At least a 1/4 million people took part in a demonstration against Israel’s war crimes, genocide and ethnic cleansing in Palestine
When I took the tube from Oxford
Street to Marble Arch we were told to get out at Bond Street because Marble
Arch was too crowded. So was Bond Street as the crowds inched forward to the
demonstration.
Despite the unanimity of the
Lying Press and BBC that 100,000 took part in the Palestine solidarity
demonstration in London today it is clear that far larger numbers marched than
last week.
I have been on more demonstrations
than most people have had hot dinners and my own feeling was that between a
quarter and half a million took part. Palestine Solidarity Campaign claimed 300,000
and that seems a reasonable estimate.
Despite the pressure from Britain’s
racist Home Secretary Cruella Braverman for people who chanted ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine must be
free’ there was no attempt by the surly police from the Met to intervene.
Even the Police, thick as they are,
would have difficulty construing a slogan in favour of a free Palestine as
meaning the genocide of Jews as Braverman claims.
The march was not in support of
Hamas or any other faction of the Palestinian resistance but in support of a
ceasefire in Gaza and an end to Israel’s genocidal bombing campaign that this
government of war criminals and of course the pathetic Kid Starver supports.
Of course most people support
resistance against Israel’s 17 year long siege of Gaza and the Apartheid
State. Hamas and Islamic Jihad have been
declared ‘terrorists’ by this government despite the government’s support for
the terrorist Israeli state.
It is clear that the Terrorism Act
2000, which was brought in to combat actual terrorism on the streets of
Britain, is now being used to silence political debate. It is a total abuse of
the legislation but Starmer, the ‘human rights lawyer’ is happy with that.
The demonstration would have been even bigger if some of Britain's trade unions had told their members of the demonstration and campaigned for it. In particular the racist pro-imperialist General Secretary of Unite, Sharon Graham, refused to publicise the demonstration.
My own branch and also the London & Eastern Region of Unite wrote to Graham protesting at her pro-Zionist, pro-imperialist attitude, see Skwawbox Exclusive: Unite members tell Graham ‘Follow union policy and start opposing murder of Palestinians’, Exclusive: Unite London/Eastern slams Graham’s silence and union’s inaction over Israeli war crimes and Video: huge crowd marches for justice for Palestinians
Below are some photographs and
video which I took
Tony Greenstein
bravo!
ReplyDelete👏👏👏
ReplyDeleteThanks for the continued analysis Tony. I'm noticing a lot of the age old arguments against the Palestinians resurfacing. Here are some of the common ones;
ReplyDeletePalestinians don't exist, they were invented by the plo
Palestine was just an Ottoman province, the Arabs never ruled it so have no rights to it
Palestinians are just Arabs who moved in after the Israeli state was born
The only reason Palestinians are fighting is because of antisemitism, or else why was there violence against Jews as far back as 1929.
If time allows, can you please help to refute these assertions ?
Hi Anonymous (please can people put their names?)
DeleteYes of course you are right and all the old myths and lies are asserting themselves. My response is that the British are only Europeans and there are plenty of European countries. British people should move out for the Italians. After all the Romans were here about 2 millenia ago and have a right to return.
No really it's not worth it. These are the lies of colonialism nothing more.
I suggest you refer these people to Jabotinsky's Iron Wall. The Palestinians in 1929 resisted and were violent because of the ongoing colonisation and Judaisation. Tell them to read the Hope Simpson Report into the conflict by the British Government. I quote from just a segment:
The effect of the Zionist colonisation policy on the Arab.— Actually the result of the purchase of land in Palestine by the Jewish National Fund has been that land has been extraterritorialised. It ceases to be land from which the Arab can gain any advantage either now or at any time in the future. Not only can he never hope to lease or to cultivate it, but, by the stringent provisions of the lease of the Jewish National Fund, he is deprived for ever from employment on that land. Nor can anyone help him by purchasing the land and restoring it to common use. The land is in mortmain and inalienable. It is for this reason that Arabs discount the professions of friendship and good will on the part of the Zionists in view of the policy which the Zionist Organisation deliberately adopted.
Reasons for the exclusion of the Arab.—Attempts were made to ascertain the reasons for these drastic provisions directed to exclude every Arab from the land purchased. The Executive of the General Federation of Jewish Labour were perfectly frank on the subject. They pointed out that the Jewish colonies were founded and established by Jewish capital, and that the subscriptions of which this capital is composed were given with the intention that Jews should emigrate to Palestine and be settled there—that these subscriptions would never have been given had it been thought that they would be employed to support Arab labourers—that it was the business of the Zionist Organisation to cause immigration into Palestine of as many Jews as possible, and that, if Arabs were employed, posts would thus be filled up for which Jews might have immigrated—that the position of agricultural labourer in the colonies, when occupied by a Jew, serves as a training for the immigrant and prepares him to take over a holding himself at a later date—and, finally, that if these posts were left open to the ordinary competition of the labour market, the standard of life of the Jewish labourer would be liable to fall to the lower standard of the Arab.
Policy contrary to Article 6 of Mandate.—All these arguments are thoroughly logical, and have a basis in fact. They are, however, irrelevant, in view of the provisions of Article 6 of the Mandate. The principle of the persistent and deliberate boycott of Arab labour in the Zionist colonies is not only contrary to the provisions of that article of the Mandate, but it is in addition a constant and increasing source of danger to the country. At the moment this .policy is confined to the Zionist colonies, but the General Federation of Jewish Labour is using every effort to ensure that it shall be extended to the colonies of the P.I.C.A., and this with some considerable success. Great pressure is. being brought to bear on the old P.I.C.A. colonies in the Maritime Plain and its neighbourhood—pressure which in one instance at least has compelled police intervention. As a symptom of that pressure may be cited the construction of a labour Kvutzoth (communal colony) on the outskirts of the P.I.C.A. village of Nessziona. It is certain that the employers of that village will not be able to resist the arguments of the General Federation, reinforced by the appeals of the vigorous labour colony at its gates.
That this replacement of Arab labour by Jewish labour is a definite policy of the Zionist Organisation is also evident from the following quotation, taken from '' A Guide to Jewish Palestine '', published by the Head Office of the KerenKayemeth Leisrael— The Jewish National Fund—and the KerenHayesod, at Jerusalem in 1930 :—
DeleteThanks Tony. Good comparison re the English just being Europeans. I've not heard of the Hope Simpson Report until now - how come its not widely spoken about ? Also, is it true that one of the major Zionist labour unions wouldn't allow Arabs in it ? If so, why was this, and is that still the case now ?
DeleteHassan
Hassan, I don't know why the Hope Simpson Report is not widely known. Probably because it is inconvenient to the Zionist and imperialist narrative. But it is a mine of useful information.
DeleteThere was only one Zionist trade union, Histadrut, which was really a general colonising agency. Yes Arabs could not join. Why? Because it campaigned for a Boycott of Arab Labour or Jewish Labour. They picketed Jewish employers who employed Arabs because they were intent on creating an economy within an economy, a self-contained Jewish economy as a precursor to a Jewish state. Arabs had no place in such a state and no place in the Jewish economy This was the beginning of Zionist apartheid and was part of the separation that would lead to the Nakba. Histadrut had a special levy to finance this campaign.