Can Palestine be Free? Public Meeting

cork | anti-war / imperialism | event notice Saturday January 17, 2009 19:16 by Joe Moore - Socialist Workers Party mapuche at eircom dot net 087-2994796

The Cork Branch,Socialist Workers Party, will host a public meeting entitled "Can Palestine be Free?", in the Victoria Hotel, Patrick St. on Thursday 22nd January, at 8.00pm. The meeting will be address by Rami Qasim, a Palestinian activist and Marnie Holborrow, SWP.

Israel's attacks and invasion of Gaza continue, with up to 1,000 killed, the majority of which are civilians. Humanitarian shelters and food convoys have been deliberately targeted, and the Israeli Defence Forces have used white phosphorous shells, which burn through to the bone. A Norwegian medical team has also documented their use of Dense Inert Metal Explosives, which can cut victims to pieces, and cause cancer in survivors.

Yet these brutal war crimes are systematically rewarded by the US and the EU. Each year, Israel receives $3 billion in US aid. The F-16s and Apache helicopters that attack Gaza, for example, were supplied by the US. The EU has also given Israel a new trade deal, to double Israel's exports of food.

Hamas is the elected government of the whole of Palestine. The Western powers, who preach about democracy in the Middle East, have never accepted their election. But they are as much a legitimate national resistance movement as the Sinn Fein movement, which fought a war of independence in 1919-1921. That movement-which was chaired by a Catholic priest-was also denounced by liberal supporters of imperialism as "backward religious obscurantism."

The Hamas rockets were fired in response to a policy of imprisoning and terrifying the population of Gaza. Israel has turned Gaza into a gigantic prison camp by imposing punitive sanctions on the area. Before the latest assault, Israel staged repeated raids on Gaza. On one occasion, in January 2007, they murdered 30 Palestinians, and Hamas replied with rocket attacks-in this case killing no one. Yet the world's media tried to equate the resistance of Hamas with the brutality of the Israeli Defence Forces.

Israel hopes to create such "shock and awe" that people will accept that resistance is futile.

In Ireland, we need to press for the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador, and promote a systematic boycott of Israeli goods. The involvement of the Irish trade union movement in solidarity with the Palestinian people is a most welcome development.

It is vital, therefore, that the message of BOYCOTT is spread.