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href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/palestinians-call-boycott-hyundai">https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/palestinians-call-boycott-hyundai</a></font>
<h1 id="reader-title">Palestinians call for boycott of Hyundai</h1>
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<p class="node__submitted">
<span class="field field-author"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/ali-abunimah"
typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label
skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Ali Abunimah</a></span> <span
class="field field-blog"></span><span class="field
field-publication-date"><span class="date-display-single"
property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime"
content="2017-02-07T23:25:24+00:00">7 February 2017</span></span>
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<p>Palestinians are calling for a boycott of Hyundai over
the company’s failure to stop its construction equipment
being used by Israel to destroy their homes and
communities.</p>
<p>“The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Committee of
Palestinian Citizens of Israel (BDS48) calls upon our
Palestinian people in the homeland and the Diaspora, the
peoples of the Arab world, and people of conscience
worldwide to boycott and divest from Hyundai Heavy
Industries (HHI), until it ends its involvement in
Israel’s violations of our human rights, particularly in
Jerusalem and the Naqab (Negev),” says an <a
href="https://bdsmovement.net/news/boycott-hyundai-end-its-involvement-israel%E2%80%99s-ethnic-cleansing-palestinian-communities-jerusalem">action
alert</a> released on Tuesday.</p>
<p>The alert calls on people around the world “to boycott
Hyundai products” and urges institutions, including
investment funds and churches, to divest from Hyundai
shares.</p>
<p>Municipal bodies should exclude Hyundai from public
tenders, the action alert states.</p>
<h2>Complicity in ethnic cleansing</h2>
<p>While Israel’s abuse of the South Korean company’s
products <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/hyundai">has
been documented for years</a>, BDS48 says the campaign
comes “at this particular moment in light of the
extensive use of Hyundai equipment by the Israeli
authorities in the recent demolitions” of many homes of
Palestinian citizens of Israel in the Bedouin village of
<a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/umm-al-hiran">Umm
al-Hiran</a> in the southern Naqab region, and in the
town of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/qalansawa">Qalansawa</a>
further north, last month.</p>
<p>Another wave of demolitions in Umm al-Hiran is <a
href="http://www.arab48.com/%25D8%25A7%25D9%2584%25D8%25A3%25D8%25AE%25D8%25A8%25D9%2580%25D9%2580%25D9%2580%25D8%25A7%25D8%25B1/%25D8%25A7%25D8%25AE%25D8%25A8%25D8%25A7%25D8%25B1-%25D8%25B9%25D8%25A7%25D8%25AC%25D9%2584%25D8%25A9/2017/02/05/%25D8%25A3%25D9%2585-%25D8%25A7%25D9%2584%25D8%25AD%25D9%258A%25D8%25B1%25D8%25A7%25D9%2586-%25D8%25A7%25D9%2584%25D8%25B4%25D8%25B1%25D8%25B7%25D8%25A9-%25D8%25AA%25D8%25AC%25D9%2587%25D8%25B2-%25D9%2584%25D9%2584%25D9%2587%25D8%25AF%25D9%2585-%25D9%258A%25D9%2588%25D9%2585-%25D8%25A7%25D9%2584%25D8%25A3%25D8%25B1%25D8%25A8%25D8%25B9%25D8%25A7%25D8%25A1-%25D8%25A7%25D9%2584%25D9%2585%25D9%2582%25D8%25A8%25D9%2584">expected
imminently</a>, part of Israel’s plan to destroy the
community and <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/charlotte-silver/israel-poised-raze-bedouin-village-so-jews-can-take-land">replace
it with a town for Jews</a>, to be called “Hiran.”</p>
<p>In December, Israel also used Hyundai equipment to <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ryan-rodrick-beiler/hyundai-profiting-israels-colonization-golan-heights">demolish
a home</a> in the occupied Golan Heights.</p>
<p>The BDS48 action alert, which was disseminated by the
Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National
Committee (BNC), notes that Hyundai has been presented
with <a
href="https://whoprofits.org/company/hyundai-heavy-industries">evidence</a>
of its “persistent complicity in Israeli ethnic
cleansing policies against Palestinians and Syrians in
the territories occupied since 1967.”</p>
<p>But the company “has failed to stop its
business-as-usual involvement,” the alert states.</p>
<p>Hyundai “has thus forfeited its responsibilities as
stated in the <a
href="https://www.unglobalcompact.org/">UN Global
Compact</a> and the <a
href="http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Publications/GuidingPrinciplesBusinessHR_EN.pdf">UN
Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights</a>” –
standards that are supposed to promote sustainable
development and halt corporate complicity in state
abuses.</p>
<h2>Tarnished brand</h2>
<p>Until the early 2000s, Hyundai was a single group
encompassing such activities as vehicle production,
shipbuilding, construction, steel, finance, retail,
aerospace and defense.</p>
<p>It was <a
href="http://app1.chinadaily.com.cn/star/2003/0807/cn10-2.html">broken
up</a> into five major companies, including Hyundai
Heavy Industries, which makes ships and construction
equipment, and Hyundai Motor Group.</p>
<p>But all the companies continue to be controlled by a
few members of the <a
href="http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20151201000957">founding
Chung family</a> as part of a <a
href="https://www.ft.com/ig/features/2014-11-19_special-reports-chaebols/chaebol.html#">complex
web</a> of entities.</p>
<p>All the spin-offs trade on the goodwill of the famous
Hyundai name, a brand that risks being tarnished by
association with Israel’s crimes.</p>
<p>Consumers around the world would be most familiar with
cars made by Hyundai Motor Group and its affiliate Kia.</p>
<p>In recent years, Hyundai has shot into the world’s <a
href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-hyundai-motor-sales-idUSKBN14L1D3">top
five automakers</a>.</p>
<p>It is a <a
href="http://www.hyundaimotorgroup.com/MediaCenter/News/Press-Releases/hmc-Mideast-3-million-export-eng-150930.hub">popular
brand</a> in Middle East countries, with Saudi Arabia
accounting for <a
href="http://www.arabnews.com/news/522951">more than
40 percent</a> of its regional sales.</p>
<p>In 2016, Hyundai saw its first <a
href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-hyundai-motor-sales-idUSKBN14L1D3">dip
in auto sales</a> in almost two decades. Its workers
have also <a
href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-hyundai-motor-strike-idUSKCN12C1P0">staged
widespread strikes</a> over wages.</p>
<p>The BDS48 action alert urges Hyundai workers and the
Korean Confederation of Trade Unions “to stand in
solidarity with our peaceful struggle by pressuring the
Hyundai management to stop the company’s complicity in
Israeli violations of human rights.”</p>
<p>“Our campaign is not intended at all to harm the
interests of the company’s workers but to protect the
rights of our people as stipulated in international
law,” it states.</p>
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