End the Siege on Gaza -International Day of Action - Saturday 26th January - Parliament, London

View a short film about the 400 strong protest on the 12th of January outside Downing Street:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWhBC6hP6cM
Join us in protesting against Israel blocking desperately ill Palestinians from accessing medical treatment and its escalating military attacks on Gaza

Saturday 26 January, 4-6pm Parliament

We are particularly appealing to medical staff to join us in uniform to visibly express their opposition to Israel preventing Gazans from traveling for lifesaving medical treatment.

‘The human catastrophe deliberately inflicted on Gaza by western policies over the past two years is one of the great crimes of the century so far’. Jonathan Steele, Guardian 11 January.

Israel’s illegal, brutal siege of Gaza is tightening, restricting fuel and electricity, and preventing even medical supplies, food, essential construction materials and paper for UN schoolbooks from entering Gaza . With lethal military strikes being launched on Gaza , and Ehud Barak has warned that an Israeli invasion of Gaza is nearing.

Even those who desperately need medical treatment are prevented from leaving. Over 65 Palestinians have died as a direct result of Israel ’s prevention of access to medical treatment. Miri Weingarten from the Physicians for Human Rights-Israel said ‘ Israel intends and wishes to punish the general population in Gaza , and they’re not hiding it — in fact, they’ve stated it clearly.’

Dr Ahmed Abu Tawahineh, deputy director of the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme, has pointed out that since last June, only a hundred patients have been allowed out of Gaza to seek treatment - less than 10 per cent of the more than 1,000 applicants.

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported harrowing scenes of: ’a two-and-a-half-year-old boy, Ahmed Samut from Khan Yunis, and a nine-and-a-half-year-old girl, Sausan Jaafari, of Rafah, as they entered the Erez crossing alone, after being torn from the arms of their weeping parents. The two children have heart conditions and need urgent surgery to save their lives...The parents of the two children, both fathers and mothers, were not permitted by the Israel Defense Forces’ coordination and liaison administration to accompany their children to this critical surgery. They are “denied entry” to Israel . The fact that Sausan’s parents had accompanied her to previous operations at Wolfson did not change the evil decree. It is indeed a decree of unparalleled evil. Only the elderly uncle of one of the children was allowed to go with them.’ http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/943343.html.

How long can this inhuman treatment continue unchallenged by international leaders?

Collective punishment is being inflicted upon the Palestinians for voting for a government against the wishes of Israel , the US and the EU.

Call on the British government to end its collusion with these policies, which are imprisoning Gazans and attempting to destroy their lives by limiting access to food, electricity, clean water supplis and medical treatment.

26 January has been declared a day of international solidarity. Join us in calling on our government to act to immediately lift the siege of Gaza . Join us in calling on our government to end the siege immediately!

More details: www.palestinecampaign.org; www.endgazasiege.net;

View a short film about the 400 strong protest on the 12th of January outside Downing Street:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWhBC6hP6cM

***PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY***

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Dr Norman Finkelstein UK Speaking Tour
In Manchester, Keele, Cambridge, London, Sussex and Edinburgh

From 21st to 25th January.

Author of ’Image & Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict’, ’The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering’ and ’Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti Semitism and the Abuse of History’. He is the son of two Holocaust survivors and one of the world’s foremost political scientists.

For full details and booking information please visit: http://tinyurl.com/2y7o2v

Monday 21 Jan

Manchester University 19:30 - 22:00

Tuesday 22nd of January 2008
Keele University 12:00 - 13:15

University of Cambridge (evening)

Wednesday 23 Jan 2008
London School of Economics 18:00 - 20:00

Thursday 24 Jan 2008
University of Sussex 13:30 - 15:30

Friday 25 Jan 2008
Edinburgh University 18:00 - 21:00

Palestine Solidarity Campaign
Box BM PSA
London
WC1N 3XX

Tel: 020 7700 6192
Fax: 020 7609 7779

Email: info@palestinecampaign.org

Web: www.palestinecampaign.org