"In a democratic society anybody should be allowed to protest, but I find it really distasteful that a Jewish business is being targeted in this way," Australian Workers Union national secretary Paul Howes says. "If people are upset about the handling of the Middle East process then fine, but why don't they protest outside the Israeli embassy and direct their protest to the Israeli state rather than a Jewish business? If people do not like the policies of the Australian government, I wouldn't expect there to be a protest outside the RM Williams store."
Repeat after me: Israel is not an Apartheid state. This BDS campaign is just BS. Part of the effort to demonise, delegitimise and ultimately to destroy Israel. Or, as Peter Wertheim says better:
"The Israel-Palestinian conflict is a struggle between two nations, not a struggle for equality within one nation," the Executive Council of Australian Jewry's executive director Peter Wertheim says.
"Within Israel all citizens, including Jews, Arabs and Druze, have the same voting and legal rights . . . Jews and Arabs use the same public transport, eat at the same restaurants, shop at the same malls and play in the same sports teams.
"The BDS [Max Brenner] campaign in Australia is not really about economic pressure, it's about demonising and vilifying Israel."
Union leader Howes says: "If they [anti-Israeli protesters] are trying to equate the campaign against apartheid in South Africa with a campaign against a Jewish chocolate shop, they've got rocks in their head."
Read it all.
