The Palestine Solidarity Campaign cannot kick its smearing-the-Holocaust habit. A banner proclaiming the media is, basically, Jewish-controlled and that Jews are, basically, Nazis (see above) was proudly paraded on the PSC’s anti-Balfour Declaration march through London today. There was no objection to it from any PSC stewards.
Added to that a woman wearing a Palestinian flag kept repeating there were “concentration camps” in Palestinian villages (part 1 below) and repeatedly accused a Jewish man holding a British flag of being “the anti-Christ” (part 2 below):
As the some 3,000 PSC activists proceeded down Oxford Street a group of about 30 pro-Israel campaigners stepped into the road in front of the march and put a stop to it for about 30 minutes before the police finally moved everyone on allowing the protest to end up in Parliament Square where it was addressed by Jeremy Corbyn MP and Diane Abbott MP (via a live link), Ken Loach, Andy Slaughter MP, Salma Yaqoob and Dave Randall, amongst others.
The pro-Israel group were also called “Zionist pigs” by PSC activists but here they are in their full glory:
More peaceful disruptions to these anti-Semitic marches through London will undoubtedly rightly follow.
Here are some other photos from the PSC march. As you can see the slogans incorporate Holocaust smearing, the Star of David, the blood libel, child killing, supporting violence against Israelis and also willing Israel’s destruction and are, of course, the slogans the above-named British politicians and celebrities will have stood in front of while addressing the PSC supporters in Parliament Square.
That’s quite a chilling prospect for Britain’s 280,000 Jews:
Prof. Wendy Pullan, Kamel Hawwash, Mark Hendrick MP, Prof. Penny Green.
At the Houses of Parliament last night the Palestine Return Centre (PRC) held an event called The Question of Jerusalem. It was hosted and chaired by Mark Hendrick, Labour MP for Preston.
Prof. Wendy Pullan, Senior Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Architecture at the University of Cambridge, went first and described Jerusalem as “a badly damaged city” the blame for which she lumped on Israel due to “50 years of conflict and occupation”.
She explained that Israel’s urban planning had led to Israelis and Palestinians vilifying each other and she compared Israel’s security barrier to the Berlin Wall.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign’s Kamel Hawwash then told of how he had recently been refused entry to Israel and treated badly at Tel Aviv airport while his wife and child were let through. He was put on a plane back to the UK. He said “Israel was an expert at inciting hatred and was not a country that wanted peace.”
Finally, Prof. Penny Green, Professor of Law and Globalisation at Queen Mary University of London, described how one of her friends who works at Hebrew University was attacked and “called a filthy Arab which is very common”.
She described the “segregation wall” and road network in the Palestinian territories as “apartheid” and said that the wall “is not about security”. She also condemned the checkpoints where Palestinians queue before they can enter Israel to work saying they are where “humans are treated worse than cattle”.
She compared the barrier to the Berlin Wall as well.
During the Q&A I got to ask a question. It isn’t easy asking a question surrounded by people trying to heckle you and drown you out but mine was aimed at Prof. Green.
I asked whether she had any sympathy with Israelis left bereaved and disabled by suicide bombers who got into Israel before the wall, which she condemned, had been built?
Hendrick immediately intervened on her behalf saying that this was a meeting about Palestine, not Israel. When I pressed that she should be allowed to answer he went outside to call armed police as you can see from these photos:
Mark Hendrick points me out to armed police.
Armed police looking for me.
Armed police getting a better sight.
Hendrick pinpoints me to police.
Meanwhile, the one person who did respond to my question was Hawwash who said “If Israel had been created in Uganda does anyone believe the Palestinians would have cause for political groups to go and kill Jews?”
I was then politely asked to leave the room by police and then asked to give my personal details. At one stage I was surrounded by seven heavily armed police. Then my friends Jonathan, Sharon and Mandy were all similarly led out.
One neutral elderly lady who had been in the room came out to complain to PRC representative Sameh Habeeb about how badly we had been treated.
What a total waste of police resources and time by this MP especially considering that literally outside the front door of the building two months ago a terrorist drove into and killed four tourists before then stabbing an unarmed policemen to death.
But Mark Hendrick, Labour MP for Preston, doesn’t have to campaign. He will undoubtedly be re-elected on June 8th as he has a 12,000 majority. So while all other MPs are currently back in their constituences working hard to keep their jobs Hendrick is in London helping the Palestine Return Centre pursue its ultimate goal; the annihilation of Israel.
That’s Labour politics under Jeremy Corbyn for you.
Yesterday afternoon about 40 Israel supporters heeded the call of the Zionist Federation and the Board of Deputies to protest the incitement by the Palestinian leaders to murder Israeli citizens. For once the protest was outside the Palestinian mission in London.
Protesters waved Israeli flags and held placards of some specific statements that have driven Palestinians to murder numerous Israelis over the last month or so. As a result Palestinians have also died but then, as we know, Palestinian leaders have little concern for their own people.
There should be permanent protests outside all Palestinian missions as they are at the heart of the current bloodshed being representatives from Fatah and of Mahmoud Abbas himself.
That said any protests are likely to fall on deaf ears. Manuel Hassassian, the head of the London mission, enjoys his jibes about Jews.
The ZF’s Arieh Miller gave an excellent speech calling for the Palestinian leaders to stop the incitement.
But, unsurprisingly, the PSC’s supporters were intent on heightening the tensions with their call for the destruction of the Jewish state.
The destruction of Israel is the PSC’s ultimate objective and it obviously doesn’t matter how many Israelis and Palestinians die in the process.
After a few minutes taking photos of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign counter-protest I was outed as a “Zionist”. I was then assailed by a police officer and asked to leave. Apparently, my presence was upsetting the PSC.
Such sensitive souls. Some people have no problem inciting bloodshed but woe betide if you photograph them.
Here are some pics and the clip of my being “outed” by the PSC while they call for the Jewish state’s demise.
Meanwhile the PSC will be back outside the Israeli Embassy this Saturday and probably showing the usual lack of concern for the continued bloodshed:
Self-explanatory
She wants “occupation” ended not the stabbings of Jews?
Another ZF banner quoting from the horse’s mouth (apologies to horses everywhere).
So if the “occupation” continues Jews will continue to be murdered?
Can there really be a Palestinian state with the state of the region?
Trafalgar Square in London was unusually quiet and reflective today as thousands flocked to stand in sympathy with Paris and those left bereaved this week by an Islamist terror gang there.
Thousands came and held up pens, pencils, crayons, signs and their own hand drawn cartoons. They sang Le Marseillaise and applauded.
As darkness fell they lay down their pens on the floor and lit candles, the National Gallery was lit up in red, white and blue and Trafalgar Square’s famous fountains alternated between those same colours.
Some chose to hold up the offending Charlie Hebdo cartoons, but I have not published those photos. I have however published photos of those brave, brave women who I saw holding up signs stating Je Suis Juif. I hope they stay safe.
I also hope that the likes of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign that pour out hatred and lies to naive minds about Israel will now cease their vile activities.
Many of the anti-Israel events I have attended, and written up on this blog, are either full of support for Hamas and Hezbollah who state publicly their desire to murder Jews or they contain outright anti-Semitic language.
If something similar to Paris happens in London we will know who to blame.
Yes, that really does say Auschwitz, Iraq, Dachau, Palestine.
Some mocked the Holocaust, others disfigured the Israeli flag, a few screamed “Allahu Akbar”, they all called for the destruction of the Jewish state.
That was the scene outside London’s Israeli Embassy yesterday afternoon as many thousands thronged to hear blood-curdling speeches calling for the end of Israel.
Kensington High Street was closed off to traffic leaving London buses stranded by the protesters who requisitioned them and covered them with anti-Israel slogans.
The protest against Israel’s latest attack on Hamas in Gaza was a toxic mix of Islamists, trade unions like Unison, charities like War On Want, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and, of course, the extreme religious Jewish sect Neturei Karta.
I knew I had outstayed my welcome when a protester grabbed me and shouted “A Zionist!”. I shook him off and made for the relative safety of the tube station.
Here’s a clip for you to savour some of yesterday’s toxicity and some photos:
Disfiguring Israel’s flag. At least they didn’t burn it.
“Cheap Jewish settlements” because Jews are tight money grabbers of course!
War On Want’s Executive Director John Hilary.
Agreed! Palestinians should be freed from their Hamas oppressors.
Is that because Israel builds bomb shelters but Hamas doesn’t bother, possibly?
Courageous guy climbs a traffic light.
They’re the stars of the show at these hate events.
Will she be off to protest against Assad, Iran, ISIS and Boko Haram now?
Police under pressure and looking under-numbered for once.
Libyan support despite things not looking too rosy in Libya either.
One of our buses gets occupied. Tell Boris!
Remind me to invite him over for Friday night dinner soon.
War On Want flags. WOW to be renamed War On Israel anyone?
Not too sure what to say about this, so I think I’ll leave it at that.
Hmm, they mean Iran, Saudi, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq don’t they? Oh wait…
Can we have our bus back now please?
Errr, the problem is not Gaza, the problem is Hamas.
Ask them to ring back, you’re at an anti-Israel protest!
War On Want No! Who can argue with that?
Oh really. Now where does it say such a silly thing like that?
“Cover up, sweety, it’s getting a bit chilly”. Aw.
(I dedicate this blog to the memory of my recently deceased mum whom I loved and miss and who, before she lost the ability to speak due to her terminal illness, always gave me one piece of treasured advice when she knew I was going to an anti-Israel event: “Be careful.”)
As many as eight anti-Israel activists were arrested yesterday outside Israeli-owned Ecostream in Brighton, on England’s south coast. Ecostream belongs to Sodastream, which has a factory on the West Bank. Although Sodastream employs many Palestinians the anti-Israel lobby prefers to see the factory destroyed along with the livelihoods of Sodastream’s Israeli and Palestinian workforce.
Every Saturday anti-Israel activists flock to Ecostream to call for its boycott. They are always met by the stoical counter-protesting of Sussex Friends of Israel. Yesterday, however, the anti-Israel activists were swelled by the presence of Palestine Solidarity Campaign affiliated trade unionists from the NHS, NUT, GMB, NUJ and the University of Brighton.
But tempers rose and not before long the number of anti-Israel activists was depleted as protester after protester was led away to the back of a police van. A heartbreaking sight, indeed.
Then the police issued a “section 14” meaning both sides were kept apart and liable to arrest should anyone step outside their own zone. The remaining anti-Israel activists were restricted to the other side of the busy road opposite Ecostream and could, therefore, hardly be heard or seen for the remainder of the protest. Ecostream’s supporters stayed close to the shop.
Ecostream itself is a magical store. You can buy products that allow you to make your own carbonated drinks and you can refill your own bottles there with anything from honey, to olive oil to washing up liquid. Basically, cut down on your use of bottles and help the environment. Refilling is also vastly cheaper when there is no bottle to pay for.
Those of us who journeyed from London and other parts of England were very warmly received by Sussex Friends of Israel. Thanks to Harvey for driving a car load of us from London. It was good to see friends and meet new people and I also bought some lovely Palestinian olive oil from Ecostream.
Meanwhile, here are photos and footage of the action and photos from inside the Ecostream shop itself.
The first clip shows two of the alleged arrests and the second shows two trade unionists explaining how the presence of so many different trade unions protesting against Israel should make those supporting Israel “question themselves”. Well, that’s certainly an unbeatable argument if ever there was one:
Trendy jacket by Reiss.
Jessica Nero (left) was arrested inside Ahava’s London shop 3 years ago
Some dashing anti-Israel trade unionists.
Journalists wanting to destroy Palestinian and Israeli livelihoods.
GMB and NHS members wanting to destroy Palestinian and Israeli jobs.
Outside Ecostream before a section 14 was imposed by police.
Across the road after the section 14 was imposed.
University of Brighton wanting to shut down Palestinian and Israeli jobs.
What a motley crew.
More of the motley crew.
Coat on ground while being spoken to by the police.
“Boycott, Boycott, Boycott. Boycott Israeli products and settlement products. Put pressure on Israel economically. It’s the language THEY understand,” Mahmoud Doughlas implored his audience last night.
Doughlas wasn’t pressed on what he meant by “they”, but the language certainly seemed to contain a racist undercurrent.
Doughlas was speaking, via Skype from Nablus, at a PSC event hosted by P21 Gallery. The event was Education under Occupation – stories from West Bank and Gaza students.
Doughlas, an electrical engineering student at Birzeit University, was speaking from Nablus because, he said, Britain had refused him an entry visa.
He began by telling the audience that when he was in 7th grade Israeli soldiers entered his school “randomly injuring people” and throwing teargas into the classrooms. He couldn’t breathe for 15 minutes and ended up in hospital.
He claimed that one of his friends had been imprisoned for 18 months for writing graffiti on a settlement wall and, if I heard correctly, he said Palestinians have even “been arrested for dreaming about doing something”.
Meanwhile, Jehan al Farra, an alumnus of the Islamic University in Gaza, definitely was in London. She had been in the UK since September studying for a Masters in Computer Studies.
Her main preoccupation last night was describing the problems of studying in Gaza, especially getting to and from academic institutions there due to fuel shortages.
During the Q&A an audience member pointed out that she is highly articulate and very confident, which is a tribute to her teachers and the syllabus. This was a difficult point for her to address without admitting that, just maybe, the situation isn’t as bad as her and her colleagues were attempting to portray.
But she did address another point when an audience member claimed that “Israel had worked hard to destroy Palestinian heritage”. Al Farra said that Israel had even “occupied Palestinian culture”. An example she gave was the Israeli keffiya.
“Jews indigenous to the Middle East, such as my family is, have worn some variation of the “kefyah” (cap/kippah) and keffiyah (head/neck scarves) for thousands of years.”
Here is al Farra last night describing how Palestinians sometimes get killed in accidents when using electricity generators:
Last night the PSC was sporting its brand new logo (see top photo – top left of screen). However, on the PSC website and their leaflets the logo is still the map of Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, which is far more honest about their intentions for Israel:
And PSC’s Ameena Saleem, who was chairing last night’s event, wasted no opportunity to call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel. This, as we know, is merely code for calling for the Jewish state’s destruction.
P21 Gallery, itself, has a fairly large space at 21 Chalton Street. It supported St James’s Church’s Bethlehemfest over the Christmas period when St James’s Church ran a number of anti-Israel events while also erecting a copy of Israel’s security wall outside its premises in central London.
St James’s Church called for the real wall, which saves lives, to be dismantled. An astonishing £30,000 was spent building the copy wall.
Meanwhile, the charitable objectives of P21 Gallery (registered number 1153141) are:
“TO WORK IN COLLABORATION WITH BRITISH AND INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS, ORGANISATIONS, ARTISTS, CURATORS AND DESIGNERS TO PROMOTE, DOCUMENT AND FACILITATE PUBLIC ACCESS TO ARAB ART AND CULTURE IN BRITAIN BY ESTABLISHING AND MAINTAINING AN ART GALLERY AND CULTURAL CENTRE FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE PUBLIC.”
“The P21 Gallery is a London-based non-profit organisation promoting contemporary Middle Eastern and Arab art and culture with distinct focus on Palestine.”
Judging by last night’s event I think that the charitable objectives could possibly be more clearly defined as: Facilitating the destruction of Israel and its replacement with a Palestinian state.
But then that wouldn’t have sounded too charitable to the Charity Commissioners.
PSC’s Salim Alam handing out anti-Israel leaflets inside John Lewis.
Ewa Jaciewicz is an activist. That’s what she does. She was last seen hanging around inside a chimney in Nottingham for which she was “rigorously trained”. She writes about her activism in great detail for The Guardian.
On Saturday she helped orchestrate an anti-Israel protest inside John Lewis on London’s Oxford Street. About 50 anti-Israel activists followed her in and unfurled banners accusing Israel of apartheid and urging shoppers not to shop in John Lewis because it sells products made by Sodastream, an Israeli company with a factory on the West Bank that produces items enabling consumers to live greener lives.
Jaciewicz, a campaigner against climate change, should be sympathetic to Sodastream except her desire to see the Jewish state disappear obviously trumps all the good that Israeli companies do for the world.
Now, that’s hypocrisy for you.
Meanwhile, you can buy Sodastream products online from John Lewis here.
One of the signs unfurled by the activists read: “John Lewis…ethical policy? You profit from war and apartheid. Stop selling stolen goods.”
There is nothing illegal about Sodastream, and international law fully supports Israel’s presence in the West Bank. Anyone would have a very hard time disproving this.
But what Jaciewicz, a member of the Polish Campaign of Solidarity with Palestine, never wrote about for The Guardian was her trip a few years ago to the Warsaw Ghetto.
Now, what would a reasonable human being do if they visited a site where some 400,000 Jewish people (or people of any religion for that matter) lost their lives? Say a prayer, lay a flower, place a simple stone in remembrance?
Jaciewicz helped daub the words “Free Gaza and Palestine” on one of the nearby walls. What did any of those 400,000 innocent lost souls ever do to her?
Jaciewicz on the left near Warsaw Ghetto.
One of Jaciewicz’s accomplices inside John Lewis was Salim Alam, one of the head honchos at the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Alam once chaired a Palestine Solidarity Campaign meeting which was so horrific that afterwards one of the audience members let rip with a long Holocaust denial rant.
So these are just two of the characters that dominate the Palestine Solidarity Campaign’s activism against Israel.
If only the shoppers at John Lewis who heard the accusations of apartheid against Israel and the calls for Israel’s destruction knew these back stories then they might understand what this sort of activism against Israel is truly about.
After about 45 minutes the police turned up and the activists removed themselves from John Lewis after being warned by the police that they could otherwise be arrested for aggravated trespass.
And as thousands continue to be gassed and murdered in Syria by Assad where are the protests against that and where are Jaciewicz’s articles on Syria?
More photos/footage from Saturday:
Jaciewicz appears in this clip: blond and in a black top and on her phone.
anti-Israel activists inside John Lewis.
Thanks to Harvey for his footage and photos above and for the others that braved the onslaught on Saturday of this continuous vile campaign against the Jewish state.
Jeremy Corbyn MP, PSC’s Hugh Lanning, Manuel Hassassian in Parliament last night.
Last night Manuel Hassassian, the Palestinian “Ambassador” to the UK, said he believes that the Jews are the children of God because nobody is stopping them from building their “messianic dream of Eretz Israel”. He called for a “one state solution” and looked forward to the world’s Muslim population reaching two billion.
He was speaking in Parliament at the Palestine Solidarity Campaign’s 4 years on from Israel’s ‘Operation Cast Lead’: Israel’s siege and attacks continue. Also speaking were Labour’s Shadow Justice Minister Andy Slaughter MP and Liberal Democrat MP Sarah Teather. Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn played host.
Addressing an audience of some 100 people Hassassian declared:
“We, the Palestinians, the most highly educated and intellectual in the Middle East, are still struggling for the basic right of self-determination. What an irony. How long are we going to suffer and be patient with Israel? You know I’m reaching the conclusion that the Jews are the children of God, the only children of God and the Promised Land is being paid by God! I have started to believe this because nobody is stopping Israel building its messianic dream of Eretz Israel to the point I believe that maybe God is on their side. Maybe God is partial on this issue.”
Then removing his “PLO and Palestinian Authority hat” he continued:
“There is no two state solution. Democracies don’t fight each other. If Israel is a democracy I would claim that the Palestinians are also a democracy. If democracies cannot fight each other then why not have one state?; one man, one vote.”
On Israel’s future he said:
“Israel will never continue to exist as a pariah state. Israel could never continue to fight wars against the Palestinians, against the Arabs and the Muslims. The United States is not going to be Israel’s strategic ally for time immemorial. And today we have 1.5 billion Muslims. In 20 years we will have 2 billion. And those 2 billion, forget about politics, from a religious perspective will not allow Israel to continue desecrating their religious rights (in Jerusalem). And then what?”
And on what could have been Hassassian said:
“What does Israel want? In 2002 the Arabs gave them the Arab Peace Initiative. Relinquishing territories occupied in 1967 would have led to normalisation of relations with Israel. If the Israelis had accepted that the flag of Israel would have been hoisted in Mecca, in Iran, in Tehran! If they had accepted. But Israel does not want peace. Israel nurtures on conflict, and the Zionist Ideology is to have the entire West Bank, the entire Palestine.”
Andy Slaughter MP accused Israel of deliberately killing whole Palestinian families and controlling the Palestinians’ calorie count. He said Israel supplied Palestinians just enough to stop them from starving and he described, what he called, Israel’s failure to supply clean water, electricity and decent homes as “collective punishment”.
Sarah Teather MP accused Israel of “wiping out five thousand homes” in one part of Gaza alone and that nothing could justify this. She said that Israel must let “basic goods” into Gaza.
PSC Chair Hugh Lanning said he noticed that during Operation Cast Lead CNN only reported on the Hamas rockets. Lanning then claimed that “while the occupation and siege continues Israel is ALWAYS the aggressor”. He also claimed that Israel had banned 180 life saving medicines from Gazan hospitals “because they might save lives”.
Jeremy Corbyn spoke about Gazans who had “never known the ability to move out of Gaza”. Ironically, he then introduced us to Rania Al-Najjar who has just completed a Masters in International Relations at London’s City University. Rania is from Gaza. She said, inter alia, that there are no economic opportunities in Gaza and that unemployment there is the highest in the world, relatively.
We then heard from two “1948 Palestinians” who live in Israel. One of them had spent three spells in Israeli prisons, his sentences ranging from one to eight years. He spoke about the remaining prisoners who had forgotten what the sky and moon look like and how they had not touched the hands of their mothers or children for many years.
Finally, Hugh Lanning announced that there will be a “controversial PSC conference” on April 13th where there will be “an open dialogue with the people of Gaza and their leaders”.
I was reading through my copy of this week’s Jewish Chronicle when I saw a piece by Jennifer Lipman.
It was about the driver of Bus No 38 who had repeatedly honked his horn as he drove passed Palestine Solidarity Campaign protesters outside Batsheva’s performance of Decca Dance on its first night at Sadler’s Wells. The protesters cheered in response.
I caught the honking on film, but thought nothing more of it.
I was more interested in hoping that the anti-Israel protesters who disrupted each of Batsheva’s three performances might be prosecuted for aggravated trespass.
But someone did complain about the honking bus driver.
Jennifer reports that a spokesman for Arriva, responding to the complaint, said:
“That sort of behaviour is totally inappropriate whilst on duty and I can confirm that the driver has been identified and interviewed by his manager. He was advised on all aspects of your complaint and his performance will be closely monitored to make sure that there are no further incidents of this nature. I am sorry that a member of our staff should have acted in this manner.”
And a Transport For London spokesman said:
“We expect drivers to promote a positive image of London Buses and to act professionally at all times. Clearly, a London bus driver should not be participating in a protest while performing their duties.”
Here is the honking bus driver in action on the night:
And here is anti-Israel activist Deborah Fink just after she had been ejected for disrupting Batsheva’s first night performance:
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