VOA标准英语2014--Boycott Against Israel Impacts Palestinian Workers 制裁以色列影响巴勒斯坦工人

 

Boycott¹ Against Israel Impacts Palestinian Workers 制裁以色列影响巴勒斯坦工人

AL-AZARIYA, WEST BANK — The Israeli government has announced it will allocate² $100 million to counter a growing international boycott against Israeli organizations operating in the Palestinian territories.

The issue was highlighted recently by a debate over the maker³ of a popular soft-drink machine operating in the disputed territories.

Targeting SodaStream

A chilly⁵ dawn is breaking over al-Azariya, outside Jerusalem. Workers gather in the dark waiting for the bus to take them to their jobs at the SodaStream factory in the nearby Jewish settlement, Ma'ale Adumim.

SodaStream builds machines that make seltzer, or soda⁴ water, for personal use. The machines are popular. But the workers are worried.

Jewish settlements in the West Bank are considered illegal by much of the international community. As a result, Israeli enterprises operating here are the target of a growing movement called Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions (BDS).

Ahmed—who does not want his real name used—arrives early to take the first bus. He's been at SodaStream for eight months and likes his job. He says it pays three times what he would earn working for a Palestinian company and that conditions are good. However, production is down and his work hours have been cut.

"I do not support this boycott," he said. "It's not good because the workers are Arabs and there will be no jobs and we will sitting at home. Secondly⁶, it is the big people who are fighting, not the workers, the young people."

SodaStream says its employs more than 500 Palestinians as well as Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs.  

"They work together here," said C.E.O. Daniel Birnbaum. "We have about 1200, 1300 people working in this facility in harmony and peace. And we are very proud of being able to be here and to contribute in our way to the co-existence and hopefully to the peace in this region."

Growing pressure

SodaStream faces growing competition from large, multi-national beverage⁷ companies, which have been interested in the growing popularity of the company's product.

At the same time, the company is under growing pressure from the BDS movement which is making gains.

A large Danish pension fund, German banks and several U.S. academic groups recently announced they were severing⁸ ties with Israeli partners that operate in the territories.

In addition, there is a growing movement to require special labels on Israeli exports from the Palestinian territories. This would make it easier for consumers to boycott Israeli products made in the Palestinian territories.

Israeli news media reported Tuesday that several multinational⁹ construction companies have withdrawn¹⁰ their bids to build two new ports in Israel, citing pressure from domestic shareholders¹¹ and activists¹² or a fear of hurting business interests in the Arab world.

These developments worry the Israeli government.

Economic hit

Finance Minister Yair Lapid last month told an international conference in Tel Aviv that a European boycott would reduce Israeli exports by one-fifth, shrinking the Israeli domestic product by several billion dollars—or more than one percent—causing the loss of 10,000 jobs. Europe is a major partner, accounting¹³ for about one-third of Israel's foreign trade.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday told a gathering¹⁴ of world Jewish leaders in Jerusalem that any talk of a boycott in Europe was an outrage¹⁵ and called its advocates "classical anti-Semites in modern garb¹⁶."

Invoking¹⁷ the boycotts¹⁸ of Jewish businesses in Nazi-led Germany prior to World War II, Netanyahu said, "In the past, anti-Semites boycotted¹⁹ Jewish businesses and today they call for the boycott of the Jewish state….I think we have to fight them."

Palestinian organizers of the BDS movement say they are working with various groups, including Israeli ones, to pressure the Israeli government to change its policies.

Some groups choose to boycott only products made by Jewish settlers in the Palestinian territories. Others advocate a general boycott of all Israeli products.

The movement has also succeeded in pressuring some international entertainers to cancel performances in Israel.

The Jewish-American actress and singer, Scarlet²⁰ Johannson, recently had to choose between her role as a celebrity²¹ ambassador for SodaStream and for the British charity group, Oxfam.

Oxfam supports the BDS movement against Israel. Johannson resigned from Oxfam and said the boycott works against peace and understanding between Israelis and Palestinians.

Eyeing long-term gains

Many of the Sodastream's Palestinian workers are too worried to speak to the media. They say privately²² that they oppose the Jewish settlements but feel the boycott unfairly targets their families and livelihoods²³.

Mahmoud—again, not his real name—has worked at SodaStream for several years, even though he has a degree in banking²⁴ and finance.

"We have no other work but at Sodastream," he said. "If there was another job outside the settlements, we would work there. But all of Palestine is our land. So we ask them to leave all the land, not just the settlement."

Omar Barghouti, a local BDS leader, acknowledges the movement hurts Palestinians, but he says Palestinians may have to suffer in the near-term in order to obtain their rights in the long-term.

"We are under Israel's control," Barghouti said. "We'll suffer as Israel suffers from the boycott. But the entire Palestinian civil society has said we are ready to pay that price to gain freedom, justice and equality."

 

His words offer little consolation²⁵ to the workers from al-Azariya who, as the sun rises, board the bus for SodaStream, hoping to return in 12 hours after a full shift, rather than in a few hours following a work-day shortened by sanctions.

1 boycott   

n./v.(联合)抵制，拒绝参与

参考例句：

• We put the production under a boycott.我们联合抵制该商品。
• The boycott lasts a year until the Victoria board permitsreturn.这个抗争持续了一年直到维多利亚教育局妥协为止。

2 allocate   

vt.分配，分派；把…拨给；把…划归

参考例句：

• You must allocate the money carefully.你们必须谨慎地分配钱。
• They will allocate fund for housing.他们将拨出经费建房。

3 maker   

n.制造者，制造商

参考例句：

• He is a trouble maker，You must be distant with him.他是个捣蛋鬼，你不要跟他在一起。
• A cabinet maker must be a master craftsman.家具木工必须是技艺高超的手艺人。

4 soda   

n.苏打水；汽水

参考例句：

• She doesn't enjoy drinking chocolate soda.她不喜欢喝巧克力汽水。
• I will freshen your drink with more soda and ice cubes.我给你的饮料重加一些苏打水和冰块。

5 chilly   

adj.凉快的，寒冷的

参考例句：

• I feel chilly without a coat.我由于没有穿大衣而感到凉飕飕的。
• I grew chilly when the fire went out.炉火熄灭后，寒气逼人。

6 secondly   

adv.第二，其次

参考例句：

• Secondly,use your own head and present your point of view.第二，动脑筋提出自己的见解。
• Secondly it is necessary to define the applied load.其次，需要确定所作用的载荷。

7 beverage   

n.(水，酒等之外的)饮料

参考例句：

• The beverage is often colored with caramel.这种饮料常用焦糖染色。
• Beer is a beverage of the remotest time.啤酒是一种最古老的饮料。

8 severing   

v.切断，断绝( sever的现在分词 )；断，裂

参考例句：

• The death of a second parent is like severing an umbilical cord to our past. 父母当中第二个人去世，就象斩断了把我们同过去联在一起的纽带。 来自辞典例句
• The severing theory and severing method for brittle block are studied. 研究裂纹技术应用于分离脆性块体的分离理论和分离方法。 来自互联网

9 multinational   

adj.多国的，多种国籍的；n.多国籍公司，跨国公司

参考例句：

• The firm was taken over by a multinational consulting firm.这家公司被一个跨国咨询公司收购。
• He analyzed the relationship between multinational corporations and under-developed countries.他分析了跨国公司和不发达国家之间的关系。

10 withdrawn   

vt.收回；使退出；vi.撤退，退出

参考例句：

• Our force has been withdrawn from the danger area.我们的军队已从危险地区撤出。
• All foreign troops should be withdrawn to their own countries.一切外国军队都应撤回本国去。

11 shareholders   

n.股东( shareholder的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The meeting was attended by 90% of shareholders. 90%的股东出席了会议。
• the company's fiduciary duty to its shareholders 公司对股东负有的受托责任

12 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 accounting   

n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表

参考例句：

• A job fell vacant in the accounting department.财会部出现了一个空缺。
• There's an accounting error in this entry.这笔账目里有差错。

14 gathering   

n.集会，聚会，聚集

参考例句：

• He called on Mr. White to speak at the gathering.他请怀特先生在集会上讲话。
• He is on the wing gathering material for his novels.他正忙于为他的小说收集资料。

15 outrage   

n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒

参考例句：

• When he heard the news he reacted with a sense of outrage.他得悉此事时义愤填膺。
• We should never forget the outrage committed by the Japanese invaders.我们永远都不应该忘记日本侵略者犯下的暴行。

16 garb   

n.服装，装束

参考例句：

• He wore the garb of a general.他身着将军的制服。
• Certain political,social,and legal forms reappear in seemingly different garb.一些政治、社会和法律的形式在表面不同的外衣下重复出现。

17 invoking   

v.援引( invoke的现在分词 )；行使（权利等）；祈求救助；恳求

参考例句：

• You can customise the behavior of the Asynchronous Server and hence re-brand it by defining your own command set for invoking services. 通过定义自己调用服务的命令集，您可以定制自定义异步服务器的行为，通过为调用服务定义自己的命令集从而对它重新标记。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• You can customize the behavior of the Asynchronous Server and hence re-brand it by defining your own command set for invoking services. 通过定义自己调用服务的命令集，您可以定制自定义异步服务器的行为，通过为调用服务定义自己的命令集从而对它重新标记。 来自辞典例句

18 boycotts   

（对某事物的）抵制( boycott的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Their methods included boycotts and court action, supplemented by'sit-ins". 他们的主要方法包括联合抵制、法庭起诉，还附带进行静坐抗议。
• Are boycotts for other purposes illegal? 至于用于其它目的的联合抵制行动是否也是非法的呢？

19 boycotted   

抵制，拒绝参加( boycott的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Athletes from several countries boycotted the Olympic Games. 有好几国的运动员抵制奥林匹克运动会。
• The opposition party earlier boycotted the Diet agenda, demanding Miyaji's resignation. 反对党曾杯葛国会议程，要宫路下台。

20 scarlet   

n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的

参考例句：

• The scarlet leaves of the maples contrast well with the dark green of the pines.深红的枫叶和暗绿的松树形成了明显的对比。
• The glowing clouds are growing slowly pale,scarlet,bright red,and then light red.天空的霞光渐渐地淡下去了，深红的颜色变成了绯红，绯红又变为浅红。

21 celebrity   

n.名人，名流；著名，名声，名望

参考例句：

• Tom found himself something of a celebrity. 汤姆意识到自己已小有名气了。
• He haunted famous men, hoping to get celebrity for himself. 他常和名人在一起, 希望借此使自己获得名气。

22 privately   

adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地

参考例句：

• Some ministers admit privately that unemployment could continue to rise.一些部长私下承认失业率可能继续升高。
• The man privately admits that his motive is profits.那人私下承认他的动机是为了牟利。

23 livelihoods   

生计，谋生之道( livelihood的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• First came the earliest individualistic pioneers who depended on hunting and fishing for their livelihoods. 走在最前面的是早期的个人主义先驱者，他们靠狩猎捕鱼为生。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件
• With little influence over policies, their traditional livelihoods are threatened. 因为马赛族人对政策的影响力太小，他们的传统生计受到了威胁。

24 banking   

n.银行业，银行学，金融业

参考例句：

• John is launching his son on a career in banking.约翰打算让儿子在银行界谋一个新职位。
• He possesses an extensive knowledge of banking.他具有广博的银行业务知识。

25 consolation   

n.安慰，慰问

参考例句：

• The children were a great consolation to me at that time.那时孩子们成了我的莫大安慰。
• This news was of little consolation to us.这个消息对我们来说没有什么安慰。