23rd December 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Charlie Andreasson | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
Hundreds greet freed detainees at midnight rally in northern Gaza Strip (Photo by Charlie Andreasson)
You stand below a dam because you have discovered cracks where water leaks out. You try to seal them with your bare hands, but they are not enough. The pressure is too high, and the cracks too large. And you scream for help, to let people know what is happening, stop the pressure from the inside before the disaster happens. But no one listens to your warning, and no one seems to want to see the water that wells between your fingers. Some even claim you are exaggerating. And you stand there,not daring to move your hands, wondering how long you will be able to hold back the pressure, how long you can keep calling before your voice fails. This is the metaphor that best describes the frustration activists here feel from time to time, a frustration we have to deal with because it cannot pass in dejection.
To be an activist here is not just to go with farmers into the “buffer zone,” or out to sea with fishermen, more or less as human shields: to try to seal the cracks with your hands, if I am allowed to continue using the metaphor as an explanatory model. Far more time is spent interviewing victims, gathering information, going to demonstrations and writing articles, to call for help and draw attention to what is happening. And it is mainly during the search for information that you unwittingly also look for something to show that a change is afoot. One’s eyes skim through title after title, then suddenly it’s there, the article that makes you pause. Standing below the dam, you notice a change among those high above you. Maybe now something’s finally starting to happen. And you feel relief and joy, and share the news with all the activists you meet.
Most recently, on 8th December, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte had planned to inaugurate a container scanner at the Kerem Shalom checkpoint, but called off the whole thing when it became apparent that the scanner would not, contrary to Rutte’s assumptions, facilitate and thereby increase the movement of goods between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Israel is determined to keep these two parts of Palestine separated from each other.
On the same trip, Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans refused to accept an Israeli military escort in the 1967-occupied territories, instead canceling his planned visit to Hebron’s older neighborhoods. Other foreign ministers have recently visited them without military escorts, and Timmermans did not accept the new conditions to avoid creating a precedent.
Netherlands, you are great among activists here now. Upright, a standard-bearer for human rights, the defender of the Geneva Conventions. Only days later, we read that the Dutch water company Viten ended a partnership with Israeli water company Mekorot. Also on Rutte’s trip was Dutch Minister of Trade Lilianne Ploumen, whose visit to Mekorot the Israelis abruptly canceled. Perhaps this was because Dutch media had revealed that the same company was denying Palestinians water, but we may never know.
Netherlands, you are a light in the darkness, and may other nations follow that light. You demonstrate that there is a political space to maneuver to bring about a change. And now Romania denies its citizens work in Israeli settlements in 1967-occupied territory. Salvation is close, you can stop shouting now, and soon you will no longer need to keep your hands over the cracks.
But we are deceiving ourselves, and maybe we need to do it to not be dejected. For while we focus on the good news, we shut our eyes, at least temporarily, to the bad, which is much more plentiful, and more serious in nature. As the UK develops a new type of drone with Israel, and Italy expands its cooperation on several levels with the aforementioned occupying power, that members of the Knesset already have started congratulating each other for the peace talks that do not seem to lead anywhere … the list is grows longer every day. And when we go out on the streets of Palestine, we see that nothing has improved. Do average people here know the Netherlands stands up for them? Do they react the same way we do to the news??
People here are hardened. They believe in a change only when they see it. They’ve had enough empty promises to stop dreaming. And that’s why they pay tribute to every Palestinian who returns from an Israeli prison, no matter what he or she has done – armed resistance, political activity, being in the wrong place at the wrong time – because this person tried, in a concrete way, to change the situation. That’s all that counts after the betrayal of all who walk above, without giving a thought to the cracks you frantically try to seal. They are about to be drowned further downstream from the dam. And we continue to cry out for help.
Israel effectively boycotts Gaza produce by not giving access to their own markets. (Photo by Desde Palestina)
The Gaza Strip, now in its seventh year of a comprehensive siege by Israel, has faced increased hardships since the 3 July coup in neighboring Egypt.
On 26 November, the United Nations’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs warned that the Palestinian enclave “is affected by one of the most serious energy crises in recent years, with potentially serious humanitarian ramifications” (“Gaza fuel crisis situation report”).
Electrical blackouts have increased to as long as 16 hours per day, while fuel scarcity has affected the operations of all 291 water and wastewater treatment facilities, causing multiple sewage spills. Local supplies of vital medicines are low or empty, and Israeli attacks on Palestinian fishermen and farmers continue.
Tom Anderson and Therezia Cooper are the research team of Corporate Occupation, a project of Corporate Watch. Naming names, and going into detailed specifics, their blog documents the involvement of both international and Israeli companies in the illegal occupation of Palestine.
The Electronic Intifada contributor Joe Catron interviewed Anderson and Cooper on 5 December in Gaza City, shortly before the end of their visit.
Joe Catron: You’ve been in Gaza for four and a half weeks. What was the focus of your research?
Therezia Cooper: We wanted to research the impact of the siege, and the way Israel profits from it. Our research has been quite broad, and looked at all aspects of the strangulation of the economy and impacts the siege has on the ground. We’ve researched agriculture, exports from Gaza, the medical sector, prisoners, and effects of drone technology and other weaponry.
Tom Anderson: Separate from research, we also wanted to provide information from people in Gaza that will be useful in BDS campaigns around the world. Many solidarity activists have a lot of contacts in the West Bank because of the relative ease of access. We wanted to make connections with Gaza activists to better inform solidarity campaigns, specifically the BDS movement.
JC: What kinds of connections have you made with Gaza activists?
TA: We’ve been encouraged by meeting people and hearing of their enthusiasm for BDS as a strategy, and that they feel it’s an important part of their struggle against the occupation.
We’ve been asked to talk by many groups. We spoke about what the international BDS movement has been doing. People were eager to hear about successes. They were keen to have more feedback from the movement, more interaction and more Arabic materials on BDS.
TC: Having all these meetings and making connections has been one of the most fruitful parts of our trip. The movement is growing a lot through interactions over the Internet, but going to meet people, having real-life contact, and talking is very important.
JC: What new resources can BDS activists expect from your time here?
TA: We focused on a few different areas. One was military technology used against Palestinians. Israeli arms companies are world leaders in drone technology. They’ve developed that technology in the context of the occupation. Their expertise, and the technology they’re now trying to sell internationally, has been gained through war crimes and repression.
Israel has sold drone technology to up to 49 countries. The BDS movement needs to challenge Israel’s ability to profit from their experience oppressing the people of Palestine, impede their foreign sales of this technology, and target the offices and manufacturing facilities of [arms] companies like IAI [Israel Aerospace Industries] and Elbit, as well as their participation in international arms fairs.
We’ve done interviews with people on the receiving end of this Israeli drone technology here in Gaza, speaking to people whose houses have been targeted, and many who’ve lost family members to Israeli drone strikes.
Drones are now Israel’s weapon of choice against people in Gaza. Deaths from drone attacks exceeded those from other weapons during the last large-scale Israeli attack on Gaza, and were a large proportion in the previous one. We hope we we can provide resources to campaigners to target these companies’ abilities to make money out of experience they’ve gained supplying equipment used to commit war crimes.
TC: We’ve also spent a lot of time doing research that can be used by the campaign against a company called G4S, which provides security systems for Israeli prisons.
The campaign against G4S is possibly the fastest-growing BDS campaign in Europe, with a lot of groups working together to pressure G4S to withdraw from the contract they have with the Israeli Prison Service [IPS], among other things.
We interviewed prisoners who had a range of different experiences in Israeli prisons, and experienced a lot of different mistreatment, including prisoners who have given birth in prison, people who have been denied proper medical care and detainees who have been forcibly relocated from the West Bank.
Again, we think by coming here to hear the personal stories of people who have experienced the abuses of the IPS, we can benefit campaign work in the UK and around Europe. It’s hard for people in Gaza to boycott Israeli products, or have that kind of BDS campaign on the ground. But I think by telling stories of their experiences, they provide the backbone of the BDS movement and explain why it’s necessary, so we can work together to pressure these companies to end cooperation with Israel.
TA: G4S makes its money from large contracts with the public sector. That’s its weakness. People around the world can pressure the public authorities giving those tenders not to give contracts to G4S until it ends its contracts with the IPS and Israeli checkpoints, settlements and the [Israeli occupation authorities in the West Bank].
It’s a good target for BDS campaigns, because a public campaign to prevent G4S from obtaining one of these tenders can cost them millions of pounds.
“Economic warfare”
TC: One of the biggest challenges that we’ve become even more aware of since getting here, is how the solidarity movement can help Palestinians achieve some kind of independent economy in addition to BDS. The struggle of the Palestinian economy is evident in everything you see, on every level, in Gaza. At the moment, it’s very difficult to find a way to support Palestinian exports.
The devastating effects Israeli policies have on farmers are overwhelming them. Their main markets have been taken away. Even when they’re allowed to export tiny amounts of produce, they have no access to the local markets, in Israel and the West Bank, which used to sustain life in Gaza.
TA: That’s part of a policy of economic warfare. Elements of the siege that seek to control Palestinian exports go hand-in-hand with policies like the targeting of Palestinian farmersand fishermen. They’re intended to devastate the economy, but also to create a compliant economy that Israel can control, and from which it can profit.
Wherever we’ve talked about the boycott, they’ve asked us about ways the solidarity movement can support Palestinian exporters and help get Palestinian produce out of Gaza. That’s one area that could do with some creative thinking by the solidarity movement about how to support Palestinians by breaking the siege, by breaking Israeli control over Palestinian exports.
I think one reason the Israeli authorities allow a small amount of exports and cash crops from Gaza is to undermine the boycott movement, to say that Israeli companies are exporting Palestinian products, and therefore shouldn’t be boycotted. It’s imperative to think of ways to break restrictions on exporting Palestinian produce without benefiting Israeli companies and the Israeli economy.
TC: Even while Israel benefits from Gaza exports, they are effectively boycotting Gaza produce by not giving access to their own markets. That constitutes a boycott by Israel of all Gaza goods.
And of course, farmers here have no options. They have to live, and they have to try to export what they can. The people we’ve met have said they have no choice, but agree with the international boycott. The exports allowed now are so small, they don’t really make a difference. In order to actually benefit the Gaza economy, there needs to be some kind of autonomy for Gaza farmers, so they don’t have to rely exclusively on Israel and its companies.
Damaging restrictions
JC: You’ve mentioned Israel profiting from the siege several times. Can you say more about that?
TA: We’ve already mentioned two areas. One is Palestinian exports, which necessarily have to go through Israeli companies. We’ve also mentioned Israeli arms companies having a market for their products in the continuing aggression against people in Palestine, and a testing ground for products they can sell internationally.
The Kerem Shalom crossing is virtually the only point for goods to enter Gaza. The flow of those goods through Israel benefits the Israeli economy. Transport and marketing companies benefit from selling those goods and transporting them through the crossing.
Health workers have to buy products from outside. All the health workers’ organizations say they are supportive of the boycott of Israel and boycott Israeli products, except when they need them to protects lives and can’t buy them from anywhere else. However, all the drugs services care providers buy or are provided have to come through Israel, except for small amounts occasionally allowed as aid through the Rafah crossing.
Israeli companies benefit in the provision of these drugs, as well as transportation of them. Health workers who need to get equipment into Gaza, when they’re able to bring it, are sometimes required to wait for its delivery while security checks or other arbitrary delays are carried out. In the case of equipment coming from international sources, they’re required to pay for its storage.
The Gaza manufacturing industry is damaged by restrictions on the entry of certain raw materials. Again, that increases the necessity of reliance on products from outside, which necessarily have to come through Israel.
JC: What’s the state of the BDS movement in Gaza?
TC: The movement has a lot of potential. There are people working hard on it, and theacademic boycott seems particularly well-known. I think there’s a clear reason for that. Gaza is very isolated, and students are so often prevented from taking scholarships abroad.
There are a lot of young people, including at universities, who have a vague idea what’s been happening with the BDS movement, but want a way to feed into it and work more directly with people on the outside, as well as organizations that have been doing BDS work here.
But as we said before, we’ve sensed a lot of enthusiasm, especially from young people, and eagerness to work on BDS. Increased connections among all the people interested in BDS, and with BDS activists in the West Bank and abroad, would be a great next step.
TA: I think the role of international campaigners in doing that is to seek the mandate and voices of Palestinians in Gaza in taking BDS actions, to be led by Palestinians in Gaza, and to create better linkages between BDS campaigns and people under siege in Gaza.
For instance, the international campaign against the Prawer Plan would benefit from involvement and experience of the refugees here, as the ongoing forced expulsions in theNaqab are simply a continuation of the Nakba, which forced the refugees who now live in Gaza from their homes.
The organization which took control of the majority of land after the Nakba, which is instrumental in erasing any trace of the Palestinian history from the sites of forced expulsions, and which is currently planting forests on the lands of Palestinian Bedouin in the Naqab, is the Jewish National Fund.
“Increased desperation”
JC: What has surprised you here?
TC: Reading about a situation is very different from actually experiencing it. In many ways, experiencing the situation is worse. We’ve come at a time when the border, and issues with fuel and electricity, are very bad. You can sense an increased desperation for a solution.
But like the West Bank, there’s the beauty of the place, the beauty of the sea, and the welcome you get from the people, who desperately want this kind of interaction with the world.
TA: The thing that struck me was the feeling of isolation, not just from the rest of the world, but from the rest of Palestine. Hearing about friends being tear-gassed by Israeli police in the Naqab, knowing that’s only a few miles away, in places we’ve been earlier this year, but feeling the extreme difficulty of meeting the people involved face to face, shows the isolation of people in Gaza struggling against the occupation.
I think the challenge for international solidarity activists is to not accept that isolation.
3rd December 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Marco Varasio | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
(Photo by Silvia Todeschini)
Like every Monday morning, relatives and friends, as well as local and international activists, gathered at the International Committee of the Red Cross in solidarity with the Palestinian political prisoners.
The rally started with the protesters chanting slogans, especially about their homeland Palestine and the political prisoner Marwan Barghouti.
Wives and mothers of the detainees stood in the middle of the tent holding pictures and banners of their imprisoned relatives.
After the weekly ceremony in support of the prisoners, Isra W. Almodallal, spokeswoman of the Palestinian government in Gaza, and Italian ISM activist Rosa Schiano spoke against Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Italy.
In their speeches, they highlighted how the agreements signed in the day’s bilateral meeting between Italy and Israel are violations of human rights and international law. They warned against the dangers of the military and scientific cooperation between the two countries and called for BDS campaigns as alternatives to cooperation with war criminals.
BDS directly affects Israel’s detention of Palestinians, since one of the companies targeted by BDS, the British-Danish G4S, operates inside Israeli prisons and detention facilities.
About 43 people, 22 women and 21 men, attended. They were farmers and representatives of the civil society and national organizations in the agriculture sector in Gaza, NPA representatives, and BDS activists.
“This kind of boycott of Israel is historical in Palestine and has succeeded in making changes in the past,” said ACAD director Muhsen Abu Ramadan. “The South African anti-apartheid movement succeeded using a boycott strategy. We should boycott and also ask for divestment from Israel in general, and also settlements. We also need to promote local products and to encourage investments in Palestinian products, as this will complement the boycott. We have to use international replacements for Israeli products if we don’t have a Palestinian product. Boycott is not only about trade but also educational centers. Israeli universities are used for research to kill Palestinians. Experience of the boycott movements has shown that it is a good way to affect Israel. It is hard to boycott here in Gaza because of the limited options, but we have to encourage the culture of boycotting. We have also to boycott some of the facilities and traders who deal with Israelis, because Israel tries to show that the conflict is just between politicians and not popular among the people. So, they tell other countries, why are you boycotting us when even Palestinians are not boycotting us? Some farmers’ unions in Europe adopted the boycott movement, and we can have a huge influence by boycotting agricultural products. We have to take care about Israeli procedures that intend to create normalization between Palestinian and Israeli products. We demand more serious positions against importing products from Israel at all, not just from settlements. We have to defend the rights of our farmers and their right to import and export products.”
He pointed out that “boycott is a national strategy for taking our rights, especially in the absence of compliance with international law with regard to Palestinians. This is a way to punish Israel, which is using the Palestinian market to make it just a consumer market so they, Israel, can benefit from it. The Israelis intend to create normalization between the occupied and the occupier. We found that 51 Israeli and international companies invest their money in settlements. We have contacted these companies and we contacted the Norwegian pension fund to boycott these companies. One of the companies is G4S , the British/Danish security firm which has held a contract to provide equipment and services to the Israeli prison system and checkpoints since 2007. Caterpillar provides the Israeli military with weaponized bulldozers used to illegally destroy homes and orchards of Palestinian families. And they are the very same bulldozers as the one that killed a 23-year-old American peace activist, Rachel Corrie, in Rafah in 2003, when she tried to protect the home of the Nasrallah family. Hewlett Packard, HP, provides the technology for Israeli gunboats that kill Palestinian fishermen, and provide the tracking system that controls all movements of Palestinians at checkpoints throughout the West Bank. We demand to talk with the investment funds in Europe, and that they boycott all these companies. Sadly, some Arab countries invest in them.”
He asserted the importance of joining the BDS movement, refusing to buy any Israeli product from the local markets and encouraging the national products. “By that, we can support our economy and destroy the Israeli economy.”
“We don’t have real experience in BDS as UAWC, or any other civil society organizations in Gaza,” said Sa’ad Ziada, project coordinator for the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC). “We just have some activities boycotting the Israeli products.”
“We established the Palestinian Day for Agriculture, held on 9th February 2013. We have been discussing how we can export our products without the intervention of Israeli companies. We have to create a long-term strategy and we need to talk with all factions in order to encourage them to create a culture of boycotting Israel. We want to make pressure on the Palestinian government to support the idea. We know that it’s really hard to boycott Israel, especially in Gaza, because most of our basic goods are from them, but at least we can boycott the products for which we already have national alternatives. The Israeli occupation is establishing a new form of slow killing, such as with this closure, the lack of jobs, electricity, unclean water, bad education, and using poisons in agricultural materials such as fertilizers and pesticides. That leads to the killing of Palestinians slowly, over the long term, not directly with bombs, but in another way. 95 million dollars is the profit from Israeli goods imported into the Gaza Strip, more than four million dollars per year. So that means if we boycott Israel, we can really affect the Israeli economy and change their policy towards us.”
“Of course the boycott is an important type of resistance. Not all the people are going to do armed resistance, but they can do this kind of resistance.”
He started his speech with a brief introduction to the BNC, its history, its start and its role and activities in Palestine.
The coalition reflects “the broad consensus among Palestinian civil society about the need for a broad and sustained campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS),” he said. “This resulted in the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel launched in July 2005, with the initial endorsement of over 170 Palestinian organizations. The signatories to this call represent the three major components of the Palestinian people: the refugees in exile, Palestinians under occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and the oppressed Palestinian citizens of the Israeli state.”
Efforts to coordinate the BDS movement, which began to grow rapidly after the 2005 call was announced, culminated in the first Palestinian BDS Conference held in Ramallah in November 2007. Out of this conference emerged the BDS National Committee (BNC) as the Palestinian coordinating body for the BDS movement worldwide.”
The BNC’s mandate and role is:
• To strengthen and spread the culture of boycott as a central form of civil resistance to Israeli occupation, colonialism and apartheid;
• To formulate strategies and programs of action in accordance with the 9 July 2005 Palestinian Civil Society BDS Call;
• To serve as the Palestinian reference point for BDS campaigns in the region and worldwide;
• To serve as the national reference point for anti-normalization campaigns within Palestine;
• To facilitate coordination and provide support and encouragement to various BDS campaign efforts in all locations.
The BNC’s main activities include:
• Campaigning with BDS activists locally and worldwide by preparing and disseminating BNC statements; public speaking; organizing the annual Global BDS Action Day on 30 March (Palestinian Land Day);
• Advocacy by briefing and lobbying policy makers;
• Monitoring and Rapid Response by means of BNC calls for action against projects and initiatives which amount to recognition of or cooperation with Israel’s regime of apartheid, colonialism and occupation (i.e., normalization);
• Media Outreach in Palestine and abroad, based on a professional media strategy;
• Coordination with BDS activists locally and worldwide, including preparation of regional and international organizing meetings and conferences;
• Awareness Raising and Training for activists and organizations about BNC analysis, standards and BDS campaign work; through workshops, BNC information materials and the BDS campaign website;
• Developing the BDS movement in Arab countries;
• Research and BDS Strategy Development.
In the West Bank, they have made some progress boycotting Israel, although they have faced many problems with the Israelis. Shuabi talked about the boycott in many countries and how Palestinian traders are forced to buy Israeli goods, sometimes from settlements, so Israel can argue with Western audiences that Palestinians themselves buy from Israel. He explained efforts to export goods through companies boycotting Israel. This project has made good progress outside Palestine.
After the speeches, there was an animated debate among organizers and participants.
25th November 2013 | Corporate Watch, Tom Anderson and Therezia Cooper | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
Palestinians hold their weekly vigil at the ICRC in Gaza City in solidarity with prisoners in Israeli jails. (Photo by Corporate Watch)
Palestinians held a demonstration at the offices of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Gaza City today in solidarity with Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails. The demonstration has been held every week since 1995 to remember the prisoners and is a focal point for organising prisoner solidarity campaigns.
The weekly vigils were initiated by Um Jaber and Um Ibrahim, two women who both had sons imprisoned by Israel and wanted to do something to act in solidarity. To read more about the weekly vigil click here.
International companies are profiting from providing services to the Israeli prison system. One such company is G4S, the British/Danish security firm which has held a contract to provide services to the Israeli Prison Service since 2007.
For more information on G4S see Corporate Watch’s company profile.
Hussam Association, a Gaza based organisation of current and former Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails, has recently released a statement calling for the prosecution of G4S.
(Photo by Corporate Watch)(Photo by Corporate Watch)(Photo by Corporate Watch)(Photo by Corporate Watch)(Photo by Corporate Watch)
