State legislatures across the country are considering a spate of bills that would blacklist companies (and, in the case of New York, individuals) that support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which tries to impose economic pressure on Israel to end its occupation of Palestinian land.

Such repressive legislation threatens the right of all Americans to engage in boycotts and other economic acts of conscience.

Churches, student and faculty groups, musicians and artists are among the groups legislators seek to silence.

As Israel is increasingly unable to defend its regime of apartheid and settler colonialism over the Palestinian people and its regular massacres of Palestinians in Gaza, it is seeking supportive governments in Europe and the US to undermine free speech as a way of shielding it from criticism and measures aimed at holding it to account for its gross violations of international law.

The Brazilian state of Bahia decided on April 2 to end its cooperation agreement with Israeli water company Mekorot.

Occupied Palestine, 17 March 2016 -- The global movement supporting the Palestinian people’s right to freedom, justice and equality has taken impressive steps into the political mainstream in recent years.