Around the country, legislators have sought to curry the support of pro-Israel voters by silencing and intimidating those who advocate on behalf of Palestinian rights. Numerous laws that have been proposed or passed, including the one Florida passed two years ago, threaten to punish those who advocate for a boycott of Israel until it ceases its human rights violations.
Because the First Amendment protects the right to advocate for a boycott, these laws are patently unconstitutional, and two federal courts have so held. While Florida’s law has not yet ended up in court, if Gov. DeSantis follows through on his threat to punish Airbnb for refusing to allow listings in Israeli settlements built illegally in the Palestinian-occupied territories, Florida’s will surely become the third law to be declared unconstitutional. Florida’s taxpayers will also become some hundreds of thousands of dollars poorer at the end of the process.
Now, undaunted by the illegality of such efforts, Florida legislators have proposed yet another law, HB 741, that is designed to shield Israel from being held accountable for its actions. HB 741, entitled “An act relating to anti-Semitism,” takes its cue from an increasingly common tactic of Israel’s defenders, namely, equating criticism of Israel’s human rights policies with anti-Semitism. At the core of that tactic is the charge that, since there are many other countries that violate human rights, those who focus on violations by the Jewish state must be doing so because they are anti-Semitic. The charge is baseless.
There are a number of reasons that individuals and organizations around the world choose to protest Israel’s human-rights practices. For those who, like us, are Jewish, the fact that Israel purports to speak in the name of the Jewish people means that we feel compelled to actively dissociate ourselves from and strongly oppose what we believe to be immoral practices. Beyond that, many in the United States, motivated by the fact that Israel receives more than $3 billion every year in U.S. aid, do not support our tax dollars being used to fund practices that violate human rights.
Yes, of course other countries violate human rights and many of us would and do support calls for collective action by those negatively impacted by those practices. Supporting the boycott movement opposing the South African apartheid system was just one such example. In the case of Israel’s human-rights abuses, there is a global call by Palestinian grassroots civil society to hold Israel accountable to change its discriminatory behavior.
It is not discriminatory to hold any nation-state accountable for its human rights abuses and for violations of international law. There is nothing anti-Semitic about that in any rational definition of anti-Semitism. The smears of anti-Semitism are not only lies, but they do great harm to people’s lives, negatively impacting their jobs and their careers, and of course their personal lives and emotional well-being.
Charges of anti-Semitism have become a distressingly familiar cudgel with which to beat back critics of Israel. We see it in the halls of Congress; we see it hurled at black activist leaders; and we see it on college campuses. Even supporters of Israel should be concerned with the tactic. There are two reasons: First, the charge that Israel is violating Palestinian rights is a serious one. It has been documented by international human rights agencies as well as by some Israelis themselves. If Israel’s defenders believe the charge is unfounded, they should respond with evidence and welcome such a debate. In truth, these conversations don’t take place because Israel’s human rights violations have been well-documented and are indisputable. Second, these are days in which there has been a serious rise in real acts of anti-Semitism. It diminishes the seriousness of that development by using false charges to punish supporters of Palestinian rights.
There is little doubt that a prosecution under HB 741 for criticizing Israel will be challenged as unconstitutional. But beyond that, we should all be deeply troubled by any attempt by the government to put someone in jail simply for speaking out on a matter of such public concern as a country’s human rights violations.
Alan Levine is a civil rights and constitutional lawyer, and Donna Nevel is a community psychologist and educator. They live in South Florida.
