Ni’lin continues to resist after 5 years of Israeli occupation and systematic land theft
A young demonstrator at Ni`ilin
International Solidarity Movement | April 27, 2013
Silwad, Occupied Palestine – Around 50 Palestinians supported by around 20 international activists, demonstrated against the apartheid wall yesterday in Ni’lin, which is a village close to Ramallah. The residents attempted to dismantle the wall and were met with violence. Around 20 were treated for tear gas inhalation and one demonstrator was injured when he was shot in the chest with a tear gas canister.
The demonstration started when around 100 people from the community gathered for the Friday prayer in an olive field. After prayers the demonstrators approached the apartheid wall, chanting peace slogans in Arabic and Hebrew. In a speech, a member of the Popular Committee expressed the injustices that Ni’lin has faced in the past and continues to face today because of the actions of the Israeli military.
Residents tried to open the metal door that separates them from most of their land that has been appropriated illegally by the establishment of settlements and the construction of the wall. Soldiers fired tear gas at the demonstrators. One demonstrator, who had climbed the wall using a ladder, was speaking to the soldiers through a megaphone before they shot him directly in the chest with a tear gas canister. The impact caused him to fall off the ladder and require medical treatment. More tear gas was fired at other demonstrators, photographers and internationals. The demonstration lasted about one hour, weakening the wall and showing the resilience of the population of Ni’lin.
Ni’lin’s history is characterised by land theft, starting with the first Israeli occupation of Palestine in 1948. Before 1948 the village of Ni’lin owned 58’000 dunams of land, from which 40’000 were stolen with the creation of Israel. The 1967 occupation lead to the construction of illegal settlements on Ni’lin’s land, stealing a further 8’000 dunams. The illegitimate establishment of the wall, which began in 2008, has stolen a further 2’500 dunams. Furthermore, the entrance of the village was closed in order to build a tunnel exclusively for settlers that lead to a further land theft of 200 dunams, highlighting the apartheid nature of Israeli policy. Nearly 90% of Ni’lin’s original land has been lost due to this systematic theft from war, settlements and the wall.
The non-violent demonstrations since 2008 have lead to the killings of five Palestinians. 10 year old Ahmed Moussa, 17 year old Yousef Amera, 22 year old Arafat Khawaja, 20 year old Mohammed Khawaja and 36 year old Yousef ‘Akil’ Srour. The residents of Ni’lin still struggle for peace and justice, and will not give up hope in spite of Israel’s use of extreme force and oppression.
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Israel spy agency has presence in Syria, says senior rebel general
By Joseph Fitsanakis | intelNews | April 25, 2013
Israel is one of several countries that maintain a significant intelligence presence inside Syria, according to the top commander of the Syrian rebel forces.
General Salim Idriss, Chief of Staff for the Free Syrian Army, told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour that the Jewish state has “many, many” intelligence officers in various parts of Syria. The Arab country has been rocked since 2011 by a violent civil war, which has cost the lives of at least 60,000 people.
Idriss was responding to comments made earlier this week by Brigadier General Itai Brun, senior intelligence analyst for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Brun, who heads the Division for Research and Analysis of the IDF’s Military Intelligence Directorate, was speaking at a conference hosted in Tel Aviv, Israel, by the Institute for National Security Studies. He told an audience of intelligence experts that the IDF was “quite certain” that the Syrian government headed by President Bashar al-Assad had resorted to the use of chemical weapons against rebel forces on at least one instance.
According to Brun, footage obtained by the IDF of rebel casualties from a March 19 attack by Syrian government forces, pointed to the use of sarin nerve gas. He referred to evidence such as the victims’ dilated pupils and “the foam coming out of their mouths” as strong proof of the use of weaponized sarin nerve gas in the battlefield.
Responding to Brun’s allegations, General Idriss suggested that Syrian government forces had used chemical weapons repeatedly in a variety of locations, including Aleppo, Homs, and the outskirts of capital Damascus. He added that rebel forces had collected “some samples of soil and blood” and surrendered it to outside “observers” of the civil war —though he refused to identify these observers. After some pressure from Amanpour, Idriss said it made sense for the IDF to know that sarin nerve gas had been used by the Syrian government, since Israel was one of several countries that had “many, many” intelligence officers inside Syria. Asked by Amanpour whether he was referring to Israeli covert-action agency Mossad, Idriss responded “yes”.
In response to Brun’s comments, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters on Tuesday that Washington was “looking for conclusive evidence, if it exists, if there was use of chemical weapons”.
European brands agree to compensate Tazreen victims, US corporations refuse
IndustriAll | 16.04.2013
Major European retailers C&A, KiK and El Corte Inglés will contribute to a compensation plan for the victims of the Tazreen Fashions fire in Bangladesh.
The brands made the commitment at a meeting held on 15 April in Geneva to discuss a 5.7 million USD compensation plan for the victims of the Tazreen Fashions fire in Bangladesh, which killed 112 workers and injured about 120 in November 2012.
The meeting was hosted by IndustriALL Global Union and attended by major European retailers, a leading Bangladesh trade unionist, the Clean Clothes Campaign and the Worker Rights Consortium.
In an outrageous display of indifference to the suffering of Bangladeshi families, major US corporations Walmart, Sears/Kmart and Disney refused to pay any compensation to the victims and failed to attend the meeting. Walmart was apparently the largest buyer from the Tazreen factory. The companies, which failed to enforce their own worker safety standards, have claimed to be deeply saddened by the deaths.
Major European retailers C&A (Netherlands), KiK (Germany) and El Corte Inglés (Spain) attended the meeting and agreed to make substantial contributions to the compensation plan for the families of the dead and for the injured. The Italian clothing brand Piazza Italia did not attend but has agreed to participate in the package.
“We have agreed on confirming the concrete amounts that each of these brands will contribute by the end of this month,” says IndustriALL General Secretary Jyrki Raina. “The families and the injured have already waited far too long.”
Other companies that were sourcing from Tazreen and failed to attend include Hong Kong based trader Li & Fung, Teddy Smith (France), Edinborough Woolen Mills (UK), Dickies (US) and Karl Rieker (Germany). Li & Fung has however agreed to paying compensation.
The compensation plan, developed by IndustriALL and its affiliates in Bangladesh and supported by international labour rights groups, is based on the compensation formula used in other recent fires. These include the December 2010 fire at That’s It Sportswear, a factory producing for Gap and other US brands, and the fire this January at Smart Export Garments, which was producing clothes for Inditex and others. The details of the plan will be worked out in a subsequent meeting to be held in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Says Ineke Zeldenrust from the Clean Clothes Campaign, “We once again call upon Walmart and the other major companies sourcing from Tazreen to aid the families of the dead and the injured workers. Their refusal to do so indicates a shocking lack of concern for the rights and well-being of the workers who make their clothes and who, in this case, were injured or killed in the process.”
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Hundreds of Bangladeshi garment workers die
IndustriAll | 25.04.2013
The worst ever industrial accident in Bangladesh has killed more than 200 garment workers with fears of a final death toll reaching 1,000 as hundreds remain injured and trapped in the debris.
“Cut off my hand, save my life!” screams a woman trapped under the collapsed eight-story Rana Plaza building in Savar, 30 kilometres outside Dhaka. The same request is shouted by trapped Aftab, while other screams in the rubble demand oxygen. 200,000 local people have assembled in Savar offering to donate blood to the rescue effort, as hospitals are gravely under supplied.
The mass industrial manslaughter occurred at 9am, 24 April. The collapsed building, illegally constructed, contained five garment factories with 2,500 workers. Those five factories are Ether Tex, New Wave Bottoms, New Wave Style, Phantom Apparels and Phantom-TAC. These factories are believed to have produced for several well-known western brands including Mango, Primark, C&A, KIK, Wal-Mart, Children’s Place, Cato Fashions, Benetton, Matalan and Bon Marché.
On 23 April, the day before the collapse, large structural cracks appeared in the supporting pillars of Rana Plaza, but local authorities were ignored by the building owner Sohel Rana and the garment factory owners when they gave the order to evacuate, while the three shops and bank on the building’s ground floor heeded the warning and evacuated. A Rana Plaza garment worker had to work three days unpaid for every one work day missed, so workers were reluctant to stay safe at home on 24 April.
Now over 2,000 workers are injured in hospital, many critically, 254 are dead and many more continue screaming from under the rubble. The IndustriALL Global Union affiliated textile and garment trade unions in Bangladesh are present and supporting the rescue efforts. Affiliates work jointly through the IndustriALL Bangladesh Council (IBC) which yesterday used a joint press conference to put forward joint demands and a programme of action, calling for justice and action from authorities and brands. The IBC will mobilize all affiliates in a mass demonstration on 26 April in front of the Dhaka Press Club.
20,000 furious garment workers from neighbouring factories this morning brought five major highways to a halt, and several local skirmishes saw angry protestors target garment factories that were not respecting the national day of mourning, forcing them to close and show respect to the dead. Protestors also targetted the building of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers & Exporters Association (BGMEA).
The systemic problems must be tackled immediately in Bangladesh’s garment industry and much responsibility must fall on the western clothing brands making enormous profits from items made in deadly conditions on poverty wages. While brands continue refusing to pay a sufficient price for safe production of their clothes, their calls for improved safety are not sincere.
Much needed improvements to the national labour law have been debated through Bangladesh’s legislative process, with the government cabinet approving revisions on 22 April. However this process has been lobbied by the global garment industry buyers who have demanded a scaling back of workers’ rights initially proposed in the reform.
IndustriALL Global Union believes that Bangladeshi garment workers deserve the right to work in safety, with full access to organize and bargain collectively in trade unions, and a substantial rise of the current US$38 monthly minimum wage.
IndustriALL Global Union General Secretary Jyrki Raina said:
This terrible tragedy highlights the urgency of putting a stop to the race to the bottom in supplying cheap means of production to international brands, a race in which hundreds of workers have lost their lives. Global clothing brands and retailers have a responsibility for their full production chains. Now it is time for them, suppliers and the Bangladeshi government to sit down with IndustriALL and its affiliates to agree on a safety program that will ensure this will never happen again.