Join us on September 10, 2022 in Oslo, Norway, as we demonstrate outside the Norwegian Parliament at Stortinget to march against the so-called “peace process,” the infamous Oslo Accords, on their 29th anniversary. After 29 years of Oslo, it is critically urgent to bring the devastating repercussions of this project to an end. Once again, it is clear: the Palestinian people, inside and outside Palestine, and throughout historic Palestine from the river to the sea, are one people struggling for liberation, not a powerless puppet Authority providing security to the occupier. It has also made very clear that the legitimate leadership of the Palestinian people is the Palestinian resistance, including the Palestinian prisoners’ movement.
Samidoun’s Jaldia Abubakra and Mohammed Khatib will be participating in and speaking at the demonstration at 4 pm on Saturday, September 10 in Oslo, called by the Masar Badil, the Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement. This demonstration calls for:
- the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea
- the clear repudiation of the Oslo Accords and their repercussions and corollaries
- confronting Israeli colonialism and normalization with Zionism
- escalating the international boycott and isolation of the Zionist regime
- standing with the Palestinian people and their Resistance, including the Palestinian prisoners
As the call for the demonstration emphasizes, “The Norwegian government, through spearheading the process of these accords, participated in this crime against the Palestinian people and their rights, alongside imperialist, Zionist and Arab reactionary forces. 29 years later, it is more clear than ever: it is time to bring down this failed agreement aiming to liquidate the Palestinian cause and all of its outcomes…The so-called ‘peace process’ launched from the 1991 Madrid conference and 1993 Oslo agreement was nothing but a tactic of deception of international public opinion. This deception was used by the United States and ‘Israel’ to steal more Palestinian land and perpetuate a system of colonialism, racism, exploitation and apartheid throughout Palestine, from the river to the sea.”
Like the Palestinian people as a whole and especially Palestinian refugees, Palestinian prisoners have been betrayed and left behind by the Oslo Accords and the path of negotiations. Once promoted as a road to the liberation of Palestinian prisoners, the Oslo accords instead enabled the use of Palestinian prisoners as bargaining chips in an attempt to extract even more concessions from Palestinian officials.
Dozens of pre-Oslo Palestinian prisoners remain in Israeli jails, as occupation forces refused to recognize Palestinian prisoners from 1948 occupied Palestine and repeatedly rescinded agreements for their release.
Of course, this was not the only outcome of Oslo for the Palestinian prisoners. At the heart of these agreements, and uninterrupted despite declarations and promises, is the Palestinian Authority’s “security coordination” with the Israeli occupation. This “security coordination” has undermined the resilience and social solidarity of the Palestinian movement, chased after and repressed the Palestinian resistance and established a “revolving door” of imprisonment and political detention between P.A. and Israeli prisons. It has firmly established the P.A. as a security subcontractor of the Israeli occupation, trained by the United States with European and British support.
The political repression of Palestinians outside Palestine is also intimately linked to Oslo; U.S. President Bill Clinton issued the executive order listing Palestinian and Lebanese resistance organizations that rejected Oslo as “terrorists” in January 1995, noting that they “threaten to disrupt the Middle East peace process.” This was shortly followed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, which created the “material support” legislation used to persecute Palestinians in the U.S. This was only strengthened by the USA PATRIOT Act and post-September 11 repressive legislation and used in the persecution of Palestinian political prisoners like the Holy Land Foundation Five.
Those “terror lists,” designations and legislation have been marketed around the world after 2001 by the U.S. and adopted in various forms by Canada, the European Union, the U.K. and elsewhere. Of course, Palestinians were never free from persecution by imperialist powers, but the post-Oslo “anti-terror” legislation further institutionalized that persecution while specifically criminalizing and classifying as “terrorist” the rejection of the Oslo project.
We urge all supporters of the Palestinian cause, the Palestinian resistance and the liberation of Palestine, particularly the Palestinian prisoners, to join us to march in Oslo on 10 September for a liberated Palestine from the river to the sea!
This demonstration is also part of the lead-up to the 29 October Marches for Return and Liberation, which will take place at the European Parliament in Brussels and in locations internationally.
Resources:
- Down with Oslo! Confront normalization and colonialism, support the resistance
- Demand Justice for assassinated Palestinian Nizar Banat: Down with Oslo!
- Bring down the path of Oslo for the liberation of Palestine – Khaled Barakat
- Al-Awda calls on the Palestinian people to break free from the shackles of Madrid-Oslo and return to its institutions of the struggle for Liberation and Return
