Major UK union declares Israel boycott

Just ahead of the cabinet's authorization Sunday of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's offer to release 250 Fatah security prisoners as a goodwill gesture to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, another British organization has called for sanctions against Israel over its policies in the PA.The British Transport and General Workers Union, one of the UK's largest, voted on Saturday to boycott all products made in Israel.
Ahead of the actual vote, Eric McDonald, secretary of TGWU's Birmingham branch, which proposed the boycott motion, compared Israel to Nazi Germany.AJC Executive Director David A. Harris [Read Harris's blog on JPost.com] called McDonald's words a "despicable expression of anti-Semitism." Harris cited the "Working Definition of anti-Semitism" first adopted by the European Monitoring Center on Racism and Xenophobia, and now endorsed by various European bodies, including a UK parliamentary inquiry into anti-Semitism."Whereas traditional anti-Semitism stigmatized and isolated the individual Jew, these recent boycott votes are attempts to stigmatize and isolate the Jewish state," said Harris in a press release.In response to the vote, the Histadrut Labor Federation announced that it would cut all existing ties with the union, which represents some 800,000 workers.Histadrut chairman Ofer Eini is expected to move on Monday that his organization cut all ties with groups that back boycotts of Israel or Israeli goods.
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