For days now Israeli F16s have been smashing the Palestinian area of Gaza while Israel's tanks are massed at the border ready for an imminent ground attack. In these few days over 300 Palestinians across Gazan society have been killed and over 1400 wounded.

 

Bring yourselves, bring your friends.

 

Bring a speech, a poem, a banner or a song.

Dear  MP,

 

The latest news on the Israeli bombing of Gaza is of indiscriminate bombing across Gazan society with large numbers of civilian casualties. Please make immediate representations to the Foreign Secretary on the US-backed Israeli aggression on Gaza at this time.

 

Please ask the Foreign Secretary what his response will be and what measures will be taken to help enforce international will for an immediate ceasefire andto get Israel to act in a humane manner.

 

Will the Foreign Secretary contact both the ambassadors for Israel and the United States to make these demands clear?

 

Israel's response - as usual - is that it is taking action to defend itself from attack after dozens of rockets falling on it in the last few days. The real truth is that, despite all these rockets, fired while Israel imposes a medieval siege on Gaza, has caused just one death in 6 months. Gaza's deaths are now in their hundreds.

 

These rockets are relative pin-pricks to Israel but its hugely aggressive attack, planned for months in advance as we recently read,  has now  killed over 300 now with over 1400 wounded and still with Israel only talking about escalation probabaly a ground attack with its massed tanks. 

 

All this in addition to the daily toll of deaths due to Israeli-enforced poverty.

 

There should be an immediate ceasefire. Israeli government representatives should enter into talks with Palestinian elected representatives (ie, Hamas). A reduction in Palestinian aggression should be contingent upon the easing of Israel's totally restrictive control of trade, movement and life in Gaza.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

LETTER to MEPs

www.writetothem.com

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Dear MEPs

Urgent call for Action on the EU- Israel Association Agreement

As you will have read, the US-backed Israeli bombardment of Gaza has
claimed nearly 300 lives and wounded twice that number.

Israel claims this is merely in response to dozens of rocket attacks.
While it is true that dozens of rockets have been fired on Israel, they
are, by comparison, pin-pricks, and have claimed only one life over
months. Meanwhile the situation in Gaza has been forced into further
deterioration by the Israelis, with a huge rise in poverty.

I welcome the recent postponement of the vote in the European
Parliament on the extension of existing EU programmes with Israel and
encourage a strengthening of resistance to this.

The postponement allows the opportunity for the vote to be related to
the upgrade agreement recently signed by the foreign ministers of all
the Member States (the EU Council).

This was a crucial step in the upgrading of relations with Israel and
one over which the European Parliament has no control.

The new EU-Israel Action Plan is currently being drafted by the
European Commission for discussion by the Member States at the
beginning of next year.

As yet, it does not include any concrete actions that will end Israel’s
blatant disregard for human rights and International law. It does not
even require Israel to meet its own obligations under the so-called
‘peace process’.

I urge you to make representations so that the Commission  will not
draft a weak document without any reference to human rights.

Please help ensure that the EC include concrete objectives regarding
human rights and International Law

There are a number of objections to the Action Plan, as below. Please
make these known to the External Relations Commissioner, Benita
Ferrero-Waldner - benita.ferrero-waldner@ec.europa.eu

Yours sincerely,



  Further Points:-

·        Include Article 2 of the Eu-Israel Association Agreement,
which says that “Relations between the parties, as well as all the
provisions of the Agreement itself shall be based on respect for human
rights and democratic principles, which guides their internal and
international policy and constitutes an essential element of this
Agreement”

·        Include specific concrete actions that should be included
(remove settlements, end siege of Gaza, sign up to Additional Protocols
of the Fourth Geneva Convention etc)

·        Refer to the fact that agreements with other countries under
the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) include extensive actions that
these states have to take on issues like human rights. For example, the
EU-Morocco Action Plan devotes more than two pages to democracy, rule
of law, human rights and fundamental freedoms and includes concrete
objectives to be achieved in the short term and in the medium term.

·        The new EU-Israel Action Plan will have a knock-on effect on
the other ENP members. It will be difficult to convince them to improve
their human rights records, if the EU does not require the same from
Israel.

·        The 1948 Declaration of Universal Human Rights is being
weakened by EU’s    refusal to apply the same standards on human rights
to all the states within the ENP

·        The current EU-Israel Action Plan initiates almost no concrete
actions related to resolving the Israel/Palestine conflict and does not
require Israel to abide by its obligations under the current peace
process. The new EU-Israel Action Plan therefore demonstrates the EU’s
failure to deal with both sides in an even handed way.

·        The agreed establishment of the subcommittee for human rights
between EU and Israel does in no way substitute for human rights
commitments in the Action Plan that should provide the basis for
effective functioning of the subcommittee.

·        The Action Plan also needs to include  a safeguard clause is
necessary to prevent Israel’s application of the benefits of
cooperation to settlement activities.