The Israel boycott movement. Old hatred in a new guise.
Book presentation by Alex Feuerherdt and Florian Markl
When: Wednesday, 18 November 2020, 19:00
Where: online stream via FacebookFor years the BDS movement has been causing a stir in Germany and internationally. Supported by prominent individuals, the movement demands a total boycott of Israel. In connection with BDS there have been numerous antisemitic incidents – Jewish women and men take note of this with the greatest concern.
In 2019 the German Bundestag adopted the resolution „Resolutely oppose the BDS movement – combat antisemitism“. In this decision, calls for a boycott of the Jewish state were condemned as antisemitic.
But the campaign continues. All over the world, Jewish women and men are put under pressure by the campaign. Here and there the campaign receives support from civil society. But who is behind these appeals? And what is the core of this campaign?
The current Israel boycott movement claims to have arisen in 2005 in response to a call by „Palestinian civil society“, to stand up merely for the observance of human rights and not to be antisemitic. Reality, however, looks different: by invoking civil society, the movement obscures its actual roots. It is not concerned with the rights of the Palestinians, but with the demonisation and delegitimisation of Israel. It represents old hatred in a new guise. In its propaganda, Israel is defamed in a grotesquely distorted manner, singled out and not treated by the same standards as all other countries in the world. Where it used to be „Don’t buy from Jews!“, the slogan today is: „Boycott Israel!“
Alex Feuerherdt is a freelance publicist and lives in Cologne. He works mainly on the topics of Israel, the Middle East, antisemitism and football and writes regularly for, among others, the Jüdische Allgemeine, n-tv.de, Jungle World and Konkret. He is also the operator of the blog Lizas Welt. Together with Florian Markl, Feuerherdt already published a book with the publisher Hentrich & Hentrich in 2018: „Vereinte Nationen gegen Israel – Wie die Uno den jüdischen Staat delegitimiert“.
Florian Markl is a political scientist and academic director of the Middle East think tank Mena-Watch in Vienna. Previously he was an archivist and historian at the Allgemeiner Entschädigungsfonds für Opfer des Nationalsozialismus and a lecturer at the Institute of Political Science at the University of Vienna. Contributions by him have appeared, among others, in the newspapers „Die Presse“ and „Der Standard“ and in the magazine „konkret“.
The conversation is moderated by Elio Adler.
The event takes place online and is streamed on Facebook. Questions to the two experts can also be asked here: https://www.facebook.com/events/694850797821068
The stream will be visible directly on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/WerteInitiative
The event is supported by the „Bildungs- und Aktionswochen gegen Antisemitismus“ of the Amadeu-Antonio-Stiftung.
