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US Sales of Palestinian Keffiyehs Soar, Even as Wearers Targeted

Izzat Hirbawi shows different keffiyeh fabric colorss in a textile factory in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, January 24,2023. (Reuters)
Izzat Hirbawi shows different keffiyeh fabric colorss in a textile factory in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, January 24,2023. (Reuters)
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US Sales of Palestinian Keffiyehs Soar, Even as Wearers Targeted

Izzat Hirbawi shows different keffiyeh fabric colorss in a textile factory in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, January 24,2023. (Reuters)
Izzat Hirbawi shows different keffiyeh fabric colorss in a textile factory in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, January 24,2023. (Reuters)

A growing number of Americans are donning the keffiyeh, the distinctive patterned scarf that's closely linked with Palestinians, to demand a ceasefire to Israel's attacks on Gaza or to signal their support for Palestinians.

Sales of the scarves have jumped since the Israel-Hamas war began in October, US distributors say, even as keffiyehs have been forcibly removed by security forces at some protests and wearers report being targeted for verbal and physical abuse.

"It was like a light switch. All of a sudden, we had hundreds of people on the website simultaneously and buying whatever they could," said Azar Aghayev, the US distributor for Hirbawi, which opened in 1961 and is the only manufacturer of keffiyehs left in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

"In two days, the stock that we had was just gone, and not just gone, it was oversold."

Hirbawi, which has patented its brand, sells scarves internationally via its US and German websites and on Amazon. All 40 variations on the US website, which include many in bright colors as well as the traditional black and white, are sold out, Aghayev said.

Unit sales of keffiyeh scarves have risen 75% in the 56 days between Oct. 7 and Dec. 2 on Amazon.com compared with the previous 56 days, data from e-commerce analytics firm Jungle Scout showed. Searches for "Palestinian scarf for women" rose by 159% in the three months to Dec. 4 compared with the previous three months; searches for "military scarf shemagh,keffiyeh palestine" and "keffiyeh" rose 333%, 75%, and 68%, respectively.

The keffiyeh, with its fishing net pattern, is common throughout the Arab world, with roots dating as far back as 3100 BC. It first came to symbolize Palestinian resistance during the 1936 Arab Revolt against British rule and later became the signature head gear of Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat.

While Hirbawi is the best-known manufacturer, others include small artisans and global copycats; luxury goods maker Louis Vuitton sold a version in 2021.

US supporters of the Palestinians and Israel have faced threats and attacks since the Middle East conflict began, with Jewish Americans seeing an increase in antisemitism and Muslim Americans an uptick in Islamaphobia.

Hazami Barmada, 38, a former United Nations official who lives in Virginia, wore one recently as she protested outside the White House and in Washington's Georgetown neighborhood in support of a ceasefire in Gaza.

Donning the scarf felt like a "superpower," she said, reconnecting her with her Palestinian heritage and offering a symbolic link to children in Gaza. But she believes it also attracts verbal abuse. "I'm taking a calculated risk," said Barmada.

Security target, Vermont shooting

At New York City's Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting in November, one attendee who wore a keffiyeh had it yanked off by a security officer - a moment captured in a Reuters photograph.

The security officer approached protesters at the front of the crowd who had a banner, a Palestinian flag, and one wearing a keffiyeh, and grabbed all three items, taking the keffiyeh from around the neck of the protester, photographer Eduardo Munnoz said.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations has documented several instances of people targeted for wearing a keffiyeh, from a father assaulted on a Brooklyn playground to a Harvard graduate student who was told she was wearing a "terrorist" scarf.

In the most serious incident, three college students of Palestinian descent - two wearing keffiyehs - were shot in Burlington, Vermont, while taking a walk last month. Hisham Awartani, 20, is paralyzed from the chest down. Authorities have charged a suspect with attempted murder in the shootings and are investigating whether it was a hate-motivated crime.

Tamara Tamimi, the mother of one of the students, Kinnan Abdalhamid, told CBS News last week that she believed they would not have been targeted if they had not been "dressed the way that they were and speaking Arabic."

Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a group at the center of US campus activism since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7. has been encouraging students to “wear your keffiyeh” in solidarity with the students shot in Vermont in the week after the incident.

Still, in Houston, Texas, SJP member Anna Rajagopal said she and other members had not worn their keffiyeh outside spaces they considered friendly to Arabs and Muslims since October, after people waving Israeli flags surrounded a cafe they were in, screaming insults.

"Myself and a friend have been cognizant of taking off our keffiyehs after leaving Palestinian, Arab spaces to be safe," said Rajagopal, 23, a freelance writer who graduated from Rice University in May and is also a member of Jewish Voice for Peace, a group that advocates for Palestinian independence.

Demand is unabated, though, sellers say. "If we could stock 20,000 keffiyehs, we would have sold them," said Morgan Totah, founder of Handmade Palestine, a group based in the Palestinian city of Ramallah that sells local artisans' wares online.

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As It Attacks Iran's Nuclear Program, Israel Maintains Ambiguity about Its Own

FILE - This file image made from a video aired Friday, Jan. 7, 2005, by Israeli television station Channel 10, shows what the television station claims is Israel's nuclear facility in the southern Israeli town of Dimona, the first detailed video of the site ever shown to the public. (Channel 10 via AP, File)
FILE - This file image made from a video aired Friday, Jan. 7, 2005, by Israeli television station Channel 10, shows what the television station claims is Israel's nuclear facility in the southern Israeli town of Dimona, the first detailed video of the site ever shown to the public. (Channel 10 via AP, File)
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As It Attacks Iran's Nuclear Program, Israel Maintains Ambiguity about Its Own

FILE - This file image made from a video aired Friday, Jan. 7, 2005, by Israeli television station Channel 10, shows what the television station claims is Israel's nuclear facility in the southern Israeli town of Dimona, the first detailed video of the site ever shown to the public. (Channel 10 via AP, File)
FILE - This file image made from a video aired Friday, Jan. 7, 2005, by Israeli television station Channel 10, shows what the television station claims is Israel's nuclear facility in the southern Israeli town of Dimona, the first detailed video of the site ever shown to the public. (Channel 10 via AP, File)

Israel says it is determined to destroy Iran’s nuclear program because its archenemy's furtive efforts to build an atomic weapon are a threat to its existence.

What’s not-so-secret is that for decades Israel has been believed to be the Middle East’s only nation with nuclear weapons, even though its leaders have refused to confirm or deny their existence, The Associated Press said.

Israel's ambiguity has enabled it to bolster its deterrence against Iran and other enemies, experts say, without triggering a regional nuclear arms race or inviting preemptive attacks.

Israel is one of just five countries that aren’t party to a global nuclear nonproliferation treaty. That relieves it of international pressure to disarm, or even to allow inspectors to scrutinize its facilities.

Critics in Iran and elsewhere have accused Western countries of hypocrisy for keeping strict tabs on Iran's nuclear program — which its leaders insist is only for peaceful purposes — while effectively giving Israel's suspected arsenal a free pass.

On Sunday, the US military struck three nuclear sites in Iran, inserting itself into Israel’s effort to destroy Iran’s program.

Here's a closer look at Israel's nuclear program:

A history of nuclear ambiguity Israel opened its Negev Nuclear Research Center in the remote desert city of Dimona in 1958, under the country's first leader, Prime Minister David Ben Gurion. He believed the tiny fledgling country surrounded by hostile neighbors needed nuclear deterrence as an extra measure of security. Some historians say they were meant to be used only in case of emergency, as a last resort.

After it opened, Israel kept the work at Dimona hidden for a decade, telling United States’ officials it was a textile factory, according to a 2022 article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, an academic journal.

Relying on plutonium produced at Dimona, Israel has had the ability to fire nuclear warheads since the early 1970s, according to that article, co-authored by Hans M. Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project with the Federation of American Scientists, and Matt Korda, a researcher at the same organization.

Israel's policy of ambiguity suffered a major setback in 1986, when Dimona’s activities were exposed by a former technician at the site, Mordechai Vanunu. He provided photographs and descriptions of the reactor to The Sunday Times of London.

Vanunu served 18 years in prison for treason, and is not allowed to meet with foreigners or leave the country.

ISRAEL POSSESSES DOZENS OF NUCLEAR WARHEADS, EXPERTS SAY

Experts estimate Israel has between 80 and 200 nuclear warheads, although they say the lower end of that range is more likely.

Israel also has stockpiled as much as 1,110 kilograms (2,425 pounds) of plutonium, potentially enough to make 277 nuclear weapons, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a global security organization. It has six submarines believed to be capable of launching nuclear cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles believed to be capable of launching a nuclear warhead up to 6,500 kilometers (4,000 miles), the organization says.

Germany has supplied all of the submarines to Israel, which are docked in the northern city of Haifa, according to the article by Kristensen and Korda.

NUCLEAR WEAPONS IN THE MIDDLE EAST POSE RISKS

In the Middle East, where conflicts abound, governments are often unstable, and regional alliances are often shifting, nuclear proliferation is particularly dangerous, said Or Rabinowitz, a scholar at Jerusalem's Hebrew University and a visiting associate professor at Stanford University.

“When nuclear armed states are at war, the world always takes notice because we don’t like it when nuclear arsenals ... are available for decision makers,” she said.

Rabinowitz says Israel's military leaders could consider deploying a nuclear weapon if they found themselves facing an extreme threat, such as a weapon of mass destruction being used against them.

Three countries other than Israel have refused to sign the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons: India, Pakistan and South Sudan. North Korea has withdrawn. Iran has signed the treaty, but it was censured last week, shortly before Israel launched its operation, by the UN's nuclear watchdog — a day before Israel attacked — for violating its obligations.

Israel's policy of ambiguity has helped it evade greater scrutiny, said Susie Snyder at the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, a group that works to promote adherence to the UN treaty.

Its policy has also shined a light on the failure of Western countries to rein in nuclear proliferation in the Middle East, she said.

They “prefer not to be reminded of their own complicity,” she said.