How Somerville Became the First US City to Vote to Divest From Israeli Apartheid

When voters across the country filed into polling stations on November 4, making choices that could shape their communities over coming years, residents of Somerville, Massachusetts, also had the opportunity to vote on a question of international significance: whether their city should boycott and divest from companies complicit in Israeli apartheid and genocide in Gaza.

The nonbinding ballot initiative instructs the mayor and all other elected officials “to end all current city business and prohibit future city investments and contracts with companies as long as such companies engage in business that sustains Israel’s apartheid, genocide, and illegal occupation of Palestine.” It marks the first time voters in the U.S. have had the opportunity to directly declare their support for the Boy