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With the global media siding with Israel against Palestinians, In the past couple of days, we have witnessed very infuriating support from global brands to Israel and its inhuman crimes and genocide against Palestinians. This support triggered anger, especially from Arabs. Ever since people witnessed this support, there was a huge campaign run by people, especially Arabs to boycott these brands.
For quite some time, none of the Egyptian franchises commented on the Palestinian cause or showed any support until the moment Egyptians started to get furious.
Here’s what happened.
Global Brands Supporting Zionism
In the previous few days, we have seen very strange support from international brands that bluntly supported terrorism and Zionism.
Starting from clothing brands to real estate, we have seen all kinds of support for Israel. The American clothing brand, American Eagle put the image of the Israeli flag on its billboard in Times Square replacing its flag.
The famous food and beverage brand McDonadl’s, its Israeli franchise has supported Israel by giving out free meals to the Israeli soldiers which made the Arabs and the Pro-Palestinian extremely angry and caused a huge backlash to the brand.
Also, the real estate brand Coldwell Banker posted on its social media platforms that it supports Israel.
Seeing this on the news and social media made people furious and encouraged them to spread the word to boycott these brands, especially the food and beverage brands like PapJohn’s, McDonald’s, KFC, Starbucks, etc.
Boycotting Whoever Supports Israel
An international invitation from Palestine supporters to boycott the brands that support Israel.
People and Arabs have been asserting the necessity of boycotting and unfollowing whoever supports Israel, whether a public figure or a brand. This global invitation has been spreading all over social media. It even reached the Israelis, which made an Israeli journalist make fun of Arabs for wanting to boycott Starbucks saying “You will boycott now but in a couple of days you’ll be back to order your Starbucks Iced White Mocha and that in case if you were able to boycott”.
How Egyptians Reacted
Ever since Israel declared war on Palestine and bombed Gaza, Egyptians have been calling to boycott brands like McDonald’s, KFC, and Starbucks.
Egyptians encouraged each other to boycott these brands, and they were even mad at Mohamed Salah for being silent the whole time ever since Gaza was under the Israeli bombing. Many people have posted on Facebook that McDonald’s and many other places have gone empty even on the weekend, which means that people are indeed boycotting.
Also, some stated that they ordered meals from McDonald’s and never picked up the phone to answer the delivery man. They are doing this on purpose to cost McDonald’s money.
Egyptian Franchise Extremely Late Reaction
After this global invitation and how Egyptians were pro the idea of boycotting these brands, McDonald’s along with other brands started to support Palestine.
In response to the social media attack on these brands and boycotting, McDonald’s stated that it donated 20 million EGP to the Palestinians while other brands started showing support through social media and also donating.
https://www.facebook.com/McDonaldsEgypt/posts/pfbid0cRv9Zay5ZLTP6mmvSXT41Zfx37x95khSTpwqWLcAMbndt99UatvK4G2N7uu1B47cl
https://www.facebook.com/PapaJohnsEgypt/posts/pfbid02MXX1CFLk5cEPszEYTryxycaVTQG4m8pHJ11Q2Rp6s8avm4GFWSZ1zQaTc8PbLMR2l
Also, the football player Mohamed Salah was said to have made a huge donation to the Palestinians.
What triggers the curiosity is why the brand started to make a move this late, which made some people refuse this support.
Egyptians’ Opinions Are Differing
While Some Egyptians support boycotting, others are still hesitant.
Some of the Egyptians are defending the brands as they have shown support or the ones working are purely Egyptians, while others opposed the idea of ordering food and then closing their phones in order not to pay for the meals, which affects the delivery men and costing them money.
Other people are still calling to continue boycotting the brands and don’t care for the donation Salah has made and asking him to speak publicly about the cause.
What we would like to say is that even if the brands here are just franchises, some of the money still goes to the mother brand, which hence some of the money goes to support Israel. Yet, we are doing anything possible to support Palestine. So, should this mean people boycott these brands?
