Starbucks named Visit Malaysia 2026 strategic partner: Economic reality or tone-deaf move? - Focus Malaysia

Two weeks ago, my tweet criticising Tourism Malaysia's "strategic partnership" with Starbucks went viral and somewhat broke the news. Focus Malaysia and The Rakyat Post covered the story and shared the tweet along with its accompanying responses.

"BOYCOTT of brands perceived to be pro-Israel has complicated many matters. Latest to draw public ire was the naming of  Starbucks Malaysia as strategic partner for the much-touted Visit Malaysia 2026 (VMY2026) campaign.

Nevertheless, detractors of the global premium coffee chain find the involvement of Starbucks Malaysia in VMY2026 ‘atrocious’ in light of the anti-Zionist sentiment which is gaining momentum especially following recent detention of the Global Sumud Flotilla volunteers by Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

“Whose idea was this?” fumed Shahnon Salleh (@shahnonsalleh) whose post on X has amassed 1.6M views at time of writing “So tone-deaf. Unbelievable.”

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