WAC does not have a strike fund. We do not know how long the strike will last but we would like to have some emergency funds to give the workers in case the strike continues for over a week. If money will arrive after the strike ends it will be put in a special strike fund for future struggles.
For 27 years, since Salit Quarries began operating in the occupied West Bank under the ownership of Jews from Jerusalem, it has employed Palestinian workers from the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Though quarrying sand and gravel from the desert Mountains just 10 km east of Jerusalem has brought considerable profit to the owners, the workers have been employed under exploitative terms and with insufficient safety standards. Until the workers began organizing with WAC (in May 2007), the West Bank workers were employed without pay slips and without pension insurance. No tests had been carried out to ascertain the affect of the dust on the workers’ health, and there were no facilities such as a dining room, washrooms or water cooler though the quarry is located in an isolated arid region. Following claims and pressure from WAC and the workers, the quarry agreed to some improvements.
On June 16, 35 Palestinian workers at Salit Quarries in Mishor Adumim (a settlement area east of Jerusalem) began a general strike. The workers, organized with the independent Union WAC-Ma’an, are demanding an end to exploitation and humiliation, and insist on signing a first collective agreement. The strike began after the workers and the union approved a draft agreement, while the management tried to take advantage of the opposition of a small number of more privileged workers in order to break the union and avoid the agreement. WAC and the workers demand that the agreement be signed immediately. If the agreement is not signed, the strike will continue.
For 27 years, since Salit Quarries began operating in the occupied West Bank under the ownership of Jews from Jerusalem, it has employed Palestinian workers from the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Though quarrying sand and gravel from the desert Mountains just 10 km east of Jerusalem has brought considerable profit to the owners, the workers have been employed under exploitative terms and with insufficient safety standards. Until the workers began organizing with WAC (in May 2007), the West Bank workers were employed without pay slips and without pension insurance. No tests had been carried out to ascertain the affect of the dust on the workers’ health, and there were no facilities such as a dining room, washrooms or water cooler though the quarry is located in an isolated arid region (see story). Following claims and pressure from WAC and the workers, the quarry agreed to some improvements.
On June 16, 35 Palestinian workers at Salit Quarries in Mishor Adumim (a settlement area east of Jerusalem) began a general strike. The workers, organized with the independent Union WAC-Ma’an, are demanding an end to exploitation and humiliation, and insist on signing a first collective agreement. The strike began after the workers and the union approved a draft agreement, while the management tried to take advantage of the opposition of a small number of more privileged workers in order to break the union and avoid the agreement. WAC and the workers demand that the agreement be signed immediately. If the agreement is not signed, the strike will continue.
Through WAC-Ma’an we learned that the Salit Quarries workers in Mishor Adumim began a general strike on June 16 because the management did not live up to its promise to sign the collective agreement at the last moment.
Conversation with Erez Wagner, WAC’s Coordinator in East Jerusalem – Erez Wagner is coordinator at the Jerusalem branch of the Workers Advice Center. He is 31 years old, married, and father of an eight-month-old daughter. In addition to his work with WAC, Erez is also a prolific artist, and has donated some of his works to the “Bread and Roses” exhibition. He is currently working on a new radio program, “Work Hour,” on Thursdays at 9:00 a.m. on the Voice of Peace (107.2 FM).
A two-year struggle waged by 45 Salit Quarry workers came
The first day of October was an historic day for
