"BDS is a proxy for foreign terror groups, and it is becoming increasingly popular with the American left. BDS promotes discrimination and normalizes the message of terror groups by cloaking it in the vernacular of civil rights." -- Marc Greendorfer
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| Palestinian solidarity protesters march towards the British parliament on June, 5 2018. Credit: Alisdare Hickson via Flickr. |
By Sean Savage
Jewish News Syndicate
Over the past decade, the BDS movement has emerged as one of the principle challenges towards the legitimacy of the State of Israel. A modern distortion of the South African anti-apartheid campaign, the movement seeks to economically pressure Israel and isolate it politically.
While Israel continues to thrive on both fronts—with a booming economy and expanding relations throughout the developing world—the ongoing threat of boycotts remains a constant challenge, especially for pro-Israel advocates in the Diaspora.
At the same time, emerging evidence suggests that the BDS movement has extensive ties to Palestinian terrorist organizations. By using the "social justice" movement as a veritable human shield for anti-Israel ideology and activism, terror groups are now succeeding in a type of reputational and commercial warfare against Israel.
This evidence has surfaced in a recent court case in Arizona, where for the first time a U.S. government body has formally acknowledged that the BDS movement aids actors engaged in terror.
In a brief filed by Arizona's Attorney General Mark Brnovich as part of a case before the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals concerning his state's anti-BDS law, Brnovich noted that the BDS campaign was not only motivated by anti-Semitism, but that it aids Palestinian terrorist groups, including Hamas as well as the Palestinian Liberation Organization, the latter of which provides payments and stipends to convicted terrorists or their families.
Marc Greendorfer, founder of the Zachor Legal Institute, said the ties between BDS and terror organizations are "extensive."
At the same time, emerging evidence suggests that the BDS movement has extensive ties to Palestinian terrorist organizations. By using the "social justice" movement as a veritable human shield for anti-Israel ideology and activism, terror groups are now succeeding in a type of reputational and commercial warfare against Israel.
This evidence has surfaced in a recent court case in Arizona, where for the first time a U.S. government body has formally acknowledged that the BDS movement aids actors engaged in terror.
In a brief filed by Arizona's Attorney General Mark Brnovich as part of a case before the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals concerning his state's anti-BDS law, Brnovich noted that the BDS campaign was not only motivated by anti-Semitism, but that it aids Palestinian terrorist groups, including Hamas as well as the Palestinian Liberation Organization, the latter of which provides payments and stipends to convicted terrorists or their families.
"That is particularly true as the effect, and often goal, of BDS boycotts is to strengthen the hand of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, which pays cash stipends to the families of terrorists, and its governmental coalition partner and terrorist organization, Hamas," said Brnovich.Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan called Brnovich's stance "a significant achievement in the fight against the boycott organizations. … This step strips the mask off the boycott organizations, most of which maintain deep ties with terrorist groups while seeking to enjoy immunity as human-rights groups."
Marc Greendorfer, founder of the Zachor Legal Institute, said the ties between BDS and terror organizations are "extensive."
"The ties are extensive and quite serious," he told JNS. "Some of the BDS groups, like Dream Defenders, send members to the Middle East to meet directly with terror groups like the PFLP [Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine], and there has been testimony before Congress that financial backers of Hamas are also providing support to BDS groups. Further reports to Congress showed that the PLO has a ‘war room' in Europe from which they coordinate and fund BDS groups in the U.S.," he explained.Last year, the Zachor Legal Institute submitted a letter to the Department of Justice urging the U.S. government to open an investigation into the ties between Palestinian terror groups and several U.S.-based BDS groups, including American Muslims for Palestine (and its affiliated entity, Americans for Justice in Palestine Educational Foundation), Dream Defenders, the Muslim Students Association, Samidoun and Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).
"We believe—and there is copious evidence to support the allegation—that these organizations are working with designated foreign terror organizations in the United States, often as part of the BDS movement to target Israeli companies, academics and institutions," Zachor stated in a memo provided to JNS.Greendorfer said Zachor has used publicly available information to document these group's ties with terror organization.
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