To: Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas, AM and Speaker of the National Assembly for Wales
Cc: Mr. Mohammad Asghar, AM
From: New York City Labor Against the War (NYCLAW)
Re: Invitation of Israeli Ambassador to Meet with Members of the
National Assembly for Wales
Dear Lord Elis-Thomas:
We believe that it is shameful that Mohammad Asghar, or any other
British public official, would call for a meeting with a
representative of the Israeli state. Thirty-one Palestinians have been
killed and eighty-five have been wounded by Israeli attacks over the
past month in Gaza alone, where the Israeli-imposed siege has resulted
in catastrophic shortages in fuel, food, clean water, medicine and
other basic human needs. In the West Bank, Israel’s colonial policies
of land theft and strangulation targeting the indigenous Palestinian
population continue unabated, as Israeli illegal settlements continue
to expropriate and colonize Palestinian land; as the apartheid wall
and Israeli-only roads encircle and imprison Palestinian communities;
and as hundreds of Israeli military checkpoints choke the remaining
life out of Palestinian society under occupation.
This year is also significant in that it marks sixty years since
Israel was established through the ethnic cleansing of over 750,000
Palestinians out of their homes and off of their lands, also marking
sixty years of Israel’s forcible denial of the basic human right of
these Palestinians to return to the places from which they were
expelled, and sixty years of institutionalized racial discrimination
against the Palestinians who managed to stay and who, as citizens of
Israel, have been touted as a sign of Israeli “democracy.” The Israeli
apartheid reality faced by Palestinian citizens of Israel has been
repeatedly compared to its South African predecessor by prominent
South African, Palestinian and even Israeli figures.
As a career diplomat who holds the rank of Major (Reserve) in the
Israeli Occupation Forces’ Artillery Division, Ron Prosor is no
regular ambassador. His job is to hide and legitimize Israel’s daily
war crimes and crimes against humanity to the British government and
the British people. It is important to remember that it is this same
army that recently murdered two British citizens who dared to stand on
the side of justice. Palestine will never forget Tom Hurndall and
James Miller.
Prosor’s role as chief Israeli propagandist in the UK was made clear
in the past weeks when, amidst the carnage in Gaza, Prosor dared to
accuse British society of becoming a hotbed of anti-Israel extremism.
Responding to a principled and historic decision by the University and
College Union (UCU) to”consider the moral and political implications
of educational links with Israeli institutions,”Prosor addressed the
British public saying that British academics “have seen their union
held hostage by radical factions, armed with political agendas and
personal interests.”
Your decision to boycott the meeting with Mr. Prosor is a clear
indication of your respect for international law, and the rights of
human beings to live in freedom and dignity. We commend your courage,
and hope that many more will follow your lead, and that of respectable
British institutions like the University and College Union, UNISON,
National Union of Journalists, and the Church of England as well as
notable personalities like Ken Loach, John Berger and Roger Waters in
making their principled positions known to the world. When the
powerful states of the world turn their backs on the downtrodden and
oppressed, it is up to the people of the world, people like yourself,
to stand with the truth in the face of all odds. History will not
forget those who speak truth to power, nor will it forgive those who
were willfully blind to the horrors that power commits.
New York City Labor Against the War (NYCLAW)
