Nearly a year has passed since the escalation of the Israel-Hamas conflict became the subject of a fierce culture war in the U.S. As grassroots advocacy continues sweeping college campuses nationwide, students and administrations have become further embattled.
Last Spring, protestors across UF and the surrounding community coalesced around the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, which plunged Alachua County and Gainesville into hot water.
Public demonstrations denouncing Israel’s retaliation to Hamas’ attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, have populated UF’s campus. A growing sector of Jewish Gators is defecting from staunch support of Israel as the war continues; this includes pushing the city and the county to divest from weapons companies like Lockheed Martin.
In November 2023, the anti-Zionist organization Jewish Voice for Peace paired with UF Students for Justice in Palestine to pressure the Gainesville City Commission to pass a ceasefire resolution and divest from munitions manufacturers. When the city commission made it clear it was unwilling to comply, activists redirected their attention to that of Alachua County.
Abigail Fletcher, an organizer with Gainesville’s chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, said it took months of resolute campaigning for the county to pay attention to their cause. In May, County Commissioner Ken Cornell motioned to direct the county to pursue corporate divestment. On July 9, county commissioners unanimously voted in favor of an amended investment policy, with Commissioner Chuck Chestnut absent.
County spokesperson Mark Sexton outlined the revised investment strategy. He said the county didn’t just cross Israel-supporting corporations off its investment list; it extracted capital from all corporate holdings.
“Instead of playing the stock market, [we now] invest in investment tools that are designed to preserve capital, like treasury bills,” he said. “We are just divesting of corporate investments and going into capital preservation.”
Sexton emphasized that the decision was in the county’s best financial interest, divorced from ideological considerations.
“There was nothing in the motion on July 9 that finalized this, that described any motivation other than preserving capital,” he said.
Still, the Florida Youth Action Fund is celebrating the county commission’s decision, said Cameron Driggers, its 19-year-old executive director. The YAF connects young people with resources to lead progressive issues-based campaigns in their communities.
“I'm so proud of the amazing student organizers and community organizers that have been working towards this issue for several weeks and months now,” Driggers said.
Driggers, a UF sophomore studying business administration, added of the county’s divestment, “I think it's nothing short of a historic moment.”
NKwanda Jah, the 70-year-old executive director of the local nonprofit Cultural Arts Coalition, also sees the county’s decision as a step in the right direction.
Jah was a vocal participant in the 1980s movement to boycott corporations supportive of South African Apartheid. She characterized Alachua County’s move to proceed with corporate divestment as a watershed moment.
“Even though this does not go far enough, it does cause the manufacturers to take note that we no longer want to be complicit in what they're doing,” Jah said.
Others disapprove of the motion to cut financial ties with Israel. Rabbi Berl Goldman of UF Chabad said Alachua County should stay out of international affairs.
“For national affairs [and] foreign affairs, we have elected officials in Congress,” Goldman said. “We vote for Alachua County Commissioners to deal with county business.”
Still, Goldman believes everyone should voice their concerns about the ongoing conflict.
“We are all speaking out against the war, against Hamas, [and] the moment Hamas surrenders and returns the hostages…not one more innocent life will be lost,” he said.
Rabbi Jonah Zinn, executive director of UF Hillel, believes Alachua County residents shouldn’t be seeking divestment from Israel of their government officials. Doing so would compound prejudice against Jewish people, he wrote in an email.
“BDS campaigns are not about shaping government policy—they are about normalizing antisemitism,” Zinn said. “Accusing Israel of ‘genocide’ is not only false; it is also a modern-day iteration of the age-old antisemitic blood libel."
Groups supporting the Palestinian cause remain unsatisfied, denouncing the City of Gainesville for failing to follow Alachua County's lead.
Representatives from some of these organizations protested outside City Hall during an August commission meeting. Others made their case inside the building, urging Mayor Harvey Ward to withdraw tax dollars from corporate investments in Lockheed Martin, Hewlett Packard, Caterpillar, Chevron, Nvidia and Textron, which supply military materials — including missiles and fighter jets — to Israel.
The city holds more than $33 million in cash and nearly $2 million in investments.
Ward cited a 2023 Florida HB3 as an impediment to the city’s ability to make corporate divestments. The mandate states that environmental, social and governance factors must not influence local financial decisions.
Still, nearly 70 local pro-Palestinian organizations have signed an electronic petition calling upon the City of Gainesville to follow Alachua County's example. The list includes UF’s United Faculty of Florida chapter, a union representing faculty members and graduate assistants statewide.
Marilyn Wende, a 31-year-old UF-UFF council member, thinks the city can do more to support her organization’s cause, she said.
“Harvey Ward is being overzealous in his interpretation of [HB3],” she said. “I would even posit that he is actually making his decision to not divest from corporations for a political reason, and it's that he doesn't agree with our understanding of the war on Gaza.”
Tess Tumarkin, a 32-year-old member of Alachua County Health Care Workers for Gaza, agreed with Wende, saying Gainesville should follow in the county’s footsteps.
“Well, if the county can do it, I think the city can as well,” Tumarkin said, “And I think if nothing [else], there is a reasonable conversation to be had.”
Ward encouraged those seeking city-level divestment to present their concerns to the Florida legislature. District 3 City Commissioner Casey Willits agreed, saying Gainesville is unwilling to defy state law to pursue corporate divestiture.
“Even if we want to say that we don't want to invest in people who make a profit off of war,” Willits said at an Aug. 15 city commission meeting, “I don’t know that we can.”
Contact Natalie Kaufman at nkaufman@alligator.org. Follow her on X @Nat_Kauf.
Natalie Kaufman is a sophomore journalism student and the Alligator's Fall 2024 Metro General Assignment reporter. In her free time, she likes drinking copious amounts of caffeine and running.
