We would like to thank you for your help with our efforts to pressure retailers Nordstrom and Ricky’s NY to stop carrying AHAVA products, which are made from stolen resources on occupied land. In February, we generated over 1,700 letters to Ricky’s CEO Dominick Costello, and in late March 2,400 people sent messages to Nordstrom’s Vice-President for Social Responsibility Linda Peffer. We know that this flood of e-mails got their attention; in fact, Dominick Costello called to discuss our campaign, although he still won’t commit to dropping AHAVA.
To mark the Second Global Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) Day of Action, which coincided with Palestinian Land Day on March 30th, Ahava boycotters staged protest actions in Arlington, VA, Washington, D.C., New York City, Boston, Montreal, and Los Angeles. You can read Prerna’s blog post and see some moving (and hilarious) videos of these actions, including one of Medea’s doing an impromptu AHAVA teach-in at Lord & Taylor. You can also read Rae’s thoughtful post about the connection between Passover, profiteers and AIPAC.
There was excellent coverage of our Ricky’s NYC protest and the Stolen Beauty campaign in The Indypendent. And in San Francisco, Sacramento, Indianapolis and Austin, boycotters delivered letters to store managers asking them to stop stocking AHAVA.
As the BDS Movement is picking up steam, our opposition has launched a campaign to undermine our work by, in their words, “de-legitimizing the de-legitimizers.” But a strikingly balanced article in The Forward about the pushback against BDS mentioned our campaign, and quoted us as wanting only for Israel to respect human rights and international law.
The decades-old “peace process” has only lead to more settlements, dispossession and suffering, our Congress is still in a thrall to AIPAC, so it’s up to us to take the profit out of occupation. If you haven’t yet sent both letters, you can still do so on the Stolen Beauty site, and invite your friends to join the boycott as well. Thanks again for taking action.
Working for peace & justice,
Nancy K, Dana, Farida, Jodie, Medea, Prerna, Rae & the Stolen Beauty team
