Thursday 31 December 2009

Ending the decade - rationally speaking

Rational - adjective:
agreeable to reason; reasonable; sensible


Words. Rational words. Words of concern. Words of dissent. Aren't they all, the zillions and zillions of them, ultimately superfluous in the face of what actually occurs, what the powerful dismissively, uncaringly, unilaterally, conspiratorially, calculatingly, wantonly, finally do?

Just think of all the campaigning, the street demonstrations, the hard-boiled evidence, the just legal opinions, the challenging letters, the humanitarian pleas, the mass condemnations directed at the warmongers who murder with impunity, the financial masters who profit and wreck lives, the climate vandals motivated only by selfish intent. The results? The bombs keep dropping on innocents, the bankers steal away with more public booty and the planet remains on a collision course with oblivion.

Tony Blair continues to walk in our midst, a criminal at large, a "peace envoy", no less, not simply unrepentant but mindfully self-assured about his 'divine' part in the genocide of Iraq. What 'rational' state would permit such a quantum abuse of power? The one, we must assume, which offers the Chilcot inquiry as a 'rational' investigation of those matters. Shouldn't we fear not only those who rationalised the intelligence in pursuit of war, but also the dark intelligence of those appointed to rationalise the crimes of the rationalisers?

Meanwhile, fear, of the economic kind, continues to stalk people's lives, the rational consequence of an irrational free market system. The massive daily exercise in hegemonic ideology underpinning capitalist society helps maintain the relentless message that banking bailouts and rampant speculation of public money are all good, rational practices; that more neoliberalism is the only rational way out of the 'mess' (as though all was well and rational 'before'); and that we will all, according to 'rational' Treasury forecasts, be ultimate beneficiaries of the great state handout to the fat cats.

The coming general election will see another intensive assault on the poorest and socially vulnerable to pay for the great 'New Deal' in saving the financier elite. Economic recovery, so it goes, remains ever-dependent on the stability of the banking sector and protection of its executive class.

Usefully, some rational evidence is now at hand to show just how irrational that dependence is:

"Hospital cleaners are worth more to society than bankers, a study suggests.

The research, carried out by think tank the New Economics Foundation, says hospital cleaners create £10 of value for every £1 they are paid. It claims bankers are a drain on the country because of the damage they caused to the global economy. They reportedly destroy £7 of value for every £1 they earn. Meanwhile, senior advertising executives are said to "create stress". The study says they are responsible for campaigns which create dissatisfaction and misery, and encourage over-consumption."

We live in a society where poor souls sit hungry and cold outside Tesco and other supermarket cities with their groaning shelves of food, all serving to keep an owner class in fabulous wealth. One might rationally say, go inside and take what you need. Act rationally, not according to the irrational rules of super/market society. Don't deprive yourself of life's basic necessities when they are all readily available. Rationalise according to your higher human rights, not what the market deems the supremacy of property rights.

That, of course, would be condemned as not just illegal, but dangerously anarchic; threatening to the 'rational' order of things. To those appalled by such gross inequality, it should make perfect rational sense.

Taking with moral intent, balancing, sharing, acting in compassionate consideration of others, thinking sustainably: these are all the hallmarks of rational non-market behaviour.

Corporate behaviour, on the other hand, predicated on zero-sum competition and greed, cannot, by rational definition, also be governed by reason or sensible judgement about human well-being. The irrationality of financial speculation underlying the present bout of economic woes - for those at the bottom end, not the high financiers - is testament to that rationally deducted truth.

And there's no more rational illustration of profit-led anarchy than the climate change crisis.

Copenhagen signifies man's most staggering capacity for blind irrationality. Even when presented with all the evidence of climate disaster, even when given the rare collective opportunity to correct the problem, the chance is not just lost, but, worse, sabotaged and dismissed by politicians protecting corporate interests.

Having just sent another thirty thousand troops to Afghanistan, Barack Obama, Nobel 'peace' man, flew into town and presided over the biggest exercise in hand-wringing stagecraft the world has ever witnessed. The poor nations, those now facing the gravest threat of flood, hunger and mass death, argued with rational conviction that a deal must be secured in order to avert the looming catastrophe - and were, predictably, blamed for the gathering's collapse. The victims victimised. It was ever thus.

Words? Even rational words? Is it any use in stating the obvious, mentioning the plain, scientific truths, re-issuing the warnings, reprising the dire implications, the prospect of imminent death warrants for millions? Power decides. Power spins. Power walks away.

Is that all too pessimistic a summary, a prognosis? Perhaps. It's always easy to forget that other kind of power: the power of people to mobilise, resist and effect rational change.

I think, for example, of how Palestine has, in the words of Omar Barghouti, now reached its "South Africa moment." Whatever the massive task in ending Israel's occupation and brutality, that shift in international support for the Palestinian cause didn't seem on the cards even a decade ago. Rational persuasion, much of it from sustained and patient campaigning - applied words - has helped change that. A year on from the slaughter of over 1400 in Gaza, many more people have come to see that holding 1.5 million people captive, deprived and fearful inside a human laboratory isn't a very enlightened or rational way of treating human beings. Nor, even for some now-realising Israelis, is it any rational way to maintain their own perceived security.

The same rational objections to state murder and political deceit are also encouraging demands for the architects of such crimes to be brought to justice. Beyond the servile rationalising of the war-friendly media, the word "Blair" has become, like a brand name, synonymous with mendacity, mass murder and the singular art of saving one's neck.

And with that rational take on word association, here's three key terms to reflect upon, with hopeful and, perhaps, not so hopeful significance, for the coming decade:

Universal jurisdiction

The Goldstone report, citing Israel's gross violations in Gaza (and the West Bank/East Jerusalem), carried a specific call for universal jurisdiction to be incorporated into individual state laws, providing a much stronger hand for campaign groups seeking grounds for indictment against the higher powers. As with the recent arrest warrant granted in a London court against Tzipi Livni, the growing application of universal jurisdiction takes us another step towards the possible arraignment of senior warmongers.

Corporate dependency

Irrational capitalist greed has necessitated emergency state action, primarily into the banking and financial sector. Of course, bankers' generous bonuses continue while banks hound struggling mortgage defaulters. There's no progressive agenda here. Socialism it's not. But the crisis intervention does, effectively, signal the end of the neoliberal ascendancy and the supreme fiction of free market 'wealth creation'. It's another rational, if harsh, lesson in understanding and rejecting the false promises of market life.

Climate countdown

Alas, one is forced to assume the most rational, realistic reading of the climate issue: ongoing environmental decline. Copenhagen was never a "sell-out": the rejection of any serious plan for carbon reduction was already decided behind the scenes, instructed by corporate lobbies and executed by their political appointees. Yet, still rationally speaking, there remains the enduring prospect of counter-action from below, from concerned and active citizens, based on the reasonable, rational assumption that too much is at stake to allow the forces of irrationalism to kill the planet.

Still time, in short, to wake up..."before they turn the summer into dust."

Peace, love and encouragement towards rational words and action this coming year.

John

Sunday 27 December 2009

Tom Harris: closing the door on reasonable questions

Tom Harris MP
Member of Parliament for Glasgow South

House of Commons, London SW1A OAA

17 December 2009

Dear Mr Hilley

Humanitarian situation in Gaza

Thank you for your further correspondence. I said in my last response to you that I will not be writing to Ivan Lewis again on the issue you raised. I would like to make it clear that this does not, as you suggest, preclude me from putting any further questions to him on your behalf, only that I now consider this particular issue to have been addressed.

I hope you find this information helpful.

Best wishes

Tom Harris

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27th December 2009

Dear Tom Harris

Thanks for your further message (17 December 2009).

If you remain willing to put further questions on my behalf, I see no valid reason for excluding the specific one I asked, which hasn't actually been addressed.

So, as a constituent, please ask Ivan Lewis to provide a convincing statement on how he reconciles his Labour Friends of Israel membership with his decision to oppose the Goldstone report.

Also, are you willing to sign this Early Day Motion in support of universal jurisdiction?

http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=40074&SESSION=903

As this is the first anniversary marking the start of Israel's mass murder in Gaza, I'd like you to give serious consideration to these questions.

I look forward to your reply.

Regards

John Hilley

Wednesday 23 December 2009

Classic BBC: excuses, denial and closure

Remember the start of Israel's mass assult on Gaza one year ago (27 December)? Remember the ways in which the BBC helped misrepresent Cast Lead as a supposedly 'defensive' exercise? Rememer how they refused to allow a basic humanitarian appeal on behalf of suffering Gazans?

Well, as another valiant Viva Palestina convoy endeavours to deliver a little comfort to Gaza, here's a very timely reminder of the BBC bolting the door to news that blames and shames Israel.

-------

Dear Tim Franks

Today's BBC Online report, "World 'failed Gaza over Israeli blockade' - aid groups" http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8425698.stm offers some useful, if still nominal, lines on the dire situation and failure of international responses.

But where is your reporting of the major UK aid convoy currently headed for Gaza? Surely this would have been an obvious place to inform readers about such an impressive humanitarian intervention. http://vivapalestina.org/

Can you offer any credible explanation for this glaring omission?

Perhaps you could headline another piece on the general absence of such coverage with:

"BBC 'failed Gaza over reporting convoy efforts to break Israeli blockade' - Palestine support groups."

Wouldn't that be a truthful addition to your present article?

Regards

John Hilley

-------------------

John

Thanks for your email. We had this news story, recently, on the internet http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8425232.stm

and there has also been some coverage on World Service radio.

As the convoy nears Gaza, we'd be happy to keep abreast of any developments.

Best wishes

Tim Franks

------------

Thanks Tim

I had a look at the linked story - the word "nominal" again coming to mind.

I'd still like some explanation about the particular absence of the convoy story.

And why the need to await "developments" when the actual departure of the convoy and its aims should be a newsworthy item in its own right?

Perhaps you'd like to elaborate on the BBC's continued failure to cover the Viva Palestina project.

(As standard practice, I will post this and any further exchanges at the Media Lens message board.)

Best wishes

John

-------------------

John

We receive a lot of requests to cover events managed by pressure groups and NGOs, often with the aim of highlighting some very important issues. It's up to us, then, to decide which we will cover in their own right, as part of another story, or not at all. We have, in the past, covered attempts to break the Israeli blockade. We are likely to do so again in the future. In the meantime, we frequently investigate the fundamental issue of conditions for Gazans in the territory across TV, radio and the internet. As I said before, we are happy to keep across developments with your convoy.

Best wishes

Tim
-----------

Dear Tim,

Thanks for getting back.

I'm afraid that "pressure group" defence won't really wash. The fact is that a very significant convoy is attempting, once again, to break the illegal blockade. You shouldn't need soliciting to think about whether to go out and cover it. It's news, and newsworthy in its own right.

Note also that the convoy marks Israel's murderous assault precisely one year on. There's an obvious context to 'hang' the story on.

You are entirely right, the un/reporting of such is your decision. And the decision not to cover it indicates very clearly the trusted subjective nature of your selective judgement. For it seems to fit very neatly with a wider BBC consensus on the non-reporting of Viva Palestina activity.

Can you explain why that is?

Also, what is meant by "your convoy"? This is a broadly-supported public and humanitarian effort to assist broken and demoralised people. Why portray it as the work of some narrow interest group? Would you describe Children in Need-type aid in such a way?

Best wishes

John

---------------

John

I'm sorry you weren't satisfied with my response. If you want to take the matter further, please do so through this link http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/homepage/

Tim

---------

Thanks Tim

As ever, the default silent sign-off.

Anyway, thanks for your replies - always helpful to keep on record as illustrations of BBC closure.

Best wishes.

John

To Guardian Editor, Alan Rusbridger

A letter (sent 19 December) to the Guardian Editor, following a fine critique of the Chilcot hearings by Media Lens.
------

Dear Mr Rusbridger

The Chilcot 'inquiry' has all the obvious makings of the classic gentleman-appointed exercise in purest warwash.

But what of the media's own role in being a trumpet-blower for the invasion? And what, more particularly, of the Guardian's carefully-crafted editorial part in giving the war, its aftermath and Tony Blair's cynical manipulations that all-important mantle of respectability?

The latest Media Lens Alert offers more than ample evidence of the gross deceptions. The fact of Blair's criminality as chief political executive in the slaughter should need no further elucidation.

Yet, as your Guardian leader noted:
“the primary aim of the probe must be to promote the reconciliation of the public with a political class which misled it so badly”.
Why “reconciliation”? Why not the criminal indictment of that political class?

Again, we see here the Guardian's ever-so-coy efforts to soothe the issue, while loftily evading its own complicit part in the human disaster that is Iraq.

The Media Lens Alert puts it well:
“This is why media protestations that politicians need to be called to account are so cynical, so insulting to the intelligence.”
The Guardian supposedly prides itself in highlighting the political contortions of Chilcot's witnesses. But where is the critical self-examination, the same reflections on the Guardian's own apologetic part in the great war narrative?

Alongside those mandarins currently being 'grilled' by Chilcot, there is another vital establishment grouping whose conduct requires serious investigation: the liberal media gentlemen's club, of which the Guardian has honorary place.

As Editor of the country's most proclaimed 'liberal-left' organ, you have, for some considerable time now, refused to engage any enquiring voice on these matters. Whether through private contempt or selective avoidance, that silence speaks volumes about the Guardian's editorial fear of rational challenge.

In the 'spirit of public accountability' so lauded by the Guardian with regard to Chilcot, wouldn't it be fitting, at least on this occasion, to answer the fairly-argued charges made by Media Lens?

Yours sincerely

John Hilley

-------------

No response received - or expected.

John

Thursday 10 December 2009

Tom Harris replies on Gaza and Goldstone

A further exchange with my MP, Tom Harris. (Previous exchange here.)

---------------------------------------------------

House of Commons, London SW1A OAA

2 December 2009

Dear Mr Hilley

Humanitarian situation in Gaza

Thank you for contacting me again regarding the response I passed onto you from Ivan Lewis and those on the Goldstone Report.

In your letter, you indicate that you feel that the response from Mr Lewis is not personalised to the concerns you raise. I cannot agree. On several occasions in his reply, Mr Lewis refers specifically to the points you raised. I am afraid that it will not always be the case that the Minister's response is the one you had hoped for. It is for this reason that I will not be writing to him again to ask for further clarification on this issue.

You have also asked for my opinion on the Goldstone report. As you point out, the UK and many other EU countries abstained from the vote to endorse it at the UN General Assembly. The report, which was commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council raises some serious issues, but as Foreign Secretary David Miliband has pointed out it is also flawed. In a letter to the UK's leading Jewish community organisations the Foreign Secretary said:
"I share important concerns about the failure of the Goldstone Report to recognise adequately Israel's right to protect its citizens and pay sufficient attention to Hamas's actions. I am also very clear that the excessive emphasis on Israel by the Human Rights Council is deeply unhelpful...The Goldstone Report does raise some serious issues which should be properly investigated. We have asked Israel to show the strength and rigour of its democracy by establishing full credible and impartial investigations. And we have continued to be absolutely clear in our condemnation of Hamas rocket attacks as a clear violation of international humanitarian law."
It is my understanding that there are also some concerns about the report's propriety. It is for these reasons that I agree that the UK was right not to endorse the Goldstone report. I hope you find this information useful.

Best wishes

Tom Harris MP
Member of Parliament for Glasgow South

----------------------------------------------

9 December 2009

Dear Mr Harris

Thanks for responding to my further letter.

You say:
"I am afraid that it will not always be the case that the Minister's response is the one you had hoped for. It is for this reason that I will not be writing to him again to ask for further clarification on this issue."
I'm rather intrigued by the 'logic' behind this statement. It seems to be saying that Ivan Lewis's differing view (which I, of course, expected) precludes you from putting any further questions to him on my behalf. That's a bland evasion, not a credible reason for dismissing my questions to him.

The same kind of evasion permeates your rejection of Goldstone. Citing David Miliband's own evasive reasons for rejecting the report is merely seeking shelter behind the UK's shameful abstention.

The Goldstone report has been widely commended for its fairness and scrutiny. There's no serious doubt about its "propriety" - as you insinuate, yet fail to explain - among international jurists like Goldstone himself.

It's also worth reiterating that Goldstone has fairly strong Zionist sympathies and accepted the enquiry mandate reluctantly. Yet, he still found Israel to be in serious breach of international laws and liable for war crimes charges. Are we to believe that the "flawed" legal aspects you suggest - again, none of which are elaborated here - justify this blanket rejection of the report?

As you, of course, know, Goldstone has also recommended action against Hamas regarding rocket fire. So, the UK's and your own stated objections on these grounds have no rational basis.

It's entirely obvious that the UK's close relationship with Israel is the central reason behind the refusal to support Goldstone. And your own pro-Israel sentiments are entirely consistent with that alignment. Which, in turn, explains your refusal to put my further question to Ivan Lewis regarding his Labour Friends of Israel membership and (as with Miliband and Brown) the part that affiliation played in rejecting Goldstone.

One year on from the slaughter of Gaza, the Goldstone report offers a comprehensive statement on those crimes and what the international community can do about them.

As my MP, I have you on record as saying that you won't endorse Goldstone and that process of justice. I hope to have your refusal highlighted come the next general election.

Yours sincerely

John Hilley

----------------

Plase sign the petition urging the UK government to endorse the Goldstone report.

John

Saturday 5 December 2009

Sport and humanity

Some brief comments and clarifying points on the pro-Palestine action at last Wednesday's match in Glasgow between Celtic and Hapoel Tel Aviv (see also background leaflet information).

The Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC)-led action was initiated solely in response to the visit of an Israeli footballing side. It was not, in any way, directed at or against Celtic as a club. The proposed flag-holding exercise was intended to express solidarity with the Palestinian people and send a clear message of such to the attending Israeli Ambassador, Ron Prosor.

The STUC's legitimate involvement in this action is in keeping with the overwhelming endorsement of a motion at its recent conference to adopt the Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) agenda.

Campaign groups have every right to engage in such peaceful, educational protest. This action followed the same kind of reasoning and tactics used to challenge and isolate South Africa's apartheid regime. The STUC and pro-Palestine campaign groups should feel no regret over their attempts to expose Israel's war crimes and persecutions.

If, as claimed, some Hapoel Tel Aviv supporters feel empathy with the Palestinians, they should also be supporting such protests and the wider BDS campaign. In truth, the club's and its fans' opposition to the action and reported taunting of Palestine campaigners at the ground betrayed their true Zionist feelings. Hapoel's 'progressive' credentials, born of the Histadrut labour movement, owes more, in fact, to the defensive postures of Labour Zionism than any real solidarity with the Palestinian cause.

According to many of those condemning the action, nothing, no inconvenient truths, should impinge on sport. Our football grounds are too precious to have 'grubby' politics invade them, they argue.

While, Palestinian civilians - families, children - are slaughtered, taken out with merciless disregard by one of the most brutally armed nations on earth, some still insist that this is not the place to express solidarity with the victims. Where should we do that, then, if not at an event hosting an Israeli team and attended by Prosor, a principal defender of that murder?

The man tasked with attending sporting and cultural events in order to deny his country's war crimes and whitewash its blood-soaked image was welcomed and paraded by another criminal-in-suit, John Reid.

Reid and his corporate-wealthy board say their club is welcoming of all, and that they don't want political statements at football matches. So, was Prosor simply there for the football? Wasn't his very presence a political act of state protection, an outright exercise in Israeli hasbara (propaganda)?

Some fans have objected to their club being "hi-jacked" for political purposes. Perhaps they should consider more closely the politically reactionary influence of Mr Reid as club chairman.

Celtic's statement of opposition to the protest was not just about keeping the club 'out of politics' (or about the manufactured "safety concerns"). It was a politically-weighted establishment reaction.

If the cosy companionship between Reid, deeply implicated in the genocide of Iraq, and Prosor, criminally complicit in the slaughter of Gaza, is what passes for a 'politics-free football club', then I suggest a strong re-think on the general meaning of the word 'political' and the term 'politics out of sport', in particular.

The same reactionary message was all too evident in reporting the protest. Both Reid and Prosor were lauded by a slavish media as respectable gents while conscientious people handing out some paper flags in moral support of the oppressed were castigated as irresponsible nuisances.

Gaza lies in pitiful ruins, its collective people traumatised by mass murder, broken infrastructure and a relentless siege, yet it's the STUC and human rights groups who get berated for being provocative, divisive and troublesome. Sometimes you really have to wonder how people come to echo that kind of disproportionate response.

For useful explanations, consider the loaded media output before and after the game. From the Daily Record to the Scotsman, the protest was smeared and derided, with no ethical or humanitarian consideration of its point and purpose.

The BBC provided its usual 'impartial' service of consulting both sides, but the subtext was clear enough: "Middle East politics comes to Glasgow", announced the reporter on Reporting Scotland, as though Palestinian groups and the STUC were, somehow, importing conflict into places where it doesn't belong.

Radio listeners also lined up to attack the STUC for having the audacity to spend a little money on some coloured paper to highlight the world's oldest occupation and Israel's starvation imprisonment of 1.5 million Gazans. Again, what price compassion?

And, very sadly, some fans took it upon themselves to write and shout hateful abuse at those handing out the flags and leaflets. A few feigned sympathetic regard for the Palestinians, while insisting that, after all, "Israel is a democracy".

Others, thankfully, expressed some clearer approval or, at least, sought to understand a little more about the actual point of the protest - to publicise Palestinian suffering at the hands of an apartheid state.

Again, many fans, mistakenly, thought the STUC and Palestinian campaigners were singling out or targeting the club itself. As later intimated to us by one supporter, some also felt rather "used". So, perhaps we campaigners should reflect a little more on how better to convey the context and message behind such protests.

That said, Palestinian groups, the STUC and others have nothing to reproach themselves about. We all have a moral and, yes, political responsibility towards suffering others. Doing something about that injustice is called proactive compassion. Which means we have a civil, dutiful right to engage in peaceful support of the oppressed.

And no sporting ground or cultural venue should be considered sacredly exempt from those concerns and actions.

Justice
Peace
Love

John

* (No football fans were harmed in the making of this protest.)

Wednesday 2 December 2009

Sport and political footballs

A leaflet distributed at tonight's football match in Glasgow between Celtic and Hapoel Tel Aviv.


Some basic things to think about on match days

While Israeli kids play their football on lush parks with multiple amenities, kids in Gaza and the West Bank have to improvise on broken pieces of waste-ground, much of it razor-wired and cratered by Israeli bombs.

Young Palestinian footballers remain imprisoned inside Gaza and the West Bank, subject to punitive travel restrictions which prohibit their individual development and the Palestinian game.

While the Israeli national side were welcomed and feted during a recent fixture against England at Wembley, the Home Office refused visas for a proposed team tour of young Palestinian footballers.

Meanwhile, Israel is threatening to stop construction of a FIFA-backed, internationally-supported football stadium in the occupied West Bank because it will sit near one of their illegal settlements.

These are just some instances of how Israel's oppressive and violent state prevents even the most basic forms of human activity for Palestinian people.

Do we just play along with apartheid and mass murder?

Some say politics and sport don't mix. They're mistaken. One of the most productive ways in which conscientious people took on South African apartheid was to challenge that regime's moral right to participate in sporting events.

Veteran peace sponsor Desmond Tutu, ex-US President Jimmy Carter, United Nations Special Rapporteur Richard Falk and numerous other humanitarian campaigners have all likened Israel to an “apartheid state” - Carter has even called Israel's system of occupation and discrimination “worse” than apartheid South Africa.

Despite a series of long-standing UN resolutions condemning its land-grabs and aggressions, Israel continues with its military attacks and containment of Gaza, its expansion of the settler-dominated West Bank and East Jerusalem, the building of its illegal apartheid wall and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians inside Israel itself.

Last December/January, Israel unleashed a pre-planned assault on the people of Gaza, slaughtering over 1400 and leaving a scene of utter devastation. No effort was made to spare hospitals, mosques, schools or UN facilities. All Palestinians were targeted.

As the UN-appointed, South African Judge Richard Goldstone's recent report on the Gaza assault concluded, Israeli operations:

"were carefully planned in all their phases as a deliberately disproportionate attack designed to punish, humiliate and terrorise a civilian population".

Goldstone's key recommendation is that Israel be referred to the International Criminal Court to face war crimes charges.

What can we do to help?

The Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) campaign - recently endorsed by the STUC and TUC - is overwhelmingly supported by Palestinians and Palestinian civil rights groups.

In the face of merciless Israeli bombing, arbitrary imprisonment, daily humiliation at checkpoints, ruthless evictions, home demolitions, settlement expansion and political resistance to any just peace agenda, Palestinians and their international supporters see BDS as a peacefully-effective means of highlighting Palestinian suffering and exerting pressure on Israel to end its illegal occupation.

Israel's ambassador to the UK, Ron Prosor, has been busy trying to disguise the mass murder, broken infrastructure and collective Palestinian trauma by promoting Israel's cultural, artistic and sporting image. It's a sham. Encouragingly, growing world awareness of the Palestinians' plight is helping to expose such hypocrisy and Israel's crimes.

By boycotting Israeli goods, services and cultural/sporting engagements, we express our practical support for an oppressed and occupied people. That's where small individual actions can help make a real difference.

Please show your solidarity with the Palestinian people.

Visit:

Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS)

http://www.bdsmovement.net/

Boycott Israeli Goods (BIG)

http://www.bigcampaign.org/

Easy Piesi

http://www.easi-piesi.org

Goldstone Report

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/specialsession/9/docs/UNFFMGC_Report.pdf

This leaflet was published by

Glasgow Palestine Human Rights Campaign

http://gphrc.org/