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→ 28 July 2022
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Fighting Back | AIR

Dr Sheree Trotter

Fervent anti-Israel rhetoric and propaganda have been hitting the headlines in New Zealand of late, and pro-Israel advocates are saying there is a need to step up the fight against them. 

In mid-May, plans for “Nakba Day” commemorations in Wellington were dealt a blow by the city’s Mayor, Andy Foster. Originally, activists planned to light up a council-owned convention centre in the colours of the Palestinian flag. 

Advice from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade prompted Foster to cancel the projection. This led to a “guerrilla projection” on the outside of the national museum, Te Papa, unsuccessful requests to meet Foster and a lot of sympathetic media coverage.

Then in June, the annual Doc Edge documentary film festival attracted the ire of Palestinian advocacy groups, who responded with a vocal boycott campaign by the Palestinian Solidarity Network (chaired by veteran anti-Israel activist John Minto) and the Palestinians in the Aotearoa Co-ordinating Committee.

It was not the first time the Academy Award-qualifying Doc Edge festival, which usually features several Israeli or Jewish-themed films, had been targeted. Back in 2018, the screening of a Ben-Gurion documentary resulted in Boycott,  Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement threats and the disruption of screenings by activists armed with fake bombs.

On this occasion, it is claimed the boycott calls were due to the festival having the Israeli Embassy as one of its sponsors. But the activists focused their anger on the film that the Embassy was sponsoring, Dead Sea Guardians, about the efforts of a Palestinian, an Israeli and a Jordanian to save the Dead Sea. 

Indigenous Coalition for Israel director Dr Sheree Trotter, who spearheaded a counter-campaign of support for the festival, said the film had been shown in many Arabic and European countries and it was only in New Zealand that a boycott had been called for. 

“The ridiculous part about this is that the film promotes a message of co-operation and working together, accepting each other’s narratives and creating a new narrative, for the collaborative goal of saving the Dead Sea from drying out.”

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→ 12 June 2022
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Calls to boycott Doc Edge festival over Embassy of Israel funding

Palestinian human rights groups have called for a boycott of this year’s Academy Award-qualifying Doc Edge international documentary film festival over concern it’s funded by the Embassy of Israel.

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→ 12 May 2021
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AIR New Zealand: Super Fund move raises BDS questions | AIJAC

Questions over just how much influence the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement has in New Zealand are being voiced following the NZ Super Fund’s recent divestment from five Israeli banks.

In March, the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation, an autonomous crown entity and manager of the NZ$50 billion NZ Super Fund, announced it was ending its NZ$6.5 million investment in the First International Bank of Israel, Israel Discount Bank, Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, and Bank Mizrahi-Tefahot.

The NZ Super Fund said it was doing so on responsible investment grounds as there was “credible evidence” that the banks provide finance for the construction of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

“In our view, based on the information available to us, the companies’ activities are inconsistent with the UN Global Compact, the key benchmark against which the Guardians measures corporate behaviour,” it said. 

Predictably, well-known opponents of Israel, like the Palestinian Solidarity Network chaired by anti-Israel advocate John Minto, greeted the news enthusiastically. 

Green Party foreign affairs spokesperson Golriz Ghahraman told the Spinoff the decision “exemplifies compliance with domestic and international (sic) in terms of investment in Israeli occupied Palestine, which all NZ institutions and companies should be meeting.”

However, National Party MP Nicola Willis reportedly said at a select committee meeting that the fund’s decision was controversial and “viewed by some groups as potentially aligning New Zealand with an antisemitic movement (i.e.: BDS).”

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→ 2 April 2021
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New Zealand Fund Decision to Divest from Israeli Banks Breaches Legal Requirements | UKLFI

Catherine Savage, Chair of the Guardians of New Zealand’s Superannuation Fund

The Guardians of New Zealand’s Superannuation Fund have recently decided to divest from Israeli banks in apparent breach of legal requirements.
The Superannuation Fund, known as the Super Fund, was set up in 2001 to secure funding for universal pensions for New Zealand’s aging population with a fair sharing of the cost between present and future taxpayers.

The Guardians’ statutory mandate is to invest the Fund on a prudent, commercial basis and manage it in a manner consistent with:

  • best-practice portfolio management;
  • maximising return without undue risk to the Fund as a whole; and
  • avoiding prejudice to New Zealand’s reputation as a responsible member of the world community.

International financial markets lawyer, Dan Harris, has pointed out:

  1. The published reasons for the decision to divest from Israeli banks show a failure to properly consider material information and give too much weight to questionable sources. This appears to be inconsistent with “best-practice portfolio management”. For example, the reasons placed considerable weight on the UN Human Rights Council’s report dated 12 February 2020. However, breaches of human rights are a matter of law, and yet the UNHRC report clearly states that it offers no legal conclusions. Moreover, the methodology used for that report was demonstrably flawed and based on biased sources.
  2. The decision appears to have been taken with a dominant improper purpose to be a political player, rather than applying a responsible investment policy; and on the basis of opposition to an Israeli proposal to extend Israeli law to part of the West Bank, even though at the time of the decision that proposal was no longer being pursued.
  3. There was a fundamental error of law in treating the Israeli Banks as responsible for acts of the State of Israel. Lawful acts of private companies cannot automatically be equated with those of a government.
  4. The divestment may damage New Zealand. US politicians on both sides may react in a negative manner. The Guardians are required to avoid prejudice to New Zealand’s reputation, not attract it

Jonathan Turner, chief executive of UKLFI commented: “As well as being an improper purpose, the Guardians’ political aims discriminate against Israel. At the same time as divesting from Israeli banks, they are investing in companies operating in Western Sahara and probably in other disputed territories”.

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→ 11 February 2021
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New Zealand MPs Take A Pledge For Palestine | Scoop

Golriz Ghahraman, MP (Green Party)

At an event to mark International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian people three New Zealand MPs took a pledge to form a new parliamentary Palestine friendship group and to “…raise the voices of Palestinian people in New Zealand’s parliament”.

The event, organised by Wellington Palestine, was attended by over 100 New Zealanders including Golriz Ghahraman, MP (Green Party), Teanau Tuiono, MP (Green Party) and Ibrahim Omer, MP (Labour Party). In a speech to open the event Ghahraman – an Iranian born refugee and former human rights lawyer – insisted that New Zealand must divest from companies that were complicit in crimes against international law.

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→ 3 June 2020
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BDS co-founder says goal of movement is end of Israel | JNS

Omar Barghouti, Co-Founder of the BDS campaign

While Israel’s supporters claim that the BDS movement is aimed at the Jewish state and is a form of new anti-Semitism, its supporters in Western countries say it’s merely a tool to change Israeli policies.

However, in a newly recorded interview on May 21 with the Gazan Voice Podcast, co-founder of the BDS movement Omar Barghouti explains that should the movement’s goals be achieved, Israel would cease to exist.

“If the refugees return to their homes [in Israel] as the BDS movement calls for, if we bring an end to Israel’s apartheid regime and if we end the occupation on lands occupied in 1967, including Jerusalem, what will be left of the Zionist regime? That’s the question. Meaning, what will the two states be based on?” he said.

During the 20-minute interview in Arabic to the Gazan audience, Barghouti appears to have let slip the real objective of the movement he founded.

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→ 17 December 2019
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Boris Johnson to pass law banning anti-Israel boycott | The Independent

Boris Johnson, PM of the UK

Boris Johnson will attempt to pass a law banning local councils from joining the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, the UK’s special envoy for post-Holocaust issues has announced.

Eric Pickles said the movement was “antisemitic and should be treated as such” during a speech at the International Institute for Strategic Dialogue’s conference in Jerusalem on Sunday.

He said the new law would not allow public bodies to work with those who boycott, divest from or sanction Israel, the Jerusalem Post reported.

It comes after Donald Trump, the US president, signed an executive order effectively definition Judaism as a nationality, not just a religion – in a move which could suppress the BDS movement.

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→ 19 August 2019
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New director of basketball Dan Shamir shares vision for new-look NZ Breakers | NewsHub

NZFOI: Nice to see the BDS crowd weren’t successful in preventing Shamir’s appointment.

With the start of the new ANBL season almost two months away, NZ Breakers newly appointed director of basketball Dan Shamir has ensured he’s settled, and ready to tackle both a new culture and a new club.

Shamir touched down on New Zealand soil from his native Israel with his family at the start of July to begin the complex process of getting the four-time champions back on the track to title contention after some lean years, with just two playoffs appearances through their past five campaigns.

That challenge – combined with the chance for him and his young family to experience a new lifestyle down under – were Shamir’s primary motivations in the decision to accept the position on a three-year term.

“This is a very unique place,” Shamir told Newshub. “It’s a place with some kind of special energy.

“I’ve been told from the first moment that I’m going to meet a lot of good people and that’s happened.”

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→ 26 July 2019
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Congress overwhelming passes resolution condemning global boycott targeting Israel | Washington Post

The House [Congress] on Tuesday overwhelmingly passed a measure condemning efforts to boycott and economically isolate Israel over its policies toward Palestinians, an explosive global issue that exposed fissures inside the Democratic ranks.

The 398-to-17 vote comes after months of turmoil centering on Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), two Muslim freshmen who have stood accused of anti-Semitism over public remarks they have made referencing Israel and the Holocaust.

The congresswomen, repeatedly singled out by President Trump in the past week, opposed the resolution, arguing that it infringes on free speech and the right to participate in boycotts for human and civil rights.

Trump renewed his attacks on Omar on Tuesday, calling her an “America hating anti-Semite” in a tweet. Omar apologized in February after suggesting that Israel’s American supporters were motivated by money.

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, or BDS, calls on the international community to withdraw investments and shun the Israeli government, businesses and other institutions to win greater rights for Palestinians living in disputed territories. Its critics argue that its goals would fundamentally undermine Israel’s status as a Jewish homeland.

“You want to criticize the government? That’s your right. You want to stop buying products from a certain country? That’s also your right,” said House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot L. Engel (D-N.Y.). “But participating in an international commercial effort that undermines Israel’s legitimacy and scuttles the chances of a two-state solution isn’t the same as an individual exercising First Amendment rights.”

Engel said of the BDS movement: “It’s a fraud. It’s Israel-hating. It’s Jew-hating. We’ve had enough of that in the world.”

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→ 15 July 2019
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Israel-Embassy-Sponsored Scholarship Should Be Terminated Kristin Crowe | Salient

NZFOI: This article describes Student for Justice in Palestine’s (SJP) campaign to have an Israeli government academic prize withdrawn. It is a step toward mounting further pressure on the Victoria University of Wellington (VUW) to adopt BDS. Salient is the VUW weekly student magazine.

On Thursday, 16 May, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) held a meeting at Berrigan House to protest a scholarship for essays on the Israeli State—a state whose political systems they say are inherently “racist” and “brutal”.

The Embassy of Israel Prize in Political Science and International Relations is listed on Victoria’s website through the Department of History, Philosophy, Political Science and International Relations. The $250 scholarship is awarded to one student per year on the merit of an essay on one of the given topics—including ”Israel and the Middle East”, ”Israel’s bilaterial relations with its neighbours”, and ”Israel’s democracy in the context of the Middle East”. The winner is selected by the Head of Department, and the winning essay “may be provided” to the Ambassador.

In the wake of a century of fighting between Israelis and Palestinians, US interventions have failed to produce peace. Israel’s continued presence in Gaza and the West Bank—including building settlements illegally in Palestinian territory, restricting the flow of commercial goods to Palestine, and denying Palestinians the right to vote—has sparked an international protest movement. Proponents are calling for boycotts, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) against the Israeli state.

Many universities in the US, Canada, and New Zealand have SJP groups which promote BDS on their campuses. Victoria is not currently participating in BDS protest, and maintains ties with Israeli universities. Lecturers from these universities have appeared on Kelburn campus, drawing criticism.

SJP at VUW are calling for the university to terminate the prize, calling VUW’s partnership with Israel “unjust” because the political climate in Israel is “directly comparable” to Apartheid South Africa.

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