The wrong side of history? Despite the Guardian’s best efforts, BDS is failing miserably

Within the radical left British cultural elite, the mere inefficacy of your futile political campaign is no impediment to its survival – at least, that is, as long as there are receptive media outlets willing to amplify your marginal views.

Enter the Guardian –  the online home for those engaged in the obsessive, morally hypocritical campaign against Israel.

The latest target: London theatres hosting Seret 2015, the London Israeli film and television festival.

Anti-Israel activists campaigning against the festival: a couple dozen artists and producers, such as Ken LoachPeter KosminskyEwa JasiewiczMike LeighMiriam Margolyes and John Pilger.

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Here are a few passages from the letter published in the Guardian on June 9th:

We, the below listed artists, producers, and concerned citizens, are disappointed and saddened to see that Curzon, Odeon, Bafta and other cinemas are hosting theLondon Israeli Film and Television Festival.

This comes at a time when the global boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel is gaining unprecedented momentum, and the Israeli government is finding itself increasingly isolated for its systematic violation of Palestinian human rights, the Geneva conventions, and international law.

It’s unclear how they define “unprecedented momentum”, but since the BDS movement was founded in 2004, noted Gregg Carlstrom (a journalist typically quite critical of Israel) writing in the Global Post, “exports to the European Union have doubled to $15.6 billion per year”.  “Foreign investment in Israel“, Carlstrom added, has similarly surged.

As this graph published by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics demonstrates, Israel GDP has actually increased at a greater rate since the international BDS movement began than before the campaign.

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Israel Central Bureau of Statistics 2014

The letter continues:

By hosting it, these cinemas are ignoring the 2004 call by Palestinian civil society for sanctions against Israel

Not to be cute, but we seriously wonder how many people in the UK have even heard of the “2004 call by Palestinians civil society”, yet alone have considered heeding its demands.

Indeed, it would be nice if even one British journalist covering the BDS movement would ask activists a simple question:

Are there any statistics which even minimally suggest that your movement has harmed the Israeli economy? 

Of course, the malevolent efforts by BDS activists to smear Israel as morally beyond the pale, and isolate it internationally, should be taken seriously, and furiously resisted.  However, it seems equally true that – despite the best efforts of the Guardian and their ideological fellow travelers – the boycott campaign against the Jewish state is failing miserably. 

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