The straw that broke the camel’s back. There’s a reason why this idiom is so readily understood. Many social, as well as physical, systems change state in sudden, non-linear ways. That’s why revolution, as Mandela said, “seems impossible until it is done.”
And so it is with Palestinian liberation. The objective situation looks extremely bleak. The balance of forces appear to be on the side of empire and genocide. Each act of resistance or solidarity can appear Sisyphean, with the boulder never reaching the top of the incline.
But then, in a way that seems impossible before it happens, the straw breaks the camel’s back, the dynamics change and the going becomes downhill.
That’s why we throw so many tactics at one goal: Palestinian liberation.
This week, the Progressive International has combined four distinct tactics to pile up more straws on the camel’s spine, to incrementally shift the balance of power.
First, on Monday, we launched a call, reported on by Middle East Eye, from a coalition of Palestinian organisations for a "total energy embargo" on Israel until it halts its war on the Gaza Strip. The coalition calls for an immediate end to energy exports to Israel and its Western backers, imports of Israeli energy and divestment from Israeli energy projects. Explaining the logic of an energy embargo, the groups argue in their launch statement that “energy supplies are instrumental to Israel’s war machine: to operate its army tanks, armored personnel carriers, ships and military bulldozers, including specialist jet fuel that allows Israeli jets to rain death and destruction down on Gaza.”
Then on Monday and Tuesday, activists around the world took direct, coordinated action against Israel’s war machine. It was the second such global day of action against Elbit Systems, Israel’s biggest arms company, which supplying the Occupation Forces with 85% of their drones and land-based equipment, along with a wide range of other technologies, munitions, and arms. And in Canada, PI member the Palestinian Youth Movement took action against TTM Technologies and the Safran groups.
Today, over 200 legislators from thirteen countries that export weapons to Israel united to commit to an arms embargo. In an open letter coordinated by the Progressive International published today, 218 legislators from thirteen countries declared their “commitment to end our nations’ arms sales to the State of Israel.” The legislators, who serve in parliaments of countries that export weapons or parts to Israel, argue that they will “not be complicit in Israel’s grave violation of international law” and instead call for an arms embargo, pledging to “immediate and coordinated action in [their] respective legislatures to stop our countries from arming Israel.”
The signatories brought together by the Progressive International (PI) sit in the Parliaments of countries that export weapons or parts to Israel: the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Canada, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Brazil, Australia, Turkey, Portugal and Ireland.
They include eleven current or former leaders of political parties. Prominent politicians joining the call include US Representative Rashida Tlaib, former UK Labour Leader and PI Council member Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Australian Green Party Adam Bandt, Coordinator of La France Insoumise Manuel Bompard and all of LFI’s deputies, President of the Workers’ Party of Belgium Peter Mertens, Canadian MP and member of PI’s Council Niki Ashton, Brazilian Congressman and PI Council member Guilherme Boulos, former Leader of Die Linke Bernd Riexinger, Leader of Podemos Ione Belarra as well as Sumar’s entire plurinational grouping of deputies, Leader of the Dutch Socialist Party Jimmy Dijk, Irish TD Thomas Pringle, former co-chair of the Peoples’ Democratic Party Sezai Temelli and the National Coordinator of Portugal’s Left Bloc Mariana Mortágua.
The action by the parliamentarians is supported by the founder of La France Insoumise Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Spanish government Minister Pablo Bustinduy and prominent Indian politician Jignesh Mevani.
Read their letter in full here and read the coverage of their initiative in The Guardian, Agencia EFE, Folha, Mediapart and Duvar.
And finally tomorrow, the Progressive International, together with the International People's Assembly, ALBA Movimientos and Pan-Africanism Today, has issued a call for an International Day of Action on 2 March to demand an end to Israel's genocidal assault on Gaza.
The road to liberation is long and winding, but the Palestinian people, aided by the active solidarity of the peoples of the world, will reach its conclusion.
In solidarity,
The Progressive International Secretariat
