Hayward votes to pull stock tied to Israel
The Hayward City Council voted to divest the city’s stock ownership stakes in four companies that have ties with Israel — apparently the first city in the Bay Area to take such a measure.
The 4-3 vote Tuesday targets the city’s current investments in San Ramon energy major Chevron, South Korean carmaker Hyundai, Santa Clara chipmaker Intel and Irving, Texas, construction-equipment giant Caterpillar.
Hayward’s holdings in the four companies amount to a total of $1.6 million out of an investment portfolio valued at $250 million.
“How can we say this has nothing to do with us when our own residents are losing family members?” said Council Member George Syrop. “Why do we spend years and millions of taxpayer dollars trying to fight climate change just to have Israel’s bombs that we pay for emit more CO2 in the last 100 days than 20 countries combined, accelerating an unlivable future for all of us?”
Mayor Mark Salinas and Council Members Ray Bonilla Jr. and Julie Roche voted against the proposal. The city manager expressed concern that city staff hadn’t had a chance to evaluate the proposal’s impact on the city’s investment portfolio.
The Arab Resource and Organizing Center applauded the council’s vote and said it hoped to see more cities take Hayward’s lead. But the Jewish Community Relations Council called Hayward’s move antisemitic.
The move comes as several cities across the Bay Area have taken stands in the IsraelHamas war. Earlier this month, San Francisco supervisors passed a resolution supporting a sustained cease-fire in Gaza, drawing criticism but not a veto from Mayor London Breed. Oakland passed a similar measure in November, after a contentious October resolution in Richmond that accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing” in Gaza.
Hayward has not passed a cease-fire resolution. Syrop said Tuesday that instead of taking such a “symbolic” step, Hayward should “do something that we can control that will actually have a material impact on those profiting on the apartheid in Gaza.”
The East Bay city’s divestiture comes after Palestinian supporters throughout the Bay Area have pressed cities to take a stand on the Middle East conflict. In Berkeley, so many City Council meetings have been interrupted by residents demanding a cease-fire resolution that council members eventually moved to a private online room open to news media and participants.
On Tuesday in Hayward, nearly 40 people spoke during public comment, most urging the city to cut ties with the four companies. Some people held Palestinian flags.
“Those dollars are being funneled to support this genocide, the occupation and the apartheid in Palestine,” one speaker said. “Not another nickel, not another dime, no more money for Israel’s crime.”
Another speaker urged the city to “take a stand,” and one woman said the city’s tax dollars were being used for “murdering and slaughtering innocent people, children, men and women.”
A few speakers spoke against the supporters and said people should focus on crimes committed by Hamas instead.
Lara Kiswani, the executive director of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center, said in a statement she hopes to see more cities “do everything in their power to divest from all companies that profit from Israeli apartheid.”
“Just as was the case in the movement against apartheid in South Africa, boycotts, divestment and sanctions are a way for the international community to hold states accountable for their human rights violations, to demonstrate solidarity and make a material impact for the broader good,” Kiswani said. “This is particularly important today, as the Biden administration has yet to heed the calls for a ceasefire.”
Tyler Gregory, the CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council, issued a statement Thursday criticizing the city’s vote.
The movement for boycotts, divestment and sanctions “singles out Israel for economic delegitimization and isolation, with the aim of destroying the country,” Gregory said. “Support for BDS is support for a world where Israel does not exist. Local lawmakers aligning with a movement that seeks to end the world’s only Jewish state does nothing to support peace between Israelis and Palestinians, but it does create antisemitism here at home.”
In 2015, the city of Berkeley rejected a proposal to divest in companies that do business in Israel.
“Why do we spend years and millions of taxpayer dollars trying to fight climate change just to have Israel’s bombs that we pay for emit more CO2 in the last 100 days than 20 countries combined, accelerating an unlivable future for all of us?” Council Member George Syrop