Photo: CC-by-ND - Jennifer Moo via FlickrToday (12 March 2012), Adalah and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) submitted a petition to the Israeli Supreme Court, seeking to annul the “Boycott Prohibition Law,” which imposes sanctions on any individual or entity who calls for an economic boycott of Israeli settlements or of Israel. The Knesset passed the Boycott Prohibition Law in July 2011, in the wake of the decision of several prominent Israeli artists not to appear or perform in settlements in the West Bank as an act of protest against the occupation.
Adalah and ACRI submitted the petition in their own names and on behalf of seven other organizations. Six of the petitioners are Israeli human rights organizations: Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, ACRI, the Public Committee against Torture in Israel, HaMoked: Center for the Defense of the Individual, The Center for Reform for Religion and State, and Yesh Din. The other three petitioners are the Coalition of Women for Peace, whose project “Who Profits from the Occupation?” collects financial information on Israeli and international companies that benefit economically from the occupation of Palestinian territory and the Syrian Golan Heights; the High Follow Up Committee for Arab Citizens in Israel, which openly calls for a boycott of Israeli settlement products; and the Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Center, which maintains that calling on the people of East Jerusalem to boycott Israel constitutes peaceful resistance to the Occupation.
In the petition, Adalah attorneys Hassan Jabareen and Sawsan Zaher, and ACRI Chief Legal Counsel Dan Yakir, claim that:
- The law imposes a “price tag” on legitimate political expression, and thus undermines public debate on the most controversial issues in Israeli society.
- The law violates the constitutional rights of freedom of expression, dignity and equality.
- With the severe sanctions it can impose, the law has created a “chilling effect” that gags those who wish to express a political stance by calling for a boycott.
The Boycott Prohibition Law creates a tort cause of action for claimants injured by a boycott to seek damages from those who called for it. The law also empowers the Minister of Finance to impose severe economic sanctions on Israeli individuals, groups and institutions that receive any state support if they call for a boycott or agree to participate.
Both the law itself and its impact on constitutional rights have been sharply criticized by civil society and human rights organizations in Israel and abroad, and by the European Union and the United States government. The Knesset’s Legal Adviser also expressed his strong stance against the law, stating that it constitutes “injury to the heart of free political expression in Israel.”
The Petition (in Hebrew)
The Boycott Prohibition Law (in English)
