The US corporation Chevron is profiting from fossil gas extraction contracts that help fuel Israeli genocide, apartheid, and grave violations of Palestinian human rights on the one hand and the climate crisis on the other.
With its extraction of fossil fuels globally, Chevron is a major contributor to climate change with a severe impact on communities and Indigenous peoples all over the world, in particular in the Global South. Chevron is also the main extractor of fossil gas claimed by Israel in the Eastern Mediterranean. As such, Chevron brings Israel hundreds of millions of dollars annually in revenues from payments for its fossil gas extraction licenses, helping to finance Israel’s war chest and its decades-old regime of apartheid, settler colonialism, and military occupation over the Palestinian people. Chevron also supports Israel’s lobbying efforts for the construction of the Eastmed Pipeline, a massive EU-sponsored fossil fuel infrastructure project that would exacerbate the climate crisis and whose feasibility is widely contested.
You can read more about the campaign on the BDS Movement’s website.
Together, let’s hold Chevron accountable for fueling Israeli genocide, apartheid, and climate disaster globally.
Things that you can do to help:
- Sign the pledge to boycott Chevron gas and products (including Chevron-owned brands Texaco and Caltex).
- Tell your friends and family about the boycott campaign! If you can, encourage organizations that you’re part of to endorse the #BoycottChevron campaign.
- Join us at organized protests at our local Chevron gas station.
- Do you know of any local events that may be sponsored by Chevron? Let us know!
Week of Action September 23-27, 2024
Here in Wenatchee, we identified our local Chevron gas station as a potential target for divestment, and spent a few weeks attempting to arrange a meeting with the owner to see if we could talk to her about potentially disaffiliating from Chevron. Her answer was a very emphatic “NO”.
So we proceeded to picket the gas station, joining over a dozen cities in a global action. Wenatchee was among three Washington cities that participated, alongside Island County and the Tri-Cities.
The BDS movement designated September 23-27 for the #BoycottChevron Week of Action. We kicked off our protest by picketing the gas station on Saturday, September 21, then picketed it every single day from Monday, September 23 through Thursday, September 26 from 5:30-6:30 PM.
Activists like Greta Thunberg and Naomi Klein added their voices to the call to #BoycottChevron. Here is Greta Thunberg speaking about it, and here is a clip from an interview that Naomi Klein did with Medhi Hasan. Zeteo lifted the paywall on the episode, and it can be watched in full here. From the website:
“As a part of Climate Week, the BDS Movement is focusing their energy on a target environmental activists like Naomi have been calling out for years: Chevron. The company is Israel’s largest supplier of energy, which not only includes power to the Israeli government, but also to Israeli military bases.
“[Chevron] is entangled with Israel’s military machinery. It operates and partially owns Israel’s largest gas fields offshore. It’s gotten very rich off of these fields… but the Israeli government takes a big piece of that, so gets hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue directly from Chevron,” Naomi explains.
Mehdi and Naomi also get into why the BDS Movement gets so much backlash in the United States; why Israel “gets a special pass” despite the US having a long history of sanctions; and they address the charges of anti-Semitism against BDS. They also discuss recent gains of the movement.”
Also, Wenatchee made it onto the BDS Movement’s instagram page and twitter!
We did have one small victory! Just after our #BoycottChevron Week of Action, Chevron halted a major expansion project planned for an Israeli-claimed gas field in Mediterranean, Leviathan, citing the worsening “security situation.” The halted plans impact the construction of a pipeline that was intended to increase gas supply capacity from Leviathan to apartheid Israel’s gas grid. Here’s BDS’s instagram post about it. We helped play a tiny part in this! Now is the time to keep the pressure on Chevron so that continuing their involvement with Israel becomes a worse and worse economic decision for them.
Wenatchee for Palestine’s Chevron protests were also mentioned in a Mondoweiss article about the boycott campaign!
Weekend of Action January 31-February 2, 2025
The BDS movement organized another #BoycottChevron Weekend of Action from January 31-February 2, and we picketed the Chevron on Saturday, February 1 during our normal protest time.
Here is the BDS Movement’s post about the Weekend of Action. From their post:
“As Chevron posted a loss for the first time in 4 years and reported a decline in fuel sales during its quarterly earnings call, over 30 cities took part in a #BoycottChevron weekend of action, targeting Chevron gas stations, offices, and other locations. Campaigners called on Chevron to end its complicity in Israeli apartheid and genocide and in climate devastation.
Chevron’s unexpected lower earnings partially resulted from a decline in US fuel sales. Chevron executives were quick to reference the “Gulf of America” on the earnings call, while saying nothing about their business with genocidal Israel.”
More than twice as many cities participated in this action compared to back in September. The movement is growing!
We actually got the local press to show up to our protest! The Wenatchee World covered our protest and published an article about it here (if you get the print newspaper, it was on the second page of the Tuesday, February 4 issue).
Global Anti-Chevron Day May 21, 2025
Anti Chevron Day has been organized by Amazon Watch since 2014. It is a global day of action protesting Chevron’s historical and ongoing climate destruction and violations of human rights globally, especially in the Amazon basin in Latin America. In solidarity with the BDS movement’s call to boycott Chevron for its complicity in Israel’s genocide and apartheid, Amazon Watch and allies integrated the Palestinian Boycott Chevron campaign into the Anti Chevron Day tradition.
The BDS movement called on supporters worldwide to participate in Anti-Chevron Day, so we organized another protest here in Wenatchee.
For this day of action, we took a leaf from Bellingham BDS, and we combined a gas station picket with a postcard campaign!
In the lead-up to Anti-Chevron Day on May 21, we encouraged people to bring in postcards to the Chevron gas station in person. The postcards contained a QR code/link to a letter to the Chevron company from franchisees demanding that Chevron end its business in apartheid Israel. This is one of the two asks that BDS is requesting from gas station owners.
The weekend before May 21, we handed out over 60 postcards, asking people to sign them and bring them to the gas station.
Then we picked the Chevron from 5:30 to 6:30 PM during rush hour on Wednesday. Our hope was that the postcards combined with the picket would make the owners of the gas station feel more inclined to want to sign the letter.
So far, we have not received confirmation that they have signed it, but our protest received lots of support from passing cars, more than we had ever received before while picketing this gas station.
One of the main purposes of actions like this is to spread awareness, both of the boycott campaign and of what is happening in Palestine in general. Even if the individual gas station itself is immovable, picketing helps draw attention to the fact that a genocide is happening.
That week, ours was one of over 35 actions which took place for Anti-Chevron Day! Wenatchee made it into the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights’ Instagram post about the day of action. You can see some more photos from other actions on the @boycott_chevron Instagram.
Chevron’s annual shareholder meeting was a week later on May 28. Chevron’s fuel sales are down, and its business in the Israeli market is at risk. The Swiss National Bank just sold its entire stake in Chevron because it now considers investments in the stock to breach its portfolio guidelines. This was not mentioned at the shareholder meeting.
Chevron also refused to respond to growing calls to boycott the company for its operation and co-ownership of Israeli-claimed fossil gas fields off the coast of occupied Palestinian land. But there was a clear sign of growing investor dissent due to Chevron’s human rights abuses and crimes against the environment. The pressure is working!
West Coast Boycott Chevron highway bannering August 29, 2025
The West Coast is standing up to genocide! On August 29th, activists from 20+ cities organized over two dozen banner drop actions along the interstate in Washington, Oregon, and California as part of a coordinated campaign called for by West Coast Boycott Chevron, an autonomous coalition with representatives from various organizations across the West Coast.
While organizationally independent, West Coast Boycott Chevron acts in solidarity with the Palestinian Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) and the United States Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), who have spearheaded the national campaign against Chevron.
This action was largely centered on I-5, which runs like a vein right through the center of Chevron’s main operations. August 29 was selected for the date because the Friday before Labor Day is a major travel day, so there are a lot of people out on the highways. Since Wenatchee does not have easy access to a highway, we traveled to Cle Elum and bannered I-90 instead.
You can see a full map of the actions here, as well as a selection of photos from most of the participating cities (and here is a compilation video). Here are the cities that participated:
- WA: Bellingham, Whidbey Island, Mountlake Terrace, Bellevue, Seattle, Wenatchee, Tacoma, Olympia, Vancouver
- OR: Portland, Salem, Albany, Ashland
- CA: Sacramento, Berkeley, Bakersfield, Santa Clarita, Burbank, Los Angeles, Pomona, Orange County, Oceanside, San Diego
This action came on the heels of a major campaign victory by our comrades in Seattle. On August 22, the Martin Luther King, Jr. County Labor Council in Washington State passed a resolution to cut ties with Israel’s genocide and apartheid and endorse the #BoycottChevron campaign! The MLK Labor Council represents over 150 unions and 220k workers in King County. The resolution also calls on the regional grocery store Safeway to cut its ties with Chevron.
Activists elsewhere in the country have also gotten Chevron dropped as a sponsor from three major events so far in 2025: the Denver Colfax Marathon, the California State Fair, and the Portland City Club. Here’s an article on the Center of Colfax’s decision to no longer accept contributions from Chevron, citing Chevron’s complicity in genocide as the reason.
Why is it so important to get events to drop their Chevron sponsorships? We now have proof that fossil fuel companies strategically fund museums, festivals, and cultural events to build political influence and public trust, all while lobbying hard against climate policy and while continuing their human rights abuses.
Chevron saw a 200% increase in public support in areas with visible sponsorships. So when we push back and get these sponsorships removed, not only does it damage their brand and hurt their profits, but it also undercuts their ability to influence policymakers.
Our coordinated highway banner drop also helped damage Chevron’s brand in addition to drawing attention to what is happening in Palestine. The effect is compounded by having multiple banners reinforce the message.
Activists in Bellevue had two people stop and ask them about the #BoycottChevron campaign. The people said that they had been driving up from Oregon and they had seen some other #BoycottChevron banners along the way, so they stopped to learn more and ask, “Why Chevron?”
Chevron is clearly very invested in the West Coast as a major base of operations, so as part of the West Coast, we feel a particular responsibility to fight back and prevent them from profiting from genocide, environmental destruction, and exploitation.
We will keep finding ways to put on the pressure until Chevron stops fueling genocide!
