International Relations
Organizing Palestinian workers: Raising the flag of solidarity.
MAAN Workers Association continues to raise the flag of international
23/12/2020
MAAN Workers Association continues to raise the flag of international
[:en]As an organization that inscribes on its banner the principle
[:en]For over a month now, with much concern and feelings
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On Sunday, December 13, 2015, the Israeli daily Calcalist (Yediot Aharonot’s economic supplement) published an article that announced the failure of the deal between Israel and China, which had been slated to allow the importation of 20,000 Chinese workers as bonded labour to work in the Israeli construction industry.
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There is no better way to strengthen Jewish-Arab partnership, and
The struggle at Zarfaty Garage is precedent setting. It is the first time that Palestinian workers in the West Bank settlements organize themselves to win a union voice and negotiate a collective agreement.
Using the illusion of a united Jerusalem, the Israeli Right was able, for a time, to conceal from the world the victims of that illusion: the 310,000 East Jerusalemites who are condemned to poverty and displacement.
The struggle of the African asylum seekers in Israel to be recognized as refugees and to be treated as human beings has been in the headlines regularly during the last few weeks. This follows their declaration, on Jan. 5, 2014, of a mass campaign including a strike to demand that the government cease abusing them. On the first day of the campaign, some 25,000 (half of all asylum seekers in Israel) gathered in Tel Aviv’s central Rabin Square in an unprecedented demonstration, showing the government that this is indeed a real human issue. Later, the asylum seekers demonstrated in front of foreign embassies and the UN representative in Israel, declaring that they would continue their struggle until the cancelation of the law that enables unlimited detention, violation of the right to work, and the current policy of not investigating asylum claims.
The public suicide attempt in the demonstration marking one year since the start of Israel’s social protest is a watershed for the movement. No longer does the protest express the frustrations of the Tel Aviv “sushi-eaters.” Now it expresses the extreme hardships of the masses, trodden underfoot by the state, driven to their last crust. And behind them are hundreds of thousands who stand on the brink, fearing a fate like that of Moshe Silman.
