French BDS activists lose high court appeal over racism charges

A French appeals court has upheld the hate crime convictions of activists who called for a boycott of Israel during a 2010 demonstration.

The ruling delivered last week by the French Cassation Court concerned seven activists whom a criminal appeals court in Caen in southern France slapped with a $1,000 fine each and a conviction for calling for discriminatory acts during the demonstration outside a supermarket that sold Israeli goods.

The seven activists from Caen were prosecuted following the final filing of criminal complaints against them by the National Bureau of Vigilance Against Anti-Semitism, or BNVCA, and two other nonprofits: Alliance France Israel and Lawyers Without Borders, BNVCA wrote on its website.

In a statement about the March 30 ruling, BNVCA called it “a new victory over the illegal BDS movement.”

The conviction came six months after a similar ruling by the same court on a different case from 2009 and 2010 involving 12 supporters of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel, or BDS.

The convictions are based on jurisprudence that views BDS as discriminatory and on a law from 2003 extending anti-racist legislation to encouraging discrimination, including boycotts, against countries or their peoples.