PETITION: Dissent From AFL-CIO Support for Israeli Invasion

[Mark Pavlick]

>
>Please repost and circulate widely among union members.
>
>To: AFL-CIO Executive Council and Officers
>The Executive Board
>AFL-CIO
>Washington, D.C.
>
>We, the undersigned labor unionists, deplore the fact that AFL-CIO President
>John Sweeney recently associated U.S. labor's name with support for the
>Israeli invasion of the West Bank which has resulted in the widespread death
>and destruction of the Palestinian people and property.
>
>We are shocked that President Sweeney appeared at a Washington, D.C. press
>conference with Bush administration officials, and among others, Benjamin
>Netanyahu of the Israeli extreme right-wing.
>
>It would be more appropriate for the highest official in U.S. labor to be
>meeting with peace groups in Israel and the United States. It would be a
>sign of great leadership to call for teach-ins in every U.S. Labor Council
>so that workers could learn and debate the complexities of the Mid-east
>crisis.
>
>We fail to see how collaboration with U.S. foreign policy in this horrific
>aggression can advance the cause of world peace or improve the lives of the
>U.S. people or the Israeli and Palestinian people.
>
>All the world knows the murderous assault on the Palestinians with the most
>modern tanks, helicopters, and missiles is financed by our taxes. It is
>imperative that our labor leadership demand the demilitarization of our
>economy and specifically educate workers on the perils of an almost $400
>billion military budget that undermines funding for our schools, housing,
>health care, and social security. The present situation invites the U.S.
>military industrial complex to reach into every corner of the globe to
>protect U.S. multi-national corporations as they loot the world's resources
>and exploit foreign labor.
>
>We recognize that to dissent from U.S. foreign policy would be an act of
>courage. It would also be an electrifying act of hope for working and poor
>people everywhere who have so much to lose from what appears to be permanent
>war.
>
>TO SIGN THIS PETITION, GO TO --
>http://www.petitiononline.com/WeObject/petition.html

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