“It is with disgust and dismay that I find my name listed as a signer of ‘Boycott Apartheid Israel: Open Letter from US Trade Unionists.’ I demand that my name be removed immediately! Prior to seeing the letter on the Palestine Chronicle website, I had never seen such a letter or engaged in discussions about its content. I find it disrespectful that someone would attach my name to a document and circulate such a document without contact with me, or consent from me.” Leading Black trade unionist Clayola Brown discovers the fetid depths to which the boycotters will sink; more on TULIP.
(Via Gene)
“The first thing to say is that Israel was not what I expected, at all. ” “There was a discussion about the boycott and it is clear that Palestinians don’t want it – all they want is equal pay and a living. ” Just a flavor of what you’ll read on this remarkable blog - thanks to the redoubtable TULIP and Engage for highlighting it.
News from Britain’s Trades Union Congress (TUC): its annual conference is urging the British government to “a) condemn the Israeli military aggression and the continuing blockade of Gaza; (b) end arms sales to Israel which reached a value of £18.8 million in 2008, up from £7.7 million in 2007; (c) seek EU agreement to impose a ban on the importing of goods produced in the illegal settlements; and (d) support moves to suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement which provides preferential trade facilities to Israel.”
Continue reading ‘Israel Boycotts: The Battle Isn’t Over’
News of a very exciting initiative via Eric Lee of Labourstart. Trade Unionists Linking Israel and Palestine - TULIP - has just been launched “to challenge the apologists for Hamas and Hizbollah in the labour movement and to fight for a two-state solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.” Spread the word.
Our old friend Bongani Masuku, the international relations secretary of the South African trade union confederation COSATU, has been in action again at Wits University.
Continue reading ‘Bongani Masuku Pushes Antisemitism Again’
Here’s a letter in the Irish Independent signed by six US labor leaders - including Jack Ahern, President of the AFL-CIO in New York - challenging the campaign by some in the Irish labor movement to boycott Israel.
Continue reading ‘American Labor Leaders Take Stand Against Boycott’
Patricia McKeown, the President of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, has been “quoting” Nelson Mandela. “Nelson Mandela described this,” she said, referring to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “as the most important problem on this planet.”
Continue reading ‘ICTU Pushes the Boycott’
Globes, the Israeli business daily, reports that the Histadrut trade union intends to ask the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) for assistance with the planned boycott of Israeli ships by dockers in South Africa. “The union in South Africa is against anything connected to Israel, and in the past even objected to a cooperation agreement we signed with the Palestinian transport workers union,” the paper quotes Transport Workers Union chairman Avi Edri as saying.
Continue reading ‘Boycotting Israel: Enter the Dockers’
One of the more sinister aspects of the academic boycott campaign against Israel in the UK was its demand that Israeli academics take a disloyalty oath: that in order to engage in international collaboration with other academics, they had to first disavow their government. That tactic has now been imported to Canada.
Continue reading ‘Israel Academic Boycott Urged by Canada Labor Leader’
This a guest post by Eric Lee of Labourstart.
Maybe it’s because it’s Christmas week, or maybe it’s because the issues are complicated, but there has been a distinctly muted trade union response to the fighting in Gaza.
Continue reading ‘Gaza and the Labor Unions’
