#73 Ben Jamal & Aimee Shalan | Defending the Right to Boycott - Confronting the UK’s Anti-BDS Bil

Palestine Deep Dive

The UK government has announced that it will press ahead to pass its long-anticipated ‘Anti-BDS Bill’ which has drawn strong condemnation from campaigners across the UK and beyond.

The Economic Activity of Public Bodies bill, if enacted, will prevent public bodies (eg universities and local councils) from divesting from companies and organisations found to be complicit in Israeli crimes against Palestinians.

The bill is due to be debated by the House of Commons in the first week of July. Its stated purpose is "to prevent public bodies from being influenced by political or moral disapproval of foreign states when taking certain economic decisions".

But at a time when Israel further entrenches its settler-colonialism and apartheid by the day, killing Palestinians at an unprecedented rate, shooting journalists, expanding its illegal settlements, demolishing Palestinian homes and upholding its besiegement of millions of Palestinians in the open-air prison of Gaza, this bill is being widely interpreted as an attempt by the UK government to maintain Israel’s impunity in the face of growing solidarity with Palestine. While the UK’s Palestine Solidarity Campaign claims the government’s main target is campaigns in support of Palestinian rights, it also suggest those pushing for action against deforestation, environmental pollution and the exploitation of children and workers could also be affected by the Bill.

Ben Jamal is the Director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), the largest organisation in solidarity with Palestinians in the UK. PSC has been leading the efforts to prevent this bill from passing into law. Jamal’s family were among the over 750,000 Palestinians driven from their homes in the 1948 Nakba.

Aimee Shalan is the Co-Director of Makan and Chair of the British Palestinian Committee. Shalan was the former CEO of Medical Aid for Palestinians and the former Director of Friends of Birzeit University (FOBZU). Aimee holds a doctorate in the Politics of Palestinian Literature. Shalan was born in the UK with her family originally hailing from Haifa, having been forced to leave in the 1948 Nakba.