Points of Articulation
Boycotting Jazwares
On October 7, Hamas launched coordinated attacks from the Gaza Strip against southern Israel, beginning with rocket launches and continuing with human forces breaching the border. They struck military bases and unaffiliated civilian targets in a terrorist attack that killed over 1,100 people, and took 250 more hostage.
A few important points:
Israel has been actively perpetrating settler colonialist violence against Palestine for decades in both the West Bank and in Gaza. The current administration of Benjamin Netanyahu is far-right, and has significantly accelerated these practices.
Hamas is a terrorist organization. It is also the duly elected government of Palestine, which does not suddenly make it not a terrorist organization. It is a danger to both Israelis and Palestinians, and its actions have impeded any peace process for decades. Israelis have a right to their homeland. Palestinians have a right to their homeland. It is morally evil to attack civilians. Communities of Jewish and Muslim people around the world have come together to support one another at this time, and to denounce the violence being perpetrated by both the Israeli and Palestinian governments, perpetrated supposedly in those people's name.
Since 1967, Israel has occupied and administered Palestian territory. The current government encourages and subsidizes Israeli citizens moving into Palestine, often using military force to displace the people already living there, claiming their land, their homes, and their belongings, all in violation of international law. Israel builds walls, builds checkpoints, builds obstacles inside Palestine; it shows no interest in doing anything to solve the conflict, just to push it out of sight.
Hamas' attack on Israel on October 7 was a terrorist strike. But that does not excuse Israel's actions in retaliation. Israel is bombing purely civilian targets, falsely claiming Hamas leaders are hiding there. They are destroying hospitals, schools, and infrastructure vital to human life. They are purposely depriving civilians of electricity and running water. They are telling Palestinians to move to "safe" areas, then bombing those areas. They are intentionally shooting clearly identified doctors, medics, and members of the press. The things Israel is doing have nothing to do with defending their country; Israel is the aggressor, invading another land; they are committing war crimes. More than that, they are committing ethnic cleansing.
Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people.
A few weeks ago, Judd Zebersky, the CEO of Jazwares, said this in a LinkedIn post:
("I encourage dialogue and respect, unless you're despicable, barbaric, bloodthirsty cowards. Don't believe the lies, but also, let me tell you about this video I totally saw that even a cursory Google search will debunk.")
As of this writing, the posts are still up, still say the same thing. There's been no retraction, no walking it back. Judd may be wrong, but he's certainly standing by it.
To be pro-Israel at this point is to be in favor of their heinous criminal actions. It feels weird to use the term "Zionist," because it's most often used by antisemites to refer to all Jews and people who support them, but that's not its actual definition: Zionism is a nationalist belief that there is a historic right to an Israeli state in the Middle East. It gets its name from Mount Zion, one of the hills where the ancient city of Jerusalem was situated; thus "Zion" was used synecdochically to refer to the land.
Many American Evangelical Christians are Zionists, because they believe the establishment of a Jewish state and the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem are prerequisites for Second Coming of Christ and the Rapture. These Evangelicals also believe that Jews need to be converted from their religion to Christianity. Many Jews are not Zionists, because they don't care about Israel's existence, recognizing that a particular square of dirt means nothing to the religion, which has survived without it before. For a good 1,878 years, in fact.
So despite the way white supremecists use it, "Zionist" is not synonymous with support for Jews; and despite the way many Conservatives are currently wielding it, "anti-Zionist" is not synonymous with antisemitism. (To say nothing of the fact that "Semitic" also does not mean "Jewish"; Palestinians are Semitic as well.) Zionism is about a country - and by extension its government - not a religion or an ethnicity. "Israeli" and "Jewish" are not two words for the same thing.
A Zionist is someone who supports the current governmental State that is Israel, nothing more. Israel's defenders try to paint anyone opposing Israel's actions as being anti-Jewish, which is at best foolish and at worst a blatant lie. The state of Israel is not synonymous with Jewish people, and condemning the actions of a government is in no way the same as condemning its citizens - otherwise every American in the world would have been in extreme trouble between 2016 and 2020. It is entirely possible to support Jews, to grieve for the horrible losses they've suffered both in the initial terrorist attack and in the ensuing war, and yet to recognize that Israel's government and the Israel Defense Forces are absolutely in the wrong and need to be stopped. Even if you don't think they should remove their colonies and give the Palestinian land back to the ones who were living there before, there is no ethical way to disagree that the way Israel is waging war is unconscionable.
Jazwares makes assloads of money off Squishmallows, the big soft plushes you see everywhere.
The majority of Jazwares' profit comes from children; the About Us page on their website says they are "committed to furthering the health, education, and development of all children through play in our local and global communities," yet they're willing to turn a blind eye to a government directly choosing to kill those children. Willing to donate money to that government. More than that, willing to attempt to blacklist anyone with the sense or decency to say that government shouldn't be doing what it's doing. Just as it's insulting to declare that being against Israel right now is to be against all Jews, it's equally insulting to declare that supporting Palestinian people is to support Hamas.
A country's leadership and a country's people are not the same thing.
We don't have any Squishmallow reviews here. They're nice to touch, but they're a bit too far outside our purview. And we don't review as many Jazwares toys as we do Hasbro or NECA. But regardless, until a sincere apology is made by Judd Zebersky to the people he's insulted and attacked, we're boycotting Jazwares.
I had a Fortnite review ready to go this Friday. I spent hours writing it, the photos were shot and edited, the page was put together and ready for you to read. It was almost the exclusive preview in last week's Email Update. It's deleted now. Gone.
I had a couple thematic Fortnite figures to review next month. They're getting returned to the store.
Jazwares makes the AEW figures, so no more of those. No Halo, no Pokemon, no Roblox, and no Star Wars Micro Galaxy Squadron. No letting Jazwares use my money to fund pro-Israel causes.
So we here at OAFE are boycotting Jazwares. We won't insist that you have to boycott them as well; that's a decision you have to make for yourself. (Though obviously you should.) We just won't be talking about them, won't be giving them any air at all until they correct their ignorant stance.
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