Protesters stage sit-in inside Zara Glasgow in solidarity with Gaza

Protesters staged a sit-in inside a Glasgow city centre shop on Wednesday. Members of the Gaza Genocide Emergency Committee occupied Zara on Buchanan Street in solidarity with Gaza. The action is part of a wider boycott campaign against the fashion giant, led by the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement and supported by the protest group, which accuses Zara of “complicity in genocide” through its continued business ties with Israel. The Palestinian BDS National Committee said: "We call on people of conscience around the world to boycott Zara, the flagship brand of the Spanish multinational Inditex, for its deep and growing complicity in Israel’s regime of settler-colonialism, apartheid, and genocide." Campaigners say Zara is financially supporting the Israeli government by operating stores in the country, thereby contributing through taxation to what they describe as "Israel’s genocidal assault on Palestinians in Gaza" The BDS National Committee said: "Zara's complicity with Israel’s regime of oppression runs deeper still. "In October 2022, Joey Schwebel, chair of Trimera Brands, Zara's Israeli franchisee, hosted a campaign event at his home for far-right Israeli minister Itamar Ben-Gvir." Elsewhere in its statement, the committee highlighted past allegations against Zara, including an offensive 2023 advertising campaign that was later withdrawn following widespread public backlash. Protesters are calling for a total boycott of Zara until the company withdraws from the Israeli market. Our GGEC BDS team on Buchanan Street today, protesting inside and outside Zara!https://t.co/faasRSM93i Boycott ZARA: Dressing Up Apartheid and Genocide pic.twitter.com/Y9kM4aEJrd — GGEC (@ggectee) July 15, 2026 The protest in Glasgow is part of a wider global campaign targeting Inditex for what activists call a “failure to uphold basic rights across its global supply chains,” with additional references to alleged labour abuses in Brazil and Myanmar. BDS also cited a legal analysis by Dr Irene Pietropaoli, which warned that companies could be "held legally accountable" for complicity in human rights abuses, including "silent or tacit complicity" through continued commercial operations in a country accused of genocide. The statement said: "Silent or tacit complicity... is apparent when a company does not directly contribute to or benefit from the genocide but is aware of it and fails to distance itself from it – assuming there is still a close link with the situation."