Workers Solidarity Movement

This audio is of the session at the 2009 Dublin anarchist bookfair organised by the Irish Palestinian Solidarity Campaign. The speaker is Nidal Saadeh, a leftist Palestinian activist from Bethlehem in the West Bank.

Palestine & womens rights - a Bethlehem women speaks at DABF 2009 by Workers Solidarity on Mixcloud

There was the whiff of something in the Derry air. The constantly rising civilian death toll in Gaza had already produced the same outpourings of rage on the streets of Derry as it had around the world. Thousands of signatures had been gathered calling on Raytheon to be given the boot, while ever larger crowds had gathered for vigils at the cenotaph, marches through the city, rallies at the Guildhall and at a nonviolent blockade of Raytheon itself. Now more and more of us were becoming determined that we do not have to resign to feelings of helplessness in the face of Israel’s war atrocities. Our burning rage was igniting something positive.

Media coverage of events in Israel and Palestine often depends on well-worn clichés that depict a bitter struggle between two homogenous and mutually exclusive cultures. The truth of course is far more complex and there is a small, but very vocal, opposition within Israel to the military Occupation of Palestine. One of the most visible and courageous forms of this opposition has been the refusal to serve in the Israeli army.

Hamas' recent "clampdown" on Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigade in Gaza, rather then its ongoing brutal repression against leftist dissent, including that of feminist voices, dominated Western coverage of life in the occupied territories.

The Kibbutz (plural Kibbutzim meaning clustering) movement is a social movement with a long history and one that has numerous connections with Anarchism. It is comprised of many different ideologies and philosophies many with contradictory intentions, sometimes present in the same Kibbutz.

Last year a Belfast anarchist travelled to the West Bank to work with the International Solidarity Movement and Palestinians and wrote this report on his impressions of the Palestinian struggle.

On last Thursday night the Cork branch of the Workers’ Solidarity Movement hosted a talk from Leiser Peles, an anarchist from Israel who is active with the Anarchists against the Wall. The talk was held at the Metropole Hotel and was attended by about forty people.

Leiser Peles, a prominent Israeli opponent of the massive wall that Israel is building on Palestinian land in the Occupied West Bank will speak in Cork on Thursday night. Mr. Peles is a member of Anarchists Against The Wall, an Israeli - Palestinian organisation established in 2003 to build solidarity with the Palestinians in their struggles.

“Anarchists Against the Wall (AATW) is a direct action group that was established in 2003 in response to the construction of the wall Israel is building on Palestinian land in the Occupied West Bank. The group works in cooperation with Palestinians in a joint non-violent struggle against the occupation.”

Operating under the principle that “It is the duty of Israeli citizens to resist immoral policies and actions carried out in out name”, the AATW is actively resisting the construction of the wall with more than protesting in the streets, governed by the belief that the Israeli segregation of the Palestinian people will not end by itself. Instead, they believe that the only way to end the occupation is by creating a social climate that is “ungovernable and unmanageable” for the Israeli state.

Marwa is a ten year old refugee from the village of Marwaheen in the south of Lebanon. Following an Israeli ultimatum Marwa’s family decided to flee. While driving away from the village the Israeli military fired on the pick up truck they were travelling in. Marwa recalls “The wind carried me far away, I woke up on the nearby rocks. Next to me, Mama and Mirna were sleeping. I went to them to wake them up but the plane saw me and came towards me so I ran away. My brother Wissam was hit in his leg and he could not reach me, he was hiding behind a rock and when the ambulance came he was waving to them to stop. Mirna was sleeping the whole time”. Marwa was sent to hospital for treatment for her burns and wounds. Her sister Mirna, 12, her brother Hadi, 5, and her mother Zahra, 51, were all killed (1)