If passed, legislation currently before the U.S. Congress would forbid businesses from supporting boycotts of Israel or other states “friendly” to the U.S. Two weeks ago, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) announced its opposition to the bill on the grounds that it violates freedom of speech. Eugene Kontorovich disagrees:

The ACLU’s claims are as weak as they are dramatic. . . . Current law [already] prohibits U.S. entities from participating in or cooperating with international boycotts organized by foreign countries. These measures, first adopted in 1977, were explicitly aimed at the Arab states’ boycott of Israel, but their language is far broader, not mentioning any particular countries. . . . [This] law has been upheld against First Amendment challenges in the years after its passage and has not raised any constitutional concerns in the nearly four decades since. . . . If the anti-boycott measures are unconstitutional, as the ACLU argues, it would mean that most foreign-sanctions laws are unconstitutional.

The distinction [on which these laws rest] between expression and commercial conduct is crucial to the constitutionality of civil-rights acts. In the United States, hate speech is constitutionally protected. However, if a Ku Klux Klan member places his constitutionally protected expression of racial hatred within the context of a commercial transaction—for example, by publishing a “For Sale” notice that says that he will not sell his house to Jews or African-Americans—it loses its constitutional protection. The Fair Housing Act forbids publishing such discriminatory notices, and few doubt the constitutionality of the Fair Housing Act. . . .

It is little wonder, then, that opponents of the Israel Anti-Boycott Act feel the need to exaggerate what the act does. It only makes clear that the old and existing anti-boycott law applies not just to the Arab League boycott but also to newer foreign anti-Israel boycotts, such as those being organized by the UN Human Rights Council. . . .

The real question is why the ACLU is now attacking the basic constitutional understandings that underpin decades of American foreign policy and civil-rights regulation—but confining its new First Amendment standard to laws relating to Israel.

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.