In 1945, three years before Israel’s founding, the Arab League passed a boycott of Jewish businesses in Mandatory Palestine. It was a move that hearkened directly to German precedents of the decade before.

In 1976, the U.S. Congress passed anti-boycott legislation that made American companies’ participation in such boycotts illegal, under threat of fines up to $1 million and imprisonment of up to 20 years. The legislation and joint efforts by the United States and Europe to combat Arab League and oil state blackmail succeeded, and the anti-Israel boycott slowly collapsed.

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