A bitter internal war over a proposed boycott of Israeli products has thrown Brooklyn’s famously progressive Park Slope Food Coop into turmoil, with Jewish members accusing anti-Israel activists of harassment, intimidation, and creating an atmosphere so hostile that organizers moved a major vote online over security fears.
The dispute centers around an effort by boycott activists to ban Israeli-made products from the coop, a battle that longtime members say has fractured the organization and created one of the ugliest controversies in its 53-year history.
The vote had originally been scheduled to take place Tuesday evening at the Picnic House in Prospect Park. But after concerns mounted among members about possible confrontations and safety risks, organizers shifted the proceedings to a Zoom-only format. Internal emails obtained by The NY Post said many of the coop’s roughly 15,000 members raised “explicit concerns about their safety.”
“People were nervous to go physically,” coop member Ramon Maislen told The NY Post.
“They are fairly violent,” Maislen alleged of the anti-Israel members.
Maislen said several members feared that individuals publicly opposing the boycott, divestment, and sanctions proposal could face harassment or confrontation after the late-night meeting concluded.
In an email sent to members, coop coordinators Ann Herpel and Matt Hoagland acknowledged that despite increased security measures, “we cannot guarantee their security.”
The proposed boycott itself would have little practical impact on store inventory. The coop reportedly sells only a small number of Israeli products, including seasonal kosher-for-Passover matzah, hummus, Bamba snacks, an herb product, and two Ecolove hair-care items.
Tuesday’s vote marked the latest chapter in a years-long anti-Israel campaign within the coop that reportedly dates back to 2012.
According to members, tensions exploded following the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza.
Maislen filed a complaint in 2024 with New York’s Human Rights Division, alleging that he and other Jewish members faced harassment because of their opposition to the boycott effort.
The atmosphere grew even more heated during a coop meeting last month after one member reportedly declared, “Jewish supremacism is a problem in this country,” while also comparing Jews to Nazis — remarks that triggered outrage among many attendees.
Opposition to the boycott effort has also emerged from prominent liberal Jewish figures. Rabbi Rachel Timoner, who previously faced criticism within parts of the Jewish community for publicly supporting New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, has become one of the leading voices against the boycott campaign.
In a recent sermon to congregants, Timoner warned that BDS “is not a movement for Palestinian statehood, or for co-existence or for peace. It is part of a larger movement for the elimination of Israel.”
Numerous coop members told The New York Post that the controversy has become the most divisive internal battle the organization has ever experienced.
Outside the coop Monday, pro-Palestinian demonstrators gathered chanting slogans about genocide, apartheid, and Zionism while newly hired security guards monitored the scene nearby.
“Vote yes to not be silent during genocide. Be on the right side of history at the coop,” shouted one woman, who was wearing a shirt that said “I’m Jewish and I’m against genocide.”
But several frustrated shoppers told The Post they were deeply disturbed by the demonstrations and growing hostility surrounding the issue.
Noah Potter, a 54-year-old attorney and coop member since 2012, warned that approval of the boycott would hand the BDS movement a symbolic victory.
He said the measure would become a “scalp hanging from the belt” of the BDS movement.
“It’s about putting the coop’s brand on the BDS ideology.
“In practice, when BDS comes into an organization, the modus operandi is to polarize and expel, purge and cause the organization to adopt a statement that is highly reductionist, and inflammatory, and assigns blame to the extent of incarnating evil,” he added.
Another longtime member from Prospect Heights, who has belonged to the coop since 1987, said the rhetoric surrounding Jews had left her horrified and reconsidering her membership.
“I thought it was disgusting,” she said, adding that if the vote passes, she will do the bulk of her shopping at the Key Food on Flatbush Avenue.
“When people are passionate about an issue, they sometimes don’t realize the antisemitism that’s there.”
One Jewish member connected to the anti-boycott organization Coop 4 Unity described witnessing a confrontation in which a pro-boycott activist allegedly intimidated someone distributing anti-boycott flyers.
“A member walked up to another guy who was flyering and got really physically aggressive,” she said.
“He backed up to him closely and started yelling about genocide and apartheid.”
Although coop staff eventually intervened, members said the incident reflected a broader escalation of tensions that has intensified in recent weeks.
“The whole time I was out there flyering, my heart was racing,” the 37-year-old woman said. “I’m a mom of two. I could think of 1 million other things I could be doing.”
Ahead of the vote, the pro-boycott organization Members for Palestine reportedly distributed forceful campaign emails urging members to support the boycott while dismissing security concerns as political intimidation tactics.
As tensions escalated, several Jewish members said they no longer felt comfortable attending coop meetings in person.
The Post said it contacted Members for Palestine for comment but received no response Monday.
In a recently filed complaint reviewed by The Post, one longtime member described suffering severe anxiety after receiving boycott-related emails referencing “Zionists.”
“I used to love the coop more than any other institution in my life (I am fast falling into a state of utter disgust with every part of it),” the member wrote.
“I lost sleep. I had diarrhea. My stomach was in knots for the two weeks between the April 14 email and the April 29 meeting,” she continued — referring to the heated debates over the boycott.
“I was so nervous that I went to the Picnic House at 4:30 pm, to ensure I could get in, because I expected to be prevented from entering.”
The member further described the atmosphere at the meeting as “intimidating,” alleging that pro-Palestinian activists “flooded” the venue wearing keffiyehs and watermelon imagery associated with Palestinian solidarity demonstrations, causing many members to stay away out of fear.
Bruno Grandsard, who has belonged to the coop for a quarter-century, said the current crisis is unlike anything he has seen before.
“There have been other periods like this in the past, but this is the worst it’s ever been,” he said.
“The majority of people just want all of this to go away. It’s just very divisive, extremely divisive.”
For Maislen and other opponents of the boycott, one of the biggest concerns is that passage of the measure could trigger a major exodus of members from the institution.
An informal survey estimated that nearly 1,000 current members could leave the coop if the boycott is approved.
“My concern is that if coop members leave in disgust, it actually kind of harms us in a way, because if we have to have another vote, there’s just fewer people that are on our side,” Maislen said.
{
Matzav.com}