Astiak's Jibber Jabber

Author: astiak

  • National Demonstration 16 May – Remember Gaza – Free Palestine!

    There is a national demonstration planned for Saturday 16th May, 2009. I will almost certainly be attending. I often get asked, why demonstrate? Then I get told it makes no difference whether you demonstrate or not. That is quite wrong in my opinion. Protests can offer a sense of clarity on an issue that was previously not so clear. Demonstrations attract media attention, it allows the opinions of like minded people to be expressed indirectly in the media. Repeated attention in the media about the crimes occurring in Palestine will bring in more supporters to our cause, with enough people the government will have no option but to intervene and make comments in order to retain public confidence.

    So, with my reasons justified, on to the details of the demonstration:

    Assembling 12noon in Malet Street WC1 London, Followed by Rally in Trafalgar Square. The map is shown below:

    View Larger Map

    To commemorate the Palestinian 1948 Nakba

    Lowkey MC, Mecca 2 Medina, Jeremy Hardy and more will join speakers from Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, along with Jeremy Corbyn MP, Martin Linton MP, George Galloway MP, Daud Abdullah – Deputy Gen Sec Muslim Council of Britain, Jean Lambert MEP, Jenny Tonge MEP, Manuel Hassassian – Palestinian General Delegate to the UK and speakers from PSC, Stop the War Coalition, British Muslim Initiative, CND, Palestinian Forum in Britain, Viva Palestina, Jews for Justice for Palestine, Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights and others

    Called by: Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Stop the War Coalition, British Muslim Initiative, Palestinian Forum in Britain and Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament

    Supported by:

    Action Palestine, Amos Trust, Arab Media Watch, Arab Women’s Association, Association of Palestinian Communities UK, Britain-Palestine Twinning Network, The Council for Arab-British Understanding, Campaign Against the Arms Trade, Christian Peacemaker Teams UK, Fire Brigades Union, Friends of Al-Aqsa, Friends of Lebanon, Friends of Birzeit University, Friends of Sabeel UK, The Green Party, Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions UK, Jewish Socialists’ Group, Jews for Justice for Palestinians, Labour Friends of Palestine, Liberation, Midlands Palestinian Community Association, Muslim Association of Britain, Muslim Council for Britain, NUS Black Students Campaign, Palestinian Forum in Britain, Respect, Pax Christi, Public and Commercial Services Union, Rail Maritime and Transport Union, UNISON, UNITE, Viva Palestina, War on Want, Zaytoun Ltd.

    Download the leaflet here.

    Leaflets are also available from the PSC office – please save the date and start organising transport now!

    Details of coaches here!

    They are looking for plenty of volunteers on the day, please contact us if you can help!

    Please contact the PSC office for more information:

    Tel:   020 7700 6192

    Email: [email protected]

    Web: www.palestinecampaign.org

  • Venezuela and Palestine establish diplomatic ties

    The Venezuelan foreign minister Nicolas Maduro and his Palestinian counterpart Riyad Al-Maliki signed agreements formally creating diplomatic ties on Monday in Caracas. This comes as tension between Israel and Venezuela grows. A palestinian embassy was also inaugerated in Caracas.

    “The people of Palestine can count on our eternal and permanent solidarity with their just and humane cause”
    Nicolas Maduro
    Venezuelan Foreign Minister

    The Israeli massacre of Palestinians left over 1,300 dead, prompting Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan leader, to cut off ties with Israel.

    Caracas expelled Israeli diplomats in January as protest against the Gaza offensive. Israel responded by dismissing Venezuelan envoys. There are plans for 10 more embassies in Latin America as stated by Al-Maliki.

    This is good news for Palestine in establishing more international support as well as establishing themselves as a state that is here to stay.

  • UN Summit To Fight Racism: EU Diplomats Walk Out

    My writing in regard to this is granted a bit late, however still very relevant. As you are all aware, there was a UN Summit to fight racism held in Geneva on the 20th of April. In this summit, President Ahmadinejad of Iran begun to make a speech shortly after being disturbed by a couple of protesters. As he continued through the speech, accusing racism on the part of Israel, and accusing the west of supporting Israel’s racist policies, British and EU officials decided to walk out of the conference, instead of staying there and making a counter statement against Ahmadinejad’s.

    The video below shows the beginning of Ahmadinejad’s speech, and the walkout.

    Following the walkout, BBC journalist Jeremy Paxman interviewed Peter Gooderham about the walkout. The video is below, which is strangely now no longer available on the biased BBC. I hope you enjoyed the video as much as I did.

    From what I can gather from this video, Gooderham didn’t really have a “distinction” between Zionism and racism. In case you struggled to hear what Paxman had quietly mumbled while Gooderham was attempting to explain this distinction I have typed it up below:

    Peter Gooderham: Well Zionism is a political movement related to the establishment of a homeland…
    Jeremy Paxman: So are some forms of racism.

    As for what Ahmadinejad had to say, I agree with most of it. Israel was formed as a result of the suffering of the Jewish people, at the expense of the Palestinian people.  And before cries of anti-Semitism reach me, at no point did Ahmadinejad refer to Judaism other than the suffering of Jews, merely Israel.

    I have included the full-text speech transcript of Ahmadinejad, kindly borrowed from Palestine Think Tank. Click on the “Continue Reading…” link to read this. You will also find the full video of the translated speech as soon as I am done converting it so it can be viewed on the web. Enjoy.

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  • Boycott Israeli Goods

    Barcode on Israeli Products
    Barcode on Israeli Products

    It is amazing how quickly Israel’s recent massacre of innocent Palestinians has just disappeared from the media. The boycott of Israeli goods must continue however. This is our way of hitting apartheid Israel’s economy. Already The Guardian has reported that a fifth of Israeli exporters report a drop in demand.

    The Palestinians have been losing land and resources to illegal settlers for over 60 years now, and this is not slowing down. More and more Palestinian territories are being occupied, land which the Palestinians rely on for their income. Instead illegal settlers take over, and then these products that are produced on illegally occupied lands are being sold in our supermarkets, yet, our government will not intervene. This is why it is up to us, the public, to make a difference. Continue your boycott. Just because there are no reports in the media does not mean the boycotts must end.

    I invite you to look at 2 websites for further information on which companies are to be avoided, and some background information on the boycott campaign.

    http://www.bigcampaign.org/

    http://www.inminds.co.uk/boycott-israel.php

  • Israel drops Gaza war crimes investigation

    I’m going to begin with an investigation carried out by the Guardian. Clancy Chassay asks why Israeli drones with optics capable of seeing the colour of a target’s clothes killed so many Palestinian civilians during the recent Gaza invasion. The video is shown below:

    This is further evidence of the Israelis attacking innocent Palestinian civilians and yet they continue to deny what is obviously the truth. In an earlier post, I talked about the damaging testimonies of Israeli soldiers, confirming that war crimes were carried out. I did mention it would be interesting to see how Israel spin their way out of this one, and surprise, they have attempted.

    Israel have closed the Gaza war crimes inquiry, no surprises there, the military invesgiating the military. The invesgiation by Israel concluded that the aforementioned soldiers were just relaying rumours and “hearsay”. So that’s it, an 11 day invesgation into the alleged human rights violations has ended. I was expecting a more convincing investigation however.