Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions

What Is the BDS Movement?

Boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) is a time-honored and effective economic pressure strategy for human rights. Modeled after global organizing to end apartheid in South Africa, BDS applies the same pressure tactics to move dollars away from the Israeli apartheid state.

You get to decide where to spend your money. Use your economic power. Boycott products on the BDS Movement’s list below, and mobilize your whole community to divest from Israel. Make it too costly for companies and institutions to do business with genocide.

How BDS Started

In 2005, 170 Palestinian civil society organizations issued a historic, rights-based call for BDS to the international community, targeting Israel and institutions complicit in its oppression against the Palestinian people.¹ USCPR endorsed the Palestinian call for BDS shortly after it was issued in 2005.

How BDS For Palestine Is Going

According to Israel’s Ministry of Finance, the economic growth rate dropped from 3% before the genocide to zero growth in 2024.²

Arab Center Washington DC

During the current ongoing genocide, BDS tactics have remained critical stepping stones in the long-haul fight for justice and liberation. USCPR’s North Star remains our demand to Stop Arming Israel, which includes sanctions to end U.S. military funding to Israel. Boycott and divestment efforts that pressure companies enabling Israel’s violence help build toward that goal.

Divestment campaigns are happening at college campuses, local city councils, state governments, churches, unions, and beyond, winning hundreds of victories in the U.S. alone. USCPR Youth Fellows have taken skills gleaned in their fellowship to go on and lead divestment campaigns, playing a role in victories such as ending Pitzer College’s apartheid Israel study abroad program. Here’s a list of BDS victories nationwide.

BDS Boycott List: At A Glance

The graphic below offers a BDS list of complicit companies identified by the Palestinian-led BDS National Committee for consumers to boycott. Read this guide from the BDS Movement. For more on complicit corporations, you can also review the American Friends Service Committee’s (AFSC) list of companies profiting from the Gaza genocide and full divestment list.

---

The Easiest Way To Boycott Genocide: The Boycat App

The BDS Movement has partnered with the Boycat app to empower people of conscience with corporate ethics information, by simply scanning the product’s barcode. They even have a browser extension for online shopping.

With 9 million products tracked and stored in their database, this app has become the secret weapon of economic pressure tactics. Israel unsuccessfully tried to buy the company a month into its $150 million propaganda campaign launch.

BDS Spotlight: Palantir

BDS Spotlight: Boycott Chevron

The Palestinian-led BDS Movement has issued a call to boycott and divest from the fossil fuel giant Chevron, including picketing the thousands of Chevron, Texaco, and Caltex gas stations and refineries worldwide.

Chevron gas fuels nearly 50% of Israel’s electricity grid. It also extracts gas from the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, generating billions of dollars for apartheid Israel, depriving Palestinians of their right to their own natural resources, and fueling genocide and environmental devastation.⁴

Use our new Boycott Chevron campaign page to plan your demonstrations, from picketing to stickering. You can also print flyers, signs, and stickers.

Beyond Boycotting: How To Escalate BDS For Palestine

1. Demand Sanctions On Israel Now

The “S” in BDS stands for sanctions: a form of economic pressure placed on a nation, in this case specifically to end complicity in Israel’s ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people. Countries have a legal obligation under international law to immediately sanction and stop arming Israel, as the International Court of Justice has advised. In September 2024, the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly voted for imposing sanctions on Israel.

Stop arming Israel now. The U.S. is the biggest funder, weapons supplier, and enabler of the Israeli military. An immediate arms embargo is necessary to cut off the endless supply of U.S. weapons and military funding, which Israel is using to mass murder Palestinian families.

2. Scan Your Portfolio for BDS Investments And Divest

Palestinian rights supporters have been asking how they can scan their own investments or the portfolios of their universities, municipalities, unions, churches, businesses, and other institutions to check if they’re invested in companies profiting from Israel’s brutal military occupation and genocide against the Palestinian people. This information can be a crucial first step in launching a divestment campaign in response to the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS).

Use this divestment tool at investigate.afsc.org, and see this divestment list from AFSC.

3. Research the Genocide Gentry and Other Local Connections

4. Raise Awareness About BDS

Print out BDS stickers to spread far and wide, like these printable Boycott Chevron stickers. These also look great on flyers for wheatpasting or on signs for BDS protests. Before stickering or wheatpasting, make sure to research local laws, which may vary.

5. Run a Local Divestment Campaign

Divestment is a key strategy because it’s tangible: It moves dollars away from weapons companies and complicit corporations that fuel genocide, making the war machine increasingly less profitable. Demand that your city/town withdraws investments from corporations complicit in genocide.

Find out how to organize for divestment through your city council, state pension fund, union, university, or other local institution. To learn more about starting a divestment campaign, see this City Council Divestment Toolkit from our sibling organization USCPR Action.

---

More Ways to Take Action

BACK: Go to the Stop Gaza Genocide toolkit.

This toolkit is intended to be a 501(c)3 compliant resource. It is not intended to advocate for unlawful activities.