#without supporting an apartheid regime that bombs hospitals

[got-no-skill]

I don't care who was there first, there is no justification for genocide.

people who try to play the “but jewish people were here 3000 years ago” card really need to learn what christians and muslims are.

christianity branched from judaism like 2000 years ago.

and islam branched from christianity like 1400 years ago.

you could say jewish people were here 3000 years ago but that’s like saying europeans have the right to africa’s land because humans were there 20,000 years ago!! at some point you went too far back and who was or wasn’t there doesn’t matter anymore.

especially when the religion you’re trying to discredit haven’t branched from your religion yet so they’re part of the “jewish people” you’re referring to!!

[tieflingkisser]

Columbia University Apartheid Divest coalition statement on chemical skunk attack

On January 19, a protest against the Israeli genocide in Gaza was attacked by counter-protesters using the chemical agent, known as "Skunk." The university bears full responsibility for all violence against the pro-Palestine movement on campus.

On Friday, January 19th, 2024, at 1 p.m., the Columbia University Apartheid Divest coalition (CUAD) held an emergency protest outside of Low Library against U.S. attacks on Yemen and the ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza, which has killed over 25,000 Palestinians. A group of counter-protestors, some of whom were affiliates of the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF), gathered in opposition, verbally harassing and provoking the students. Both internal security from CUAD and Columbia Public Safety officers, including John Murillo, the Director of Public Safety, were present. However, Public Safety turned their backs to the counter-protestors and faced the CUAD protest, a clear indication of who they intended to keep “safe.” Around 1:30 p.m., an IOF-associated counter-protester attacked a Palestinian student and issued a death threat. Instead of responding to this serious attack, which they witnessed, public safety officials surrounded and initiated a physical altercation with the Palestinian student, accused him falsely of pushing them, and allowed the assailant to disappear. Around 2:00 p.m., two students sprayed an odorous chemical at CUAD protestors. When the protest ended around 3:00 p.m., the smell remained strong and was clearly noticeable on protest signs, students’ hair, clothing, backpacks, and jackets. Following student and community attempts to find the deployers of the chemical agent, known as “Skunk,” we identified them as two former IOF Officers who are current Columbia School of General Studies (GS) students. While these two students seriously endangered the campus community, they are but two members of a larger imperial project. Their actions are a result of Columbia’s complicity in the ongoing genocide in Gaza and refusal to protect its Palestinian and Palestine-supporting students.  Since Friday, students impacted by the Skunk spray have reported abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath, and excessive coughing, with four students ending up in the emergency room. Over the past 24 hours, at least nine impacted students have been sent to the hospital for electrocardiograms (EKGs), chest X-rays, and respiratory and digestive system stabilization. Their medical reports upon discharge all state “exposure to chemical agent.” Despite these frightening physical symptoms, we are extremely grateful and privileged to have access to healthcare when those in Gaza do not. The Israeli blockade restricts medical care Gazans are entitled to receive under international law, and since October 7, the Israeli occupation has bombed all thirty-six hospitals in Gaza. This has forced doctors to perform C-sections and amputations without basic anesthesia. We must highlight that Israel attacks the people of Gaza daily with bombs, white phosphorus, and bullets. In the West Bank, the IOF deploys Skunk spray not only against individuals protesting but against entire Palestinian homes as a method of collective punishment. We cannot pull our eyes from the genocide in Gaza and Israel’s settler-colonial regime. 

[clubofinfo]

Expert: When Mike Treen, the National Director of the ‘Unite Union’ in New Zealand arrived at the airport in the capital, Auckland, on August 1, a group of people were anxiously waiting for him at the terminal with Palestinian flags and flowers. They hugged him, chanted for Palestinian freedom and performed the customary native Haka dance. For them, Mike, as all of those who set sail aboard the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza last July, were heroes. But the truth is Mike Treen and his comrades were not the only heroes for braving the sea with the aim of breaking the hermetic Israeli military blockade on the impoverished and isolated Gaza Strip. Without those who were present at the Auckland airport, upon Mike’s arrival, and without the thousands of supporters all across the world who have mobilized as a community – held numerous meetings, raised funds, created a powerful media discourse, and so on – Treen’s attempted trip to Gaza would not have been possible in the first place. The first boats to successfully break the Gaza siege, in October, 2008 were the ‘Free Gaza’ and the ‘Liberty’. They carried 44 people from 17 countries. The activists wanted to push their countries to acknowledge the illegality of the Israeli blockade on Gaza and to, eventually, challenge the siege. Their triumphant arrival in Gaza ten years ago, marked a historic moment for the international solidarity movement, a moment, perhaps, unparalleled. Since then, Israel has launched several massive and deadly wars on Gaza. The first war took place merely weeks after the arrival of the first boats, followed by another war in 2012 and, the deadliest of them all, in 2014. The siege grew tighter. Also, since then, many attempts have been made at breaking the siege. Between 2008 and 2016, 31 boats have sailed to Gaza from many destination, all intercepted, their cargo seized and their passengers mistreated. The most tragic of these incidents was in May 2010 when the Israeli navy attacked the ‘Mavi Marmara’ ship – which sailed alongside other boats – killing 10 activists and wounding many more. Even then, the stream of solidarity boats continued to arrive, not only unhindered by the fear of Israeli retribution, but also stronger in their resolve. Palestinians consider the killed activists as ‘martyrs’ to be added to their own growing list of martyrs. However, none of the boats made it to Gaza; so why keep on trying? Last May, I arrived in New Zealand as part of a book tour that took me to other countries as well. However, in New Zealand, a relatively small Pacific island with a population that does not exceed five million people, the solidarity with Palestine was exceptional. I asked about the strong Palestine solidarity work in New Zealand, inquiring with the coordinator for ‘Kia Ora Gaza’, Roger Fowler, who, at the time, was busy with final preparations for the Freedom Flotilla. In New Zealand, he said, “for many years support for the Palestinian struggle lingered, often perceived as being too distant, and falsely portrayed as being ‘too complicated’. But the global outrage at Israel’s murderous attack on the ‘Mavi Marmara’-led humanitarian flotilla to Gaza in 2010 was a major turning-point that changed all that.” Fowler, himself, along with other New Zealand activists joined the ‘Lifeline to Gaza’ convoy soon after the attack on the ‘Mavi Marmara’, reaching Gaza with three ambulances, packed with badly needed medicine, as the Israeli siege also deprived the Strip of hospital equipment and urgently needed medicine. Coordinating all of this was not a simple task as it also needed to be streamlined with the global efforts for the convoy, which included the dispatching of 140 other ambulances and 300 activists arriving from 30 countries. “There were many moving scenes as Palestinians learned how far we had come from to offer solidarity – their Israel overlords had told the Palestinians for years that nobody cared about them, which is a big line,” Fowler told me. I also spoke with Mike Treen upon his return from his Gaza sea journey. Treen is a seasoned activist, who works daily at defending the rights of workers from across the country. He sees his struggle for workers’ rights in New Zealand as part and parcel of his global solidarity outlook as well. “In my role as part of the union movement in this country, I was also able to explain (to New Zealanders) that innocent working people (in Gaza) are the victims of this siege and that Israel has driven unemployment to over 50% for working people – one of the highest rates in the world,” he told me. Treen, just like Fowler, understands that the boat solidarity is not merely an issue of providing urgently needed supplies, but as a well-coordinated effort at exposing the evils of the Israeli blockade. “Unless Israel is directly bombing Gaza, the siege and its hideous human implications simply drop off the radar of public consciousness,” he said. And this is precisely the real mission of the Gaza flotillas: While Israel wants to normalize the Gaza siege as it is currently normalizing its Occupation and Apartheid regimes, the solidarity movement has created a counter discourse that constantly foils Israeli plans. In other words, whether the boats arrive on the Gaza coast or are hijacked by the Israeli navy, it makes little difference. The power and effectiveness of this kind of solidarity goes even beyond Gaza and Palestine. “Our involvement in international solidarity endeavors, such as the Freedom Flotillas has, in turn, sparked a resurgence in other important elements of building the strength of the world-wide movement for justice”, Fowler told me, soon after Treen’s return to New Zealand. Mike Treen also has his work cut out for him as he is now busy engaging the media and various communities in his own country, sharing his experiences on the boat, which led to his arrest, beating, tasering and deportation. And like the horrific Apartheid regime in South Africa, the Israeli Apartheid will collapse, too, because Palestinians continue to resist and because millions of people, like Mike and Roger, are standing by their side. http://clubof.info/

[neonstatic]

[ID: Four images of a resolution proposal. It goes as follows:

"Resolution Calling for a Ceasefire in Gaza, an End to the Israeli Occupation of Palestine, and Support for Workers' Political Speech by the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, United Auto Workers Local 2325 November 2023 WHEREAS, Palestinian trade unions issued a statement calling for unionists worldwide to pressure governments to stop all military funding for Israel, to take action against companies involved in Israel's brutal and illegal siege, and to pass motions in our unions to this effect; WHEREAS, in recent weeks, working people around the world have shown public support for Palestinian freedom; WHEREAS, we are legal workers, including attorneys, paralegals, legal advocates, social workers, interpreters, investigators, administrative staff, and more, serving and defending the most demonized and oppressed communities in the United States-poor, criminalized, immigrant, Black and Indigenous people-and we stand for human rights and against apartheid. ethnic cleansing, and genocide; WHEREAS, Israel has, since the violent tragedy on October 7, 2023, increasingly espoused genocidal rhetoric against all Palestinians, including the Israeli Defense Minister calling all Gazans "human animals." and the President of Israel denying the existence of innocent civilians in the Gaza Strip, and has taken actions to collectively punish civilians in Gaza, such as cutting off food, water, aid, and electricity, and conducting a widespread bombing campaign; WHEREAS, the United States has encouraged Israel's escalation of violence against Palestinians-for example, the House of Representatives recently passed $14.3 billion in US military aid beyond the nearly $4 billion a year it provides to Israel annually-and it has otherwise failed to express solidarity with the people of Palestine or taken any actions to do anything but escalate the current violence;

WHEREAS, Israel has cut off internet and phone service in Gaza, further isolating Palestinians in Gaza from the rest of the world and from one another; WHEREAS, since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed over 11.100 people in Gaza, not counting thousands of missing people and those who are dying from starvation, illness, or lack of treatment; WHEREAS, Israel has bombed hospitals, schools, places of worship, and refugee camps, resulting in numerous deaths of civilians who are already displaced from their homes and are seeking refuge at internationally recognized safe areas;

WHEREAS, on October 13, 2023, Israel gave 1.1 million Palestinians living in northern Gaza only 24 hours to evacuate their homes; WHEREAS, in recent weeks, the number of Palestinian arrests and Israeli attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem have greatly escalated, including 133 Palestinians killed in the West Bank since October 7, 2023; WHEREAS, Israel is holding approximately 10,000 Palestinians in its prisons, many of them under administrative detention without due process, and treatment of Palestinians in prison has worsened in recent weeks; WHEREAS, Israel has kept the Gaza Strip under a state of siege for decades, and according to many international human rights organizations, maintains a colonial apartheid occupation regime against the Palestinian people; WHEREAS, the recent Israeli siege on Gaza deepens the ethnic cleansing and dispossession of the Palestinian people that has been ongoing since the Nakba in 1948 and the Balfour Declaration in 1917; WHEREAS, Palestinians will now need humanitarian relief that reflects the assistance we provide as legal service workers in New York, Detroit, and Texas, including relief to address Palestinian homelessness, refugee displacement, prisoners rights, criminal defense, rights of parents and children, and access to food, clean water, medical services, schools and essential utilities. WHEREAS, in 2022, this local passed a Resolution on Divestment from Israel Bonds, affirming support for individual members and as a local collectively to take action in support of Palestinian liberation from Israeli apartheid; WHEREAS, many of our members, and the majority of our clients, have ancestors who are survivors of colonization, apartheid, or genocide; WHEREAS, our members denounce and are subjected to Islamophobic attacks and antisemitic threats, and such attacks and threats are on the rise as Israel and the United States continue to escalate the violence in Gaza; WHEREAS, in the face of these ongoing horrors, members of the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys reaffirm and deepen our connection to the Palestinian liberation struggle; WHEREAS, organized workers at CAMBA Legal Services Workers United - UAW Local 2325, The Bronx Defenders Union - UAW Local 2325., Make the Road NY Union - UAW Local 2320, workers at the San Francisco Public Defender's Office, United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), National Writers Union, the American Postal Workers Union, NYU GSOC-UAW 2110, University of California Academic Workers - UAW 2865, Student Workers of Columbia - UAW 2710, Rutgers Adjunct Faculty Union, and others have spoken out in solidarity with the Palestinian people in recent weeks;

WHEREAS, workers, law students, and undergraduate student organizations are being doxxed for expressing support for Palestinians and opposition to Israeli occupation, ethnic cleansing, and genocide; WHEREAS, New York County Defender Services pressured attorney Victoria Ruiz to quit after the New York Post published an article containing a video that misrepresented her actions at a vigil for Palestinians recently killed by Israel; WHEREAS, the ALAA chapter at The Bronx Defenders is being threatened with organizational defunding due to The Bronx Defenders Union - UAW Local 2325, October 20, 2023 statement in support of Palestinians, which condemned the ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians committed by Israel and the United States; WHEREAS, such threats to defund The Bronx Defenders are threats against vital legal services provided to 20.000 low-income Bronx residents, including Bronx parents facing family separation by child protective services in family court as well as Bronx community members facing displacement in Bronx housing court, deportation in immigration court, and prosecution and incarceration in criminal court. THEREFORE, be it resolved, that the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, Local 2325 of the United Auto Workers, takes the following positions:

We call on Israel and the United States to implement an immediate ceasefire; restore water, electricity, gas, and internet; permit international humanitarian assistance, and retract any evacuation orders in Gaza;

We call for an end to Israeli apartheid and the occupation and blockade of Palestinian land, sea, and air by Israeli military forces;

We oppose all existing and any future military aid to Israel;

We endorse the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement;

We endorse Not On Our Dime legislation, which prohibits not-for-profit corporations in New York from aiding or abetting activity in support of illegal Israeli settlements in violation of the Geneva Conventions of 1949; and

We support the right of all Palestinian refugees to return to their homeland; and THEREFORE, be it further resolved, that we reject all attempts to intimidate workers for their political speech, and we will organize against any attempts by our employers to procure funds denied to other legal services providers due to their union's political activism in support of Palestinians and in opposition to the Israeli apartheid regime and occupation; and

THEREFORE, be it further resolved, that we call on our elected officials, UAW International labor councils of which we are members, other unions, and our employers to use all available resources to take the actions listed above.

Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, United Auto Workers Local 2325"

End ID]

From the river to the sea

hey all! firstgrave here

I was somewhat recently banned on tumblr for “targeted harassment”. the post that got me banned? a post in which I said Israeli settlers and former IDF soldiers had actively engaged in ethnic cleansing and genocide. 

I attempted to appeal the ban but have gotten nowhere, and I do see this as the final reason in why I should stay away from tumblr as a whole. I am no longer interested in coming back to tumblr, and will be making no future efforts to do so.

however, some important updates I want to give: many people whom I was mutuals with were there for my entire law school journey, the passing of the bar, and my entrance into the career of public defender. this is something I’ve been dreaming of and working towards for years now. 

in october, the union which represents the office of public defenders I work with, and the majority of public defenders in NY entirely, proposed a resolution on the genocide in Palestine, reinforcing the rights of union members to speak out against apartheid and ethnic cleansing and calling for an end to Israeli occupation. in response, four Zionist members of the union have commenced a lawsuit in attempt to get an injunction against the union members voting on the resolution. the union has now filed a motion to move the case to federal court, thus removing it from the jurisdiction of conservative Long Island state court judges, but also to have the action deemed as an unconstitutional infringement on free speech. 

since the lawsuit was filed, a supervisor at my office has cursed out myself and the 8 new attorneys I was hired with, telling us to “get the fuck” out of her office if we don’t support Israel, and we do not deserve to work there if we do not agree with her. so now we are also in the process of filing a union grievance and EOC claim against the supervisor. this has put us at significant odds against management and we may very well lose our jobs over this (we are at-will employees for the first 3 years of our contract, so while discriminatory firings are illegal, it would be near impossible to prove in this instance.) I am likely to lose my dream job that I have worked years to reach over this. 

The attempts to silence any and all people who speak out against the atrocities being committed with our tax funding cannot be ignored. When we look back at the atrocities of history and wonder how they were allowed to occur, it is because many people feel more comfortable turning a blind eye to the suffering of those “other” to them, and those that do care are faced with coordinated censorship campaigns armed with threats of loss of employment, homelessness, incarceration, violence, and even death. 

In the time all of this has occurred, thousands of men, women, and children have been senselessly and brutally massacred by Israeli forces, aided by other world powers. The US is actively and happily funding the genocide of Palestinians, as well as Britain, Canada, and other imperial nations. Babies have been abandoned and denied humanitarian aid, cities have been leveled, and families have been devastated. 

Attached here is the proposed resolution of the legal aid union. I stand by it wholeheartedly, and ask others to share it as well. There is no excuse for silence or complacency in the face of genocide. Those who are not in Palestine, have not witnessed and experienced the horrors in which every Palestinian citizen has been forced to endure, do not get the benefit of turning a blind eye. 

May we see a free Palestine in our lifetimes. 

[yasminewestbank]

thank you so much for listening nat, you have no idea how much it means to me.

palestinians are oppressed. israel is an apartheid. israel completely controls palestine however doesn't grant palestinians the right to vote. palestinians can't vote, their freedom of movement is limited even though it's not limited to jews who live in the same place (completely based on your ethnicity), they're judged in military courts unlike jews who are judged in normal courts, palestinian children are also judged in military courts and israel is the only country in the world that trials children in military courts, indigenous palestinian communities are being displaced constantly (which is a war crime against the geneva convention), and palestinians are being killed DAILY (not an exaggeration) by the israeli army. an israeli soldier can shoot and kill a palestinian person without a reason and nothing is done. the israeli army constantly terrorizes palestinians by entering their houses and wrecking them to install fear. not houses of suspects, but just random houses, in order to "train". if you're palestinian, a random military officer can randomlly decide "ok i need to train my division so lets use this house" and break into your home, force you to sit with your family in 1 room while using ur house as a training spot. this was admitted by the military even tho it was known even without them. all geneva convention rules to how to treat civilians in occupied territories are constantly violated in israel. palestine doesn't have a military, bc it's not let be an actual country, so when the idf "fights" palestine they're fighting civilians.

gaza is known to be the most densely populated area in the world, and biggest open air prison in the world. they're under seige and lockdown by israel for decades. israel controls everything that enters or leaves gaza. no palestinian is allowed to leave gaza. they dont have an airport. they have electricity to only few hours a day. israel controls how much food enters gaza, as in it counts the fucking calories. meanwhile it constantly bombs gaza, claiming it "only bombs hamas offices", but in actuality they bomb schools, hospitals, and apartment buildings. so many gazans die each year. so many children, women, elderly. gaza is hell.

i can go on and on. the list of terror acts and war crimes israel goverment and military commits against palestinian people is endless. and the US is the biggest sponsor of this apartheid regime - it aids israel more than aiding any other countries, giving it BILLIONS of dollars EACH YEAR.

israel feeds the world tons of propaganda. the israeli propaganda is a huge machine that brainwashes israeli ppl to think we're in the right and that if we don't have occupy palestine, the palestinian ppl are savages that will kill all of the jews.

nelson mandela supported palestine and said south africa's freedom is incomplete without the freedom of palestinians. his grandson says he views palestine's apartheid as even worse than the one that took place in south africa.

i truly can go on forever abt all the bs that goes on in palestine. thats why i keep sharing posts. im sorry this was probably really rumbly. but i hope this gave you some more insight abt the existence of israel in the present

i hate the whole western world all of it all of it commits war crimes and no one cares bc its the west so its probably right and normal. a whole bunch of european countries besides israel ceased aid to palestine just bc of the actions of few. this is collective punishment and its a fucking war crime. but its the western world so there is no one to hold it accountable bc theyre not going to hold themselves accountable theyre not going to take themselves to court