At a rally of about 80,000 people on Sunday. Indonesian Ulema Council, a body of Muslim clerics called for a boycott of U.S. and Israeli products over President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital earlier this month. The council called on the government to officially ban U.S. products in the country.
However, Indonesian Vice President Muhammad Jusuf Kalla described such calls as misguided due to the country’s reliance on U.S. technologies and products. He asked the people to not to be emotional over the issue asking if Indonesian dared to boycott iPhones or stop using google while surfing the internet. In addition to that, he said while it would be easy to ban U.S. movies in the country, other American goods such as petroleum equipment are vital for the country’s oil industrious to survive.
Instead, he called for adding pressure on the United States via the United Nation and called for dialogue rather than violence. He said, there had already been three wars over Jerusalem and in all cases, Palestinian territory has shrunken.
