A Houston firm has sued the state of Texas saying the state’s ban on doing enterprise with firms that take part in a boycott of Israel is unconstitutional.
A&R Engineering and Testing Inc filed the lawsuit in the USA District Courtroom in Houston on October 29 arguing that Texas’s anti-boycott legislation is a violation of its free speech proper assured beneath the US Structure’s First Modification.
“Texas’s ban on contracting with any boycotter of Israel constitutes viewpoint discrimination that chills constitutionally protected political advocacy in help of Palestine,” mentioned A&R Engineering’s criticism, filed in opposition to the town of Houston and Texas Lawyer Basic Ken Paxton.
Russ Hassouna, the proprietor of A&R Engineering, is a Palestinian American who has been doing enterprise with the town of Houston for 17 years. He refused to signal a renewal of his contract with the town final month after legal professionals demanded he conform to its phrases prohibiting any BDS exercise.
“Israel is an occupier of my homeland and it’s an Apartheid State. It’s my proper and obligation to boycott Israel and any merchandise of Israel. This coverage is in opposition to my constitutional proper and in opposition to Worldwide Legislation,” Hassouna mentioned within the criticism.
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) motion seeks to generate worldwide financial strain on Israel to alter its remedy of Palestinians. Within the US, the motion is energetic on faculty campuses, echoing the anti-apartheid boycotts of South Africa within the Nineteen Eighties.
Opponents of the BDS motion who help Israel view it as anti-Semitic and designed to destroy Israel’s financial system. In 2017, the Texas legislature adopted an anti-BDS legislation that requires contractors with the state and native governments to not boycott Israel.
“Even proponents of those legal guidelines perceive that these legal guidelines are fairly clearly unconstitutional and out of step with 250 years of American historical past,” mentioned Gadeir Abbas, a lawyer with the Council on American-Islamic Relations who’s representing A&R Engineering.
“There’s by no means been an historic analogue to states requiring their residents to a pledge of allegiance to a international nation,” Abbas advised Al Jazeera.
In 2019, a federal choose within the Western District of Texas dominated the state’s anti-BDS legislation was unconstitutional, however the ruling was dissolved on enchantment after the state amended the legislation.
“What’s been taking place is like whack-a-mole,” Abbas mentioned. “We file lawsuits in opposition to these clearly unlawful legal guidelines after which the legislation is modified in ways in which make it tougher to get a choose to resolve whether or not it’s constitutional or unconstitutional.”
Controversy over efforts to ban the BDS motion has accelerated within the US following the choice by standard ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s to cease promoting its merchandise in Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories.
New York’s public pension fund with $268bn in property introduced final week it might promote most of its holdings in Unilever Plc, a publicly held firm that owns Ben & Jerry’s.
The New York State Widespread Retirement Fund held $111m value of Unilever shares, in line with the Reuters information service. A 2016 govt order by former Governor Andrew Cuomo bans the state from doing enterprise with entities that observe BDS.
The American Jewish Committee, a pro-Israel advocacy group, praised the New York sale of Unilever inventory, saying in an announcement, “boycotting Israel has penalties”.
Pension officers in New Jersey, Arizona and Florida have moved to promote shares in Unilever or prohibit new purchases of the inventory.
Unilever has mentioned the choice to withdraw from the occupied territories was made by Ben & Jerry’s impartial board, and Unilever stays dedicated to its companies in Israel. Ben & Jerry’s mentioned it might proceed gross sales in Israel outdoors of settlements in occupied areas.
In a uncommon criticism of Israel, a Biden administration official voiced US opposition to Israel’s settlement growth within the West Financial institution, saying that it damages “the prospects for a two-state answer”.