The term “anti-Semitism” is being bandied about by top Israeli officials these days. Economy Minister Naftali Bennett used it when discussing new economic sanctions being used to influence Israel's policies toward the Palestinians. A few days later, the designation went to the very top when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described those who boycott the Jewish state as "classical anti-Semites in modern garb." Netanyahu and Bennett were referring to growing concerns in Israel over the Palestinian-led movement of boycott, divestment and sanctions, better known as BDS. The boycott has been growing recently, mainly by the European Union, Israel's No. 1 trading partner, and which accounts for about a third of its total trade. In the past six months, a flurry of European banks, pension funds, engineering firms and lawmakers have driven home their displeasure with Israeli settlements. So too a growing number of European consumers say buying fruits and vegetables grown on land that Israel has occupied since 1967 supports the illegal confiscation and control of land and water resources that should be in Palestinian hands. Fewer dates or peppers in European shopping carts will not put a dent in the Israeli economy yet Israeli leaders are taking the new European moves quite seriously. Israel's Finance Minister Yair Lapid has said that the country could suffer economically from a costly boycott if peace talks with the Palestinians fail. US Secretary of State John Kerry, who is brokering the negotiations with the Palestinians, has warned that Israel could find itself increasingly targeted by a boycott if it fails to reach a peace deal. On Feb. 9, Netanyahu convened a special meeting of government ministers to formulate a strategy against the growing economic boycott. It was then that he used the label anti-Semitic. Many Israelis, not just Netanyahu, say the boycott has strong anti-Semitic connotations and is meant to delegitimize the Jewish state as a whole and not merely a pressure tactic against its policies toward the Palestinians. However, Netanyahu calls anyone who condemns Israel's crimes anti-Semites. That is the Jewish guilt that has worked for Israel for decades. Anti-Semitism is prejudice, hate or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish religion or heritage. The EU movement has nothing to do with racism or prejudice. It is about the illegality of Israel's settlements, Israel's denial of Palestinian rights and the need to boycott companies producing in settlements as a minimal measure of ending complicity in grave violations of human rights. As much as Netanyahu hates to admit it, the world is not practising anti-Semitism but Israelis like Netanyahu are practising Zionism, the national movement of Jews that supports the creation of a Jewish homeland in the territory the Jews defined as the land of Israel. Of course, Zionism is a colonialist, racist ideology that led to the denial of rights, dispossession and expulsion of the indigenous population of Palestine. Anti-Semitism is manifested in expressions of hatred or discrimination against individual Jews to attacks by mobs, state police, or even the military on Jewish communities. But the flurry of activity of European firms does not come under any of these categories. Rather, it comes at a time when companies are more accountable to consumer and civil society groups. There is a slow accumulation of a sense that there are legal and reputational risks for companies to engage in business activities which involve illegal settlements. That is not being anti-Semitic. That is having a conscience.
