JAKARTA - The forced occupation -- often by force -- that Israel has done against the Palestinians has often encouraged solidarity movements. One of them is BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions). This movement shows solidarity towards Palestine not a monopoly of Muslims alone.
In principle, the BDS movement is a way to pressure Israel to end the discrimination, colonialization, and violence that has been going on since 1967 in the "Promised Land." The BDS movement originated from the initiation of the Palestinian people themselves.
Initiated in 2005, the movement originated with 170 community groups in Palestine who were troubled by the Israeli occupation. The community consists of political parties, trade unions, refugee networks, non-profit organizations, as well as various humanitarian organizations.
"This movement (BDS) campaigned for a boycott of Israeli products. BDS activists in various countries took action so that supermarkets, state institutions, and community organizations do not establish economic relations with Israel in any form, including selling Israeli-produced goods from Israel's own territory, as well as from Palestinian territories under Israeli occupation," Magdalena Krisnawati said in the book A Note from Tehran (2013).
The boycott was essentially a peaceful and bloodless act. The formation of the BDS movement was inspired by a similar movement in South Africa: the anti-apartheid movement.
The spirit is the same, focusing on the fight to end discrimination and racist acts against black people in South Africa. Therefore, the BDS movement has three main demands.
First, end the Israeli occupation. Second, end apartheid. Third, for the right of refugees to return. People who joined the BDS movement also called on the public to demand an end to Israeli oppression of palestinians.
This is what many people often ask. Does the boycott have an impact? The answer is yes. According to Aljazeera, the BDS movement caused israel's economy to lose billions of dollars a year.
Over time, support for the BDS movement grew. Support for BDS came from international trade union federations, such as South Africa, the UK, Ireland, India, Brazil, Norway, Canada, Italy, France, Belgium and Turkey.
The movement grew because BDS not only brought about change for the end of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The BDS movement has also become as bright as hope for many countries in the world that are still battling social injustice and protracted wars.
The bigger this movement happened in August 2002. At that time a group of Palestinian organizations in the occupied territories voiced to conduct a thorough boycott of all matters related to Israel, be it economic, cultural, and academic.
In that context, the BDS movement can win the hearts and minds of all the world who do not want the tyrannical presence of oppression of a country in the 21st century.
Impact of BDS movementEvery year, the action in the DBS movement increases. This can be seen from the title of Israel Apartheid Week held annually. The term Apartheid itself refers to the similarity between the actions of the Zionist regime of Israel to the Palestinian people, with the policy of white racial discrimination against blacks in South Africa.
As a result, israel's boycott campaign is expanding. Moreover, the Israeli government has announced plans to build 1,400 new homes in the West Bank. Six hundred houses were built in Ramat Shlomo and eight hundred homes in other West Bank areas.
A number of European companies also boycotted cooperation with Israeli companies. Dutch company, PGGM for example. PGGM, which is The Netherlands' largest pension fund, attracted investment from israel's five major banks in 2014.
The five Israeli banks in question are Hapoalim, Leumi, First International Bank of Israel, Israel Discount Bank, and Mizrahi Tefahot Bank. The move was taken by PGGM following the move of Dutch water company VIten which first ended cooperation with an Israeli company.
"Not only companies, even a number of American academics who are members of the American Studies Association boycott Israeli educational institutions. By voting, 66 percent of the 1,252 members who voted supported a boycott resolution banning formal collaboration with Israeli academic institutions," Rosalina wrote in her paper in Tempo Magazine titled Tango Bibi Dance (2014).
The EU is not to be missed. Israel's second-largest export market -- at 32 percent -- has officially begun a boycott since early 2014. The move was followed by a number of tax and customs agencies in EU countries.
The fruit, all agencies have put up a label "Jewish settlement products" so that consumers can clearly know which products from Israeli companies. In that year also Israeli Finance Minister Yaer Labed, said that due to the boycott, the country's losses in a year reached 8 billion dollars or equivalent to Rp114 trillion.
The loss also followed the dismissal of 10,000 workers in various areas of Israeli company-owned enterprises. The panic forced Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to urge Israeli-led states to draft anti-boycott laws.
Israel even spent big to fight the anti-boycott campaign. Through that move, Israel is confident it can get out of the difficult situation. Netanyahu said the world today is increasingly dependent on products from Israel, especially in the field of technology.
"They (tech companies) came because they wanted the benefits of Israel's reliability and innovation. The BDS movement cannot stop Israel becoming a global technological power," Netanyahu said.
*Read more information about ISRAEL-PALESTINE or read other interesting writings from Detha Arya Tifada.
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