Unfortunately, even though a broad-based strike would be able to exert leverage to stop the genocide, we can be sure the idea would be met with many reasons why it couldn’t work.
However, in response to Israel’s genocide in Gaza, its brutal attacks on the West Bank and Lebanon and pushing for war with Iran, which could easily morph into WW III, many organizations and some countries are calling for an international boycott of Israel—some are even calling for a boycott of US companies—to impose sanctions, sever diplomatic relations, and pressure Israel and the US to stop their aggression and massacres against civilians – and maybe, just maybe, avert a nuclear war. The Palestinian-led BDS movement began in 2005 and because it is effective, both Israel and the US are passing laws to shut it down. The idea was conceived in 2001 during an (in-person*) World Conference Against Racism held in South Africa and shares many similarities with the anti-apartheid movement that dismantled the racist state there.
And just to note, there are times when a strike and boycott work together.
Meanwhile, since the US is a prime facilitator of Israeli warmaking, genocide, apartheid and oppression of Palestinians, and now attacks on Lebanon and Iran, it seems very appropriate that there are calls for a boycott of US companies and goods.
There are progressive Christian organizations demanding boycotts not just of Israel but of US companies And there is a long list from the American Friends Service Committee of companies profiting from the Gaza genocide.
Veterans For Peace, for example, as a respected international anti-war veterans organization, along with Jewish Voice for Peace, Students for Justice in Palestine, CODEPINK and other progressive organizations could use their platforms to join the call for a global boycott of US companies tied to the genocide in Gaza. Of course, if these groups do the necessary organizing homework so that when the call does go public it hits the corporate world like a ton of bricks, that might put them in the crosshairs of the incoming Trump administration. That, paradoxically, might be the best thing that could happen because it would spark further resistance.
There are active protests of the Gaza genocide boycotting US goods. McDonald’s and Starbucks, because of their support for Israel, are suffering from boycotts in Jordan. Meanwhile here in the US, major unions are urging Biden to stop arming Israel, while international dockworkers and other unions are also activated to block transport of arms to Israel and unions globally are blocking arms shipments to Israel.
The concepts, let alone reality, of massive strikes and boycotts may be long shots at stopping the genocide and the march towards nuclear armageddon. But in times like these, in the most threatening time ever for man-made extinction, every viable resistance option must be taken.
Tarak Kauff is the editor-in-chief of Peace and Planet News. He was a paratrooper in the U.S. Army from 1959 to 1962 and is a lifetime member and former board member of Veterans For Peace. He is a longtime activist for peace, justice, and the environment.