Update

Over-Cooked? Israel’s Gastro-Propaganda Round Tables Festival Ends After BDS Campaign

After a four-year, cross-continental BDS campaign, Israel’s culinary propaganda festival Round Tables did not take place in 2019.

After a four-year, cross-continental BDS campaign, Israel’s culinary propaganda festival Round Tables did not take place in 2019.

While there has been no official announcement of the demise of the apartheid festival -- which was sponsored by the Israeli ministry of foreign affairs and Israeli companies complicit in violations of Palestinian human rights -- campaigners had been told by previous participants that the 2018 edition would be its last.

Since 2015, Palestinian civil society organisations -- unions of farmers and farm workers, womens' unions, environmental groups and grassroots campaign groups --  had called on international chefs to boycott the festival.

This call was echoed by scores of civil society organisations and human rights activist groups around the world, including in Austria, Belgium, Chile, Colombia, Denmark, Ecuador, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Portugal, Scotland, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, the UK, and the US.

At least six top international chefs heeded the call across the multi-year campaign, and cancelled their participation in the festival Israel dubbed an exercise in “gastro-diplomacy”. Here, we celebrate the impact of the four-year BDS campaign and its many milestones.


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