(June 18, 2026 \/ JNS)\n <\/p>\n
The Somerville, Mass., City Council is set to consider an \u201cEthical Procurement Ordinance\u201d on June 30 that would bar the city from contracting with or investing in companies deemed complicit in what the measure describes as \u201cthe violence and destruction taking place in Gaza and Palestine by Israel\u2019s actions, which are supported by the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n
If approved, Somerville would become the third Massachusetts municipality to adopt such a measure, following similar actions in Medford and Northampton.<\/p>\n
The proposal<\/a> follows a nonbinding ballot question approved by Somerville voters in November 2025. The measure passed with 55.7% of the vote and called on city officials to end business relationships with companies that \u201cengage in business that sustains Israel\u2019s apartheid, genocide and illegal occupation of Palestine.\u201d<\/p>\n On Nov. 25, 2025, the council adopted a resolution supporting divestment and pledged to \u201cwork toward passing an ordinance within a year.\u201d<\/p>\n On Wednesday, the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and the Anti-Defamation League sent a letter to Somerville Mayor Jake Wilson and other city officials urging them to reject the proposal, calling it \u201cflagrantly unconstitutional\u201d and warning that its adoption could prompt legal challenges.<\/p>\n Richard Rosen, senior vice president for legal advocacy at the Brandeis Center, told JNS that the proposal comes amid rising Jew-hatred in the city.<\/p>\n \u201cIsraelis and Jews are being vilified in this community. There is a hostility toward Jews in the community. Jewish families are leaving,\u201d Rosen said. \u201cThe idea that a Jewish family would feel obligated to leave their home in the United States in 2026 because of antisemitism\u2014it\u2019s easy to say it\u2019s shocking, it\u2019s mind-blowing, but it is.\u201d<\/p>\n Rosen told JNS that the pending ordinance is \u201cwritten so broadly that it would prohibit the city from doing business with Microsoft.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThey are not focusing on Israeli companies,\u201d he added. \u201cAn American company that is contracting with Israel is covered.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSomerville is not supposed to be conducting U.S. foreign policy,\u201d Rosen said. \u201cThey don\u2019t like the foreign policy of the United States, so they\u2019re freelancing to set their own foreign policy with respect to contractual relations with companies that do business with Israel. They\u2019re not allowed to do that. It\u2019s that simple.\u201d<\/p>\n Somerville, a city of roughly 80,000 residents just northwest of Boston, drew national attention in January 2024 when it passed a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, prompting widespread online mockery that a small Massachusetts city had brokered peace in the Middle East.<\/p>\n Northampton<\/a>\u2018s resolution, unanimously passed in September 2025, and Medford<\/a>\u2018s ordinance, enacted in late 2025, are both being challenged in court by opponents who argue that municipalities cannot use contracting and investment policies to conduct their own foreign policy toward Israel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(June 18, 2026 \/ JNS) The Somerville, Mass., City Council is set to consider an \u201cEthical Procurement Ordinance\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":499706,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":["post-499705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/499706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}