Palestinian Spring

Against the rogue state of Israel, its allies and accomplices:

Once again the State of Israel demanded and obtained that the French state and other European states, as well as major airlines (including Air France), that prevent friends of the Palestinian people to answer the call of the mission”Welcome to Palestine” and go to the West Bank for visits and a peaceful program under international solidarity

International solidarity very natural, which is almost unanimously considered obvious in the case of another country.
Israel had already dictated the requirements for a first mission to “Welcome to Palestine” last July and had intervened violently during the same period to prevent the flotilla of boats to Gaza to go to show solidarity with the people under siege.
Over a thousand people of all ages and all backgrounds, are prohibited to travel, in complete violation with a fundamental right: freedom of movement.

And a significant portion of those who were able to reach Tel Aviv, including thirty people from Lyon, is currently incarcerated in Israeli jails because they refuses to be expelled.

This is very serious. The State of Israel wants to ban mere citizen of going to see that this state imposes a life unbearable for the Palestinian people in the West Bank, that it submit since a long time the Palestinian to a control and a colonial military repression in various forms.
It wants to prevent these citizens may testify to the courage of the Palestinian people and its resistance.

What is equally serious is that European states including France and airlines are running, and express direct support to the colonial policy and to the apartheid policy and ethnic cleansing of a State which has a constant impunity andcriminal policy which endangers the world peace.

In Israel itself, a current of opinion is mobilized: the pacifist anti-colonialist came to welcome visitors to Tel Aviv airport, part of the press and intellectuals denounce the cynicism of their government’s repressive measureswithout foundation ”to taxpayer expense.”
We hope that this movement matures.
Israel wants to impose a blockade of all of Palestine!
Our response to this policy is to develop the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) against the State of Israel as itinfringe international law!

The national office of the French Jewish Union for Peace, April 16th 2012

French Jewish Union for Peace - 21 ter rue Voltaire, 75011 PARIS

Phone number : 06 26 25 97 33 · e-mail : contact@ujfp.org · Site : www.ujfp.org

About a hundred demonstrators occupied Tuesday for more than an hour the Rone prefecture in Lyon, in solidarity with themission Welcome to Palestine participants trapped by the Israeli apartheid regime.

Israel has jailed some fifty participants in the mission, including some of the Lyon area.

Our imprisoned comrades demanding the basic right to travel, and to respond to the invitation by our Palestinian friends to visit Bethlehem in the occupied territories.

At 11:30, a police armada had invested the outskirts of the prefecture, as well as indoor, denying access to the users.

Watch, also, this video of the evacuation muscled of our comrades, with kicks generously distributed by police to a man down!

http://youtu.be/4v0Ey_RtHOE

Today is prisoners’ day in Palestine.  Everyone from the Galilee to the Negev and from Jericho to Rafah remembers the sacrifices of hundreds of thousands of political prisoners held over the years and stands in solidarity with the thousands still held.  It is a special prisoners’ day because many of our prisoners are on hunger strike today and because many are joined by hunger strike of visitors who are imprisoned simply because they declared they wanted to visit us in our large prison in the West Bank.  Nearly fifty prisoners, most of them from France are in Givon Prison and are joining the hunger strike in solidarity with our prisoners and also to demand they be allowed to visit us in Bethlehem as part of the Welcome to Palestine Campaign.

Israel successfully projected its power into airports across Europe and North America to stop people boarding aircraft in their home countries to visit Palestine. To achieve this, Israel certainly resorted to criminal means, hacking into personal emails.

It was, however, at a cost. One among many similar voices in Israel was the Foreign Ministry official who said that “We insulted hundreds of foreign nationals due to our concerns, and gave the other side a victory on a silver platter… direct damage to tourism and the reputation of Israel.”

Israel’s harsh blockade of Palestine continues, part of the enforcement of what even the British Government calls an illegal occupation.

Send a letter to your MP to raise issues in Parliament and elsewhere concerning:

• Israel’s power to spread propaganda lies unchallenged by the UK Government in order to control who embarks at UK airports. The British Government should demand that Israel produce “statements by radical pro-Palestinian activists indicating that they intend to arrive on commercial flights from abroad, in order to disturb the peace and confront security forces at Ben Gurion International Airport.” http://bit.ly/HQWnjO

  This baseless claim was used to deny boarding to UK citizens in UK airports.

• Israel’s ability to deny access to British citizens’ access to Palestine while the UK Government:

1. has changed legal procedures to remove universal jurisdiction and protect Israeli officials who previously feared prosecution in Britain for war crimes
2. routinely turns a blind eye to UK-based Zionists who serve in the Israeli army, contrary to the Foreign Enlistment Act 1870

The Welcome to Palestine 2012 participants, 9 from Britain including 5 Scots, in Givon Prison will be refusing food from tomorrow in solidarity with the Palestinian hunger strikers and to demand their right to transit Israel to go to Palestine.

March for the Karamah Hunger Strikers – March for Palestine

https://www.facebook.com/events/353500491364265/

ASSEMBLE GEORGE SQUARE, GLASGOW TUESDAY 6PM 17/4/2012 to March to BBC HQ Pacific Quay

On Palestinian prisoners day, Tuesday 17th of April, the Palestinian prisoners movement will launch the Karamah (Dignity) hunger strike. They will place the true oppressive nature of the Israeli state under the spotlight once again. In a courageous move, highlighting the steadfastness of Palestinian resistance to occupation, 1600 prisoners will embark on an indefinite hunger strike demanding their basic rights as political detainees.

The magnitude of the 1600 Palestinian prisoners embarking on the Karamah hunger strike must be met with a significant international response. This means mass mobilisations to question the impunity of the Israeli state and our own governments involvement.

As the resistance of the prisoners escalates, our actions in turn must escalate.

On the 17th April, we will begin the escalation by marching for the liberation of Palestine and the dignity of the hunger strikers.

The intifada that is stirring in the Zionist jails must resonate beyond the prison walls and we demand that the BBC end their complicity through their silence of the Palestinian prisoners.

In response to the Palestinian call for a international day of solidarity this demo is called for by ‘We Are All Hana Shalabi’ / Students Palestine Societies in Scotland.

Supported by:
Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Friends of Al Aqsa Scotland, Scottish Palestine Forum, Youth Against Settlements (Hebron, Occupied Palestine), Stop the War Coalition, Glasgow Lebanese community

*UPDATE* ALSO PROTESTS IN:
Aberdeen: St Nicholas Square: 5pm
Edinburgh: St Andrews Square: 5.30pm

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About forty French participants of the mission Welcome to Palestine, and a dozen other internationals, were jailed Monday morning at Givon (near Tel Aviv), because they refused to be deported on their arrival, and not because they committed any offense or crime, quite the contrary.

According to the score that we could perform on the night of Sunday to Monday, there were 27 men and women who arrived in Tel Aviv on an Easyjet flight from Geneva, and 10 or 11 others arrived on board an Air France flight from Nice.

Some have managed not to get caught with their mobiles, and were able to sendto the outside world (to us, to relatives in France) a few new SMS: the morale is high. They maintain their right, elemental, to be able to travel in occupied Palestine and they are prepared, if necessary, to declare hunger strike, especially because this Tuesday April 17th is a day of general mobilization of thousands Palestinians languishing in the jails of the apartheid regime.

Example of an SMS received on Monday morning at 10 h30

“We are 13 girls in Lyon, Scottish 4, 2, Nice, Marseille 2, 3 in Paris, one of Quebec, one of Corsica, and they still don’t let us call without giving us any explanation . We all go on a hunger strike as long as we cannot call. And tomorrow we will all go on a hunger strike with the Palestinian women prisoners. “

Already, the draconian measures taken by the government and the Israeli secret service to prevent the thousands of volunteers to reach Palestine (only half a dozen have managed to win Bethlehem, to our knowledge) has turned into diplomatic and political disaster for Netanyahu and his clique.

We owe this to the overzealous Secret Service which have been unable to determine with any credibility in what the volunteers were “dangerous extremists pose an existential issue for Israel,” have raked wide, very wide, in the composition of their blacklists.

Haaretz reveals that for hundreds of passengers whose identities have been stalked for weeks, the Shin Bet has not been able not only to establish that they represented any “danger” to Israel, but even in some cases any militant activity in the service of the Palestinian cause!

The sweep operation did not spare a member of the Board of Directors of the powerful German pharmaceutical company Merck (Merck Darmstadt) who came in Israel in order to sign an agreement for scientific research! He found himself black-listed!

Better, a French diplomat and his wife who must start working at the French consulate in Jerusalem this summer. The couple was planning to look for an apartment in Jerusalem, but the night before their departure, they received an email from the airline, Lufthansa, saying that their tickets were canceled because they were banned from enter Israel!

In fact, what happened Sunday with a passenger on Air France, puted off her flight from Nice to Tel Aviv because she had responded negatively to a questionnaire from the airline asking if she was “Jewish” or ” Israeli “, gives a fairly clear picture of the exclusionary strategy developed by the Israeli spy agencies. When the passenger is not “racially pure”, is eliminated.

Even if it means to go after passengers with the “right profile”. Still in Nice, Sunday, members of our delegation witnessed the misadventures of a transient non-member of the mission who have been inquisitorial questioned by the Air France staff. Her crime? This woman, Jewish French citizen, had the air of an Arab, because of her surname and the complexion of her skin, which is not surprising since that many of the Jews in France are from the Arab world, especially North Africa. And when the employees of Air France have sought to hide behind the racial instructions they had received from Israel, the Jewish passenger replied indignantly, “Well, now I do not like this country.”

Wherever passengers, hundreds, were denied boarding, there were vigorous protests, , Brussels, Geneva, Mulhouse, Rome, Paris, Nice, etc. … We report the news on these sites http://www.bienvenuepalestine.com andhttp://www.europalestine.com, as well as our twitters @ touspalestine, @ Europalestine1, and on the Facebook page.

Friends and members of the mission, stay tuned for more, and all initiatives which will be announced.

WELCOME FRANCE PALESTINE MISSION

Press Release from the Welcome to Palestine Campaign

We did not have to show our 1500 visitors Israeli racism, arrogance, and human rights violations; the Israeli government showed them and also showed the whole world. Calling itself a democracy, this outlaw state denied the right of people from around the world to come visit us and see for themselves the reality of life under occupation.

We the Palestinian people are 11 million normal human beings, 7 million are refugees or displaced people simply because they are natives to a land that was wanted for a Jewish state. Five million of us are living in increasingly shrinking ghettos on a tiny fraction of our land. We remain here despite an illegal and brutal occupation that includes land confiscation, movement restrictions, home demolitions, illegal imprisonment of thousands (many now on hunger strike), and countless other inhuman conditions. We did not expect from this occupation that daily violates human rights to also allow us as prisoners under its boot to openly and honestly receive visitors. These visitors who wanted to come and see what reality is like here certainly were shocked at the Israeli behavior. And those who wanted to welcome our visitors and were brutally assaulted will remember how the same Israeli police let right wing fanatics sing and disrupt at the airport. The whole world is now seeing Israel for what it is: a police state that fulfills all the requirements of being an apartheid pariah state per the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (1973).

Countries that once supported Apartheid in South Africa had people who mobilized against it. Now people of conscience mobilize to challenge this apartheid that is now so explicitly expressed.

Those airlines and governments that acted as subcontractors for the Israeli apartheid regime are being challenged by their own people. In denying boarding to a passenger by Air France, the airline documented that she cannot board because she is neither Jewish or Israeli! (see in french http://wtp2france.palestinejn.org, English: http://palestinianspring.palestinejn.org)

In claiming in writing that we called for disruptions and for challenging “security” of Israel, the Israeli government was exposed as lying. In forcing a Swedish passenger (unrelated to our campaign) to sign that he was not going to meet with any “pro-Palestinian” individuals or groups, the Israeli government was shown to be racist. Imagine if a similar requirement was posted to visitors to any other country about visiting or meeting with “pro-black” individuals or organizations. In sending a letter to that claims activists should worry about Iran and Syria before worrying about this system of apartheid, the Israeli government showed the bankruptcy of its arguments. In denying us the right to visit, the Israeli government showed the world that it has a lot to hide.

For examples of participant profiles of those denied their right to visit us in Palestine, visit http://www.welcometopalestine.info/index.php/participant-profiles-uk-us

At the end of our press conference in Bethlehem, we passed out Easter colored eggs. We Palestinian Christian and Muslims are grateful to all who act on their conscience, Internationals, Israelis, and Palestinian volunteers. Thousands of us say loud and clear: we will not be silenced, we will continue to organize campaigns until we have freedom and until Israel complies with all relevant International and Humanitarian laws.

Contact email: media@palestinejn.org
Contact phone numbers in languages: Arabic, English. French, Spanish, Hebrew
0599255573 (A, E, F)
0568347074 (A, E, S)
0598939532 ((A, E)
0505633044 (A, E, H)

Welcome to Palestine 2012 Campaign websites

http://bienvenuepalestine.com

http://palestinianspring.palestinejn.org

http://www.righttoenter.ps

http://welcometopalestine.info

http://bienvenidosapalestina.jimdo.com/

http://bienvenuepalestine.ca/

English: http://palestinianspring.palestinejn.org
Arabic: http://wtp2arabic.palestinejn.org
Spanish: http://wtp2spain.palestinejn.org
French: http://wtp2spain.palestinejn.org
Swedish: http://wtp2sweden.palestinejn.org
Norwegian: http://wtp2norway.palestinejn.org

Israel and Air France racism come to light, this Sunday, in the joint operations of the Israeli intelligence service and the airline company in order to prevent people going to Palestine.

It has been proved that you must declare yourself a Jew and/or be the carrier of an Israeli passport in order to have the right to travel.

A young passenger who answered negatively to both questions was forced to leave the plane after she had already boarded.

The case, which will have judicial action where AirFrance will have to explain its collusion with the apartheid regime, happened in Nice airport, AirFrance flight number AF4384 to Tel Aviv at 14h45.

Like in other airports, about thirty passengers have been refused permission to fly with AirFrance on the grounds that the Israeli government has put their name on a list. Either actual participants to the W2P mission or people regarded arbitrarily as a part of it.

The young woman, Horia A., had been allowed to register normally, then board.

However, few minutes before the take off, a hostess came to the front of her seat and asked her to follow her. The hostess, having isolated the passenger in a quiet place, asked her a first question, embarrassed:

“Madam, have you got an Israeli passport?”

Horia “no”

The hostess, in her walkie-talkie, spoke with her management on the ground : “she said no”

“And now, is your religion Israel…euh…are you a Jew ?”

Horia : « No »

The hostess speaking in her walkie-talkie: “also no”

During the next minutes, Horia could observed discussions between the AirFrance staff, comings and goings, before the hostess confirmed that Horia was forbidden to fly, and mentioned “a very complicated situation”

Horia had the wisdom to obtain the report, signed by the AirFrance employee, who is an accomplice because of these twisted actions by management.

Here is the document (Horia and the employee name have been erased)

MISSION BIENVENUE PALESTINE FRANCE

See the copy below : here is the important paragraph of the report

client boarded and then was questioned, as demanded by the Israeli authority, then put out because she was refused entry to Israel.