Tuesday, August 5, 2014

In defense of Palestine–An appeal to world opinion launched from Bolivia

‘Join the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against the terrorist state of Israel’

Faced with the tragic events our Palestinian brothers and sisters are living through in Gaza, the Network in Defense of Humanity (REDH) assumes our responsibility and expresses the following:

We take up as our own the words of compañero Evo Morales, a founder of the Network in Defense of Humanity and President of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, who has declared Israel to be a terrorist state.

We express our absolute repulsion at the genocide being carried out against the Palestinian people by a state founded on dispossession and the colonial occupation of Palestinian territories.

We pay recognition to, and express our solidarity with the Palestinian people and its resistance organizations, especially in Gaza, in their heroic struggle against Israeli attempts to exterminate them and seize the small pieces that remain of what was once their homeland.

We condemn the imperialist role of the United States that politically, financially and militarily sponsors and backs Israel, in the face of the extraordinary inaction of the UN Security Council whose resolutions on the question of Palestine are systematically violated with complete impunity by Washington. The United States is once again demonstrating the hypocrisy and cynicism with which it has acted throughout history, threatening sanctions and interventions against the peoples of Latin America, Africa and Eurasia who defend their sovereignty at the same time as its backs the actions of Israel.

We denounce the complicity in what is occurring, by default in some cases, of the governments that make up the European Union, as well as the unconditional subordination of the media oligarchs to Washington's dictates. Enough of calling it a war when in fact it is a genocide being perpetrated by one of the best equipped armies in the world against a people whose defensive resources are infinitely inferior in quantity and quality!

We encourage you to join the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against the terrorist state of Israel, as it is time for active and creative solidarity that goes beyond statements of condemnation. We have failed the more than 1600 people killed in Palestine over the last few weeks, as well as the more than 9000 injured since the start of the terrorist operation hypocritically named "Protective Edge".

We demand an end to apartheid and genocide, as well as to the walls and illegal settlements. We call on the governments of the world to demand that Israel complies with UN Security Council resolutions that oblige it to withdraw from Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, return to the borders that existed prior to the "Six Day War" (1967) and guarantee the right of return for Palestinian refugees, as per Security Council Resolution No. 242, November 22, 1967, a resolution that has been consistently ignored by the state of Israel.

We call for a real political solution to the conflict in Palestine on the basis of dialogue, negotiation and the existence of two states with equal rights and delineated borders that are internationally recognized. We believe this solution must begin with the immediate lifting of the blockade on Gaza and the liberation of all Palestinian political prisoners. We congratulate the governments of ALBA [Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Our Americas], Mercosur [Common Market of the South] and other governments of the South for their position of solidarity against the barbaric actions of Israel in Gaza.

We adopt as our own the words of the revolutionary, Nelson Mandela: "We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians." We affirm that Israel has morally and politically lost this battle in the face of the brave Palestinian people and the growing condemnation by the peoples of the world of a "criminal" state that violates international law. The unbreakable Palestinian resistance will be rewarded, sooner rather than later, with the smiles of their children in a free homeland.

Against Israeli terrorism and US imperialism, in defense of the right to self-determination for Palestine and all the peoples of the world!
(Translation: Fred Fuentes)

Sign on: endefensadepalestina@gmail.com

La Paz, Bolivia August 4 2014

Initial signatories

Evo Morales, Bolivia

Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, Argentina

Pablo González Casanova, Mexico

Eduardo Galeano, Uruguay

Roberto Fernández Retamar, Cuba

Federico Mayor Zaragoza, Spain

Silvio Rodríguez, Cuba

Luis Arce Catacora, Bolivia

Gianni Vattimo, Italy

Gabriela Rivadeneira, Ecuador

Istvan Meszaros, Hungría/United Kingdom

Samir Amin, Egypt

Alfonso Sastre, Basque Country

Nardi Suxo, Bolivia

Enrique Dussel, Mexico

Marta Harnecker, Chile

Carmen Bohorquez, Venezuela

Cesar Navarro, Bolivia

Miguel Barnet, Cuba

Franz Hinkelammert, Germany

Héctor Arce Zaconeta, Bolivia

Piedad Cordoba, Colombia

Reverend Raúl Suarez, Cuba

Martin Almada, Paraguay

Fernando Rendón, Colombia

Graziella Pogolloti, Cuba

Sacha Llorenti, Bolivia

Ana Esther Ceceña, Mexico

Luis Britto, Venezuela

Rafael Cancel Miranda, Puerto Rico

Atilio Boron, Argentina

Theotonio Dos Santos, Brazil

Alfredo Rada, Bolivia

Piedad Cordoba, Colombia

Farruco Sesto, Venezuela

Ángel Guerra, Cabrera, Cuba/Mexico

Juan Carlos Trujillo, Bolivia

Mel Zelaya; Honduras

Hildebrando Pérez Grande, Peru

Patricia Villegas, Colombia/Venezuela

Maria Nela Prada, Bolivia

Stella Calloni, Argentina

Omar González, Cuba

Hugo Moldiz, Bolivia

Pascual Serrano, Spain

Raúl Pérez Torres, Ecuador

Obispo Raúl Vera, Mexico

Joao Pedro Stedile, Brazil

Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Portugal

Rodrigo Álvarez Cambras, Cuba

Socorro Gomes, Brazil

Katu Arkonada, Basque Country/Bolivia

For other signatories, see http://alainet.org/active/75935