Victory to the Palestinian prisoners’ hunger strike!

[ckaihatsu]

Victory to the Palestinian prisoners’ hunger strike!

By Freedom Road Socialist Organization

Freedom Road Socialist Organization stands in solidarity the 1500 Palestinian prisoners who are entering their 35th day of an open-ended hunger strike - the “Battle for Dignity.” We salute the revolutionary steadfastness and discipline or all those who have chosen to put their lives on the line to resist the deplorable treatment they face, as Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

The hunger strike began on April 17, when prisoners began refusing food to demand basic human rights, such as: proper medical treatment, allowing family visits, access to higher education, an end to administrative detainments, ending solitary confinement and stopping imprisonment without charges or a trial.

As news of the prisoners on hunger strike began to circulate, supporters joined the hunger strike. For example, on May 6, Leila Khaled, the icon of the Palestinian resistance and a leading member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), announced in Aman, Jordan, that she was beginning an open-ended hunger strike in support of the striking prisoners. With the participation of supporters around the world, the estimated number of participants has swelled up to 2000.

Israeli forces have attempted to shut down the hunger strike. They first circulated a video of Marwan Barghouti, a hunger strike leader allegedly eating a handful of cookies. This video doesn’t have a date stamp to confirm when it was taken. Occupation forces have also violently shut down protests in support of the prisoners and two Palestinians have been killed in the process. The transfers of weakened hunger strikers to field hospitals is done through an arduous process meant to put strain on tired bodies. Finally, Israeli settlers have been holding barbecues in front of prison windows in the hope that the aroma of cooking food will weaken their resolve.

But they haven’t broken. The Battle for Dignity now enters its second month with the numbers of prisoners striking growing larger.

In the U.S., it is vital that every progressive person stands in solidarity with the Palestinian prisoners by publicizing their struggle and protesting Israel’s occupation of Palestine. We have a duty to oppose U.S. support for Israel.

The battle being courageously waged by Palestinians is part and parcel of the fight for the liberation of Palestine. These prisoners are risking their lives for the emancipation of their nation and to end the colonization by Israel. The Battle for Dignity is paramount in the struggle against imperialism and Zionism, and the struggle to free all historic Palestine – from the river to the sea.

We must continue to stand in solidarity with all Palestinian prisoners, abroad or here in the U.S., and we will not rest until Palestine is free.

Read more News and Views from the Peoples Struggle at http://www.fightbacknews.org. You can write to us at [email protected]

[ckaihatsu]

5 things you can do RIGHT NOW to support Palestinian hunger strikers!


USPCN calls for National Week of Action in support of Palestinian political prisoners!


View this email in your browser
Share
Tweet
Forward
Pin



5 things you can do RIGHT NOW to support Palestinian hunger strikers! USPCN calls for National Week of Action!
As the over 1,500 Palestinian political prisoners enter their 36th day on hunger strike, the risks to their health are increasingly grave, so urgent actions in solidarity are of critical importance.



Here are 5 things you can do RIGHT NOW to support the hunger strikers' demands, which include the restoration of regular family visits, an end to solitary confinement, an end to administrative detention (imprisonment for months without formal charge), the strengthening of medical care, and access to education:

Demand a meeting with your U.S. Senator or U.S. Congressperson THIS WEEK, and ask them to pressure Israel to meet the prisoners' demands. USPCN chapters and coalition partners in Detroit, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, and the Bay Area, thus far, have already made commitments to visit at least one of their Senators or Congresspeople. If your legislator does not recognize the urgency of your request for a meeting, please join this National Week of Action anyway with a picket or protest of her office or other targets, like Israeli consulates, and let us know of your plans by emailing [email protected].


Call or write your elected representatives and ask them to make a public statement in support of the hunger strikers, like this powerful one from U.S. Congressman Danny Davis of Illinois.


Black out social media! Change all your social media profile pictures to this one here below and make sure to tag #DignityStrike.





Organize a day-long fast with your families, friends, and / or organizations in support of the Palestinian prisoners, like USPCN's on May 11th or the one called by Palestinian-American students for TODAY, Monday, May 22nd.


Call the International Red Cross at 202.587.4600 to demand that it fulfills its obligation to examine the prisoners' cells; and Amnesty International USA Headquarters at 212.807.8400 to demand it pressure Israel to meet the strikers' demands.


For more information and regular updates on the hunger strike, follow @uspcn, @Addameer, and @SamidounPP on Facebook and Twitter, as well as these hashtags: #DignityStrike, #PalHunger, and #StopAD.


******************************************

Support USPCN's work by making a tax-deductible donation to USPCN (c/o the WESPAC Foundation)!




Copyright © 2017 US Palestinian Community Network, All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because you signed up to receive messages from USPCN.

Our mailing address is:
US Palestinian Community Network
c/o WESPAC
31 Mamaroneck Ave, Ste 403
White Plains, NY 10601

Add us to your address book


Want to change how you receive these emails?
You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list

Email Marketing Powered by MailChimp

[ckaihatsu]

https://socialistproject.ca/bullet/1420.php


[see source for links within text]


Urgent Call On Day 40 of Palestinian Hunger Strike

Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC)

Hundreds of Palestinian political prisoners are now approaching their critical sixth week on hunger strike, and they have made an urgent appeal for international solidarity. As they hit Day 40 of their courageous Dignity Strike on May 26, the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC) calls for intensifying global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns to amplify the prisoners’ legitimate and just demands.

40 Days of Mass Hunger Strike

In particular, the BNC calls for immediate international action toward implementing a comprehensive military embargo on Israel, similar to that imposed against apartheid South Africa in the past. International bodies – including banks, private military corporations, research centers, universities and governments – must stop enabling Israel's military and security apparatus, and stop facilitating the development of Israeli military technology. As long as military ties continue, the international community is effectively sending Israel a clear message of approval to continue its severe violations of international law, including its violations of basic prisoners’ rights.



Comprehensive Military Embargo

This is a critical moment – with every passing hour, Palestinian hunger strikers are risking death. Their health is rapidly deteriorating as they maintain their commitment to assert their dignity and win their internationally recognized rights. A comprehensive military embargo on Israel is long overdue and as urgent as ever.

Palestinians have come together in remarkably strong support of the Dignity Strike. There have been two general strikes with mass participation across historic Palestine. The general strike on Monday, May 22 was the largest since the first Intifada (1987-1993). Rallies and creative actions are happening on a daily basis in Palestinian refugee camps across the region. Those living under Israeli military occupation are also demonstrating in the streets, shutting down Jewish-only settlers’ roads, bringing work and traffic to a standstill and refusing the entry of Israeli products into supermarkets. Across solidarity tents the slogan “boycott your jailer” rings loud.

International action is needed to support and sustain these inspiring grassroots mobilizations as Israel has responded with its predictable use of brutal military force and repression. At least one demonstrator, 23-year old Saba Abu Ubeid, has been killed by an Israeli sniper. A second young man at a solidarity march was shot in the head by an Israeli settler.

ACT to support the Dignity Strike. There are many ways. On May 26, Day 40 of the Dignity Strike:

1. Join the #BDS4DignityStrike social media campaign. Share this image widely using the hashtag #BDS4DignityStrike.

2. Organize a banner drop or street action in your community or campus to raise awareness about the Dignity Strike and call for a military embargo. Use #BDS4DignityStrike to share pictures from your action.

3. Do your research and launch a divestment campaign. Your bank or pension fund are likely to have collaboration with Israeli military companies. Pressure them to divest.

4. Start a campaign for your university to cut all ties with Israel's military industry. Universities often conduct joint military or dual-use research with Israel or with weapons companies that supply the Israeli military.

5. Write to your elected officials, multilateral bodies and the UN to raise the issue of the Dignity Strike and build pressure to exclude Israeli military companies from contracts and eventually impose a military embargo on Israel.

6. Create your own BDS-related action. Don't limit yourself to this list.
The Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC) again and again reaffirms its full support for the Dignity Strike. We call on people of conscience and citizen groups to take urgent action, mainstreaming and escalating military embargo campaigns as an effective nonviolent means of holding Israel accountable to international law and ending its fatal impunity. •

The Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC) is the largest coalition in Palestinian civil society. It leads and supports the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Visit their website and follow @BDSmovement


---


An Injury to One is an Injury to All:
Workers Support Palestinian Prisoners on Hunger Strike

Labor for Palestine

“We urge all labor organizations and workers’ movements to express their solidarity and support for the Palestinian prisoners’ hunger strike, for the Palestinian people’s struggle for liberation and for the campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel.” — Palestinian Trade Union Coalition for BDS (PTUC-BDS), April 28, 2017.

Freedom and Dignity; Support Palestinian Prisoners


Labor for Palestine joins workers around the world to stand with 1,500 Palestinian prisoners who have been on hunger strike since April 17 to protest conditions that Amnesty International calls “unlawful and cruel.” After more than a month, their health is failing, but their steadfastness remains unshakable.

From workers’ rights and women's rights, to anti-racism and anti-colonialism, hunger strikes are a time-honored form of protest against injustice.

But the Israeli government – which receives $3.8-billion per year in U.S. weapons and closely coordinates with the same police agencies that systematically terrorize Black and Brown communities in the United States – threatens to force-feed the strikers, and is gunning down their supporters in the streets of Palestine. Such relentless state violence reflects the continuing Nakba, Israel's 69-year-old ethnic cleansing campaign against the Palestinian people.

Undeterred, the prisoners have vowed: “Our chains will be broken before we are, because it is human nature to heed the call for freedom regardless of the cost.”

They know that, like Jim Crow and apartheid South Africa, Zionist settler colonialism will one day fall to the unstoppable tide of popular mass resistance.

Labor bodies around the world have risen to their defense, including the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), Canadian Labour Congress, 26 European trade unions and labor organizations, World Federation of Trade Unions (representing 92 million workers in 162 countries), and International Trade Union Confederation (representing 181 million workers in 163 countries).

Their outpouring is accompanied by rising international labor respect of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) picket line, which demands an end to occupation and apartheid, full equality for all, and Palestinian refugees’ right to return to the homes and lands from which they were expelled.

In the U.S., BDS has been embraced by West Coast dockers refusing to handle Israeli Zim Line cargo, the United Electrical Workers, CT State AFL-CIO, UAW 2865, UAW 2322, GSOC-UAW 2110, AFT 3220, and thousands of other union members.

This parallels growing intersectional solidarity with Palestine from the Movement for Black Lives, Standing Rock, #NoBanNoWall, and other U.S. grassroots social justice movements.

Today, we affirm:
* Victory to Palestinian Political Hunger Strikers!
* From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free! •

Issued May 21, 2017 by Labor for Palestine Co-Conveners: (Affiliations below for identification only) Suzanne Adely, Global Workers Solidarity Network; Michael Letwin, Former President, Association of Legal Aid Attorneys/UAW Local 2325; Labor for Standing Rock; Clarence Thomas, Co-Chair, Million Worker March; Executive Board, ILWU Local 10 (retired).

Endorsing Organizations (list in formation):
Al-Awda New York, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition
AROC: Arab Resource & Organizing Center
Decolonize This Place
Arab Resource & Organizing Center
Existence is Resistance
Jews for Palestinian Right of Return
LA4Palestine
Labor for Standing Rock
NYC Students for Justice in Palestine
Labor For Standing Rock
Palestinian Youth Movement - USA
Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network
U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights
U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel
U.S. Palestinian Community Network.

Petition: www.change.org.

Related Reading


Zionist Colonization is Not ‘Exceptional’: A Marxist Viewpoint
Tikva Honig-Parnass | 2017-05-04

BNC Statement on Israel’s Ongoing Campaign to Silence Omar Barghouti and Repress BDS
BDS National Committee | 2017-03-27

Refusing Settler Colonialism, From Turtle Island to Palestine
2017-03-26

Against the Blacklisting of Activists and Writers
| 2017-03-07

[ckaihatsu]

USPCN statement: Victory to the Palestinian Political Prisoners' #DignityStrike


Victory to the Palestinian Political Prisoners' #DignityStrike

View this email in your browser
Share
Tweet
Forward
Pin


USPCN statement: Victory to the Palestinian Prisoners' #DignityStrike

“They will not criminalise us, rob us of our true identity, steal our individualism, depoliticise us, churn us out as systemised, institutionalised, decent law-abiding robots. Never will they label our liberation struggle as criminal.”
-- Bobby Sands, Irish Republican leader who died in a political prisoners' hunger strike in 1981

After 40 days of the Palestinian Strike of Freedom and Dignity, our political prisoners have suspended their hunger strike and declared victory! Over 1,800 prisoners participated in the open-ended hunger strike, consuming only salt and water; and many more tens of thousands in Palestine, other Arab states, and the rest of the world protested, fasted in solidarity, and supported the #DignityStrike. USPCN salutes the prisoners and everyone else who played a role in this historic victory!



The hunger strike began on April 17th, the International Day of Solidarity with Palestinian Political Prisoners, when 1,500 original strikers representing all of the social sectors and political forces in Palestinian society, announced their basic and humanitarian demands, including the restoration of regular family visits, an end to solitary confinement, an end to administrative detention (imprisonment for months without trial or formal charge), the strengthening of medical care, and access to education.

When the prisoners declared victory May 27th, the only detail reported by any media was the restoration of a second monthly family visit, but today in a press conference, Issa Qaraqe, director of the Palestinian Prisoners Affairs Commission, said that "80 percent of the demands" of the prisoners were won after 20 hours of negotiations between the committee in leadership of the prisoners and the Israeli Prison Service (IPS).

It should also be noted that the IPS claims that the agreement was not made with the prisoners themselves, but between Israel, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and the Palestinian Authority (PA). We reject this boldfaced lie, and also condemn the role of the ICRC, which was responsible for cutting the second monthly family visit in the first place.

In addition, we will not allow the PA to take any credit for this hunger strike and the victory it brought for our prisoners and our people. As we have many times in the past, USPCN again demands that the PA, under its President Mahmoud Abbas, immediately halt “security coordination” with Israel. It cannot be more clear that this coordination plays a leading role in serving Palestinian organizers, activists, and resistance leaders to the Israelis. In fact, a number of the hunger strikers were originally jailed by the PA before being abducted and imprisoned by the Israelis.

This hunger strike was always about more than just visitation rights and better services for the prisoners. It was a fight for respect, dignity, and freedom. And it was won because of the steadfast strength of the hunger strikers themselves, who built a united front across the political spectrum, even when the enemy tried to isolate and marginalize the leaders and break the strike. The IPS had refused to negotiate with the prisoners until just two days ago, which means the strikers broke the Israelis instead.

The fight was won because of the brave family members of the prisoners, and the entire community of Palestinians in historical Palestine, who continuously lobbied and protested to pressure Israel to accept the demands, even under massive repression from both the Israelis and the PA. It was won also because it was a fight taken up by huge numbers of people across the world, who organized nonstop in solidarity and support. In the U.S., despite virtually no coverage at all from mainstream media, activists still organized protests, visits to legislators, and solidarity encampments.

As a reminder that the U.S. government and its elected officials, regardless of party affiliation, are complicit in Israeli crimes against Palestinian prisoners and our people in general, only one, Congressman Danny Davis of Illinois, wrote a letter supporting the strikers. (Coalitions of forces met with Congresswoman Barbara Lee of California and, led by USPCN, with Congressman John Conyers of Michigan, and are hopeful to get positive responses, even though the strike is suspended.) And despite a meeting USPCN organized with the staff of U.S. Senator Dick Durbin, one of the most powerful members of Congress, he has been mute.

Even with this incredible victory, we cannot forget that dozens of strikers have been hospitalized, and many more will take months to recover physically. They were and are ready and willing to give up their lives to win their dignity and respect, and they and millions of other Palestinians are also ready and willing to give up their lives for full liberation.strike nablus



As the Irish martyr, Bobby Sands, suggested in the quote that opens this statement, the essence of our defense of Palestinian political prisoners is a defense of resistance, a defense of organizing for liberation. The criminalization of our organizers, protesters, and leaders by Israel, the U.S., and even the Palestinian Authority (PA), is a criminalization of resistance, an attempt to brand illegitimate our movement for our national rights to return home, to self-determination, to equality, and to freedom. Those of us who seek to secure those rights, from every social sector of Palestinian society, are always going to be subject to imprisonment, whether within the open-air prison of Gaza under siege, the walled-in West Bank, the jails of the occupation and those colluding with it, or even prisons inside the U.S.
We are proud to salute and celebrate our hunger strikers and all the prisoners, and remind all that this victory comes only with a "suspension" of the hunger strike, so we must make certain that the Israelis do not renege on the agreement, as they have so many times in our history.

Follow @uspcn, @Addameer, and @SamidounPP for updates, and stay tuned to #DignityStrike and #PalHunger on social media. Continue organizing until every single one of our Palestinian political prisoners is free, and until full Liberation and Return!

USPCN
May 28th, 2017

******************************************

Support USPCN's work by making a tax-deductible donation to USPCN (c/o the WESPAC Foundation)!

Twitter Facebook Website


Copyright © 2017 US Palestinian Community Network, All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because you signed up to receive messages from USPCN.

Our mailing address is:
US Palestinian Community Network
c/o WESPAC
31 Mamaroneck Ave, Ste 403
White Plains, NY 10601

Add us to your address book


Want to change how you receive these emails?
You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list

Email Marketing Powered by MailChimp