Activists in Denmark with Boykot Israel delivered a message to the German embassy in Copenhagen on 31 May: Stop the criminalization of BDS! Participants in the action carried signs and banners and chanted together against the German Bundestag (parliament) resolution denouncing the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement (BDS) as “anti-Semitic.”
The activists noted that they delivered their letter (full text below) to the German embassy in Copenhagen via the guards stationed there, saying that the embassy is situated in a closed well guarded building. The letter comes as part of the ongoing Palestinian and international protest against the Bundestag resolution, passed with the support of most major German political parties, including the CDU, SPD, Greens and FDP.
It should be noted that the resolution emerged originally as a response to an even more anti-Palestinian, racist proposal by the AfD and ultra-capitalist FDP, which aimed to ban BDS. Given the AfD’s well-known affinity with racism and open arms for apologists for German Nazi fascism, it should be quite clear that there is nothing anti-racist or anti-fascist in the Bundestag’s resolution.
Resisting German racism, official anti-Semitism (that conflates Jews with Israel) and anti-Palestinianism: Human rights activists today rallied for a boycott of apartheid Israel outside the @GermanyDiplo embassy in Copenhagen. Photos via https://t.co/fKj3zZyaXG pic.twitter.com/v5IiLBYd99
— Ali Abunimah (@AliAbunimah) May 31, 2019
Instead, it reflects official anti-Palestinian racism – as well as a fundamentally anti-Semitic notion that Zionism and Israeli apartheid represent Jews and Jewishness. (In fact, Jews – including Israeli Jews – have been arrested in Germany on multiple occasions for protesting against Israeli apartheid – not to mention the silencing of Rasmea Odeh and ongoing, racist attacks on Palestinian organizing.)
Read the full letter below:
May 31, 2019
Open Letter
To the German Embassy in Denmark
From Boykot Israel
Stop Criminalization of BDS
Boycott of Israel is not anti-Semitism
The Boykot Israel Campaign hereby pronounces its sharp criticism of the anti-BDS resolution passed by the German Bundestag (Parliament) on May 17. In the resolution the BDS is falsely accused of anti-Semitism. But the BDS is not based on religion or ethnicity or fighting against the Jews. The BDS is an anti-racist organization campaigning against the crimes of the Israeli apartheid-state.
By passing the anti-BDS resolution the German state unequivocally places itself on the Israeli side and supports Israel’s more and more desperate struggle against the hastily growing BDS-movement. By the anti-BDS resolution the German state not only violates BDS’ freedom of speech, but at the same time makes itself an accomplice to decades of Israeli crimes against the Palestinians: Ethnic cleansing, massacres, demolition of houses, extension of the illegal settlements, killings of hundreds of unarmed demonstrators in Gaza etc.
The more the BDS is attacked by Israel and its allies, the more justice-loving people all over the world will support the rights of the Palestinian people and back up the BDS – such as we do in Boykot Israel in Denmark.
We agree with the words of the Israeli journalist Gideon Levy:
“Germany, Shame on you and your anti-BDS resolution!”
Copy: The media, the political parties in the Danish Parliament, Amnesty International. The Palestine Network.
Discover more from Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network
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