Members of the Park Slope Food Co-op voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday night against a motion that would have moved the organization closer to joining an international boycott against products made in Israel. The vote settled a debate that had embroiled the venerable neighborhood institution for many months and divided its membership.

The vote, conducted by paper ballot, came during the Brooklyn co-op’s monthly general meeting, with 1,005 people voting against the motion to hold a referendum on a boycott, and 653 in favor.

“A boycott should be by consensus, and there is obviously not that,” Jeff Prant, a co-op member, said after the vote. While the arguments for the boycott had merits, he said, they were “outweighed by the divisiveness.”

Tensions at the co-op, on Union Street, had been climbing to a breaking point in recent weeks as the members, numbering about 16,300, weighed the matter. Reporters and television trucks had become a common site outside the co-op’s doors. Advocates passed leaflets with increasing urgency. Politicians and pundits weighed in. And emotions, in at least one instance, spilled over into fisticuffs.