WASHINGTON — The US House of Representatives passed on Wednesday a massive defense budget that would bar companies engaged in boycotts of Israel from Pentagon contracts.
According to The Intercept, this is the first step toward a federal law punishing criticism of Israel.
The bill would effectively ban contractors boycotting Israel from tapping most federal contract dollars.
The ban, the latest legislative attempt to target the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (BDS), would still have to pass the Senate. The upper chamber was debating its own version of the budget bill on Thursday that does not include an anti-BDS provision.
“This amendment is really designed to shield Israel from any accountability by penalizing those who protest its violations of Palestinian human rights through boycotts, which should be protected by the First Amendment,” said Hassan El-Tayyab, the legislative director for Middle East policy at the Friends Committee on National Legislation.
The anti-BDS provision was spearheaded by Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo.
The overall bill passed 231–196, with support from 214 Republicans and 17 Democrats.
El-Tayyab said that passing the anti-boycott provision in such a rushed manner did a “real disservice to the American people, especially people that are engaged in protesting an unfolding genocide going on in Gaza.”
Bills targeting the BDS movement have passed many state legislatures. Some seek to bar people or companies supporting BDS from winning government contracts, leading critics of the laws to argue that they violate the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech by punishing political views.
Thirty-eight states had some form of anti-BDS legislation in effect as of 2023, according to Palestine Legal, a group that supports the free speech rights of pro-Palestine advocates.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order targeting the boycott movement during his first term in 2019, which he restored in January after his reelection. Pro-Palestine activists have been a major target of his ongoing crackdown on universities and immigrants.
C. QNN
