“I was more than terrified,” [Sena Alissa] says while holding her newborn baby girl in a bed in Gaza City’s struggling al-Shifa hospital, 20 minutes from Nuseirat. “I’m giving birth in war.” (source)
The latest Israeli attack on occupied Palestine in the form of an ongoing military assault on the people living in the Gaza Strip has made an already unbearable situation much more devastating. Women, children, and elders represent the majority of the hundreds of people who have lost their lives. The assaults are a form of reproductive violence by creating conditions that increase miscarriages, pre-term labor, and stillbirths. Israel is currently targeting sewage systems, worsening an existing water crisis created by the Israel blockade of supplies to Gaza, and depriving hundreds of thousands of Gaza residents of clean water. Free Palestine is, and always has been, a feminist issue.
People around the world are mobilizing direct actions to denounce Israel’s brutal violence and ongoing occupation. Here’s a list of convergences. Below is INCITE!’s statement of endorsement of the movement for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel, framing the occupation with a race & gender analysis.
Here are handouts: PDF, JPEG Front, JPEG Back
The statement is in text below. Also visit this call from ASWAT to LGBTQ organizations to take action against the bombing of Gaza civilians. And download and place stickers or bookmarks where you see items that should be boycotted. TAKE ACTION!
INCITE! endorses the Palestinian call for BDS—Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions for Palestine because…
- Israel is a settler colonial state founded on the ethnic cleansing of 80% of the indigenous Palestinian people…
- And because Israel considers Palestinian women a “demographic threat,”…
- And because one in four women in Gaza, and 4 in 5 children there, are undernourished…
- And because the siege on Gaza was described as “catastrophic” and a “prelude to genocide” even before the latest murderous assault…
- And because Amnesty International, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and a UN-commissioned independent report have concluded that Israel’s offensive in Gaza amounted to “crimes against humanity”…
- And because the restrictions imposed by Israel have resulted in a 58% increase in miscarriages among Palestinian women in the West Bank in a single year…
- And because Israel celebrates the declining Palestinian birth rate as a success, while encouraging Jewish women to have more children…
- And because Israel promotes itself as a haven for gay people, while barring queer Palestinians from participating in Pride day celebrations…
- And because Palestinian children are arrested by Israeli soldiers with no right to due process, and are imprisoned without any charges against them…
- And because our tax dollars are used, against our will, to create a living hell for Palestinian women and their families…
- And because, since 2000, nearly 6500 Palestinians have been killed, including over 1400 children, and 40,000 have been injured…
- And because, since 2000, 20,000 Palestinian homes have been demolished to allow for Israeli “natural growth,”…
- And because Israel has resisted all official attempts to force it to comply with international law and end its violation of Palestinian human rights…
- And because Israeli control and domination of the geographic terrain and resources of Palestine deny Palestinian families the right to free mobility, clean water, food, and other basic living necessities…
- And because reports of torture and sexual violence of Palestinian men and women political prisoners and detainees violate international human rights law…
- And because Israel’s entrenched system of discrimination and segregation constitutes an apartheid system as harsh as South Africa’s old system…
- And because the global Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement played a major role in ending apartheid in South Africa, and is the model and inspiration of the Palestinian people today…
- And because Palestinian civilian society, not their corrupt “leaders,” is calling upon the international community to show its solidarity and support by engaging in a similar consistent and comprehensive movement…
We can support the Global BDS movement by engaging in boycotting Israeli products everyday.
For more info on the global BDS movement, please visit:
http://www.bsdmovement.net/
http://usacbi.org/
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