Activists protested the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra’s performance at the Walt Disney Concert Hall last week as part of a growing global movement of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) in support of the Palestinian cause. 

Los Angeles marked the end of the orchestra’s U.S. tour and a potential turning point in the BDS movement in the United States.  It was one of the first times that regional BDS activists coordinated a unified national call to boycott Israel through the Philharmonic. 

“We hope to send a message to the Israeli Philharmonic and Israel that it can’t drown out Palestinian calls for justice with pretty music,” said Radhika Sainath, of BDS Los Angeles for Justice in Palestine.

Demonstrators organized actions in five of the six cities where the orchestra performed.  In Los Angeles, there were 30 protestors picketing, holding banners and signs which read, “Without justice there is no harmony” and “Don’t harmonize with Apartheid.”  

While this wasn’t the first time the Israeli Philharmonic had come to the U.S. and had been the focal point of pro-Palestinian action, it was a first time for many of these demonstrators. 

BDS activists compared the situation in Israel to South African apartheid and said that the cultural boycott underscores Israeli human rights abuses and violations of international law. 

A plethora of organizations now exist to promote BDS’ three goals: an end to the occupation; equal rights and an end to discrimination of minorities, and allowing displaced Palestinians to return to their homes. 

“BDS is something anyone can participate in,” said David Lloyd, founding member of U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.  Individuals can use non-violent means to promote change, he said pointing to the effective BDS movement that was instrumental in ending South African apartheid.

For Lloyd and the protesters, the Philharmonic tour is part of propaganda campaign to brand Israel.

“Israel aims to show it’s an enclave of Western civilization in the midst of a barbaric Middle East [and] that it’s modern, masking that it’s an ethnocracy and theocracy,” he said.

In 2004, Palestinian academics and unions called for cultural and academic boycott of Israel.  A year later, 170 Palestinian civil society groups made the wider call for BDS, kicking off the movement that has been growing every since.

“Government has not made changes to how it treats Israel,” said Taher Herzallah of American Muslims for Palestine referring to U.S. foreign policy. “So now we’re putting it in the people’s hands.”

While BDS has been embraced by Europe and elsewhere like South Africa, it has been less successful in the United States.

“The United States is the belly of the beast,” said Marsha Steinberg, a retired union organizer who is part of BDSLA.  “Even with the United States, Los Angeles is the hardest [to organize].” 

According to Steinberg, Los Angeles has a large and wealthy pro-Israel community.

Even so, dedicated activists are promoting BDS in Los Angeles as a way to end the occupation and promote social justice for Palestinians.

Last fall, Los Angeles was the kick off of a statewide campaign to get California’s two largest public pensions to divest from Israel.  The Israel Divestment Campaign aimed to get a ballot initiative that would require the California Public Employee Retirement System and California State Teachers Retirement System to divest $1.5 billion from companies who provide military supplies and services to Israel or construction materials for settlements.

The campaign cited the pensions’ own social responsibility clauses and policy manuals in support of its call. 

The first-of-its-kind campaign only gathered 12,000 of the 433,000 necessary signatures, but it’s continuing an online campaign as well as approaching the pensions directly.  

Civil society groups, celebrities and artists, as well as other governments have come out in support of the movement.  

Last month, author and foundering member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, Omar Barghouti had his visa for traveling to the United States delayed, effectively cancelling his tour promoting his book on pro-Palestinian BDS.

Pro-Palestinian supporters said they believe this was linked to Barghouti’s leading role in the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee, the organization leading the BDS movement globally.

The Israeli legislative branch, or Knesset, is now debating a law that would make support for BDS illegal.  The law would affect Barghouti, a graduate student at Tel Aviv University. Also, those outside of Israel who support BDS might be barred from entering the country for up to 10 years if the law passes.

“It’s a symptom of how frightened they are,” said Lloyd.

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