A-Infos (en) Israel/Palestine, Two petitions, 1) Call for boycott 2) Call for International Intervention

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1) Call for boycott

APPEAL
Published 10 April, 2001

The authors of this appeal are Israeli citizens and Jews of other nationalities whose
families have been victims of racism and genocide in past generations, and who feel
they cannot remain silent.

After 6 months of relentless military oppression of Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied
territories, the government of Israel has made daily life even more intolerable for the
Palestinians by imposing a physical siege on their villages and towns. This siege has
brought
upon the Palestinians a complete cessation of “normal” life. For the majority of them
there is no going to work, no shopping for food and other necessities, no medical
services, and in many cases no water or electricity.

In 1948 the state of Israel dispossessed the Palestinians, evicted hundreds of
thousands of them from their homes into refugee camps and did not allow them to
return when the war ended. The same state is now preventing the victims of 1948 from
having even the most basic
services in their refugee camps and remaining villages and towns.

The inhumane oppressor hopes that starving will help force the Palestinians to
surrender, without having any “negative public opinion problems” that live ammunition
may have had in Western media. Indeed, public opinion in the West has largely relaxed
any protest against
the Israeli government's policies of killing civilians—men, women and children—since
much of the killing is now being done away from the TV cameras. Human rights
violations by the Palestinian Authority have also helped Israel to falsely portray itself
again as the
righteous victim

We call on the world community to organize and boycott Israeli industrial and
agricultural exports and goods, as well as leisure tourism, in the hope that it will have
the same positive result that the boycott of South Africa had on Apartheid.

This boycott should remain in force as long as Israel controls any part of the territories it
occupied in 1967. Those who squash the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians must
be made to feel the consequences of their own bitter medicine.

We urge every recipient of this appeal, irrespective of origin and nationality, to:

1. Start practising the boycott on a personal level immediately, and make sure that the
steps taken are known in the community (for example: tell your shopkeeper why you
will not buy Israeli products; avoid leisure travel to Israel).

2. Add your name to the appeal, circulate it to your friends, and do whatever you can to
have it endorsed by groups concerned about human rights.

3. Organize activities to put pressure on your government to cut economic and
commercial ties with Israel and to rescind preferential economic treaties with Israel.

Meir  Amor              Toronto, Canada
Hagit Borer               Los Angeles, USA
Aviva  Ein-Gil          Tel-Aviv, Israel
Ehud  Ein-Gil            Tel-Aviv, Israel
Arie  Finkelstein        Paris, France
Ouzi Dekel                 Paris, France
Esty  Dinur                Arena, USA
Rachel  Giora            Tel-Aviv, Israel
Zamir  Havkin           Givataim, Israel
Zvika  Havkin            Princeton, USA
Haggai  Katriel          Haifa, Israel
Irit  Katriel                 Haifa, Israel
Justin  Kodner            Princeton Junction, USA
Debby  Lerman          Tel-Aviv, Israel
Mely  Lerman            Tel-Aviv, Israel
Moshé  Machover      London, UK
Annie Ohayon            Paris, France
Yael Oren Kahn          Kenilworth, UK
Akiva Orr               Kfar Shmaryahu, Israel
Rachel Ostrowitz    Tel-Aviv, Israel
Hilla Rudich           Givataim, Israel
Herzl Schubert        Tel-Aviv, Israel
Ilan Shalif                Tel-Aviv, Israel
Ur Shlonsky             Geneva, Switzerland
Ehud Sivosh             London, UK
Gideon Spiro            Jerusalem, Israel
Adeeb Yaffawi         Yaffa, Israel
Eyal Rozenberg         Haifa, Israel
Guy West                  Herzliyya, Israel
Dita Bitterman          Tel-Aviv, Israel
Roey Angel               Holon, Israel
Yael Arbel                 Tel-Aviv, Israel
Oz Shelach                 Jerusalem, Israel / NYC USA
Jakub Susid               Warsaw, Poland
Eran razgour              Tel-Aviv, Israel
Toma Sik                   Budapest, Hungary
Helga Kotthoff          Fulda, Germany
Michal Magid            Moscow, Russia




2) Call for International Intervention 
> From: otherisr@actcom.co.il

GUSH SHALOM - pob 3322, Tel-Aviv 61033 - http://www.gush-shalom.org/

In the past days some academics have started circulating a petition calling for 
international intervention in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including the 
deployment of an international peacekeeping force that would protect the 
Palestinians from Israeli aggression and repression. Gush Shalom fully agrees 
with the request which is similar to what we advertised in the main Israeli 
papers and on our website.

The petition is to be signed by Israeli citizens and addressed to the public 
worldwide. The petition will be distributed through different communication 
channels and published, hopefully, in the main American and European 
newspapers.

If you would like to sign the petition please send your name, address,
phone number and professional title to one of the following addresses:

  Yaron Ezrahi: mshruth@mscc.huji.ac.il

  Hannan Hever: hever26@post.tau.ac.il

  Anat Matar: mata@post.tau.ac.il

  Adi Ophir: adiophir@post.tau.ac.il

Israeli Citizens Appeal for International Intervention
in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

We, citizens of Israel, are extremely concerned about the rapid deterioration 
of the condition of the Palestinian people in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. We 
consider the Jewish settlements in the territories occupied by Israel since 
1967 to be an ongoing act of aggression against the Palestinian people. Massive 
construction of new Jewish settlements and expansion of existing ones have 
continued relentlessly even after the signing of the Oslo agreements, more than 
seven years ago. This is but one major element of the burden of the Israeli 
occupation, which has become unbearable for Palestinians living in the West 
Bank and Gaza. While we totally condemn acts of terror against innocent 
civilians, we regard Palestinian violence as being, on the whole, a legitimate 
revolt against colonial occupation. Despite the fact that many innocent 
Israelis have been victims of this revolt we understand that there can be no 
moral and military symmetries between occupiers and occupied. The occupation 
itself is morally and politically wrong; the excessive force Israel uses in 
order to impose its rule against growing Palestinian resistance is totally 
unacceptable. 

The Israeli army has used lethal weapons against non-armed demonstrators 
killing over four hundreds Palestinians, among them about seventy youth under 
sixteen, and wounding thousands more. In response to Palestinian attacks Israel 
has been retaliating by bombing and shelling targets in Palestinians cities. 
Israeli control of all major roads in and around the West Bank has fractured 
the Palestinian territory, cutting it up it into a series of isolated ghettos. 
This is severely crippling Palestinian economic activity, pushing ever larger 
portions of the Palestinian population beneath the poverty line to the point 
where in some areas there are already signs of famine. Israeli operations are 
disrupting Palestinian emergency medical services, transportation, and 
education. Palestinian civilians are not only abused and mistreated by members 
of the Israeli military, but are further exposed to daily harassment and 
aggression by Jewish settlers. The mental harm caused by years of 
terrorization, anxiety, loss, humiliation and mourning is inexpressible.

Israel acts as a sovereign that has relinquished all legal and moral 
responsibilities to protect the Palestinian population under its jurisdiction. 
We acknowledge the complexity of a situation in which it is often difficult to 
distinguish between legitimate acts of Palestinian resistance and unacceptable 
acts of Palestinian terror and between legitimate defensive Israeli policy and 
acts of State terror. But the complexity of this situation can neither diminish 
our responsibility nor silence our voice. It is our moral obligation as Israeli 
citizens to express our solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for freedom, 
and to do everything possible to protect the Palestinian population living in 
the occupied territories. We urge our fellow citizens, and friends and 
colleagues worldwide to join us in speaking up against the continued occupation 
and oppression of the Palestinians. Specifically, we call for an immediate 
international intervention to stop the killing and wounding of human beings who 
are exercising their elementary right to claim political freedom. We call upon 
you to urge your governments to go beyond hesitant condemnations of Israeli 
policies and initiate an international peace force that would help protect the 
Palestinians from the aggression of the Israeli government and facilitate the 
resumption of serious negotiations between the parties to the conflict.


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