You can do something for Al-Quds!

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim,

Al-Quds and Palestine lands acquire currency with US’ recognition of Al-Quds as Israel’s capital and 100th anniversary of withdrawal of Ottoman Empire from Palestine lands, Alhamdulillah. With these incidents public opinion start to react and show interest to occupation and cruelty in these lands. Without any of them, Al-Quds and Palestine already have a special place in Muslims’ heart. For 100 years, we lack both protecting lives and properties of our brothers and sisters, and showing respect and interest to our first qibla, Al-Aqsa. We only remember these lands when Gaza was bombed intensely or incidents in Al-Aqsa are not bearable any more. It’s the time for come to our senses.

We thought deeply what can we do for Palestine, and decided to boycott affectively and actively. Because we cannot reach out to Gaza, and Al-Quds are under the occupying state’s gun.

From time to time, there was some boycotting movements take place in Turkey but they were focused on only products not companies. So we witnessed that people boycotting some of the products of a company while buying others. Somehow Turkish people couldn’t adopt boycotting. Boycott couldn’t be more than a flow when something happened until today. However, there is hope. Because we have international boycott campaigns which are born in Palestine and spread to the world.

Maybe, the BDS movement is the most reliable movement in this area. They aims to become one in the world against Israel. BDS said that “The global nature of today’s economy means that there are thousands of companies that have links to Israel and are complicit to various degrees in Israel’s violations of international law. However, for our movement to have real impact we need our consumer boycotts to be easy to explain, have wide appeal and the potential for success. That’s why we particularly focus globally on a select few strategic campaigns. We also encourage the principle of context sensitivity, whereby activists in any given context decide what best to target and how, in line with BDS guidelines. There is a lot of information online claiming that some large companies give money to Israel, some of which turns out to be false. BDS has built a reputation for strictly adhering to established facts and producing the most accurate information.”

The two important resource BDS showed are Investigate and WhoProfits. Later, we will make an effort to create a list of active companies and their products in Turkey. For now, to people who says “I want to boycott all of them, give me the full list”, we will give the list of Inminds. (We couldn’t provide its link because the website is banned in Turkey for some reasons.) In the ongoing process we are aiming to create an original list of companies and products which is sold in Turkey and equivalent products to them.

Let’s see companies BDS mentioned:

Caterpillar bulldozers are regularly used in the demolition of Palestinian homes and farms and in Israel’s massacres in Gaza. SodaStream, Ahava, Sabra Hummus are companies which are not available in Turkey but they profits Israel. In addition, Hewlett Packard helps run the ID system that Israel uses to restrict Palestinian movement. Apart from these, there are more companies BDS mentioned in their web-site: Cemex SAB de CV, DXC Technology, Dexia Group, Fosun International Limited, G4S plc, Genie Energy Ltd., HeidelbergCement Group and Motorola Solutions Inc.

Motorola Solutions Inc., Caterpillar Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise are companies we are familiar. However, HeidelbergCement and Decia Gropu via Denizbank are the two companies exist in Turkey. Others are not active or doesn’t exist in Turkey.

Just as we said before, BDS focused on companies which their suffering leads to Israel’s. They also boycotting other companies but their main targets are those companies we mentioned. At this point, BDS calls to both personal boycott and forcing the companies and governments. Beside economic boycott, BDS emphasized importance of cultural and academic boycott. To make this real, we need to an eager and powerful group and of course volunteers.

Well then, what can we do personally?

It is very simple. There are companies keeping the leading positions in Turkey. You can boycott these companies and their products, announce your boycott to your community, your friends and family. Inminds had made a list and visualized it. You can find products under the company logos. We are still investigating the company names whether they support Israel or not and which way they support. However we already know some of the company names in the list are holding a huge place in Israeli economy.  

We will give details later but to sum up, these companies have Zionist founders or occupying state love them so they gave Jubilee Awards to the CEOs or founders of companies. In addition they have factories in Israel which are providing excessive cash flow their economy. Some of them (like Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Caterpillar) support Israel with construction – destruction and ID system for Palestinians. Volvo is catching up with Caterpillar when it comes to construction – destruction.

Of course they don’t do these things without repayment. Technically, they are just investing money to a country just like they do to ours. They are investing their money to a country. You feel annoyed when you read the “a country”, right? You see, our fundamental problem is calling Israel as a country when they are only occupant oppressors on land they  has no right.

Why we got angry when Trump said Al-Quds is capital of Israel? Because US isn’t to decide that, there is no legitimacy and even Al-Quds isn’t going to be capital to anyone with just one statement, it encourages occupying state and give power to it. The companies above, strengthen occupants’ hand more than Trump’s statement with million dollars.

Are these companies go bankrupt with only one cup of coffee, a bottle of coke or a chocolate bar and withdraw their investment from Israel? Of course, they aren’t. Our aim isn’t make companies to go bankrupt, it is driving them into a corner and make them segregate Israel.  Do you know that BDS was a key factor behind at 46% drop in foreign direct investment into Israel in 2014 compared to 2013? In other words, YES, a cup of coffee, a computer, a boot, or construction machines if you are client you don’t buy is enough to annoy Israel.

This article is only the beginning, an intention article actually. It will continue with other articles with allowance of Allah. Fi Amaan Allah until the next article, don’t forget to be aware of and create awareness.