A new phase is developing in the US Palestinian solidarity movement: Block the Boat.
In organizing theory, activists often emphasize the importance of formulating what they call an “escalation plan.” When pushing for social change, they explain, it is important that one’s methods of exerting pressure on power slowly grow in strength, not remain stagnant.
A Palestinian university’s decision to bar from its campus an Israeli journalist and outspoken critic of the occupation has exposed a growing rift among Palestinian activists about the merits of contact with Jewish Israelis.
Staff at Bir Zeit University, near Ramallah in the West Bank, ordered Amira Hass, a reporter for the Israeli daily Haaretz newspaper, to leave a public conference late last month. She was told it was for her own “safety” in case students protested against her presence.
Despite the pro-Israeli bias in Australia’s mainstream media, more than 69% of Australia’s population are now critical of Israel’s influence in the world (BBC Poll, 2013) and many of these critics in Adelaide are eager to express that disapproval by employing the time-honoured tactics of BDS.
Image: Fatou Bensouda, the international criminal court prosecutor. Photograph: Michael Kooren/AFP/Getty Images
First we must free ourselves from the clutches of the Enemy Within. Only then will Israel be brought to account and the Palestinian know peace and prosperity.
Western leaders ‘nobble’ the International Criminal Court
After every bloody episode of violence perpetrated by Israel, media spin doctors are often deployed with one grand mission: to absolve Israel of any responsibility in their acts of carnage.
“In the period between the end of World War Two and Marshall’s meeting with Truman [May 12, 1948], the Joint Chiefs of Staff had issued no less than sixteen (by my count) papers on the Palestine issue.
Netanyahu goes nowhere near Gaza so avoids witnessing the horrors inflicted by Israeli troops on his demented orders.
A wish-list for the brave Palestinians
There was never a better moment for the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement to mass-mobilise for a mega-campaign to not only impact more heavily on the lawless Israeli state but also unmask those in business and public life who shamelessly support the criminal programme that was embedded in its DNA while on the Zionists’ drawing board.
The slaughter of civilians is necessary to stop Gaza rocket-fire. That’s what Israel says. “This isn’t about rockets from Gaza,” says Unite.
The union Unite is to be congratulated on its no-nonsense analysis and statement expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people. Especially at this horrific time. Unite is the biggest union in the UK and Ireland, with nearly 1.5 million members. Its mission is to strive for a society that places equality, dignity and respect above all else.
Neil Young’s July 17th, 2014, concert in Israel has been cancelled, not because Young had a change of heart but, as promoter Shuki Weiss productions (who booked Young while on his ‘Honour the Treaties’ tour of Canada) claimed in part: “It is with deep regret that we are forced to announce the cancelation (sic) of the Neil Young and Crazy Horse show… in light of the missile attacks in recent days and the fear for the audience’s safety at an event with so many participants”…
