The darker side of Oxfam
But lurking behind this carefully-crafted website, and indeed the spokesman’s carefully-worded statement, is a rather different reality.Divest This!: A Panic-Driven Response to Omar Barghouti
In truth, Oxfam channels charity funds to political groups which follow deeply partisan agendas, and support the boycott of Israel.
Over the last few years, Oxfam GB and the Dutch branch of the charity, Oxfam Novib, have granted many tens of thousands pounds to Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP).
This group is linked to whoprofits.org, a website that publicly identifies boycott targets, including Israeli banks, utility providers and companies like SodaStream.
As the leader of a “movement” that has accomplished next to nothing in close to fifteen years, Omar Barghouti seems to have developed special vision powers (perhaps learned while studying at an Israeli school he insists everyone in the world but he should boycott). These powers allow him to see panic-stricken Israeli supporters on all sides that quiver in perpetual fear of BDS’s explosive growth that always seems to arrive in the form of a damp squib.Answering Roger’s questions
Barghouti’s latest New York Times piece (paired with a “rebuttal” by Hirsh Goodman which declares Israel to be guilty, but urges something other than boycotting as a punishment – great diversity of opinion Grey Lady!) demonstrates all the rhetoric ticks that give BDS staying power despite lack of concrete victory (incidental or otherwise).
Thus 16% of the American Studies Association’s membership voting for an academic boycott is a “landslide vote” while the stunning backlash against the boycott from across the academy goes unmentioned. Or perhaps that is just part of the panicked response of Israeli supporters? (Keep in mind that in the heads-I-win-tails-you-lose world of BDS, both the BDSers own activity and the overwhelmingly negative response it generates counts as a victories for them.) (h/t Yenta Press)
The other day you posted an open letter to Neil Young and Scarlett Johansson on your Facebook page. This letter was primarily made up of a series of questions regarding the Palestinian employees of SodaStream’s factory in Ma’ale Adumim, addressed to Ms Johansson.
I see that neither Neil Young or Scarlett Johansson has offered you any answers to these questions, so I thought I might have a go.
There are several hundred Palestinians employed at this particular factory, I don’t know each of their particular circumstances, so I have taken my lead from the people interviewed in this recent article, and this video.