Pro-BDS groups like Code Pink, The US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, and The Electronic Intifada have done their part to spread the word but in a way that Johansson probably did not anticipate. In the Super Bowl ad - which SodaStream ultimately edited so it could be broadcast during the game and then posted, unedited, on its YouTube channel - the actress says SodaStream spells "less sugar, less bottles." Then she quips, "If only I could make this message go viral," shedding a white lab coat and appearing in a revealing, black skirt. The reason that SodaStream was singled out is not a mystery: its global ambassador - who also starred in its Super Bowl commercial - is Scarlett Johansson. All of these outfits - those with a presence in Area C and those that just outsource to the wider West Bank labor market - benefit from the depressed wages made possible by, among other things, Israeli occupation. Fanzilla, which helps clients up their Facebook fan base, has Palestinian software developers. Intel and Cisco employ Palestinian programmers. On top of all this are the Palestinian firms hired by outside companies and scattered across the West Bank. In the Mishor Adumim Industrial Park, where the SodaStream factory is located, there are roughly 300 factories, most of which are owned by Israelis. It is home to about 300,000 Palestinians, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.) Other Palestinians at Israeli companies in Area C make things like circuit boards, ceramic pipes, plastic bags, exfoliators, and fake lawns. Area C, unlike Areas A and B, is under full Israeli control and encompasses 61 percent of the West Bank’s land mass. (The West Bank is divided into three zones, or areas. The 500 Palestinian employees at the 220,000-square-foot Ma’ale Adumim plant, which includes three manufacturing buildings and four warehouses, are a fraction of the 20,000 Palestinians working at Israeli firms in Area C. It was about the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, the plight of the Palestinians, and even the right of the Jewish state to exist at all.Īll the hubbub obscured an important fact: SodaStream is hardly the only business with a hearty business in occupied territory. SodaStream was no longer about homemade seltzer. But the flare-up quickly turned political, and in a matter of days, if not hours, it had become a proxy battle pitting Israel’s most hostile critics against its most impassioned defenders. Allegedly, the ad was killed because it included a jab at two of the game’s sponsors, Coke and Pepsi. Then in January the company, which is headquartered near Tel Aviv and has a factory in the West Bank settlement of Ma’ale Adumim, 10 minutes by car from Jerusalem, was catapulted into the national news after Fox canceled a SodaStream ad planned for the Super Bowl. It was mostly symbolic: there were only a handful of Israeli products sold at the co-op, including tapenade, organic paprika, kosher marshmallows, and a sleek, home-carbonation machine called SodaStream.Īt the time, SodaStream was not a household name. The vote had been precipitated by the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions, or BDS, movement, which seeks to use economic and political pressure to force Israel to withdraw from the West Bank. In March of 2012, members of the Park Slope Food Co-op in Brooklyn voted against boycotting Israeli goods.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |