> On 6/8/06, tfast <tfast at yorku.ca> wrote:
> > As the original message indicates I forwarded it from one of our
members. I
> > an provide you with her email offlist if you want or perhaps persuade
her to
> > temporarily join lbo-talk.
> >
> > In any case, I have to say I am ambivalent about the equivocation.
Although
> > strategically I think it is unhelpful. To the extent that it has caused
any
> > debate in the mainstream press it has simply been attacked as malicious
> > rhetoric.
>
> If you hate flaks, you shouldn't make a peep about Israel and
> Palestinians, for any way you talk about it -- from a play about
> Rachel Corrie to Stephen Spielberg's movie about the costs of Zionism
> to the PCUSA's selective divestment -- you'll get flaks. Most people
> don't relish getting flaks, and that's why they don't speak up, as
> evidenced by the cancellation of My Name Is Rachel Corrie. The amount
> of flaks you get is not based on what you say and how you say it but
> the level of your name recognition (if an individual) or institutional
> weight (if a union, a church, or something like that). I'm sure the
> PCUSA and Tony Kushner have gotten more flaks than the most strident
> but obscure anti-Zionists on the margins of the sectarian left.
>
> Since you must expect flaks if you get any attention at all, what you
> need to do, should you decide to speak up, is to steel yourself, line
> up allies, and exploit flaks to keep the debate alive. That seems to
> be what Sid Ryan, CUPE Ontario President, seems to be doing well, and
> he got to publish this in The Toronto Star, a mainstream press.
>
> <blockquote>CUPE has history of defending human rights
> Ontario union democratically voted to engage in a peaceful form of
> protest against Israel, says Sid Ryan
>
> Jun. 8, 2006. 01:00 AM
>
> Members of CUPE Ontario — hardworking and intelligent individuals who
> provide a range of services in every one of our communities — have
> been called everything in the last week or so from courageous to naïve
> to stupid. But the resolution approved by delegates at the largest
> convention in our history, to support an international campaign of
> boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, has to be seen in
> the context of our union's overall policy on the Middle East and our
> history of union democracy and social justice.
>
> CUPE Ontario's policy dates back to 2002. Then delegates to that
> convention approved a resolution requesting the Canadian government
> call for, and actively work toward, an end to suicide bombings and
> other violence against innocent people. The resolution also demanded
> that Israel abide by United Nations resolution 242 and withdraw from
> the Occupied Territories. The Canadian Labour Congress approved a
> similar resolution in the same year.
>
> At the national level in 2003, CUPE members added their support for a
> peace process based on equality between Israelis and Palestinians and
> on the implementation of UN resolutions and international law.
>
> Yet the years go by and the levels of poverty and oppression
> experienced by ordinary Palestinian people are further entrenched.
>
> While editorialists condemned CUPE members for their naïveté — or
> worse — the World Food Program was reporting nearly 51 per cent of the
> Palestinian people are unable to feed themselves.
>
> Its study pointed to international sanctions against Hamas and Israeli
> security restrictions on border crossing points that are holding up
> aid and trade. One UN official described the growing numbers of
> people, especially children, rummaging through garbage cans for food.
>
> But this debasement and dehumanization did not start with the election
> of Hamas, a legitimate election whether we like the results or not.
> And, for the record, we believe Hamas must renounce violence and
> recognize Israel's right to exist.
>
> There are Palestinians who have spent their whole lives in crowded
> refugee camps. They spend hours in arbitrary delay and frustration at
> checkpoints on their way to work, school or medical appointments.
> Hundreds of roads have been torn up to inhibit travel.
>
> Since 2000, the Israeli army has demolished more than 3,000
> Palestinian houses and apartment buildings, leaving people homeless,
> possessions lost.
>
> In the occupied West Bank, Palestinians are allotted about 70 litres
> of water a day, while Israeli settlers get 600 litres. Unemployment is
> sky-high and health care difficult to get.
>
> Israel did remove settlers from the Gaza Strip. But the area is still
> surrounded by a massive electric fence, in effect creating a blockade
> and making it almost impossible for Palestinians to conduct commerce.
>
> Israel also continues to build the wall, creating a border that it has
> decided unilaterally and taking another 10 per cent of West Bank land
> for its own.
>
> And Israel continues to expand the illegal settlements in the West
> Bank in defiance of UN resolutions.
>
> Despite an International Court of Justice declaration that the wall is
> illegal, despite UN resolutions, despite opposition among many of its
> own citizens and calls to withdraw coming from countries,
> organizations — yes, even unions — around the world, Israel persists
> in policies that punish all Palestinians.
>
> So, frustrated like so many millions who support a negotiated and just
> peace in the Middle East, CUPE members exercised their right to
> introduce policy resolutions to their Ontario division convention.
>
> Three locals and one district council submitted resolutions on
> supporting the existing international campaign. It was distributed
> along with other resolutions in advance of our convention, as outlined
> in our constitution.
>
> It was placed in a list by our duly constituted resolutions committee,
> debated and approved on the convention floor.
>
> CUPE members continue to support a peace process.
>
> We continue to oppose suicide bombings and other violence against
> innocent people.
>
> But we also agreed that it is time to draw back the curtain on a
> developing, man-made humanitarian crisis in the occupied territories.
>
> To draw attention to this inhumane suffering, we democratically voted
> to engage in a peaceful form of protest against the policies of the
> State of Israel, which are clearly contrary to international law.
>
> Sid Ryan is president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees,
> Ontario, the political wing of Canada's largest union. CUPE Ontario
> acts on behalf of its more than 200,000 members.
>
>
<http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Arti
cle_PrintFriendly&c=Article&cid=1149717018332&call_pageid=968256290204></blo
ckquote>
>
> CUPE and COSATU's position has also gotten attention of the press in
> Israel/Palestine:
> "COSATU Supports CUPE Ontario for Resolution on Boycotting Israel,"
> Palestine News Agency, 7 June 2006,
> <http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?id=6508>;
> Ronen Bodoni, "South African Union Joins Boycott of Israel," 8 June 2006,
> <http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3260201,00.html>.
>
> That Israelis as well as Palestinians get to know that criticisms of
> the Israeli policy are gradually spreading from individual activists
> to sizable institutions on the left like the PCUSA and CUPE Ontario in
> the West, supported by South Africans, is what matters.
>
> That's setting aside that you can't do even purely bread-and-butter
> unionism if you are afraid of flaks. Anytime you go on strike, you
> get flaks, more so than when you speak up about Israel if your strike
> happens to impact a lot of people like TWU Local 100's strike last
> year. Hell, you may get fines, jail time, or worse.
>
> --
> Yoshie
> <http://montages.blogspot.com/>
> <http://mrzine.org>
> <http://monthlyreview.org/>
>
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