Join us in making this year’s 13th annual international Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) bigger, better and bolder! IAW is an annual international series of self-organized events (rallies, protests, lectures, cultural performances, concerts, films and workshops) held in over 250 cities, communities and campuses across the globe. IAW raises awareness of Israel’s apartheid policies towards the indigenous Palestinians. Israel’s discriminatory policies are now also increasingly affecting Africans (click here for more info on Israel’s “War against Africans”).
IAW is endorsed, in South Africa alone, by more than 85 organizations, trade unions, embassies, youth movements and other groups including South Africa’s governing party, the country’s largest student formation and SA’s largest trade union federation. (Click here for a list of all endorsers or if you would like to endorse the campaign.)
The largest ever IAW campaign took place in 2016. In South Africa, community members, students, government ministers, politicians, ambassadors, trade unions, artists and others all joined the week long awareness raising initiative. One of the highlights of IAW 2016 was the participation, in her official capacity, by the Speaker of the National Assembly in Parliament, Ms. Baleka Mbete (click here).
United in our diversity, South Africans from various racial and religious groups participate in Israeli Apartheid including members of the Jewish, Hindu, Christian, Tamil and Muslim communities (click here). Last year, a group of Jewish Israelis wrote an open letter urging South Africans in general and members of the South African Jewish community in particular to participate in IAW (click here). The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem also wrote a letter to South African muslims and clergy to participate in #IsraeliApartheidWeek (click here) and, writing from the Holy Town of Bethlehem, Palestinian Christians publicly called on South African Churches to participate and support #IsraeliApartheidWeek (click here).
We invite you to join us in the footsteps of those who came before us who, around the world, mobilized in their hundreds of thousands – if not millions – during the 1980s, to raise awareness of Apartheid SA’s racist policies against the indigenous people of our country and to build support for the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign against Apartheid SA. Click here to find out how to get involved.
For media interviews with the IAW South Africa Team, please contact: Alex Mdakane, National Spokesperson of IAW in South Africa [+27 (0) 785268663] or Nabeela Sujee, National Convener of IAW in South Africa [+27 (0) 726370386].
I favour a one-democratic-state solution to be instituted after the return of all Palestinian refugees.