Farah Manji has written a piece entitled THE GRAPES OF WRATH: A Case for Boycotting Israeli Wines from Occupied Territories. Pardon the pun, but it’s the pits.
It’s also long, so I can’t ask you read it all. You will never get those 5 minutes of your life back. But you get the idea from the title.
Why am I even drawing attention to it? Because Manji is a consultant for the World Bank, (having co-authored at least one report for them) and – surprise, surprise – has worked at UNRWA.
Promoting a boycott of Israel seems to contravene the World Bank’s Code of Conduct (page 17):
POLITICAL ACTIVITIES
Staff may have legitimate personal interests in the civic and political affairs of the countries where we are citizens. However, when we consider participating in such activities, we must balance our personal activities with the World Bank Group’s status as an independent and non-partisan international institution, and avoid situations that could cause the public to believe the World Bank Group is politically influenced. If a staff member’s personal political activities create the perception that the World Bank Group is partisan or trying to influence a country’s national politics, the World Bank Group’s reputation could be seriously harmed and relationships with key stakeholders could be undermined.
True, Manji is not an employee of the World Bank, but their Code of Conduct applies to consultants (page 6):
I am very disturbed that a consultant for the World Bank expresses such strong support for the boycott of Israeli goods – it makes it look to me like the World Bank Group could be politically influenced.
Hat tip: Tommy
