Approximately six to seven protesters performed a sit-in at Starbucks across the street from San José City Hall on Wednesday morning to show resistance towards the company’s relationship to Israel.
Gargi Cheema, one of the protesters who approached customers walking into Starbucks, said the least protesters can do in America is show their support for the Palestinian people, educate and encourage consumers to be conscious where they spend their money.
“By supporting Starbucks, you are directly supporting Israel's actions and how they have been bombing Palestinians, not just since October 7, but for the past 75 years at this point,” Cheema said.
Experts from the United Nations (UN) warned the public that the Palestinian people are at risk of experiencing genocide because of Israel’s response to Hamas, according to a Nov. 2 press release from the UN.
Experts said the conflict in Gaza has reached a “catastrophic tipping point” and warned that there was a dire need for food, water, medicine, fuel and essential supplies in the region, according to the same source.
Cheema said Starbuck’s two largest investors Vanguard and BlackRock, are financially supporting Israel.
Vanguard Group and BlackRock Fund Advisors are the two largest passive fund asset management firms in banking, according to a Sept. 15, 2021 article from the Common Reader.
Vanguard owns 105,626,376 shares, which 9.2% of Starbucks shares, according to a webpage from Fintel, a financial information platform that provides advanced research tools for financial professionals.
Black Rock owns 76,086,062 shares and 6.6% of Starbucks shares, according to a different webpage from the same source.
Vanguard and BlackRock both have made investments in two other companies responsible for building homes in illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, according to a Jan. 2, 2021 article from Reuters.
At 9 a.m. Nuha Khan, a political science freshman at Mission College, sat at one of the tables inside Starbucks holding a sign and facing the employees while they served drinks to customers.
Khan said they chose to boycott the Starbucks on Santa Clara Street because it is located across the street from City Hall.
“We were hoping to grab the attention of local officials, people who have the ability to make change within our city,” Khan said.
She said the boycott at Starbucks shows how there are other ways city officials and citizens in San José can stop supporting Israel’s actions.
“There are other ways that San José can stop funding a genocide or take matters into their own hands to help a the situation right now in Palestine,” she said. “That is (to) stop drinking Starbucks, boycotting places that actively fund Israel.”
In San José, a city bylaw prohibits local officials from taking any positions or actions to address foreign policies or international relationships, according to a council resolution policy that was published in 1979.
The purpose of this bylaw is to recognize and support every citizen’s fundamental right to have their own views and opinions, according to the same document.
Khan said the organizers and her decided to do a sit-in at Starbucks because they want to see the company stop financially supporting Israel.
Starbucks sued Starbucks Workers United, a union representing more than 9,000 of its employees, in October after the union posted a message on X that said, “Solidarity with Palestine,” according to a Dec. 1 article from NBC.
The post was not authorized by the union or its workers and was quickly deleted after it was published, according to an article from CNN Business that was published on Thursday.
In a letter to the public, Sara Kelly, the executive vice president and chief partner officer said Starbucks condemns acts of terrorism, hate and violence and disagrees with the views the union has expressed, according to an Oct. 13 message from Starbucks’ website.
Hamas is one of the Palestinian territories’ two major political parties, governs the Gaza Strip and has been categorized as a terrorist organization by dozens of countries including the US according to the same source.
In October, Hamas, an Islamist militant group, launched a surprise attack in southern Israel, killing 1,400 people and taking dozens of hostages, according to an Oct. 10 article from PBS.
The Israeli government in response declared war on Hamas and began striking targets in the Gaza Strip, including residential buildings and healthcare facilities, according to a webpage from the United Nations (UN).
Around 14,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed in air and artillery strikes carried out by Israeli military forces in response, according to a Nov. 15 article from the BBC.
A protester who asked to remain anonymous said he decided to protest because he said he feels the world is “shedding an eye about what’s happening” and wanted to be a part of the movement.
The protester, who asked to remain anonymous, stood in front of Starbucks facing City Hall with an Arabic instrument called a daf that looked similar to a tambourine with the Palestinian flag painted on one side.
“I use it in protests and (it) has the Palestinian flag on it with blood and because if we're not speaking about Palestine, we're all complicit because the media is shutting us up, basically,” the protester said.
The protester asked to remain anonymous because he was concerned he would be doxxed by Canary Mission, an Israeli blacklisting and doxxing operation that targets students and professors critical of Israeli policies, according to Friday article from The Nation.
“Not only are they (the Israeli military) killing people but they're also displacing people,” the protester said. “(Residents of Gaza) don't know where to go. They want to get out. They want to avoid the killing, but they can't because they're being attacked in the north of Gaza.”
In 1948, Israel declared independence from the UN and began capturing Palestinian territory, according to a different webpage from the UN.
The Gaza Strip and the West Bank are the only two territories that currently still belong to Palestine, according to the same source.
Since the 1980s, Israel has continued to build illegal settlements in the Gaza Strip and in the West Bank, according to the same webpage from the UN.
According to the same webpage, in 2005, Hamas took over the Gaza Strip and the Israeli government imposed blockades on both territories creating a humanitarian crisis for Palestinians.
Andrea Lopez, a senior at Connections Academy, said some people try to make all Palestinians and Arabs look like terrorists when they talk about Hamas.
“They're trying to demonize the act of Hamas when it was literally just a cry for help for the people of Palestine,” Lopez said.
The same anonymous protester said the public discourse around the topic is beyond politics, and that he sees the issue in an abstract way.
He said he values all human beings and doesn’t want people to die.
“I don't need to be a Palestinian to stand up right now. I don't need to be anything. I don't need to be Hamas,” the protester said. “I just need to be a human, stand with humanity and that's what we're doing.”
The anonymous protester said he wants people to understand that being anti-Zionism does not make someone automatically anti-semitic.
Zionism is a Jewish nationalist movement that aims to create and support a Jewish national state in Palestine, according to a webpage from Britannica.
“We love Jewish people, we don't have anything against them,” the protester said. “(But) we are anti-Zionism, which is basically nationalism that is framed upon that is hiding behind religion in a way or another.”
