The government has passed a law that bars entry to foreigners who have publicly supported a boycott of Israel “or an area under its control”.
In 2014, Netanyahu convened a meeting of top Israeli ministers to discuss possible counter-BDS measures, including, according to the Israeli daily Haaretz, “legal suits in European and North American courts against [BDS] organisations”, “legal action against financial institutions that boycott settlements”, and “whether to activate the pro-Israel lobby in the US, specifically Aipac, in order to promote legislation in Congress”. Since then, major banks around the world have shut down the accounts of pro-BDS groups. In 24 US states, bills and orders that stifle free speech by discouraging, penalising or restricting support for boycotts of Israel or of settlements have been passed...
Israel’s strategy has been to force a choice on companies subjected to pressure to withdraw or divest: stay in Israeli-controlled territory and ignore the boycott campaign, or accede to its demands and face potential lawsuits and losses in much bigger markets in Europe and the US.
David Shulman, a renowned Indologist, Hebrew University professor, and activist with Ta’ayush (“co-existence”), a leftwing Israeli-Palestinian group that protects Palestinians from Israeli settler attacks, said that his biggest problem with BDS was “the virulent tonality” of it: “I understand it is a heterogeneous movement. But so much of it is based on hatred, which is a terrible basis for political action.”
[BDS co-founder] “Omar [Barghouti] said: ‘Look, I don’t want the west to come and save us. I’m not asking for the west to come invade Israel. I’m just asking it to stop supporting our oppression.’” Snitz added: “It’s true that this conflict is not special in how bad the violations are. What is special is how much the liberal west actively supports them.”