Pictures from our vigil last night in Walthamstow

Balfour Declaration centenary - 69 years of Israel's illegal and brutal occupation of Palestine - 1500 Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike for over a month.


Time to acknowledge, apologise and act!



Join us and work with us on achieving justice and human rights for the Palestinians.

Join WFPSC vigil tonight 6.30 in Walthamstow Town Square

Tonight we will remember:
- 100 years of the fateful Balfour Declaration which promised Palestinian land to the Zionist movement.

- 69 years of the Nakba (Catastrophe) when up to 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly expelled from their homes during the creation of the state of Israel.

- 1500 palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails on hunger strike for more that 30 days demanding their rights and protesting against mistreatment, occupation and dispossession of Palestinian people.
Show your solidarity!

Find out more on
https://www.palestinecampaign.org/campaigns/balfour2nakba/
https://www.palestinecampaign.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/Nakba-Factsheet-2017.pdf
https://www.palestinecampaign.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/Palestinian-Prisoners-PSC-Factsheet-0517.pdf
https://www.palestinecampaign.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/hunger-strikers-leaflet-A4.pdf

Visit our Palestine Solidarity stall in Walthamstow

Tomorrow, Saturday 13 May ’17, we will devote our stall to Balfour Declaration and 69 anniversary of dispossession of the Palestinians.

We now have new Palestine Solidarity Campaign info materials on the Balfour Declaration and British involvement in Palestine, which we will be handing out.

History cannot be unlived but injustices have to be acknowledged and apologies made.

This year marks a centenary of British Foreign Minster Arthur Balfour’s promise of a homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine, which materialised on 15 May 1948 depriving Palestinians of their homeland.

Palestinians called this a Nakba, (Catastrophe) which resulted in the mass ethnic cleansing, violence and decades of occupation of Palestinian people.

Come and have a chat about these important issues which impact on the world we live in to this day.

Demand justice and equal rights for Palestinians

See you there.

Palestine stall on Saturday 22nd April in E10

You will find us with our Palestine stall near the Leyton tube in the shopping area between the TK Max and the Poundland, tomorrow, Saturday the 22nd April.

Come between 11.30 -14.00 for a chat, to pick up your leaflets and stock up on Palestinian produce.

Looking forward to see you there!

Cork Conference highlight - Jeff Handmaker, Ronnen Ben-Arie & Mazen Masri

Cork Conference highlight - Mutaz Qafisheh, Leah Tsemel & Hatem Bazian

Cork Conference highlight - Blake Alcott & Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian

Cork Conference highlights - Ardi Imseis, MiaTamurin & Oren Ben-Dor

Cork Conference highlights - Geoffrey Alderman & Yakov Rabkin

Cork Conference highlights - Salman Abu-Sitta & Catriona Drew

Cork Conference highlights - Ghada Karmi & Richard Falk

Cork Conference highlights : Yoella Har-Shefi & Robert Wintemute

Cork Conference highlights by A. Simons

Cork conference report

A report about the Cork conference will appear soon.

Visit our Palestine stall tomorrow, Matalan, High Str E11

Waltham Forest Palestine Solidarity Campaign (WFPSC) activists will run a stall with Palestine infomation and publicity and produce by Palestinian farmers, tomorrow, Saturday the 25th, 12.00 -14.00, outside Matalan in High Street Leytonstone.

The weather forecast looks promissing, so come and join us for a chat about Palestine, our Boycott, Divestment and Sancton (BDS) campaigns and to sign petition against Hewlett Packard (HP) and a letter to your MP asking them to intervene on behalf on hundreds of Palestinian children in Israeli military jails.

Hope to see you there!
Free Palestine

See us at our Walthamstow stall tomorrow, Sat 11 March, 11.30-14.00

Dear friends and Palestine supporters,

Our regular Wathamstow Palestine info and produce stall is, as always, taking place on the second Saturday of each month 11.30-14.00, in the Town Square at the market, near the Library.

Pop over for a chat tomorrow, to stock up on the latest from our stall, to sign a Palestinian Child Prisoners letter to your MP and Boycott Hewlett Packard petition and most importantly, to get on our supporters list and find out how you can join WFPSC and make our human rights movement grow even stronger.

Also, you are invited to the Palestine Solidarity evening on Tuesday 21 March in The Wanstead Tap, with the guest speakers from Palestine and a young local UK/Palestinian teen activist form Wanstead.

More details can be found below.

See you there!

An Evening of Palestine Solidarity in the Wanstead Tap

Newham Momentum is organising an Evening of Palestine Solidarity on Tuesday 21 March, in the Wanstead Tap - see the attached poster for the event details.

Come and hear inspirational nonviolent activist Hamed Qawasmeh who will speak about the current situation in Palestine and how communities organise to survive and resists Israeli occupation.

Qawasmeh comes from the Palestinian Town of Hebron/al-Khalil which has seen the worst of the five decades long Israeli occupation. In Hebron quarter of a million Palestinians are dominated by 700 violent Israeli settlers living in an illegal settlement in the hearth of the Hebron’s Old City, with 3000 heavily armed Israeli soldiers insuring their impunity.

We will also have a pleasure to hear Leane Mohamed, a wonderful UK/Palestinian teen who won Jack Petchey 'Speak Out' award for her talk about her native homeland Palestine, only to be exposed to an onslaught of attacks and threats by the Zionists and their sympathisers.

Leane was the guest at the recent AGM of the national Palestine Solidarity Campaign and she inspired many with her determination not to be denied the right to speak out.

Members of the Waltham Forest PSC will run a stall with the information materials and produce by the Palestinian farmers, including a delicious Zeytoun olive oil, zatar, olive oil soap from Nablus etc.

Bring your friends and family!

Very much looking forward to see you there.

Israeli military prisons are no place for a child

Please sign the letter to your MP demanding that they take action to protect lives and human rights of over 700 hundred Palestinian children incarcerated in Israeli military jails.

See below the line details of this London-wide PSC campaign including the link to the letter which will be sent to the London MPs with the signatures collected.

Let’s make this campaign massive. Please sign and share widely.

----------------------
Dear Friend

We are asking you to join us in launching a co-ordinated London wide campaign to highlight the plight of Palestinian child prisoners.

Under Israeli military detention, Palestinian children are routinely:
•Taken from their homes at night and at gunpoint.
• Blindfolded, bound and shackled.
• Interrogated without a lawyer and with no audio-visual recording.
• Held in solitary confinement.
• Forced to sign confessions.

We need your support to make sure that each London MP, MEP and Assembly member is made aware of the issue, takes notice of our voices and signs the letter telling the UK government to break its silence and take action.

You can see the full text of the letter and sign it by using the following link: https://goo.gl/forms/yhWsTsYUw kuLLJbu1

Letter On The Plight Of Palestinian Child Prisoners: To London MPs, MEPs and London Assembly Members

This form will collect minimum details from you, so that you can become a signatory to the letter. Your signatory details are being collected by the London Palestine Solidarity Campaign Branches Child Prisoners Action Group who will submit the letter to London political representatives on your behalf and keep you informed of progress. Here is the text of the letter to which we hope you will agree to become a signatory by completing the details requested in the section of this form below the letter :

To: [MP or MEP or London Assembly Member]

Dear [ ]

We are writing to you as your constituents to ask for your support to end to the well-documented systematic ill-treatment of Palestinian child prisoners in the Israeli military detention system. At present, under Israeli military detention Palestinian children as young as 12 are routinely: • Taken from their homes in night time raids by soldiers at gunpoint. • Blindfolded, bound and shackled. • Interrogated without a lawyer or relative being present.

The key demand in the letter is:

To require the UK Government to make a public statement that it will take immediate, effective and meaningful action-including through international bodies-to ensure all the following requirements are implemented by the Israeli government without delay:
1. Children must not be prosecuted in military courts that lack basic and fundamental due process guarantees;
2. Detention must only be used as a measure of last resort;
3. Children must not be arrested at night;
4. Children must not be subjected to any form of physical violence;
5. Children must have access to legal representation and parents prior to and during interrogations;
6. All interrogations of children must be audio-visually recorded;
7. Any statement made as a result of torture or ill-treatment must be excluded as evidence in any proceeding; and
8. All credible allegations of torture and ill-treatment must be thoroughly and impartially investigated in accordance with international standards, and perpetrators brought promptly to justice.

[Note all these requirements are those set out by Defense for Children International Palestine]

You can see the full text of the letter and sign it by using the following link: https://goo.gl/forms/yhWsTsYUw kuLLJbu1

Thank you for your support and please share this e-mail by forwarding to others. The more signatories we have the more pressure we can bring to bear.

London Palestine Solidarity Campaign Branches.

(email londonchildprisonerscampaign@g mail.com if you have questions or want more information. But please note that to sign the letter you need to use the links above)

Watch your DATES!

Taste of Palestine in Leytonstone

Xeinab and her mum Ghada talk and cook Palestinian food in Leytonstone for the Waltham Forest Echo’s Katie Robinson.

Get a recipe for delicious Salad Baladi and read the article here on page 14: http://walthamforestecho.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Echo-24.pdf

The 13th annual Israeli Apartheid Week is here

Dear friends,

Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW http://apartheidweek.org/ ) 2017 is here, a series of events taking place in campuses and cities around the world, aiming to raise awareness of Israel's regime of settler colonialism and apartheid, and to build solidarity with the Palestinian-led boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement.

IAW is a huge global annual event and PSC has been working for the past few months with partners including War on Want, the BDS national committee and others to provide support and resources to the fantastic groups of student activists who have organised events across UK campuses.

You will have seen media coverage of the attempts by pro-Israel groups to lobby universities to prevent events going ahead. Students are standing firm and PSC is working with all key partners to support students in bringing the issues of justice for Palestinians to campuses all over the UK this week.

This year's wide range of events includes the opening plenary in London on Tuesday 28th February, 100 years of Palestinian resistance against settler colonialism (https://www.facebook.com/events/1097869287008470/ ), with poet and Dream Defenders activist Aja Monet; Farid Esack, veteran anti-apartheid activist; and Dr Karma Nabulsi.

Many other events including talks, film screenings, and exhibitions are taking place across the UK - see the Israeli Apartheid Week website for more.

Join us on Saturday the 25th in Leyton

Our next stall with information about Palestine and Palestinian produce will take place in Leyton, this Saturday the 25th between 11.30 and 14.00.

You will be able to find us a short distance from the Leyton tube in the area between TKMax and Poundland.

Pop over for a chat about Palestine, about BDS,to add you signature to our Palestinian Child Prisoners and Boycott Hewlett Packard petitions and to find out how you can get involved more in the local Palestine solidarity activities.

Palestine stall in Walthamstow tomorrow

Our monthly stall in Walthamstow is tomorrow, Saturday the 11th, between 11.30 -14.00

You will be able to find us with our Palestine publicity and Zeytoun produce in the Town Square near the Library.

The weather forecast says that we will be spared from heavy rain tomorrow, so pop over for a chat, to pick up leaflets about Palestine and to stock up on your olive oil, zatar, Nablus soap etc. and to sign our Palestinian child prisoners and boycott Hewlett Packard petitions.

Please make a note in your diaries that on 25 February, weather permitting, we will be outside TK Max in Leyton during the same time as above.

John Lewis profiting form destroyed childhoods

IMPORTANT Petition: Please sign and share.

Edinburgh Action for Palestine (EA4P) launched a petition against John Lewis selling toys produced in Israel and its illegal settlements on the occupied Palestinian land.

Read the label and boycott Halilit, Taf, Tiny Love and Interstar (also sold by Argos and Amazon).

John Lewis also sells Keter garden furniture and playhouses from Barkan settlements.

To sign cut and paste into yur browser the petion link:
https://www.change.org/p/john-lewis-stores-uk-john-lewis-stop-helping-israeli-toymakers-profit-from-illegal-settlements


The copy of the full petition text is below:

Petitioning John Lewis Stores UK

John Lewis, Don't market Israeli toys from illegal settlements

Edinburgh Action 4 Palestine Edinburgh Edinburgh, AL

Edinburgh Action for Palestine (EA4P) supports the human rights of Palestinians, campaigning for the end of Israeli military occupation, exile of Palestinian refugees, and discrimination against Palestinians within Israel. As part of this we promote peaceful opposition through BDS - Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions.

For 48 years, Palestinians have been harassed and threatened routinely by heavily armed soldiers, bombed, imprisoned without trial, subjected to daily military checkpoints so that normal life is impossible. Many must also watch while police or soldiers demolish their family homes. You can imagine the effect on children. Home is the one place children should always feel safe.

John Lewis sells a range of toys from Israel: Halilit, Taf, Tiny Love and Interstar. The first three are made in Israel, but Interstar toys are made on a settlement in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT). A settlement is purpose-built housing for Jewish people on land taken by force from the Palestinians. The UN Security Council has repeatedly condemned the settlements as illegal - most recently two weeks ago - but settler businesses continue to thrive. Interstar is one such business. Halilit, as the UK supplier of Interstar, Taf and Tiny Love toy brands, also profits from Interstar's settlement business; And John Lewis then profits from the toy sales.

Palestinian homes are demolished for a number of reasons, including lack of allowance and collective punishment: 1025 structures in 2016, leaving 1613 people homeless. The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions reports that Palestinian homes are demolished to create space to expand settlements. - Thus, Interstar, Halilit and John Lewis may profit from the homelessness of some Palestinian children and families.

Children are particularly vulnerable to this vicious oppression: Palestinian children going to school must face checkpoints, tear gas and even assault by Israeli soldiers and violent settlers. Meanwhile under the 10 year siege of Gaza, 30% of children have malnutrition, and water and basic medicine are scarce. The abuse of Palestinian child prisoners is an international scandal. Http://maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=774158

EA4P members support Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions as a peaceful means of putting pressure on the Israeli government to end this cruel occupation, exile and apartheid. Most of us could not buy any products from Israel while the occupation continues and you may feel the same. However, our formal request to John Lewis is at least not to assist the Occupation by dealing in settlement products.

PLEASE NOTE: Interstar are also sold by Argos and Amazon. John Lewis also sells Keter garden furniture and playhouses from Barkan settlements.

Please sign the petition urging John Lewis to end this trade.

This petition will be delivered to:
• John Lewis Stores UK

Zionist threat to end Jewish support for Tories

Israel’s interference in UK politics is becoming increasingly public, thanks to the Al Jazeera undercover investigation of behind the scenes machinations by the Israeli agents from the Israeli Embassy and those domestic ones, planted within many UK democratic bodies. The agents were caught on camera planning to destroy reputations of elected representatives of the UK people such as Members of Parliament and student representatives. Now traditional supporters, the Tory Party is told to behave or suffer the consequences!

Read the recent article by Jews for Justice for Palestinians here http://jfjfp.com/?p=89867

US activist and IWPS volunteer Anna Baltzer talks about life under the occupation in Palestine

Stolen goods in our shops - don't buy fruits of occupation

Look at the box of Medjoul dates me and a friend photographed earlier in a Turkish supermarket at the bottom of Walthamstow Market.
The box had text in Arabic and in English and the brand is Jordan Valley.

You would think that those dates are produced by the Jordanian or Palestinian farmers, and the intention is that you think exactly that.

In fact they come from the illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, Palestine.

The barcode 72900….indicates that Israel is a producer. It is known that in order to cover up the country of origin and avoid being boycotted, Israel sometimes uses different barcodes.

What makes the country of origin totally certain is the ‘Hadiklaim’ logo.

Hadiklaim is an Israeli date growers’ co-operative which sells its dates abroad under the following brand names: King Solomon, Jordan River and Jordan River Bio-Top, as well as under the private labels of supermarket chains.

Always check the label and if it says ‘Hadiklaim’ don’t buy it and complain to the management.

International laws say that occupiers should neither move their population into the occupied countries, not exploit their resources.

In the case of Jordan Valley Medjoul dates Israel is guilty on both accounts.

The fact that we have goods acquired by theft and criminal activities in our shops is both incomprehensible and unacceptable and we should boycott them and make them unsaleable.

More info about Israeli dates sold in the UK can be found here https://www.palestinecampaign.org/checkthelabel/

Film showing '5 Broken Cameras'

Waltham Forest Palestine Solidarity Campaign is showing a wonderful and award winning Palestinian film

'5 Broken Cameras'
in the Wanstead Tap
at 7pm
on this Thursday, 19 Jan 2017

The film is a first-hand account of non-violent struggle in Palestine against the Israeli occupation and land grab.

‘5 Broken Cameras’ won a 2012 Sundance Film Festival award, the Golden Apricot at the 2012 Yerevan International Film Festival, Armenia, the 2013 International Emmy Award and was nominated for a 2013 Academy Award.

Looking forward to seeing you there!