COSATU+meets+Leila+Khaled



=COSATU meets Leila Khaled=

The Congress of South African Trade Unions held a meeting on Wednesday 19 July with Leila Khaled, the renowned Palestinian freedom fighter.

She welcomed the opportunity to meet the organisation which she described as "our voice in South Africa" and said: "The South African struggle inspired us".

She thanked COSATU for the statement that it issued on 10 July, jointly with the SA Council of Churches and the Palestine Solidarity Committee. She said that Palestinians were well aware of COSATU's support and it was much appreciated.

The Israeli attacks on Gaza and Lebanon are justified as a response to the arrest of three soldiers in Palestinian territory, which the authorities had every right to do. "Is it logical to respond by killing children and destroying a country's infrastructure?" she asked; "It is time to punish the aggressor!"

The World Bank has estimated that 70% of Palestinians are living in poverty. Unemployment stands at 50% and in Gaza it reaches 75%. People are being forced to live in bantustans. There are 10 000 Palestinian political prisoners in Israel jails, including 465 children under 18 and mothers with children. There are checkpoints everywhere and the apartheid wall has even separated a shepherd from his sheep, when it was closed for the night.

Even before the latest incursions, 10-15 Palestinians were being killed every day. "The Israeli government's policies amount to slow genocide," she declared

Leila Khaled appealed to the unions to stop this war. She supported COSATU's calls for cutting diplomatic ties with Israel and economic sanctions, and for South Africa to break off all contacts with the Israeli Occupation Forces. In this conflict you have to be on one side or the other; South Africa cannot be a broker, she said.

She also urged the unions to help raise the funds for challenging the Israeli government in international courts.

COSATU President Willie Madisha promised to continue its solidarity campaign both in South Africa and internationally. The federation and its affiliates agreed to raise the issue in resolutions at forthcoming congresses, and in international confederations, including the ITF, ICEM and Education International, in all of which COSATU members now hold the leading positions, and with the ANC.

In South Africa the unions will embark upon a programme of action which is likely to include marches to, and human chains around, the Israeli embassy, to demand that he ambassador be sent home

COSATU reiterates and updates the demands it made, with the SACC and PSC on 10 July, which were to:


 * Demand that Israel immediately withdraws all Israeli Occupation Forces from Lebanon and Gaza and ends the occupation of Palestinian lands;
 * Demand that Israel abides by the provisions of international humanitarian law and human rights law, and refrains from imposing collective punishment on Palestinian and Lebanese civilians (as per the UN Human Rights Council declaration issued on 6 July 2006);
 * Call on Israel to release all detained Palestinian ministers and legislators and to release all political prisoners - including hundreds of women and children;
 * Call on the EU to stop the severe sanctions imposed by Europe on the Palestinian Authority as a penalty for exercising their democratic right and electing a government of their choice. This by itself is a brutal intervention on behalf of the occupation
 * Call on the United Nations to implement the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on Israel's Apartheid wall;
 * Call on the United Nations to ensure that Israel fulfils its obligations in terms of international law;
 * Call on the South African government to immediately recall the South African ambassador from Tel Aviv and to begin the process of ending diplomatic relations with Israel;
 * Call on the South African government to ensure that no South African serves - in any capacity - in the Israeli Occupation Forces and that any South African citizen doing so will be prosecuted under the Regulation of Foreign Military Assistance Act;
 * Call on all South Africans to establish a strong, forceful and determined boycott and sanctions campaign against the Israeli apartheid state until the end of the occupation.
 * Call on South Africans to identify a national day of action in solidarity with the Palestinian people and to observe it with rolling mass action around the country.

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