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 Palestinian- Isaereli conflict discussion

Political debate. Sunday 16:30-17:45

We are not dealing with a 2 sides conflict, but there are many prespectives to the issue, and we shouldn't accept the splitting view point.

A debate was around the suicide bombers-
Opinions-

WE THAN PASSED TO DISCUSS 2 Issues raised at the previous workshop-

1. Women activism in Israel - Palestine

2. Organization in neighbour arab countries

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 Israel/Palestine Action Workshop

author: uri
Monday 2-9-2002

Following the general political discussion on Sunday of the conflict in "that lump of land west of the Jordan river", activists from Palestine/Israel and international activists met on Monday for an extremely productive discussion of action plans.

The first session focused on the creation of a strong networking infrastructure between Israeli, Palestinian and international activists. Over the past few months there has been a rise of activism in the area. Local people (Jewish and Arab) have formed a growing radical peace movement and many international activists are arriving in the occupied territories for solidarity actions.
The intensity of the conflict in this period made it difficult for the two groups to create strong links, and so the participants began the session by drawing up a 'wish list' of things they would like to do for each other. Among these: international participation and support for actions in Israel; financial and resource sharing; news and media exchange; and local help for international activists coming in or out.
This was followed by a brainstorm session to come up with tools for making these things happen. Among these: a list of people who can meet, house and help international activists; a shared action calendar; an information kit; and a permanent 'combo' that would deal with the nuts and bolts of visas, legal aid and communication. A meeting was set for tuesday at 10 in the evening in the freeplace Boerhaavelaan to further define these tools. The planned international mobilisation to defend the olive harvest in Palestine in October can be an opportunity to test these tools.

In the second session, there was a discussion of some very high-profile international actions that could give visibility to many issues and opinions, and send a strong political message going beyond what the politicians are talking about.Among these were the idea of having a boat of activists and Palestinian refugees trying to enter Israel, an international womens' human-rights march in Palestine/Israel with related actions, a mass demo at the port in Marseilles calling for boycotts on Israeli products, an International Kaffieh (Palestinian scarf) Day, and the Abraham's Alliance project of meetings among Jewish and Muslim religious figures.
Finally there were suggestions to have action-workshops at the autonomous space during the European Social Forum in Florence, and to create a radical alternative news agency to counterbalance the information which the Israeli government and army feed to the mainstream media.

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