Vermont Labour Council stands against “Israeli apartheid”
Vermont (QNN)- Vermont State Labour Council has announced joining alliance of Labor for Palestine which stands against “Israeli apartheid.”
“As workers, labor, and anti-apartheid activists, we join millions around the world to unequivocally condemn Israel’s genocidal attacks on the Palestinian people,” the Council said in a statement posted on Facebook.
The council mentioned several attacks on the Palestinian people in the statemnet such as, mass evictions in the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighborhoods of Jerusalem, storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque, waves of state-sponsored violence throughout the West Bank and the ’48 areas (stolen from Palestine in 1948), and merciless bombardment of Gaza that has already killed and wounded hundreds of people, many of them children.
The Council stated that these crimes are only possible because of “$3.8 billion a year (or $10+ million *per day*) in bipartisan US military aid that gives Israel the guns, bullets, tanks, ships, jet fighters, missiles, helicopters, white phosphorus and other weapons to kill and maim the Palestinian people.”
While referring to George Floyd’s death, the council said that Palestinians can’t breathe since 1948 with Israel’s knee on their neck.
The Council also expressed an unconditional stand with the Palestinians resistance in all parts of Palestine, “just as they have stood with our struggles for Black and Brown Lives, Standing Rock, migrant rights, and beyond.”
The Council also urged all workers and labor bodies in the US to join the growing mass protests against apartheid Israel.
“We uplift the Italian dockworkers who refused to ship weapons to Israel on April 14, thereby answering the urgent May 13 appeal for international solidarity, signed by Palestinian trade unions, to support the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS),” the Council said.
On the same issue, Executive Board Member, Helen Scott (of the AFT) stated, “The VT AFL-CIO opposes racism and discrimination of all kinds, stands in solidarity with workers across the world, and recognizes the power of organized labor to effect positive social change.”
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“We have heard the call of Palestinian workers’ organizations for global solidarity in their struggle for freedom and justice and we applaud the growing number of US unions that have responded with resolutions, statements, and workplace actions, such as the Block the Boat campaign. We, therefore, endorse US Labor Must Stand with Palestine.”
