Brooklyn food coop makes it harder to boycott Israel

A New York City food coop that previously rejected a proposal by some members to boycott Israeli products has voted last week to adopt new measures designed to make it more difficult to pass boycott resolutions in the coop.

At their annual meeting on January 26, members of Brooklyn’s Park Slope Food Coop voted 294 to 192 to require a 75% super-majority, instead of 50%-plus-one, to boycott any food producers.

While the motion did not specifically mention Israel, the proposal was an effort to preempt a resuscitation of the 2012 fight over boycotting Israeli-made products carried by the store.

The calls to boycott Israel by the coop is part of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, a Palestinian-launched effort to isolate Israel diplomatically and economically.

Coop secretary Jesse Rosenfeld, who proposed the heightened boycott requirements, praised the vote’s outcome and said the new 75% threshold would end “division and hostility.”

In recent years, BDS activists have targeted the market for carrying Israeli-made products, embroiling the neighborhood institution in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and dividing its membership.

In March 2012, members of the coop overwhelmingly voted against boycotting Israeli products in a 1,005 to 653 vote.

New York City mayor and then-Public Advocate Bill de Blasio said at the time he was proud of his neighbors for doing the right thing, calling the boycott effort inflammatory and destructive. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn called the idea “ill-conceived,” and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer denounced the proposed boycott as “an anti-Semitic crusade.”

The debate over the proposed boycott at the 39-year-old cooperative was mostly symbolic because the co-op carries only a half-dozen products imported from Israel.

AP contributed to this report.