BDS movement nominated for Nobel Peace Prize
The Palestinian Solidarity Campaign and Jewish Voice for Peace released news this week that the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanction) movement has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
BDS opposes the illegal activities of the Israeli Government in denying the human and civil rights of civilians targeted by Israeli Government Apartheid policies, mainly in the Occupied territories.
Israel’s Apartheid Government has responded by banning any person or organization that supports BDS from entering Israel, a move ironically reminiscent of the actions taken in Germany during the 1930s against Jews.
Here is a statement released jointly by Ben Jamal, Director, Palestine Solidarity Campaign and Rebecca Vilkomerson, Executive Director, Jewish Voice for Peace, urging your support.
The Palestinian-led movement for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize!
Bjørnar Moxnes, the Norwegian Member of Parliament who formally made the nomination, said:
“Awarding this year’s Nobel Peace Prize to the BDS movement would be a powerful signal, emphasizing the international community’s commitment to support a just peace for the Palestinian people… the Israeli people and all people in the Middle East – and the world at large.”
We couldn’t agree more.
We don’t have to tell you how well-deserved this nomination is. For the past 12 years, people all over the world, often at great personal risk, have come together with this simple, irrefutable message:
Palestinians deserve justice, freedom, and dignity just like everyone else.
BDS stands in the same proud tradition of nonviolent resistance as the Montgomery bus boycotts, the United Farm Workers grape boycott, the boycott against South African apartheid, Gandhi’s boycott of British goods… the list goes on. And we know history will include BDS on that list.
In fact, we know it will be a model for grassroots movements to come. Using the BDS call as a strategic and moral guide, people all over the world have leveraged their power to wage unbelievably creative campaigns, driven by a truly beautiful and inclusive vision of what the world can be.
And just imagine the leap forward our work could take if BDS actually won the Nobel Peace Prize.
Today— as was the case with all those other boycotts, in their time— not everyone sees BDS for the principled movement that it is. Every day, BDS activists are attacked by those devoted to defending Israel’s apartheid system.
That’s why it’s so important to come out strong in our support for this nomination. And that’s why JVP and PSC have come together to advocate for this important recognition.
The Nobel Committee will publish a shortlist of nominees by the end of September. We need to lift our collective voice as high as we can today, and seize this opportunity to take a meaningful step towards justice.
Ray Hanania is an award winning political and humor columnist who analyzes American and Middle East politics, and life in general. He is an author of several books.
Hanania covered Chicago Politics and Chicago City Hall from 1976 through 1992 at the Daily Southtown and the Chicago Sun-Times. He began writing in 1975 publishing The Middle Eastern Voice newspaper in Chicago (1975-1977). He later published “The National Arab American Times” newspaper (2004-2007).
Hanania writes weekly columns on Middle East and American Arab issues as Special US Correspondent for the Arab News ArabNews.com, at TheArabDailyNews.com, and at SuburbanChicagoland.com. He has published weekly columns in the Jerusalem Post newspaper, YNetNews.com, Newsday, the Orlando Sentinel, Houston Chronical, and Arlington Heights Daily Herald.
Hanania is the recipient of four (4) Chicago Headline Club “Peter Lisagor Awards” for Column writing. In November 2006, he was named “Best Ethnic American Columnist” by the New American Media. In 2009, Hanania received the prestigious Sigma Delta Chi Award for Writing from the Society of Professional Journalists. He is the recipient of the MT Mehdi Courage in Journalism Award. He was honored for his writing skills with two (2) Chicago Stick-o-Type awards from the Chicago Newspaper Guild. In 1990, Hanania was nominated by the Chicago Sun-Times editors for a Pulitzer Prize for his four-part series on the Palestinian Intifada.
His writings have also been honored by two national Awards from ADC for his writing, and from the National Arab American Journalists Association.
Hanania is the US Special Correspondent for the Arab News Newspaper, covering Middle East and Arab American issues. He writes for the Southwest News newspaper group writing on mainstream American issues.
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