[News] California dockworkers reject meeting with Israeli consul
Anti-Imperialist News
news at freedomarchives.org
Fri Jul 9 17:32:43 EDT 2010
California dockworkers reject meeting with Israeli consul
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article11384.shtml
Report, The Electronic Intifada, 9 July 2010
[]
Picketers at the Port of Oakland prevent the unloading of goods from
an Israeli ship on 20 June 2010. (Bill Hackwell)
Two weeks after the International Longshore and Warehouse Union
(ILWU) in the San Francisco Bay Area joined with activists at the
Port of Oakland
<http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article11348.shtml>to block the
unloading of an Israeli Zim Lines cargo ship, the union reaffirmed
its support of Palestinian rights despite pressure from the Israeli
consulate and the Zionist-Israeli organization Stand With Us.
On 6 July, a group representing the Israeli consulate and Stand With
Us attempted to pressure the ILWU Local 10 into withdrawing its
protest of Israel's 31 May attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla and
its condemnation of the Gaza siege and wall in the West Bank. The
groups had asked to address the ILWU Local 10's Executive Board at
their regular meeting.
However, the local union members were not easily persuaded, and
denied permission for the Israeli delegation to attend their meeting,
according to a press release issued by Labor for Palestine (US)
("<http://www.laborforpalestine.net/wp/2010/07/08/oakland-dockers-stand-firm-as-israeli-consul-seeks-an-audience/>Oakland
dockers stand firm as Israeli Consul seeks an audience," 7 July 2010).
The local's rejection of the meeting follows a request sent by the
Palestine General Federation of Trade Unions (PGFTU) to the ILWU
Local 10 Executive board, praising the union's historic action at the
Port of Oakland on 20 June. The Palestinian trade union leaders also
expressed deep concern that the Israeli consulate would command a
meeting with the union in an attempt to coerce members out of their
political stance on Palestinian human rights.
"Although we do not live in the United States, we find it highly
unusual and somewhat uncustomary that a paid foreign representative
of a racist and apartheid regime can demand and get a meeting with
the executive board of a local union no less than the ILWU," stated the PGFTU.
"We humbly ask of you to hold steadfast in the face of backlash and
revenge against your union. The call for a meeting with your union by
a foreign paid emissary is intervening in the domestic affairs of
local community grassroots action in the United States. Israel, an
apartheid state, maintaining an illegal war against our people,
should not be given the platform at your union house. That platform
should be reserved for heroes who champion justice and equality for
all. Please ask Mr. Tor to end his government's criminal actions and
answer for the 40,000 people Israel killed during the multiple
invasions and occupations of Lebanon, the massacres of Deir Yassin,
Qibya, Sabra and Shatila, Jenin and Gaza. Like the Turkish nationals
[killed on 31 May], the fallen have names, lives and families and
worked in the most destitute of conditions. Our mission, like yours,
is to bring dignity to our working people."
Freedom Archives
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415 863-9977
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