Johansson: Defending an Israeli company

Scarlett Johansson has found herself “mired in one of the Middle East’s touchiest controversies,” said Max Fisher in WashingtonPost.com. The Hollywood star is now the face of Israeli company SodaStream, which makes some of its home-carbonation devices in an Israeli settlement on the West Bank. That connection didn’t go down well with Oxfam, a respected charity that appointed Johansson as “global ambassador” in its fight against poverty. Oxfam chided her for representing SodaStream, saying the firm benefits from Israel’s illegal occupation of the West Bank. The Jewish actress replied that the SodaStream factory, which employs some 500 Palestinians, was a “bridge to peace between Israel and Palestine,” and quit Oxfam. Johansson deserves kudos for standing up to these anti-Israel bullies, said the New York Daily News in an editorial. Oxfam isn’t boycotting companies that operate in China or other repressive states. “Only Israel, which protects basic human and civil rights, is forbidden territory.”

You need not hate Israel to boycott SodaStream, said Debra DeLee in Forward.com. SodaStream is operating not in Israel but in “territory occupied by Israel” in violation of international law—territory that could form part of a future Palestinian state. Israeli businesses that set up in the West Bank only perpetuate the occupation, making a two-state peace solution harder to achieve. So until SodaStream relocates its factory to Israel proper, I won’t be buying. Neither should the rest of us, said Lisa Beyer in Bloomberg.com. The Israeli occupation has crippled the Palestinian economy with restrictions on everything from freedom of travel to goods that can be imported. “It’s safe to assume that SodaStream’s Palestinian workers would prefer unemployment and independence over jobs and the occupation.”

Easy for you to say, said The Jewish Daily Forward. The Palestinians employed by SodaStream earn up to four times the West Bank average, and appear to be treated the same as their Israeli co-workers. Outside the factory, “the occupation—with all its lopsided oppressiveness—reigns.” But that situation is the fault of intransigent Israeli and Palestinian leaders, and of “an Arab world that only pays lip service to the Palestinian cause.” It is not the fault of a company and an actress “trying to make a buck by selling fancy seltzer.”

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