Israel's Anti-BDS Bill Is Not An Attack On Free Speech

Israel has taken legal in response to Israelis that encourage or participate the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanction (BDS) movement whose goal is to destabilize Israel as opposed to encourage peace talks with the Arabs.

As Muqata points out, the kind of step that Israel Israel is taking against boycotts is common worldwide:

As far as I know, until yesterday every single Western country in the world, except for two, has laws making participation in boycotts against Israel illegal. Today, the UK stands alone in dishonor with no anti-boycott law on the books.


For example, since 1976, it has been illegal for any US citizen to participate in the Arab boycott against Israel – punishable by fines of up to $50,000 or five times the value of the exports involved or jail term of up to 10 years.

As far as I know, until yesterday every single Western country in the world, except for two, has laws making participation in boycotts against Israel illegal. Today, the UK stands alone in dishonor with no anti-boycott law on the books.

For example, since 1976, it has been illegal for any US citizen to participate in the Arab boycott against Israel – punishable by fines of up to $50,000 or five times the value of the exports involved or jail term of up to 10 years.

An early translated version of the Israeli bill reads in part:

Bill prohibiting boycotts or Sign -2010

Definition	1. In this Act - "Area under the control of the State of Israel" - including Judea and Samaria; "Boycott of Israel" - a boycott imposed on the person because of his ties with Israel or with areas under the control of Israel; "A foreign political entity" - as defined in section 36A (a) of the Associations, 1980 1.
Imposing ban on Israel boycott	2. Not initiate a boycott of Israel, to encourage participation in, or provide assistance or information to promote it.

Here is the final version:

Proposed Bill to Prevent Harm to the State of Israel
by Means of Boycott 27 June 2011

Definition	1. In this bill, "a boycott against the State of Israel" – deliberately avoiding economic, cultural or academic ties with another person or another factor only because of his ties with the State of Israel, one of its institutions or an area under its control, in such a way that may cause economic, cultural or academic damage.
Boycott – a civil wrong:	Knowingly publishing a public call for a boycott against the State of Israel will be considered a civil wrong to which the civil tort law [new version] applies, if according to the content and circumstances of the publication there is reasonable probability that the call will bring about a boycott and he who published the call was aware of this possibility.

Already you can see that one change is that in the definition, Judea and Samaria--the actual names of the areas referred to as West Bank--are not specified. It is not clear whether that is a concession to avoid confrontation, or an deliberate statement that Judea and Samaria are as much a part of Israel as any other area.

Also, in describing the offense, the definition concentrates on encouraging, while the revised version criminalizes even calling for one.

And that is where the bill runs into trouble, allowing anyone who maliciously calls for a boycott on Israel to take out their halo and claim in all innocence that all they are doing is exercising their freedom of speech--ignoring a country's right to defend itself from harm.

Jonathan Tobin captures the essence of the problem Israel's anti-boycott bill faces:

The passage by Israel’s Knesset yesterday of a bill that seeks redress against those who call for boycotts of the country or, institutions or regions under Israeli control is being blasted throughout the world as an assault on civil rights. Though the legislation does not, strictly speaking, “ban” advocacy for boycotts, it does have the potential to infringe upon freedom of speech. As such, it is a mistake, and yet another in a long history of unforced errors made by the Jewish state in the battle for international public opinion.

However, there is more to this issue than the mere assertion that Israel’s current parliamentary majority is seeking to infringe upon the civil liberties of its citizens. A proper understanding of the issue requires us to see that those seeking to implement boycotts are not merely expressing criticism of government policies but are, in fact, waging economic warfare on Israel. Moreover, such boycotts are not merely symbolic efforts to chide the Jewish state on a particular issue but part of an insidious international conspiracy to strangle a nation. If the majority of Israelis, and it would appear a majority of the country as well as the Knesset backs this measure, it is because they rightly see advocacy of boycotts as racist attacks on their very existence.

The bill will allow citizens to sue individuals and groups that call for economic, cultural or academic boycotts. It also prevents the government from doing business with companies that initiate or comply with such boycotts. That will act as a restraint on the assertion of such views and would be considered blatantly unconstitutional in an American civil liberties context. The Israeli Supreme Court may find a way to invalidate it, but let’s remember the context. Unlike the United States, Israel remains a country still living in a state of war with some of its neighbors. Israel’s foes are not, as some in this country falsely assert, merely objecting to its possession of the West Bank and the city of Jerusalem but its very existence. It shouldn’t be too hard to understand why so many of its citizens view advocacy for isolating their nation in this manner to be beyond the pale.

There are, it must be admitted, better ways to fight the boycott than bans on its advocacy, irritating as such speech may be. It would be far better were the bill confined to penalties against those who actively conspire to create or comply with efforts to isolate the country. In a democracy, even a democracy at war, as Israel must be considered to be, mere speech ought not to be considered illegal so long as it does not directly lead to violence.

While Tobin clearly criticizes the implementation of the bill, he also realizes and explains its need--as well as giving the context of the goal of those who push for BDS.

Clearly, you don't have to be in complete agreement with bill in order to understand the reasoning behind it, or to condemn the the absurdity of much of the criticism of it.

For example, NGO Monitor rebuts the attacks on the anti-BDS bill as an infringement on free speech, even as it disagrees with the bill:

...As explained below, NGO Monitor does not see this legislation as the appropriate means to combat the BDS movement. However, numerous NGOs have released misleading and false statements about the new law, including the New Israel Fund, which wrongly claimed that the bill “criminalizes freedom of speech,” and Gush Shalom, which says the law is “a death sentence for the right to freedom of expression.”

The anti-boycott law does not specifically address boycotts of “settlements;” it is meant to address calls for boycotts anywhere in and against Israel. The global BDS movement targets all of Israel, even within the Green Line, and explicitly rejects the existence of Israel within any borders.

The intense public debate and discussion about the new law is indicative of the strength and vibrancy of Israeli democracy, not its decline, as many political advocacy NGOs have claimed. These same NGOs are preparing to challenge the new law in the Israeli courts, another sign of a strong democracy. Furthermore, those NGOs could have lobbied MKs and presented alternatives, in order to stop the bill. Instead, they spend more time and resources lobbying European Parliaments in opposing Israeli government policy.

In examining the content of the bill and the possible ramifications, NGO Monitor addresses the following points:

• The “Anti-Boycott bill” (MK Ze’ev Elkin – Likud), that passed into law on Monday, July 11, allows “citizens to bring civil suits against persons and organizations that call for economic, cultural or academic boycotts against Israel, Israeli institutions or regions under Israeli control.”
• NGO Monitor is concerned this new law is counterproductive, not the most appropriate framework, and will only polarize important discussions regarding the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. The law will not shed light or encourage informed criticism on the NGOs and their foreign government funders that lead most BDS campaigns.
• Regarding other legislation in June 2011 dealing with foreign government NGO funding - MK Ofir Akunis’s (Likud) bill on limiting foreign government donations to NGOs and MK Faina Kirschenbaum’s (Israel Beiteinu) bill to revoke NGO tax-free status on donations from foreign entities - Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor, stated, “However, the answer to this challenge [NGO use of foreign government funding] is not to curtail NGOs’ freedom of expression…Israel’s vibrant democracy does not merely survive criticism, it thrives and is improved by it, especially when much of this ‘criticism’ can be exposed for what it really is: disingenuous and ideologically motivated propaganda.”
• In February 2011, the Knesset adopted the NGO Funding Transparency Law (MK Ze’ev Elkin - Likud). The objective of this law is to provide Israeli democracy and civil society with the information necessary to assess the extent and impact of secret foreign government funding for a narrow group of political advocacy NGOs, some of which promote boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. Many of the NGOs that referred to the anti-boycott law as anti-democratic used the same language regarding the NGO Transparency Law.
• Both the secrecy of these funding procedures and the manipulation of civil society by external groups and governments violate the accepted norms and practices among sovereign democratic nations.
• There is deep concern among Israel’s democratically elected representatives regarding foreign government funding of political advocacy NGOs that are centrally involved in delegitimization campaigns. This concern is also reflected consistently in public opinion polls.
• The "Anti-Boycott Law," and other legislation regarding foreign government funding of NGOs, is a response to the absence of basic policy changes among the European governments that are responsible for supporting the BDS movement. [Italics added]

Whether the bill has a future and will be put into law is as of yet uncertain.
What is certain is the goal of BDS--and Israel's need to protect itself.

Those claiming that this is purely an issue of free speech are missing the point.
Perhaps on purpose.

See: Those Who Criticize Israel's Anti-Boycott Law Forget The US Has One Too

Technorati Tag: Israel and BDS.