The co-op is a major institution in the Brooklyn neighborhood and the boycott became a citywide issue, drawing in elected officials, rabbis, street activists and leading Jewish groups.<\/p>\n
The boycott campaigners said the effort was meant to \u201cstop genocide,\u201d while opponents said<\/a> the boycott was discriminatory, divisive and punished independent food producers for the actions of their government.<\/p>\n The pro-boycott effort, led by a group called Park Slope Food Coop Members in Solidarity with Palestine, listed<\/a> eight companies connected to Israel that sell products at the co-op and would be subject to boycott.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tGet The Times of Israel’s Daily Edition \t\t\t\tBy signing up, you agree to the terms<\/a><\/p>\n The products were removed from the store\u2019s shelves the morning after the vote, a co-op member told The Times of Israel.<\/p>\n Of those eight companies listed by the boycott campaign, half are run by Arab Israelis or sell products from Arab-owned factories.<\/p>\n \t One of the companies, Al Arz tahini, is owned by Arab Israelis in Nazareth and supports LGBTQ causes.<\/p>\n Conservative Arab Israelis called to boycott Al Arz in 2020 after the company donated funds to an LGBTQ<\/a> support line.<\/p>\n In response, Arab and Jewish Israelis, and Israeli diplomats<\/a>, pushed back by buying the company\u2019s tahini, driving up its market share.<\/p>\n \u201cWe in the Al Arz Tahini family love people without differentiation between religion, sex, gender or color. Food connects people,\u201d the company said at the time.<\/p>\n Another firm targeted by the boycotters, Equal Exchange, sells olive oil from a non-profit run by Arab and Jewish women<\/a> in Israel whose mission includes \u201cbuilding bridges\u201d and \u201cpromoting peace.\u201d<\/p>\n Equal Exchange also sells olive oil produced by Palestinian farmers<\/a> in the West Bank.<\/p>\n An article<\/a> last year by Linewaiters\u2019 Gazette, a publication produced by the co-op, said that the store sold olive oil from both the Israeli and Palestinian operations.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t clear if the boycott would apply to both the Israeli and Palestinian olive oils produced by Equal Exchange. The boycott group\u2019s list did not specify.<\/p>\n Contacted for comment, the boycott campaign referred The Times of Israel to a press statement released after the boycott passed.<\/p>\n \u201cTonight\u2019s win is proof that cooperative movements are powerful models for exercising solidarity and participatory democracy,\u201d organizer Taylor Pate said<\/a> in a statement.<\/p>\n Equal Exchange<\/a> is a workers\u2019 co-operative based in the US and dedicated to fair trade practices.<\/p>\n Meaningful revenue lost, but bigger hit to morale<\/p>\n Rachel Simons, a co-founder and CEO of Seed + Mill, another company on the boycott list, said the firm was started by three women in New York\u2019s Chelsea Market. They began selling their products in the co-op about six years ago.<\/p>\n Simons described the partnership as \u201cmy dream account\u201d because she \u201cloves the mission and values of a food co-op.\u201d<\/p>\n \t \u201cThey could not have found a person or a founder of a brand who is more upset about it, mainly because I really love what they\u2019re doing and I support their mission wholeheartedly,\u201d she said in an interview, referring to the co-op collectively working to provide affordable food to families.<\/p>\n Seed + Mill sells sesame-based products, such as tahini and halva. The tahini is produced by a Muslim father-son team in northern Israel. The operation employs a mixed workforce including Muslims, Jews and Druze, Simons said. She added that the business decisions were not ideological, but that Israel makes high-quality tahini, so she found partners there whom she likes and trusts.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is just the reality of working in Israel, where Arabs, Israelis, Jews, Muslims, Druze, Christians \u2014 they work together. It\u2019s really more of a fact of life as opposed to anybody making some sort of conscious decision to build a diverse workforce,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Seed + Mill has not received any communication from the co-op. The company\u2019s products were sold at the store through a third-party distributor, and Simons assumed that the co-op would just not file any more orders.<\/p>\n The co-op sales were \u201cmeaningful revenue\u201d for the company, but the bigger hit was to morale, she said, adding that she wished the co-op\u2019s leadership \u201chad asked if I would like to talk to the members.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs a brand, we\u2019re humans. We\u2019re not just robots selling things,\u201d she said, adding that most of the team is not Jewish. \u201cThey\u2019re just really sad and baffled that this is what\u2019s happened to our brand.\u201d<\/p>\n The company has received abusive messages for years that have escalated recently, Simons said.<\/p>\n \u201cAt least give us the chance to discuss it and to humanize this conflict and to come over to our store and have an ice cream and actually hear about the people who make the products,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Soom tahini, another company targeted in the boycott, said<\/a> in 2022 that its tahini was produced in a factory owned by an Israeli Arab.<\/p>\n The boycott also applied to Osem, a major snack producer in Israel that has participated in programs to increase Arab participation<\/a> in the workforce and to boost Arab-Jewish coexistence<\/a>.<\/p>\n The UJA-Federation of New York, one of the leading Jewish communal groups in New York City, said on Thursday that it would buy 20,000 bags of Osem\u2019s Bamba snacks<\/a> in response to the boycott.<\/p>\n The Bamba will be distributed at Sunday\u2019s Israel parade<\/a> in Manhattan, the federation said.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t That\u2019s why we started the Times of Israel – to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.<\/p>\n So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven\u2019t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.<\/p>\n For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.<\/p>\n Thank you, \t\t\t
\n\t\t\tby email and never miss our top stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1780078267_144_20260526_untitled_07685.jpg\")
<\/a>
\n\t\tCampaigners for and against a BDS referendum at the Park Slope Food Coop in Brooklyn, New York City, May 26, 2026. (Luke Tress\/Times of Israel)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1780078268_579_20260526_untitled_07690.jpg\")
<\/a>
\n\t\tCampaigners for and against a BDS referendum at the Park Slope Food Coop in Brooklyn, New York City, May 26, 2026. (Luke Tress\/Times of Israel)<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tYou’re a dedicated reader\t\t\t<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1780078268_328_334x334-200x200.png\" "\\"\\"\/")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tJoin Our Community\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n