(New York Jewish Week) — The news that workers at Breads Bakery, an Israeli chain in New York City, were demanding “an end to this company’s support of the genocide happening in Palestine” as part of a union push has triggered concerns among those worried about surging anti-Israel sentiment in the United States.

“This is going to spread,” Deborah Lipstadt, the former United States special envoy for monitoring and combating antisemitism, wrote on X Thursday. “This is not spontaneous, This is part of an effort to marginalize Jews and Israel.”

But is an Israel boycott as a union demand even possible to achieve? Do workers have rights when it comes to protecting their beliefs about Israel? What role are unions playing in anti-Israel advocacy? And what might happen next at Breads?

To answer these questions, we reached out to two labor scholars — Harry C. Katz, the director of the Scheinman Institute on Conflict Resolution at Cornell University, and Samuel Estreicher, an attorney and scholar on labor and employment law and arbitration law at New York University. We also visited a rally by Breads’ supporters on the Upper West Side on Friday afternoon.

Here’s what we learned.

Is it common for workers to press for political concessions as part of their unionization efforts?

The Breaking Breads workers are doing something unusual, Katz said. He said he was not aware of other examples of employees making demands related to Israel as part of a unionization effort.

“There are unions who have taken out political stances, but the stances are ‘we oppose the Netanyahu government,’ or ‘we oppose the invasion of Gaza,’ ‘we are sympathetic to BDS,’” he said. “They’re allowed to take that stance, but they have not done what you’re asking about.”

Of course, unions can and do use their might to advance political agendas. But that often happens in the advocacy space, with unions reminding decision-makers that they represent a powerful voting bloc, not in bargaining within individual units.

The insertion of Israel demands in a unionization announcement reflects an anti-Israel swing within swaths of organized labor in the United States and beyond.

In December 2023, United Auto Workers, the union that Breaking Breads has filed under, became the largest union to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. It was a sharp departure for the union, which had previously been staunchly supportive of Israel.

In March 2025, UAW came to the defense of two members at Columbia University who had been involved in pro-Palestinian protests there, including Grant Miner, who headed a union chapter representing 3,000 undergraduate and graduate students employed at the school before being expelled.

The “assault on First Amendment rights being jointly committed by the federal government and Columbia University are an attack on all workers who dare to protest, speak out, or exercise their freedom of association under the US Constitution,” UAW said in a statement at the time.

UAW national and the local group representing Breaking Breads, as the union is calling itself, both did not respond to a request for comment.

What are the chances of the Breads workers getting what they want when it comes to Israel?

Slim to none, Katz and Estreicher both said.

For one thing, it’s far from assured that Breaking Breads will even succeed in being recognized as a bargaining union. The employees announced that “over 30%” of Breads’ workers had signed onto the unionized effort, the minimum required under federal labor law — and far less than most unions announce themselves with.

The threshold allows the workers to petition the National Labor Relations Board to hold a union election. In an election, more than half of workers who participate must support the formation of the union for one to be created.

“Thirty percent is an extremely low level of support through the signing of authorization cards,” Katz said. “For them to say, ‘Oh, they have a bit over 30%,’ that suggests they’re going to have an extremely difficult time if this goes to an election.”

Then, even if the union does meet the legal threshold for recognition, Breads is under no legal obligation to engage on issues related to Israel.

“Workers don’t have a right to tell management what management wants to do with its own funds, or personal beliefs and political views regarding Israel,” Katz said. “The law requires bargaining in good faith about wages and other employment conditions. That’s the requirement.”

The workers are alleging a range of unfair employment practices, including low wages, irregular schedules and unsafe working conditions. If their union is recognized, Breads will have to negotiate a contract addressing those issues — and will have to comply or risk a strike.

But on the off chance that questions about Israel somehow make it to the bargaining table, “management can refuse to discuss it,” Katz said.

Breads has indicated that it does not believe political issues are appropriate fodder for negotiation.

“We’ve always been a workplace where people of all backgrounds and viewpoints can come together around a shared purpose, the joy found at a bakery,” it said in a statement responding to the announcement of Breaking Breads. “We find it troubling that divisive political issues are being introduced into our workplace.”

Estreicher put it simply: “They can say whatever they want,” he said about the workers. But Israel-related issues would never be considered a “mandatory subject of bargaining” like wages and working conditions, and workers could be fired if they strike over the issues.

Since there isn’t actually a union yet, can Breads just fire the workers making the anti-Israel demands now?

Some of Breads’ supporters have called for the company to fire the workers who are agitating against its ties to Israel.

“I don’t understand why the owners [don’t] simply fire the so-called unionizing staff. New York is an at-will employer. They’re creating a hostile work environment,” one commenter wrote on an Instagram post by pro-Israel influence Lizzy Savetsky decrying the workers’ demand. “There’s the door, ungrateful employees. Feel free to take a loaf with you on the way out.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/DTRF-49kXBW/?hl=en

But firing workers who joined Breaking Breads would be a problem, Katz said, even though they don’t formally have a union yet.

“Management often gets away, due to the weakness in the enforcement of our labor laws, … with the firing of union sympathizers and activists,” Katz said. “But that is technically illegal. It’s illegal for management to fire people because of their views towards the union or their activism within the union.”

Do workers have a protected right to refuse to work on a specific job that offends their beliefs, including about Israel?

One of Breaking Breads’ objections was to catering events that it said involved groups with ties to Israel or to producing custom loaves decorated with Israeli flags.

The question is not the same as the one that recently occupied the Supreme Court, when it ruled on cases about small-business providers — including a wedding cake maker — who declined to serve same-sex clients, citing religious beliefs.

Those cases were about whether the government could compel a business to create custom content that violates the owner’s beliefs — and the court ruled it could not. But workers do not have the same protections individually, nor do they have the right to impose their beliefs on their employer.

“It’s the employer’s business, not their business. That’s my position. I think that’s the legal position,” Estreicher said. “People have all kinds of views with different things. Anyway, an employer should be able to make clear that he makes the decision on who the customers are, and they can’t interfere with that.”

Workers would likely also have a difficult time seeking redress against their employer for serving specific customers against their beliefs, Katz said.

Contract violation claims go to third parties known as arbitrators, who rule whether management ran afoul of its contract with the union and what penalty, if any, should be applied.

As an example, Katz said, “A Palestinian employee says in this case: ‘I’m baking cookies that get eaten or sold at an event that supports Israel.’ I can’t imagine an arbitrator would say you have a right to refuse that kind of work.”

Estreicher said one Israel-related claim by Breaking Breads could be appropriate grounds for redress, if true. The workers said Breads had told workers they could not speak Arabic on the job — a demand that may run afoul of employment law.

“If they’re in public contact jobs, I think they can [have that rule], but there are legal issues about if they’re not in public contact jobs,” Estreicher said. “If they’re in the kitchen, having a prohibition would be problematic.”

What happens next at Breads?

When it comes to the unionization effort, it could be several weeks before there are clear developments. Employers can choose to recognize unions voluntarily, but if they do not, the National Labor Relations Board typically makes a decision about whether it will support an election within about 45 days. Elections are then held several weeks to months after that.

For now, the popular bakery appears to be reaping positive dividends from its workers’ dissatisfaction. Fans of the bakery and pro-Israel activists have asked the New York City Jewish community to buy their products, and even offered to work for Breads for free.

A few hundred showed up at a Friday gathering to buy a coffee or a snack and hang out at the Upper West Side location, called for by pro-Israel activist Shai Davidai.

“We are dealing with an ideological war, and that ideological war says that if you are a Zionist, if you believe that Israel has a right to exist, if you’re a proud Jew, then you don’t deserve to live here,” Davidai said.

Davidai stressed that the event was all about showing strength in numbers.

“We want to show here a Jewish, Zionist business, that we have their back, and they won’t be cowered by a loud and nasty minority that wants to ruin things for everybody,” Davidai said.

“This isn’t just about buying products,” he added. “So first thing, [almost] everyone who’s buying a product is wearing a sticker that says, ‘Zionist,’ right? So the cashier, the employees, the business owner, and everyone on the street sees that we are coming out as Zionists. We’re not hiding anymore.”

By about 12:10 p.m., the fast-moving line at Breads’ Upper West Side location had begun to wrap around the block. Parents had brought babies, and people of all ages waited in line, as new customers arriving at the scene ended their FaceTime calls — some in Hebrew, some in English — by describing the scene to the person on the other end of the line. Some customers came alone and met new faces while waiting in line; others came with friends.

“Today, they are not just trying to bite the hand that feeds them, they’re trying to gnaw it off,” said Judy, a longtime Upper West Side resident who declined to share her last name, about the workers. “That’s what I was thinking all last night. It’s preposterous. It’s ludicrous. It’s beyond reproach.”

Colleagues Marc Rodriguez and Max Lippman waited in the middle of the line, and, like many, were hoping to land one of Breads’ award-winning babkas.

Rodriguez, who is not Jewish or Israeli but whose wife is both and whose children are Jewish, said he felt obligated to support the store, which he is a fan of and had been to in Israel. He brought a small Israeli flag, and wore one of the “Zionist” stickers that Davidai had handed out.

“I want to support the store, support the owners, and I want to remind the workers over here who is supporting this store, and who is patronizing the store,” Rodriguez said. “I think it’s a nice, respectful way to show support. We’re not shouting, we’re here. We’re all smiling, happy, talking. And also, I’m so excited for carbs.”

Lippman, who is from the Upper West Side, heard about the call to head to Breads on social media.

“In general I’m pro-union,” he said. “But once part of that is saying that they’re anti-Zionist, that seems unnecessary. It’s an Israeli-owned bakery. We’re here to show our support. It seems unnecessary when forming a union to state your beliefs on Israel. It doesn’t matter who the owners are,” Lippman added. “We’re just here to support the bakery and the babka makes that easy.”

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