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West Bank Boycott: A Political Act or Prejudice?
(New York Times) Jodi Rudoren - For many Israelis, the word "boycott" recalls the Nazi-led one of Jewish-owned businesses that spread in the 1930s from Germany across Europe. "The politically correct way to be anti-Semitic is not to say, 'I hate the Jews,' but to say, 'I hate Israel,'" said Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Mark Regev, Prime Minister Netanyahu's spokesman, said Israel is unfairly singled out, while human rights violations elsewhere in the world - and other states' occupation of land claimed by other ethnic groups - are ignored. "It's of dubious morality to hold the Jewish state to a standard to which you hold no one else," Regev said. "Are you boycotting any other place of disputed sovereignty on the planet, or are you picking and choosing your moral outrage?" Some people "are being very selective with their indignation, and it fits into certain cultural prejudices."