On 3 September 2025, the Scottish Parliament passed a motion proposed by the Scottish Greens to immediately boycott Israel.
A majority of 62 Members of Scottish Parliament (MSPs) voted to impose on the Scottish and UK governments a “package of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) targeted at the state of Israel and at companies complicit in its military operations and its occupation of Palestine.”
The 31 votes against the motion came mainly from Tory and Liberal Democrat MSPs, while the Scottish Labour MSPs abstained.
This means the SNP, as the ruling party, and the Scottish Greens both overwhelmingly voted in favour of this motion. On the same day, the Scottish Parliament flew the Palestinian flag and First Minister John Swinney announced that funding to arms companies which sell weapons to Israel has been paused.
The proximity to the Scottish elections must have had nothing to do with this, naturally – as it had nothing to do with the First Minister finally calling what’s happening in Gaza a genocide just a month prior, almost two years after the genocide started!
Netanyahu’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide, and the ground invasion of Gaza City only intensifies it.
The world cannot look away. We need serious and urgent action to put a stop to this.
The UK Government must recall Parliament, sanction Israel, and end all arms sales now.
— John Swinney (@JohnSwinney) August 21, 2025
Arms manufacturing
I am not sure if John Swinney and the rest of the SNP MSPs are aware that Scotland hosts the major arms manufacturers Leonardo, Thales, Raytheon and BAE systems. Do they know that Babcock International, a defence company that has worked in partnership with Israeli arms companies, owns the Rosyth dockyard?
Outside of arms specifically, the list of Scottish-based companies, including the Royal Bank of Scotland, involved in the Israeli economy – or at the very least trading with Israeli companies that can be said to be involved in the occupation – is endless.
Even the Church of Scotland owns hotels in Jerusalem and Tiberias!
It’s therefore been hard to find a way to make this BDS call actually work in Scotland without a complete overhaul of how businesses are run and controlled.
Fear not! This is where the long-awaited ‘procurement guidelines update’ from the Scottish government comes in.
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“Professional misconduct”
Published on 6 February, the new guidance now directs bidders to take care when they are trading with companies “involved, whether directly or through their supply chains, in activities which constitute grave professional misconduct”.
This “professional misconduct” can include holding assets in illegal settlements, or being involved in actions that might harm or infringe on human rights. But nowhere in the update is Israel mentioned by name, or is even a reference to boycotting it made.
In fact, it points out that countries which signed the World Trade Organisation Procurement Agreement “must be treated the same as bidders from the UK”. If you haven’t guessed it: Israel is a signatory.
So, the BDS motion can’t stand – the document explicitly says it is “discriminatory” to refuse contracts with Israeli companies. Although trade exclusions can be made based on “conduct”, these would have to be assessed on a case-by-case basis rather than a blanket ban as the initial boycott motion calls for.
Break with their system
It should come as no surprise that the BDS motion has been walked back. Naturally, the massive profits Scottish-based companies make through their contracts with Israeli companies could not be put under that kind of threat – no matter how many Palestinian lives are lost.
We have seen the same logic allow energy companies to get away with making record profits while workers suffered during the cost of living crisis. And we’ve seen the same disregard for human life from the rich and powerful in their cover-up of the Epstein files.
This is their system that we live under. If we want to end the genocide and occupation taking place at the hands of the Israel state and construct a world free of all exploitation and war, we have to take matters into our own hands and break with their system entirely.
