Just International

Take Action! #SaveSheikhJarrah and Defend Jerusalem: Boycott Israel, Support Palestinian Resistance

As we approach the 73rd anniversary of the Nakba, the Zionist colonization of Palestine and the forced expulsion of Palestinians, the Nakba is continuing. This is apparent everywhere in Palestine, but perhaps is most clear in the heart of Jerusalem, Palestine’s capital: in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan, where Palestinian families are being threatened with imminent expulsion from their homes and lands by the Israeli regime and its colonial settlers, as they refuse to concede their lives to racist Zionist colonialism.

Palestinians in Jerusalem are under attack on multiple levels, defending their land, city and identity from erasure and colonialism for 73 years. They face the stripping of their identity and residence — even from their place of birth — severe repression, land confiscations, home demolitions and ongoing Zionist attempts to erase the Palestinian and Arab presence and nature of the city.

Right-wing settler mobs have rampaged through Sheikh Jarrah in the past days, screaming “Death to Arabs” and attacking Palestinians. Settlers attacked Palestinians breaking the Ramadan fast during Iftar, pepper spraying them and throwing rocks at them. Working hand in hand with these violent settlers, the Israeli military has attacked residents, sprayed skunk water and tear gas throughout the neighbourhood, invaded homes, assaulted women, children and elders and seized dozens of Palestinian youth defending their own homes.

In Silwan, Palestinians are being threatened with violent expulsion from their Jerusalem homes in order to make way for a “David-themed” tourist attraction to produce income for the Zionist settler colonial project, built atop the homes and lives of the indigenous Palestinian people.

Palestinians in Jerusalem — and throughout occupied Palestine and in exile — continue to resist and to prove that the Palestinian struggle continues and that organizing and resistance is the road to liberation. We know that it is this resistance that will defeat the attacks of Zionism and imperialism, and our actions and organizing around the world can work to build support for the Palestinian people and their resistance in Jerusalem, Gaza, throughout occupied Palestine and in exile and diaspora.

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network urges all friends of Palestine around the world to join the campaign to #SaveSheikhJarrah. Boycott Israel, take the streets and take action, organize direct actions and speak out to defend Jerusalem, defend Palestine and support the Palestinian resistance and the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea!

Join us in the Week of Palestinian Struggle from 15-22 May — and before the week officially begins — to escalate our organizing, resistance and action to support the Palestinians struggling, resisting, fighting and facing the most severe, brutal and deadly colonial violence on the front lines of liberation struggle.

 

Here are some ways that you can take action

End the Spiral of Violence: Sanctions Now!

We’re on the brink of a full scale war in Israel and Palestine.

At least 55 Palestinian children have already been killed. Mothers dead. Hundreds injured.

The tensions keep escalating. Fast.

It’s all rooted in Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine and decades of violent oppression of the Palestinian people, which Human Rights Watch just concluded amounts to “crimes against humanity.”

This is where it all began, and this is where it must end.

Possibly the only way to stop this horrific cycle of Israel’s violent displacement of Palestinians from their homes, daily punishment of innocent families, Hamas firing rockets, and Israel bombing Gaza is to make the economic cost of this conflict too high to bear.

It’s what helped end apartheid in South Africa, and it can help end apartheid here.

We’re fast approaching 3 million signatures. Click below to sign our call to sanction Israel for breaking international law and committing crimes against humanity, and let’s make this a turning point.

Sign the petition.

ACTION ALERT: CAIR Thanks Members of Congress for Supporting Palestinian Human Rights

American Muslim News Brief

(WASHINGTON, D.C., 5/14/20) – The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today thanked member of Congress who yesterday stood in support of Palestinian human rights as dozens of civilians are being massacred by Israel’s bombardment of Gaza.

ACTION REQUESTED: Sign CAIR’s Card Thanking Members of Congress for Supporting Palestinian Human Rights

According to media reports, the Israeli government’s ongoing bombardment of the Gaza Strip has so far killed 119 Palestinians, including 31 children and 19 women. An entire family of 6 was killed in their home. In addition, the Israeli government continues to attack worshippers and protesters at the Al-Aqsa Masjid compound while fighting to expel Palestinian families from Sheikh Jarrah.

SEE: Palestinians flee as Israeli artillery pounds northern Gaza

Several Democrats in House of Representatives spoke out against America’s military support for Israel and called for the protection of Palestinians’ rights.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) criticized the Biden administration for statements that she said did not acknowledge “Palestinian humanity. “To read the statements from President [Joe] Biden, Secretary [of State Antony] Blinken, General [Lloyd] Austin and leaders of both parties, you would hardly know Palestinians existed at all,” said Tlaib.

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu an “ethno-nationalist leader. “Consider that 78 percent of their [Palestinians’] land was taken from them.”

Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) SAID: “Palestinians know what state violence, militarized policing and occupation of their communities look like, and they live that reality of having to go through checkpoints while trying to live their lives.” “We are anti-war, we are anti-occupation, and we are anti-apartheid,” she said…

KEEP CAIR STRONG

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A Global Demand to 35 Governments: Get Your Troops Out of Afghanistan / A Thank You to 6 That Already Have

The governments of Albania, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mongolia, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, Ukraine, UK, and US all still have troops in Afghanistan and need to remove them. These troops range in number from Slovenia’s 6 to the United States’ 2,500. Most countries have fewer that 100. Apart from the United States, only Germany has over 1,000. Only five other countries have more than 300.

Governments that used to have troops in this war but have removed them include New Zealand, France, Jordan, Croatia, Ireland, and Canada.

We plan to deliver a big THANK-YOU to every government that removes all of its troops from Afghanistan, along with the names and comments of every signer of this petition.

We plan to deliver a demand to remove all troops to every government that has not done so, along with the names and comments of every signer of this petition.

The U.S. government is the ring-leader, and the bulk of its killing is done from the air, but — given the deficiency in democracy in the U.S. government, which is now on its third president who promised to end the war but hasn’t — it is critical that other governments withdraw their troops. Those troops, present in token numbers, are there to legitimize behavior that could otherwise be recognized as lawless and outrageous. A government lacking the courage to reject U.S. pressure has no business sending any number of its residents to kill or risk dying in a U.S./NATO war.

This petition will be signed by people in each nation involved in the war, including the nation of Afghanistan.

Please sign the petition, add comments if you have anything to add, and share with others. If you want to be part of delivering the petition to a particular government, contact World BEYOND War.

Unsilencing Abuse

This website has been set up by friends of Nazia Ahmad and Junaid Ahmad, as they attempt to reveal their truth of the abuse they faced at the hands of a well-known academic

March 3, 2021

Dear friends

Since the publication of our article in The Daily Vox a few days ago, talking about male academics’ abuse, and the circulation of the unedited version of the article on social media and various academic mailing lists, we have received an avalanche of messages, almost all showing a heart-warming level of solidarity and support. In these private messages and in public forums there have been numerous calls or requests, a genuine desire, by people who want to know who the abuser is so that friends and others can decide how they will respond.

We are both extremely thankful to courageous colleagues (mostly women) who publicly declared their solidarity with Nazia and me, some of whom then received a few somewhat obnoxious responses that criticized those who try to unequivocally stand with survivors of abuse.

Our decision not to reveal the name earlier was partly based on our (and especially my) sense of protection for ourselves. I have been able to speak about this only years later and after much intensive therapy. The intention of the article was not to open wounds but to point out a phenomenon. However, with the overwhelming support that we have received, we are sure that there is sufficient support to cushion any trauma that might arise from public exposure. Those who think that not revealing the name was some intellectual game or because the culprit is seemingly untouchable and incredibly intimidating don’t know the experience of trauma from a decade-long period of abuse, and the fear that lingers from it. To name an abuse (let alone an abuser), especially by one who wields social and political power, is not an easy thing to do.

At the age of around 20, I believed in a man who seemed to me to have come from a commendable background of being a leading veteran of the South African liberation struggle, and who offered Muslims around the world a valuable Muslim intellectual-activist intervention in his classic book Quran, Liberation, and Pluralism. To me, he loomed as an Ali Shariati-type figure and a hero when I met him for the first time when our community in Yorktown, Virginia, and my father, the late Professor Mumtaz Ahmad, hosted him at our home.

It was not long after our first meeting that Farid Esack’s sexual advances towards me began, despite me telling him that I was not gay and reminding him that I was married (to Nazia). Sadly, that did not stop him, and for the next 9 years the sexual advances continued, developing into sexual abuse. Enthralled by him after our first meetings, I moved to Cape Town to study under the great progressive academic. In retrospect, I and my family were masterfully manipulated by him; I now understand that I was groomed by him.

It took Nazia and I virtually a decade after that to come to terms with what had happened, after first deeply repressing it, and then slowly revealing it to ourselves through intensive therapy and abundant support from close friends and colleagues, and we continue to live with the trauma today. We could not have written the earlier article about a seemingly all-powerful, well-resourced, often-cited narcissist had we not received such support, which we are extremely grateful for.

Attempts by Farid Esack to silence me happened as late as 2018, and included threats such as: ‘I guess I will step out of public life now forever, or better yet, I will kill myself. But that may make you feel guilty since you may feel responsible!’ Or his claim that my exposing him would harm the Palestinian cause because, according to him, ‘I am BDS South Africa.’ Humility was never his strong point; more hypocrisy by someone who built a career as a famous ‘feminist,’ ‘progressive,’ ‘Muslim liberation theologian.’

We would love to see more feminists, progressives and Muslim liberation theologians, but Farid Esack belongs in none of these categories. He utterly sullies the meaning of these appellations, and sullies any platform, space or movement for social, global, and gender justice that he is involved in.

Sincerely,

Junaid Ahmad (with Nazia Ahmad)

 

 

When men speak out against abuse they must be ready to be accountable for the abuse they have perpetrated

An article published on the South African website ‘The Daily Vox‘ on 17 February 2021 has raised much debate and consternation in a number of sectors: academic circles, activist circles, international solidarity circles, and feminist circles. It alleges sexual and other forms of abuse against a well-known academic and activist.

​The article in the ‘The Daily Vox’ is heavily edited. Below is the unedited version that was subsequently posted on facebook. It makes for grim reading, and should cause all activists to sit up and take notice of the abusers they hide in their ranks. For years. For decades. The authors of this article call on us for action. We can respond. Or we can ignore them and move on.

by Nazia Ahmad and Junaid Ahmad
Several months ago, two incidents in Cape Town sharply raised the issues of sexual harassment and misogyny among South African Muslims. The most recent was of two Bo-Kaap brothers accused of child molestation, and before that, of a maulana spewing tasteless sexist remarks in a video that went viral. Muslim women (and men) were understandably outraged and many, including academics, activists and grassroots leaders, expressed their outrage with righteous anger. We want to focus on responses to the earlier incident, the maulana’s video.

There was a legitimate demand from women that Muslim men denounce the crudely sexist language in the video. Many Muslim men did express their abhorrence for the video, and a public, and very welcome, display of this was a letter of solidarity by a group of Muslim men condemning the sexist remarks.

Many of the signatories to the letter were prominent men who have demonstrated a lifetime of commitment to justice and human rights, including women’s rights. But, as many women know, it’s better to be cautious about those who leap first into the limelight to lead some new crusade that they latch onto. One of the signatories of the letter, for example, is a vocal, diva-like individual who likes to describe himself as a “feminist” and a “progressive” liberation theologian committed to gender equality. His character, however, is diametrically opposite to these ideas which he claims to champion. In fact, he is guilty of worse things than the maulana’s sexist language. We know; we are among his victims.

The misdemeanors of this academic range from luring young foreign students to his home with promises of free accommodation then throwing them onto the street because they refuse to obey his every command, to the abuse of his Black female domestic worker, to sexual abuse.

One case we know of intimately is of a young protégé/disciple of this academic who was abused by him for almost a decade, beginning with sexual advances when the protégé was around 20 and already married, to verbal, intellectual, emotional and sexual abuse. The young man’s wife meant nothing to this “feminist” academic who held him hostage to his authoritarianism and abuse and subjected his wife, too, to emotional abuse.

After finally breaking from the clutches of the perpetrator – many years later, the young man finally faced his abuse after engaging with a psychologist for many months of intense therapy. What was shocking for him, however, was that when he told his story to other friends, he found members of three Muslim organizations who casually made comments such as “Oh yes, he was accused of sexually harassing boys thirty years ago already.” So why did these people not speak then? Why did they not write open letters about this theologian like the one written about the Cape Town maulana? Why was he protected by these Muslim organizations? If he was exposed then, how many young men could have been saved from him?

The narcissism and egoism of this academic leads him to seek the limelight of whatever fashionable cause he can latch on to and to create student cults around himself. His captive students must revere him, obey him and accept the myriad forms of abuse that result. His feminism seems to allow him to abuse young people, insult those who disagree with him, and even swear and abuse his domestic worker. It is pure hypocrisy for such a person to sign that open letter about the maulana.

The mistake of such people is that they think that the naïve young 20-year-olds they induct into their cults will never grow up, and their domestic workers will remain silent and will not complain. Many such victims will remain silent out of sheer fear. But it is time for the fear to be broken. These abusers also think that all the nasty and insulting things they say about real feminists and liberation activists behind closed doors will remain hidden.

It is quite possible that this powerful man’s pattern of abuse may very well have influenced and enabled others close to him to behave in the same way. One of his protégés was recently accused by multiple women of sexual harassment, and he was protected and defended by the said academic.

It is welcome and laudable when men stand up in support of the rights of women and speak out against sexism and misogyny. But we must be careful that such solidarity is not just self-serving, and that the men standing up are not themselves abusers – of naïve young men and women, of their domestic workers, of their sisters, mothers and wives. Including such men in the kind of letter that was issued makes a mockery of the female victims and their suffering, and serves nothing but the egos and careers of such men. They must be stopped and they must be exposed.

Let’s get U.S. troops out of Syria & Iraq!

The Biden administration is continuing the devastating cycle of endless war.

On February 25, President Biden ordered airstrikes on militia forces in eastern Syria. Days later, rockets were launched on an air base housing U.S. troops in western Iraq. We’ve been here before: they bomb, we bomb, they bomb, we bomb.

In places like Syria and Iraq U.S. occupation has fueled historic instability, caused immense suffering, created millions of refugees, and cost hundreds of thousands of lives. And if you’re reading this, you know what we know: this status quo has got to go.

Here’s the silver lining: because we’ve been here before, we’ve also learned what works — and we know that the only way ANY of this changes is with *grassroots pressure*. So we’ve got to get LOUD.

There is one straightforward, simple way we stop the cycle of endless war in its tracks, get U.S. troops out of harm’s way, and stop them from deepening or causing new harm: we bring them home.

To President Biden and Secretary of Defense Austin:

I urge you to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria and Iraq. U.S. troops should come home, and they must be withdrawn responsibly — with a complementary humanitarian and diplomatic surge that works to build a sustainable peace, holds war criminals on all sides accountable, welcomes refugees displaced by the conflict, and addresses the instability and suffering that violence-first U.S. foreign policy has caused.

Add you name here

Palestinian Students Solidarity Campaign #FreePalestinianStudents

We, the undersigned organizations, join our voices together in a global call to urge the immediate freedom of imprisoned Palestinian students and the protection of Palestinian students’ right to education, right to political expression and involvement and right to determine their own futures. The Israeli occupation has targeted Palestinian students and, specifically, the Palestinian student movement and Palestinian student organizations for harsh repression and political detention and imprisonment.

We join together to call for action and support for Palestinian students behind bars, including:

Boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, including Israeli academic institutions, which are fully complicit in the systematic deprivation of Palestinian rights.
Ending all military and economic aid, military transactions, joint projects and direct funding to the Israeli occupation regime by governments around the world.
Challenging “normalization” programs that aim to legitimize Israeli occupation — this is an attempt to legitimize the criminalization and targeting of Palestinian students.
Organizing to build direct links of solidarity with Palestinian students and the Palestinian student movement, to ensure that they will not be isolated from their global community of support despite all attempts by the Israeli occupation.
**

Hundreds of Palestinian students are routinely detained by the Israeli occupation, especially those who are part of student organizations involved with campus political life. At Bir Zeit University alone, approximately 74 students were detained by occupation soldiers during the 2019-2020 academic year. They are among nearly 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners jailed by Israel. The work of student organizing, from holding book fairs to organizing events and participating in student elections, is criminalized by the Israeli occupation. Still more students are detained for joining demonstrations or posting on their social media profiles.

Palestinian students have been seized by Israeli occupation forces and abducted for their participation in the student movement in their homes, at their workplaces and on their campuses.

Once arrested, Palestinian students are routinely subjected to torture under interrogation — subjected to stress positions and stretched out over chairs, suspended from walls and forced to stand on tiptoe, deprived of sleep, cuffed and pressured on injured limbs, and beaten.

Palestinian students may be sent to administrative detention — imprisonment without charge or trial, indefinitely renewable in six-month periods. Palestinians routinely spend years jailed with no charges, no trial and no real challenge to the deprivation of their rights. They may be brought before Israeli military courts, which convict over 99% of the Palestinians charged there.

One of the most common charges is “membership in a prohibited organization,” typically referring to the student blocs. These represent the full spectrum of Palestinian politics. They organize lectures, book fairs, rallies and other campus events and participate in student elections. The charge sheets often refer to these standard activities of campus life, which are widely interpreted as a barometer for broader Palestinian political opinion.

The targeting Palestinian students is an attack on Palestinian futures. It is a systematic attempt to undermine the capacity of young Palestinians to organize with one another for a liberated future for their people: One free of colonization, apartheid and occupation.

These are not isolated cases, but a direct and collective violation of Palestinian students’ right to education, as affirmed in Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Article 13 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The targeted repression of students is just one facet of Israel’s crime of apartheid against the Palestinian people.

We condemn the complicity of the Palestinian Authority, which has not only failed to defend Palestinian students but has also engaged in political detention and harassment of student movements as part of its “security coordination” with Israel.

Palestinian students in occupied Palestine ‘48 — Palestinian students in Israel — are subjected to ongoing, systematic harassment and discrimination, including bans on student groups and prohibitions on demonstrations and protests.

Further, Palestinian and Palestine solidarity student groups internationally are targeted for campaigns of defamation, organization bans and administrative repression, with these efforts officially and unofficially supported by the Israeli government and pro-apartheid lobby organizations around the world. All the while, Palestinian refugee students are denied their right to return to occupied Palestine.

This persecution is supported by the billions of dollars in aid, military transactions and unlimited political support given to Israel by major imperialist powers like the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the European Union states and Australia. This coincides with the militarization of police in imperialist countries and their global use of military and economic domination against the peoples of the world. Israeli persecution of Palestinians mirrors the state repression of popular movements and marginalized peoples in these countries, especially indigenous and Black liberation movements.

We cannot and must not remain silent about the persecution of the Palestinian student movement and of individual Palestinian students behind Israeli bars. We stand with Palestinian students!

Add your organization’s name to this statement: http://bit.ly/palstudentsignon

Tell Congress: Demand that Israel provide the COVID-19 vaccine to Palestinians

Like all people, Palestinians have the right to live in health and safety. But while the Israeli government rolls out the COVID-19 vaccine to millions of Israeli citizens, Israel is denying the lifesaving vaccine to Palestinians living under its military occupation.

On February 15, Israel delayed the transfer of vaccines for medical staff in Gaza [1]. And in another clear example of Israel’s racist policies, the Israeli government planned to vaccinate only Israeli citizens held in their prisons, leaving Palestinians illegally held in Israeli prisons [2] vulnerable to disease and death. Only after massive international outcry, this plan changed.

Let’s be clear: the Israeli government is obligated under international law to provide the vaccine to Palestinians living under its military occupation [3] and is actively neglecting their obligation to do so. This endangers Palestinians who are already at risk because of Israel’s systematic destruction of the Palestinian health-care system [4]. For instance, in Gaza, the worsening public health situation is compounded by living under an almost 14 year blockade, facing crushing poverty and ongoing, systematic violence.

COVID-19 is revealing Israel’s brutal decades-old system of separate-and-unequal control over the Palestinian people. This is apartheid, and the U.S. is paying for it with $3.8 billion in unconditional military funding every single year.

Congress has the power to hold Israel accountable, or continue enabling Israel’s abuses. It’s up to us to make our demands clear and ensure they choose justice. Tell your representatives that healthcare for all has no borders: Congress must demand Israel provide the COVID-19 vaccine to Palestinians now.

Sources:

1. Israel blocked Covid vaccines from entering Gaza, say Palestinians, The Guardian, Feb 16 2021

2. Israel ‘declined WHO request’ to provide Covid-19 vaccine for Palestinian medics, Middle East Eye, Jan 11 2021

3. Israel: Provide Vaccines to Occupied Palestinians, Human Rights Watch, Jan 17 2021

4. COVID-19 in the West Bank and Gaza: A second wave under military occupation and siege, MEI, July 29 2020

ADD YOUR VOICE HERE.

Take action now: On his 100th day of hunger strike, it’s time to #Rage4Maher

 

Join the twitterstorm and social media campaign for Palestinian prisoner Maher al-Akhras now, on his 100th day of hunger strike. Take action NOW – at 10 am Pacific, 1 pm Eastern, 6 pm British and Irish time, 7 pm central Europe time, 8 pm in Palestine.

Post on Twitter and your other social media accounts – including Instagram and Facebook, and use the hashtag #Rage4Maher!

Use this handy Tweet Sheet for prepared tweets that you can paste and use: http://bit.ly/mahertweets

TAKE ACTION:

1. Join the social media campaign on Tuesday, 3 November at 10 am Pacific time, 1 pm Eastern time, 8 pm Palestine. We will launch a new hashtag for maximum impact. Follow @SamidounPP on Twitter for the hashtag, sample tweets and more. Let us flood social media with demands for Maher al-Akhras’ freedom on his 100th day of hunger strike!

2. Join the picture and solidarity campaigns. Send your photos to Within Our Lifetime – United for Palestine, CAPJPO-EuroPalestine and more.Join WOL’s Instagram campaign today!

3. Sign the petition. Join over 3,000 people who have already raised their voices to international human rights groups Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights to take action for Maher al-Akhras. The ICRC in particular has failed to live up to its responsibilities to protect Palestinian prisoners, calling on the political prisoner jailed without charge or trial to “find a solution” with the occupying power violating his rights.

Sign the petition here: https://www.change.org/p/amnesty-hrw-icrc-un-ohchr-act-now-to-free-maher-al-akhras

4. Organize creative actions. Ad hacks, postering and other outdoor actions can draw a significant amount of attention to Maher al-Akhras and the Palestinian cause at this critical time.

4. Build the boycott of Israel! Join the movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel. Highlight the complicity of corporations like Hewlett-Packard and the continuing involvement of G4S in Israeli policing and prisons. Build a campaign to boycott Israeli goods, impose a military embargo on Israel, or organize around the academic and cultural boycott of Israel.

Please share your actions and posts with us at Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network on Facebook, @SamidounPP on Twitter, and at samidoun@samidoun.net.

 

Take action now: On his 100th day of hunger strike, it’s time to #Rage4Maher

 

MEDIA STATEMENT FROM MALAYSIAN NGOS AND PROMINENT INDIVIDUALS ON NORMALISATION OF UAE-ISRAEL RELATIONS

We condemn in the strongest possible terms the decision by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) government to normalize relations with Israel. It is thoroughly ill-advised and treacherous to the struggle of their Palestinian brethren for justice and freedom.

When the momentum is gaining the world over for the continuous and enhanced isolation of the one remaining apartheid state in the world, the UAE’s decision to break ranks is utterly shameful, deplorable and fully deserving of the criticisms and condemnations it is receiving.

The UAE foreign minister’s attempt to cloak the decision as being motivated by a desire to stop Israeli annexation of Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) is truly pathetic. One only needs to see the angry reactions of the Palestinian Authority (PA), the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), and the Hamas government to know what a hollow and self-serving excuse the minister’s statement was. Even as he spoke, the Zionist regime has made it clear that annexation is only on a temporary halt. So, the claim of a quid pro quo by the UAE foreign minister fools no one but himself.

It is high time that the UAE and other similar regimes in the Gulf which are in continuous power without universal suffrage realized that they are being manipulated by the Zionists and their propaganda machinery. The Iranian specter is being used to capitalize on the fears and anxieties of these unelected regimes. What states such as the UAE appear to forget is that taking decisions such as normalizing relations with Israel without genuine consultations with their own populations may be counter-productive and self-defeating to their objective of making their unelected regimes more secure.

We call on the international community and all organizations which are desirous for a genuine peace in the Middle East and justice and freedom for the Palestinian people to redouble all efforts and campaigns to isolate the Zionist regime.

14 August 2020

NGO:
1. BDS Malaysia
2. Palestine Scholars Association Abroad in Southeast Asia
3. Malaysian Women Coalitiin for Al Quds and Palestine (MWCQP)
4. SEJAGAT Malaysia
5. National Union of Malaysian Muslim Students (PKPIM)
6. Malaysian Consultative Council Islamic Organizations
7. Pertubuhan Mawaddah Malaysia
8. Pertubuhan IKRAM Malaysia
9. Angkatan Belia Islam Malaysia/Muslim Youth Movement Malaysia (ABIM)
10. Al Quds Foundation Malaysia (QFM)
11. Muslim Care Malaysia
12. Viva Palestina Malaysia
13. Asia WE
14. International Movement for a Just World (JUST)
15. Muslim Youth Movement of Malaysia (ABIM)
16. Global Peace Mission (GPM) Malaysia
17. MediCOM Malaysia
18. HARMONI
19. Majlis Perwakilan Pelajar Kebangsaan (MPPK)
20. Palestinian Cultural Organization of Malaysia (PCOM)
21. Citizens International
22. Palestinian Progressive Association Malaysia (PPAM)
23. Movement for Monetary Justice – Malaysia
24.  Ummatic Mission Relief of Malaysia (UMRM)
25.  SALIMAH (Persatuan Persaudaraan Muslimah Malaysia)
26. HUMANE (UniSZA Society for Humanity)

POLITICIANS

1. Syed Ibrahim Syed Noh, MP Ledang, Malaysia
2. Mukhriz Mahathir, MP Jerlun, Malaysia
3. Mohd Azis Jamman, MP Sepanggar, Malaysia
4. Fahmi Fadzil, MP Lembah Pantai, Malaysia
5. Azman Ismail, MP Kuala Kedah, Malaysia
6. Steven Sim, MP for Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia
7. Ahmad Hj Hassan , MP for Papar