Ukrainians are hopelessly under-armed compared to Russia. They are in a David Vs Goliath battle and there has been widespread media reporting of people making Molotov cocktails in an attempt to rebalance power and give the civilian population, untrained but enthusiastic, the chance to fight back.

The Molotov cocktail is the weapon of choice when you have no firearms.

As Russian troops crossed the border into Ukraine, not so far away in Palestine a group of boys were making Molotov cocktails to hurl at the foreign occupying army in their country. All historic Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, has been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967 – one of the longest military occupations in modern history. The boys were in the occupied West Bank where Palestinians live under a cruel military regime through which they face daily harassment, ritual humiliation, arbitrary arrest, prolonged detention without trial (children included) and well-documented brutality when they resist their occupiers.

When the Israeli military turned up, 14-year-old Mohammed Shehadeh was shot and killed, allegedly while throwing a Molotov cocktail. His family say he was 300 metres away from the incident but either way this is almost irrelevant to the occupying power whose main purpose is to “teach a lesson”..

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Damien O’Connor moves from “keep politics out of sport” to “keep politics out of agriculture”

Minister of Agriculture Damien O’Connor is scheduled to speak at an online summit this week helping to develop “strategic partnerships” with Israel in Agriculture.

Attached is the letter Damien O’Connor sent us in response to our request for him to pull out of the event.

Here is the Open letter to Damien O’Connor from the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa in response.

Dear Mr O’Connor,

Open letter to a minister ignoring war crimes, ethnic cleansing and human rights abuses

Writing this letter to you reminds me of the letters the anti-apartheid movement wrote to the New Zealand Rugby Union and governments in the 1970s and 1980s in the campaign against apartheid in South Africa.

Back then the rugby union and most politicians refused to recognise the appeals from South Africa’s black majority for support and solidarity. They arrogantly ignored the suffering and human rights abuses which went with apartheid and wanted to “keep politics out of sport”.

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Writing this letter to you reminds me of the letters the anti-apartheid movement wrote to the New Zealand Rugby Union and governments in the 1970s and 1980s in the campaign against apartheid in South Africa.

Back then the rugby union and most politicians refused to recognise the appeals from South Africa’s black majority for support and solidarity. They arrogantly ignored the suffering and human rights abuses which went with apartheid and wanted to “keep politics out of sport”.

Today another anti-apartheid struggle is being waged against the racist, apartheid policies of Israel and its unbridled brutality against the Palestinian people. Your letter pays lip service to Palestinians but expresses solidarity with Israel and its desire to “keep politics out of agriculture”.

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The Chief Science Advisor to the Ministry of Primary Industries, John Roche, is scheduled to speak at the on-line event on 15/16 February. He must be withdrawn from the speaker line up by the government.

Amnesty International declaration of Israel as an apartheid state demands government action today.

“Our report reveals the true extent of Israel’s apartheid regime. Whether they live in Gaza, East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank, or Israel itself, Palestinians are treated as an inferior racial group and systematically deprived of their rights. We found that Israel’s cruel policies of segregation, dispossession and exclusion across all territories under its control clearly amount to apartheid. The international community has an obligation to act”

Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General

“Aotearoa New Zealand’s “obligation to act” begins today. There is no place to hide. The ball is in Nanaia Mahuta and Damien O’Connor’s court” says PSNA National Chair John Minto.

“Israel is a racist apartheid state and its agriculture sector is based on ethnic cleansing, war crimes and human rights abuses against the Palestinian people.”

“Amnesty International’s report confirms this”

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On Friday PSNA wrote to Fat Freddy’s Drop asking the Kiwi supergroup to withdraw from their scheduled 18 January performance at the Sydney Festival.

So far more than 25 acts have either withdraw or distanced themselves from the festival in protest over a $20,000 donation from Israel’s Australian embassy to support Sydney Dance Company’s production of Decadance by Israeli choreographer Ohad Naharin.

In accepting this donation, the Sydney Festival is using the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs logo in festival promotional material and is aligning itself directly with the racist, apartheid state of Israel.

“We are urging Fat Freddy’s Drop to show respect for the Palestinian struggle and pull out”

“We know this won’t be easy or comfortable but it’s the right thing – and the only decent thing – to do”

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Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa has written to the Minister of Foreign Affairs this afternoon urging Nanaia Mahuta to speak out and condemn outright Israel’s declaration of six Palestinian Human Rights organisations as “terrorist organisations”.

“This is another outrageous abuse of human rights, for which the Israeli regime has become synonymous”, says PSNA National Chair John Minto.

“Our government must speak up and hold Israel to account for this savage attack on legitimate human rights organisations”.

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Call for New Zealand government to speak up and

1. Condemn Israeli bombing of Gaza and

2. Call for lifting of the Israeli blockade on the besieged Palestinian enclave

Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa has written to the Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs calling on the government to speak up on behalf of the besieged people of Gaza who are once more under bombardment by Israeli bombs during the global Covid 19 pandemic.

Israel claims its attacks are in retaliation for incendiary balloons sent from Gaza which have caused fires in Israel. However this is the micro issue. It is subterfuge. The cause of the conflict is the Israeli blockade of Gaza.

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US Ice Cream manufacturer Ben and Jerry’s has announced it will no longer sell ice-cream in the occupied Palestinian Territories.

This is a welcome development while Israel is continuing to flout international law with their new government approving the building of 31 more illegal Jewish-only settlements in the occupied West Bank alongside the destruction of Palestinian homes and on-going ethnic cleansing of Palestinian families from occupied East Jerusalem to make way for Jewish settlers.

It appears this move may be linked to last week’s request from the UN Special Rapporteur, Michael Lynk, for countries to recognise Israel’s sponsoring of Israeli settlers on Palestinian land in the Occupied West Bank as “a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.”

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The swearing in of a new Israeli Prime Minister after 12 years of appalling anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian racism from former Prime Minister Netanyahu is not good news.

New Prime Minister Naftali Bennett tips the scales as even more racist than Netanyahu.

Netanyahu was infamous for statements of race-hatred such as:

• “The way to deal with Palestinians is to beat them up. Not once but repeatedly, beat them up so it hurts so badly, until its unbearable”

• “Palestinians are an existential threat to Israel” (shades of the Nazi attitudes to Jews)

• “Israeli is not a state for all its citizens” (ie he’s right – it’s an apartheid state – Palestinians are second-class citizens)

• (If anyone isn’t sure just how racist these statements are – replace the word “Palestinians” with the word “Jews” and read them again!)

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Q: What can New Zealanders do to help the Palestinian struggle?
A: Change your Kiwisaver provider

As the ceasefire in the Middle East holds, Israeli state forces have begun mass arrests of Palestinian citizens of Israel involved in peaceful solidarity actions in support of Palestinians in Gaza, occupied Jerusalem and the occupied Palestinian Territories.

Needless to say no effort is being made to track and arrest the hundreds of Jewish Israelis who chanted “Death to Arabs” through many cities across Israel during its heavy bombardment of Gaza.

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PSNA met online tonight and decided to organise nationwide protests again next Saturday 22 May.

We were very pleased with the 4,000 people who turned out in 10 centres around the country last Saturday – the largest public protests on this issue for many years – and we expect this coming Saturday to be significantly bigger given the escalating attacks on Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem, across the occupied West Bank, through Israel itself and now in cruel, cowardly attacks on Gaza.

The focus of the protest will again be the Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and their failure to offer more than pious words and ineffective platitudes in the face of horrendous war crimes.

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Nationwide rallies and marches will take place across the country this Saturday, 15 May as New Zealanders express their outrage at Israel brutality and their support for the Palestinian struggle for human rights.

The protest venues can be seen here https://www.facebook.com/Palestine-Solidarity-Network-Aotearoa-PSNA-403868133556427/events

These protests mark Nakba Day (Arabic for “catastrophe”) which remembers the mass ethnic cleansing of 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and land by Israeli militias in 1948.

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The Palestine Solidarity Movement Aotearoa has written to the Minister of Foreign Affairs Nanaia Mahuta tonight urging the government to speak out against the imminent ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the Occupied East Jerusalem area of Sheikh Jarrah and the Israeli state violence being used against Palestinians protesting against these racist, apartheid policies.

In recent hours there has been extensive media coverage of Palestinian protests in East Jerusalem in which over 200 Palestinians have been injured.

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Today is World Keffiyeh Day (the keffiyeh is a piece of iconic Palestinian dress) and a big group of MPs got together to wear keffiyehs as a show of solidarity with Palestinians at a time when it is so desperately needed.

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The Palestine Solidarity Movement Aotearoa has written to the Minister of Foreign Affairs Nanaia Mahuta tonight urging the government to speak out against the imminent ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the Occupied East Jerusalem area of Sheikh Jarrah and the Israeli state violence being used against Palestinians protesting against these racist, apartheid policies.

In recent hours there has been extensive media coverage of Palestinian protests in East Jerusalem in which over 200 Palestinians have been injured.

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We urge the government to speak out against the imminent ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the Occupied East Jerusalem area of Sheikh Jarrah and the Israeli state violence being used against Palestinians protesting against these racist, apartheid policies

In recent hours there has been extensive media coverage of Palestinian protests in which 200Palestinians have been injured.

Tensions have been high in East Jerusalem in recent weeks after Israeli restrictions on Palestinians around the Damascus Gate and the intervention of extreme right-wing Israeli politicians, such as Itamar Ben-Gvir who wants to “Expel the Arab enemy”. Ben-Gvir is stoking the flames of race-hatred against Palestinians while he enjoys under the protection of the Israeli army.

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An Israeli government demand that a medical clinic in the Occupied West Bank be demolished has raised another call from the Palestine Solidarity Network for the New Zealand government to speak out.

Israel has instructed inhabitants of the West Bank town of Zanouta to destroy many of their homes and their medical clinic. This follows an earlier Israel demolition of a Palestinians Covid 19 clinic.

PSNA Spokesperson John Minto says not only is Israel denying Covid-19 vaccines to 4.5 million Palestinians under its occupation and control but is using the pandemic as a cover to increase its rate of destruction of Palestinian houses and structures.

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With new revelations of the appalling racism behind Israel’s refusal to provide Covid-19 vaccines to 4.5 million Palestinians under its occupation and control, PSNA has renewed our call for the government to speak out alongside the United Nations and demand Israel end its medical apartheid immediately and provide vaccinations to all Palestinians.

When questioned by Andrew Marr of the BBC this week, Israeli Health Minister Yuli Edelstein likened his obligation to vaccinate Palestinians to Palestinians’ responsibility to care for “dolphins in the Mediterranean” (See interview transcript below)

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The Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa welcomes Nanaia Mahuta as the new Minister of Foreign Affairs.

We hope the new appointment will bring a fresh approach to New Zealand policy in the Middle East and practical support for the Palestinian struggle.

The entire area of historic Palestine is under the longest military occupation in modern history as Israel repeatedly and blatantly defies international law and continues the ethnic cleansing of East Jerusalem and the theft of Palestinian land.

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