BDS SONGS

As Princess Madonna prepared to sell out her alleged love for Palestinians by appearing ($1 million for 2 songs) at Israel’s captured festival “Eurovision,” I wrote this version and got the distinguished Israeli-American singer Danielle Alma Ravitsky to belt it out.

Ciao, Hebron Funders The Hebron Fund, dedicated to Israel’s creeping seizure of a Palestinian city in the West Bank in the name of religious exclusiveness, is a tax-deductible organization. Are there no rules?

Hey Hebron Funders
We see your plunder
We’re here to tell of the crimes
Of your occupation
And we know you
Don’t deserve to…be a 501C3

Illegal clampdown
Creates a ghost town
Closing hundreds of businesses
Right downtown
You really oughta open Shuhada
And stop illegal settlements

A holy city it was so pretty
But then you came, made your claim
No you would not share
This occupation destroys a nation
Why should this be tax exempt?

Behind your army
You’re acting smarmy
Pretending this is your town
No one else around
You barricade them
And act dismayed when
They answer we shall not be moved

You’re occupying and always lying
Apartheid is but a step
To your final goal
Ethnic cleansing and dispossession
Why should you be tax-exempt?

Ciao HP Who provides apartheid with ID cards, checkpoint systems, computers for prisons, etc etc? Hewlett-Packard does.

Hey Hewlett-Packard
Check out this placard
Human rights will prevail
and apartheid fail
So stop your bailing that ship ain’t sailing
Stop your jailing of Palestine

Well hello HP
Say can you hear me
Or can you only hear share prices rising
Internet servers are life preservers
Of the settlers’ ship of state

I sent an email regarding Israel
When you supply IT and ID cards
Your biometrics suppressing ethnics
Are the Israeli Polaroid

Your Basel system helps Israel list ‘em
Checkpoints are merely part of their prison scheme
Your computers enable persecutors
Stop supporting this regime

So Hewlett-Packard
Check out this placard
Human rights will prevail
And Israel will fail
To kill a nation
So in summation
Stop surveilling Palestine
So stop your bailing that ship ain’t sailing
Stop your jailing of Palestine

Bibi No Nagila War criminal Netanyahu is joined by his master mentor Henry Kissinger at the Plaza Hotel, New York. The Bib receives an award from the right-wing Hudson Institute for We Can Only Imagine What. We present alternative prizes.

(Not a song:) Mock BDS Debate. Recorded live in Chapel Hill, May 2016.

(It Is) Right to Boycott (VIDEO)The NY legislature couldn’t pass the bills to blacklist companies and organizations that support boycotts for human rights for Palestinians. So Gov. Cuomo executive ordered them, raising Joe McCarthy from his well-earned grave. A state-wide Freedom to Boycott coalition has been combating these atrocious bills, which are surfacing around the country. Here are some songs and images of this growing movement.

short version:

Our Settlement House

Real estate giant RE/MAX is buying and selling illegal homes in occupied territory. Somebody’s got to do it, right? Wrong.

I’ll light the fire
To burn down the nation that we conquered yesterday
We’ll get Re/Max
to broker the houses that we build and sell
to forge apartheid benefitting me
only for you and me

Settlement homes marketed by us break the law
moving occupiers into
Such a cozy room
but wrongdoing’s illuminated by the UN’s human rights laws
These must be obeyed
By everyone but me

Our house is a very, very fine house
But some would have it banned just cause we stole the land
But everything is easy when you lie

Our house is not at all a borderline house
It’s deep in the West Bank
It’s guarded by a tank
We’re guilty to the re-max, that’s our crew

They find a buyer
Israel has the power but
Palestinians aren’t going away

Swift-Leviev Medley Taylor Swift sported apartheid/child soldier jewelry from Leviev on the cover of Vanity Fair. Seemed more vain than fair, so I rounded up a couple of romantic tunes plus an old standby, Hava Nagila.

Boycott G4S – It’s Easy As A-B-CG4S claims to be in the security business. But actually they increase insecurity, first for Palestinians, then for Israel, which is burying itself under a pile of lies and expropriations of other peoples’ lands. What time is it? Time to boycott, divest, divorce, cancel, and condemn.

Star of Goliath Song cycle with images: History of Palestine/Israel, with reflections from 2004 visit. 25 min. Remixed 2015.

Round Table, Ciao

Israel is gathering chefs to food-wash apartheid. No, no, no: Gastro-diplomacy is hasbaracracy.

(tune: Bella Ciao)
This food Round Table
Is just a fable
Makes us conceive of Tel Aviv
As a place of peace
But they’re foodwashing
Freedom they’re squashing
And we’ve got to stop it now
Supporting conquest
Is what we protest
This Round Table enables
Theft of land and rights
Ethnic cleansing and dispossession
Are what’s really on your plate
Uprooting orchards, displacing farmers
This can’t be seen behind the screen
Of your haute cuisine
Gastro-diplomacy is hasbaracracy
Will we swallow this? Hell no!
While they put Gaza on a diet
Can we keep quiet and dine
with the finest chefs
It may have Michelin, it may be trendy
In any language, we say no
Come all ye foodies, and do your duties
When they call, text, or tweet and say
Come eat with us
This cultural project, we soundly reject
To Round Table, we say no
It’s culinary ethnic cleansing
To Round Table, we say no

Killing Them Softly

Lauryn Hill needs new advisers. Crossing a legit picket line to play for apartheid, that ain’t it.

Palestine’s pained by these singers
Slinging a knife with their words
Killing them softly with your song
Killing them softly with your song, buying a big lie
You went wrong, killing them softly with your songIsraelis sang a good song
They had a certain style
And so you came to sing there
And help them to defile
And there you were this pop star
Endangered by their liesPalestine’s pained by these singers
Slinging a knife with their words
Killing them softly with your song
Killing them softly with your song, buying a big lie
You went wrong, killing them softly with your songYou were a true believer
In Israel’s holy shroud
But Palestine’s in fetters
So why should we be proud
I prayed that you would finish
But you just keep right onPalestine’s pained by these singers
Slinging a knife with their words
Killing them softly with your song
Killing them softly with your song, buying a big lie
You went wrong, killing them softly with your song

Friends of the IDF, Ciao

Seriously? The gang that raises money for the gang that steals Palestine has a 501C3?

Hey IDF-niks
We’re wise to your tricks
We’re here to tell of the crimes of your occupation
And we know you don’t deserve to
Be a 501C3Friends of this army are acting smarmy
They’re shilling for an illegal, immoral hoax
Stolen orchards, demolished villages
Don’t get a 501C3They’re bombing babies
There are no maybes
Destroying homes is their way of democracy
Let’s stand for justice, for Palestinians
No more 501C3They’re occupying and always lying
Apartheid is but a step to their final goal
Ethnic cleansing and dispossession
Why should they be tax-exempt?Just think about it
How can you doubt it
When cops in Mexico kill college students
Do the friends of police assassins
Deserve a 501C3?So IDF-niks
We’re wise to your tricks
We’re here to tell of the crimes of your occupation
And we know you don’t deserve to
Be a 501C3

City Council Don’t Go

New York City Councilors are planning to visit an apartheid state to increase business, educational, and cultural ties. Guess which one? Hint: they train our cops to stop, frisk, and shoot to kill.

(tune: Bella Ciao)
Hey politicians
Check your positions
To stand for justice may be a career risk
But Israel trains our cops in bad behavior
It’s just one big stop and frisk

The JCRC and UJA folks
Are shilling for an illegal, immoral hoax
Stolen orchards, demolished villages
Are not the values of New York

Mark-Viverito, this is our grito
Lend your support to the homeless and dispossessed
Just like in Vieques
They’re target practice
Madam Speaker, please don’t go

Now Mr. Lander
Let’s have some candor
You were opposed to surveillance of Muslims here
So stand for justice, for Palestinians
Mr. Lander please don’t go

Mr. Van Bramer, Torres and Johnson
Take a broader view of who is a loved one
Parades of gay pride can’t hide apartheid
They’re pinkwashing, don’t you know

Richards & Rosenthal, Mark & Antonio
Are you really progressive right down the line
Why don’t you stand up for the downtrodden
From New York to Palestine

So please don’t go there
Because it ain’t fair
Israel’s a conqueror of stolen land and rights
We’ve got to build a better future
And we’ve got to start right now

More Dead and Gaza Moans

Israel periodically “mows the lawn,” as they themselves call massacres, to demoralize Gaza, while spinning insulting stories about their motives. It makes things even worse, right? Time to cut aid and boycott yet? Not yet? When, then?

(Tune: Four Dead in Ohio)
Jet fighters and troops are coming
Apartheid has really grown
While westerners’ hearts are numbing
More dead and Gaza moansGotta get down to it
Settlement’s taking our town
Should have been stopped long ago
What if you knew us
And saw them blow up our homes
How can you run when you know?Jet fighters and billions coming
Palestinians on their own
They’re losing their land and water
Israelis must now atoneGotta get down with it
Indigenous people must live
Uprooting their trees is a crime
What if you lived in an
open air prison like us
How could you run when you know?

Some Christmas songs about Hewlett-Packard’s nefarious technology of domination in occupied Palestine:
God Rest Ye HP

O Little Town of HP

Hewlett-Packard’s Coming To Town

Shekels, Shekels, Shekels

Amazing Grace, Palestine – two versions: a cappella in Berkeley

and with guitar, in Seattle.

This Food’s Not Your Food Sometimes Israelis like to claim various foods as their own invention when in fact they were there in the neighborhood for, let’s say, millenia. I wouldn’t care except that erasing a people’s culture is an integral part of ethnic cleansing, which has been proceeding apace since, oh let’s say, 1948.

A Show Called Dig

Human Rights Man – Stones are rolling downhill into shameful complicity with settler colonial criminality.

Audio only:

This Boycott Was Made For You and Me – From non-union grapes to segregated buses to apartheid, we’ve always voted with our wallets.

Ode to Soda Stream – Alteration of Earth Day anthem, since Earth Day’s been altered by “green” Soda Stream – but guess what, E-Day has cut SS off! Go Green, not Apartheid!