The New Dark Age

18 January, 2010 — Scottish PSC

1. Scottish PSC Activists in court

2. Never Again for Anyone speaking tour starts this week! – HMD Trust refuses to publicise meeting with Auschwitz survivor

SPSC campaigners facing trumped-up political charges of ‘racism’ Thursday 21st and Friday 22nd of January, 9.30am outside Edinburgh Sheriff Court

Help us fight the move to criminalise the boycott of Israel. The same British authorities who support the siege of Gaza are working to stifle Israel’s critics here.

Even if you can only be there for 10 minutes to show your support, please meet outside the court at 9.30am on Thursday and Friday, and stay for as little or as long as you can. A court room full of supporters makes a difference. For more information on the case please check SPSC website: http://www.scottishpsc.org.uk

Thursday 21st and Friday 22nd of January, 9.30am

Sheriff Court, Chambers Street, Edinburgh, EH1 1LB

Map: http://tinyurl.com/EdinburghSheriff-Court

“Anyone who stands up for Palestinians is automatically accused of being ‘anti-Semitic’. I am Jewish and proud to be Honorary President of the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign, an anti-racist group that opposes Israeli apartheid.” Marion Woolfson

Five SPSC members are facing trial on Friday for boycotting Israeli state-sponsored cultural ambassadors, the Jerusalem Quartet. The Israeli musicians, in the words of their admirers, believe that ‘a rifle in one hand and a violin in the other is the ultimate Zionist statement.’ While Israel was carrying out what the UN’s Goldstone report describes as “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity” in Gaza early this year, the Procurator Fiscal here in Edinburgh was preparing to drop the original Breach of the Peace charge in favour of new charges of “racially aggravated conduct”.

This Thursday and Friday prosecution and defence witnesses will be called and the BBC recording of our protest will be presented. Our lawyers will argue that what the SPSC campaigners’ actions are in no way racist, but a political statement against the actions committed by the state of Israel – actions directed to end the ‘culture of impunity’ in which Israel breaches in a daily basis international and human rights law.

Boycott helped end South African Apartheid, and can do likewise with Israel. The TUC have now joined the STUC, and many others, in pushing for boycott of Israel until it stops its crimes.

The five accused are confident this trial will see the Israeli State and its British allies in the dock of the real supreme court: the court of public opinion.

HMD Trust refuses to publicise meeting with Auschwitz survivor

To: Holocaust Memorial Day Trust

18 January 2010

The UN’s Judge Goldstone added his voice recently to the condemnations of Israel’s massacres in Gaza and ongoing violations of human rights across the whole of Palestine. Those who remain silent concerning those crimes are sending a dangerous signal to Israel that it can indeed kill with impunity. We fear that Israel is planning fresh massacres.

The commemoration of the Nazi Holocaust can and should be an opportunity to reflect on all examples of state-directed mass murder and to intensify our commitment to end them. We deplore the decision the UK Government-sponsored Holocaust Memorial Day Trust website to commemorate mass killings selectively, and to exclude reference to the mass killings in Iraq, Afghanistan and, recently, Palestine. It is truly shocking that the official HMD website is censoring all publicity for the 2010 Holocaust commemoration meetings where Hajo Meyer, a survivor of the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, will speak of his experiences and call for solidarity with the besieged and violated people of Gaza.

We call upon the HMD website to immediately publicise these important events: otherwise the impression will spread that the memory of the Holocaust is being selectively used to further an agenda in support of British and Israeli militarism. Signed

Mick Napier, Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign mailto:campaign@scottishpsc.org.uk to add your signature]

Download Never Again Tour Leaflet/Poster

Join the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign & the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network for a UK tour with

Hajo Meyer, Auschwitz survivor & Palestine solidarity activist. Dr. Hajo G. Meyer was born in 1924 in Bielefeld, Germany. Not allowed to attend school there after November 1938, he fled to the Netherlands, alone. In I944, after a year in the underground, he was caught and subsequently survived 10 months at Auschwitz. He lives in the Netherlands, where he works as publicist and essayist. A member of IJAN, Hajo Meyer is on the board of the Dutch group “A Different Jewish Voice”, part of the coalition of European Jews for Just Peace. He is the author of three books, on Judaism, Holocaust and Zionism.

‘My great lesson from Auschwitz is: whoever wants to dehumanise any other, must first be dehumanised himself. The oppressors are no longer really human whatever uniform they wear.’ read interview with Hajo Meyer

Also with Dr Haidar Eid, independent political commentator and activist residing in Gaza.

“Archbishop Desmund Tutu of South Africa said, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” The UN, EU, Arab League and the international community by and large have remained silent in the face of atrocities committed by Apartheid Israel. They are therefore on the side of Israel. Hundreds of dead corpses of children and women have failed to convince them to act. This is what every Palestinian knows today — whether on the streets of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank or refugee camps in the Diaspora.” read full article http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10232.shtml

21-30 January 2010: Scotland, England and Ireland – Scottish meetings in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee

On January 27, Holocaust Remembrance Day, leading politicians from the U.S. and Europe will join in honouring the memory of Jews killed in the Nazi genocide. Yet the immensity of that tragedy is dishonoured by the hypocrisy of the ceremonies: those who pay homage to the victims of yesterday’s silence are silent about today’s inhumanity. We say, “Never again!” For anyone. Never again for the people of Gaza. Never again for all those struggling against dehumanization, racism and genocide everywhere, every day.

21/1: Glasgow, 7.30pm, Glasgow University, Charles Wilson Building 22/1: Dundee, 7.30pm, D’Arcy Thompson Lecture Theatre, Ground Floor, Tower Building, Perth Road (hosted by Dundee University Stop the War Society) 23/1: Edinburgh, 2pm, Augustine Church, George IV Bridge 24/1: Sheffield 25/1: Liverpool 26/1-28/1: London 29/1: Belfast 30/1: Dublin