On Wednesday evening, British Members of Parliament (MPs) voted on the third reading of the Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill, or what is commonly referred to as the Anti-Boycott Bill. The bill was passed with 282 MPs voting for it and 235 MPs voting against it. The bill will now progress to Britain’s upper house, the House of Lords, where it will either be passed into law, or amendments will be proposed.  

The bill bans public bodies, including local councils, authorities, cultural institutions, and universities from imposing their own boycott or divestment campaigns against foreign countries and territories. It will prevent a range of public institutions from taking ethical issues into account when spending or investing their money. Unusually for a bill that is meant to have universal applicability, it singles out one entity for special protection: "Israel". 

The bill is proving highly controversial drawing public protest and opposition from more than sixty campaign groups. 

The controversy centres on the blatant silencing of public institutions – a growing number of which are critical of "Israel" - by explicitly prohibiting them from boycotting, divesting, or sanctioning the country. Many human rights organisations believe such restrictions will normalise the oppression of Palestinians and prolong "Israel’s" illegal occupation of Palestine. 

The practice of boycotts has a long history. Mahatma Gandhi started a boycott of English-manufactured goods, notably cloth. The boycott spread across India and cut British cloth imports by half from £26 million in 1929 to £13.7 million in 1930. Boycotts remained part of India’s struggle until it gained independence in 1947. 

In December 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in the town of Montgomery, Alabama for disorderly conduct, convicted, and fined $14, the equivalent of approximately $550 today. Of course, we know Parks was actually arrested for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man. Her arrest led to a thirteen-month bus boycott and ended with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling segregation on public buses was unconstitutional.

Boycotts of South African cultural and sporting events were commonplace in the late 1970s and 1980s and played a significant role in ending the repressive apartheid regime. Years later, Nelson Mandela, leader of the African National Congress and South Africa’s first black president, told Riverdance artist Robert Ballagh: “The boycott was one of the most important weapons in the struggle against apartheid.”

In the 2000s, pension funds, public institutions, and sovereign funds began divesting from fossil fuel companies to force them to change their environmentally damaging practices. The divestment strategy was endorsed in 2015 by World Bank President Jim Yong Kim who commented: “Every company, investor, and bank that screens new and existing investments for climate risk is simply being pragmatic.”

Boycotts and divestments are economic levers which play a critical role in isolating bad states and pressurising dishonest governments to reform. They have a successful track record of ending discriminatory policies and oppressive practices, which makes it highly worrying the British government is attempting to remove the right of public institutions to decide how and where they ethically invest and trade.  

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Disturbingly the preferencing of "Israel" and its occupation rule doesn’t end there. Contained in the bill is a clause asserting "Israel", the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and the Occupied Golan Heights as territories which “can never be exempted” from the protection of the proposed legislation. This means the immunity afforded to "Israel" and occupying power is permanent, and beyond redress unless at some future point, the bill is overturned. 

The bill’s authors must have been aware of its perverse and cruel logic as they included a further clause, one which prohibits individuals bound by it from making any statement indicating they would contravene the bill were it lawful to do so. This is a gagging order designed to censor public sector workers, who could face fines or imprisonment if they express a pro-boycott opinion that isn’t endorsed by the national government. The clause is severe and unprecedented.

The bill provides "Israel" with impunity despite its apartheid practices, current war crimes, and land theft. The practical implications are shocking - public institutions will be forced to recognise illegal Israeli settlements as legitimate territories. 

The bill is discriminatory in nature, nonsensical in parts, and is clearly less about boycotts than it is about quashing Palestinian solidarity across a range of institutions in the UK.  

As the voting on the bill took place, Ben Jamal, Director of the UK’s Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, said: “It is a national scandal that in the midst of this humanitarian catastrophe, the Government is seeking to push through its pernicious anti-boycott bill, which would prevent public bodies from acting in line with the wishes of their members, and divesting from companies complicit in human rights abuses.”

The origins of the Anti-Boycott Bill can be traced back to June 2016 and a British High Court ruling that dismissed a legal challenge to Leicester city council's resolution to boycott goods produced in illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied West Bank. The case was brought by Jewish Human Rights Watch, which argued the boycotts were discriminatory against Jews, and therefore in violation of UK law. 

Lord Justice Simon disagreed and concluded the council’s resolution was a “lawful exercise of its public functions in relation to public supply or works contracts.” 

MP and minister Michael Gove, who is a “friend of Israel” and suggested being a Zionist was common sense, championed the idea of banning boycotts through a change in the law, and by 2019  the Conservative manifesto included a pledge to “ban public bodies from imposing their own direct or indirect boycotts, disinvestment or sanctions campaigns against foreign countries.” 

By June 2023, the bill was ready to be put before MPs in the lower house, the House of Commons. Unusually for a piece of legislation, it was accompanied by a lengthy press release and a quote from a non-government official, Marie van der Zyl, President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews. 

The bill had its second reading in July and went before a committee session in September.

It is ironic the bill’s third reading was on the eve of South Africa’s genocide case against "Israel" in the International Court of Justice and highlights the entrenched nature of white settler colonialism in British government policy. As the country that authored the "state of Israel" into existence in 1917 - via the Balfour Declaration – Britain is determined to suppress any and all efforts to dismantle "Israel’s" apartheid system, and free the Palestinian people from the tyranny of occupation. 

At the time of writing, approximately 24,000 Palestinians have been murdered by "Israel" in Gaza and the West Bank since October 7th, 2023.