Rochdale Palestine Solidarity Campaign supported by Rochdale and Littleborough Peace Group, today (Saturday 21 May 2011), urged Rochdale shoppers to "Boycott Israeli Goods!"
Rochdale PSC Branch Coordinator Jenny Turner said,
"For over 60 years successive United Nations' resolutions have not brought any respite for the suffering of Palestinian refugees or the people in territories occupied by Israel. The world's governments have done nothing, so ordinary people in Rochdale and elsewhere must take their own action. We are here today to raise awareness of the Palestinian struggle and to promote and support the international boycott of Israeli goods. The state of Israel has repeatedly shown through their words and deeds that they have no respect for the rights of the Palestinian people or those supporting them around the world. We need to bring global pressure to bear on Israel to respect human rights and international law."
"The Israeli military seeks to control every aspect of Palestinian life in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, occupied since 1967. We in Rochdale PSC and RLPG believe that it is a scandal that Israel profits from exporting fruit and vegetables grown on illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian land and often misleadingly labelled 'West Bank'. People in Rochdale do not want to buy food grown on stolen land. Israel's siege of Gaza caused untold misery to it's people throughout 2007 and 2008 ; then Israel used overwhelming military force to kill 1,500 Palestinians, including many hundreds of children, at the start of 2010. We are calling on shoppers in Rochdale to show their solidarity with and support for the Palestinians against occupation, to join the boycott and help bring down Israeli apartheid in the same way the consumer boycott brought down South African apartheid. It has worked before and it will work again." , she concluded.
Andrew Wastling said,
"Today we are telling Rochdale shoppers to check the label ~ and asking them not to buy goods labelled 'Israel' or 'West Bank'. 'West Bank' means that this is produce from Israeli settlements on stolen Palestinian land. We are urging people to complain and challenge their supermarkets and to buy Palestinian goods wherever they can. Rochdale PSC has distributed cards for shoppers to hand to the manager of their local store. We urge anyone who wants to support the Boycott or who wants to join Rochdale PSC to contact us at 07787 575 570 at 07842 252639 or email us at rochdalepsc@gmail.com. We will be pleased to supply details of future,meetings , events and activities, especially our showing of the 'Iron War' film and Social Evening planned for 5 October 2011 in Rochdale."
