Apartheid Minister: Targeted Civil Thwarting of BDS Activists

On March 28th 2016 in occupied Jerusalem, Israeli Yediot newspaper (Ynet) hosted a conference which was dedicated to fighting the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against apartheid Israel.

Rather than discussing the merits of the BDS campaign, which is grounded in international law and universally recognized human rights, the participants avoided doing any of that and in turn accused the campaign of everything ranging from anti-Semitism to outright terror.

Minister of Interior, Aryeh Deri (currently under fraud investigation), and Minister of Transport, Intelligence and Atomic Energy, Yisrael Katz, have discussed their ministries' actions against BDS activists. These range from the potential denial of citizenship and residency, to what Minister Katz had termed "targeted civil thwarting".

The new term "targeted civil thwarting" / "סיכול אזרחי ממוקד", according to Katz, means the use of intel gathering in order to 'expose illegal activity' by BDS activists. This term is a word play on the commonly used "סיכול ממוקד" which would literally translate into "targeted thwarting" but is a known euphemism meaning targeted assassinations.

It would make sense to assume that what the future holds would be less targeted assassinations by the Zionist regime and more attempts to "use intel to thwart...", meaning to escalate their attempts to frame and discredit BDS activists who will continue to carry out their activity publicly and unapologetically.