Palestinian racism, Israeli propaganda, and the glorification of settler-colonial violence against Indigenous people,” as Palestinian cultural organizations have stated.
- Grassroots organic boycott targets:
- McDonald’s (US), Burger King (US), Papa John’s (US), Pizza Hut (US), WIX (Israel), etc. are now being targeted in some countries by grassroots organic boycott campaigns, not initiated by the BDS movement, because these companies, or their branches or franchises in Israel, have openly supported apartheid Israel and/or provided generous in-kind donations to the Israeli military amid the current Israeli offensive against 2.3 million Palestinians in the occupied and besieged Gaza Strip–described by leading international scholars of international law as an “unfolding genocide.” If these grassroots campaigns are not already organically active in your area, we suggest focusing your energies on our strategic campaigns above.
- Remember, all Israeli banks and virtually all Israeli companies are complicit to some degree in Israel’s system of occupation and apartheid, and hundreds of international corporations and banks are also deeply complicit. We focus our boycotts on a small number of companies and products for maximum impact.
Additional resources: To learn more about companies complicit in Israel’s abuses of Palestinian human rights visit Who Profits, Investigate, and the UN database of companies involved in Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise.
