Israel-linked boycotts unlikely to take off

It’s hard to get a cheap flight right now. Bonza’s finances ain’t so bonzer. Jetstar doesn’t seem very cheap – what price the ritual humiliations of getting your hand luggage weighed in departure lounges modelled on refugee processing centres?

Perhaps it doesn’t matter. By applying the pro-Palestine protest rhetoric from universities everywhere, it follows that no commercial flying – regardless of the cost – should be taken here in Australia.

Amid the cries of “war criminals”, it seems we really must boycott all major airlines.

Qantas, Virgin, Jetstar and Rex all use Boeing planes. And Boeing is bad, you see, apparently because it supplies weapons to Israel and its “genocide”.

Indeed, any enterprise with “direct or indirect ties to Israel” ought to be black-listed. As a bonus, prosecuting this case also offers a veneer of righteousness for brash shows of antiSemitism.

It’s unprecedented, this. Like weakwilled villains of Shakespeare, university bosses present a united front of tolerance for intolerance. Federal ministers such as Jason Clare channel Neville Chamberlain, pandering to marginal electorates, and the price is decency. Clare is very dumb – or very cynical. Forget a country – he couldn’t lead a dog.

Naturally, the misplaced protests here have been appropriated from misplaced protests elsewhere. They’re allegedly about free speech, albeit with the disruption of students in stunts that don’t seem, to use the lingo, very inclusive or safe.

A full boycott, using the “ties with Israel” measure, certainly demands a few sacrifices by the believers.

Other companies besides Boeing have been accused of colluding with the “enemy”. You must cast out your runners (Puma, Adidas) and give up TikTok. And put down your phone (Apple).

You ought to give up fast food (McDonald’s and KFC) and resist indulging in a takeaway coffee (Starbucks).

SodaStream, a company where Jews and Palestinians long worked side-by-side, is a big no-no, presumably along with the outlets that sell SodaStream, such as Woolworths, Officeworks and Bunnings.

As far as we can tell, the protesters are not ready to commit to outing a terrorist organisation that massacred 1200 Jews last October.

Perhaps this will follow the smiting of bigger evils, such as a company that once celebrated Jews and Palestinians in its tyrannical crusade to fizz water.