People of Color Support Rainbow Grocery to Boycott Israeli Goods

5/10/2008



Dear Rainbow Grocery



We are writing as shoppers at Rainbow Grocery who are people

of color. Some of us are in RBIG (Rainbow Boycott Israeli 

Goods) which as you know has been asking for a meeting with

the collective since mid 2006. We have taken up the boycott of 

Israeli goods because the issue of Zionism is first and foremost

a racial justice issue.

Some of us are fairly new to the Bay Area and some of us have

been Rainbow shoppers since the 1980’s. We shop at Rainbow 

because we are fighting for our lives in a racist (and sexist) 

system that relentlessly assaults our health and wellbeing. 

Rainbow is a very important resource for both knowledge of and 

access to healthy living food and other natural supports for 

disease prevention and cure. We also believe in and support 

the concept of collectives.

We also shop at Rainbow because we expect progressive 

organizations like Rainbow be responsive to community and 

to take a position and strong action for justice. As you know,

the Palestinians are being subjected by Israel to an apartheid

system where people with darker skins are humiliated and 

brutalized every day and treated in a savagely racist way. This 

is the 60th anniversary of the Nakba, when Israeli soldiers went 

from village to village massacring Palestinians young and old. 

Israeli policies of ethnic cleansing and seizure of lands from the

indigenous people are eerily reminiscent of the way Native 

Americans were treated in this country.

In the April 2008 issue of Vanity Fair, the role of the Bush

administration in deepening the suffering of Palestinian people, 

who are people of color, is presented in great and gory detail. 

“Vanity Fair has obtained confidential documents, since 

corroborated by sources in the U.S. and Palestine, which lay

bare a covert initiative, approved by Bush and implemented by 

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Deputy National 

Security Adviser Elliott Abrams, to provoke a Palestinian civil 

war.” This article exposes how at the behest of the US 

government, Israel has unleashed an unimaginable level of 

violence aimed at expelling those Palestinians who can/will go,

and killing/maiming as many people as they dare of those who 

remain.

As individuals and organizations (including small businesses)

we must confront the question of what it means if we refuse to 

stand with people of color around the world and to protest our 

racist enemies’ closest friends abroad. As people of color we 

daily, must confront the question, what does it mean for our 

struggle against racism that Bush's closest ally is empowered

to do as they like with complete impunity by those of us who

consider ourselves to be anti-racist.

We are adding our voices to those calling immediately for a

meeting with Rainbow to discuss Rainbow’s boycotting Israeli

goods.

Sincerely,

Nell Myhand 

Synthia Green
Shirley Yee
Faris Barhoum
Pablo Jim
Samia Shoman 
Jahahara Alkebulan Maat
Sharon Lungo
Chris Lymbertos
Lily Haskell
Adnan Hamwi
Sannah Rahim
Phil Hutchings
Jess Ghannam
Happy Hyder
Joyce Umamoto
Ayesha Gill
Chris Mazaleh
Nissor Ahmed
Ali Abong
Patricia Hemphill
Grace Shalhoub