EBS loses 320 milion euro contract in Netherlands over its involvement in Israeli apartheid
More than 1,000 UK cultural figures join cultural boycott
French firms pulls out of Jerusalem cable car after government warning
Barclay’s divests from Elbit Systems
20 businesses across South Africa join GS4 boycott
Veolia sells Israel businesses targeted by Palestinian-led boycott campaign
The Central Council of the Confederation of National Trade Unions joins the BDS movement
Lauren Hill cancels her concert in Israel
1,600 Spanish academics join academic boycott
University of Helsinki cancels G4S contract over support for Israeli prisons
450 Belgian academics join academic boycott
Foreign investment in Israel plummets
United Church of Christ votes to divest from Israel
Telecom giant Orange announces end to Israel presence
Veolia sells off all Israel operations
EU announces labelling of settlement products
Brazil refuses to accept settler as Israeli ambassador
United Electrical Union Workers adopts BDS
Soda Stream leaves illegal settlement factory
500 British academics pledge support for academic boycott
Spanish soccer club turns down 5 million euro Israeli sponsorship
Dutch pharmacies stop selling Ahava
US Anthropologists back Israel boycott in landslide vote
Why does Hillary Clinton oppose BDS?
Well, here, I must take the cynical view; it’s all about the Benjamins.
Clinton’s #1 donor is Haim Saban:
Saban happens to be Clinton and her husband’s top political patron. An Israeli-American businessman, he came into billions of dollars in the entertainment business. According to The Washington Post, Saban and his wife have poured more than $2 million into Hillary Clinton’s presidential coffers; he has vowed to spend “as much as needed” to see her installed in the White House.
and his #1 concern is Israel:
I’m a one-issue guy, and my issue is Israel
His greatest concern, he says, is to protect Israel, by strengthening the United States-Israel relationship. At a conference last fall in Israel, Saban described his formula. His “three ways to be influential in American politics,” he said, were: make donations to political parties, establish think tanks, and control media outlets. In 2002, he contributed seven million dollars toward the cost of a new building for the Democratic National Committee—one of the largest known donations ever made to an American political party. That year, he also founded the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, in Washington, D.C. He considered buying The New Republic, but decided it wasn’t for him. He also tried to buy Time and Newsweek, but neither was available. He and his private-equity partners acquired Univision in 2007, and he has made repeated bids for the Los Angeles Times.
By far his most important relationship is with Bill and Hillary Clinton
His hawkish influence has already manifest itself in the primary. In July, in a letter to Saban, Clinton pledged to fight BDS and asked his help with ideas on how to do so. Asking for Saban’s ideas during a democratic primary doesn’t seem like a winning move. In November he called for more scrutiny of Muslims, which he had to walk back.
Some democrats argue that the hawkish Clinton/Saban type of support for Israel is standard fare in the democratic party. To respond to that, I’ll finish up with a quote from The Forward:
All this might raise a question: If Saban is not so different than other hawkish pro-Israel Democrats on policies of national security and foreign policy, why are his comments so important?
The answer is that Hillary Clinton stands a good chance at becoming president and Saban is tremendously influential on her. His positions ought to worry us because they may indicate a different approach to Israel just as many Americans are starting to understand what we risk by adopting unquestioning, robust support for a state that is turning sharply to the right—at a cost to both the U.S.’s bottom line and our moral standing.