Version imprimableOver 300 Palestinians had been killed in the first three days of this latest Israeli slaughter.
And as ever with war, along with the bombs and the deaths have come the lies. The Israeli government is keen
to claim that it is ’only responding’ to missile
strikes launched from within the Gaza strip. Yet
this defence of ’only responding’, so eagerly
repeated by our own media, is a travesty of the
truth – for it turns the laws of cause and effect
upon their head. It ignores the history of 60
years of oppression and occupation, of a
continuing attempt to wipe the Palestinian
nation out of history.
It is that history of oppression – from the
forced expulsion of hundreds of thousands of
Palestinians in 1948 and the occupations of
Gaza and the West Bank in 1967, through to the
refusal to recognise the results of democratic
Palestinian elections and the continued blockage
of Gaza - that has fed the continuing resistance
of the Palestinian people.
That resistance is both completely
understandable and entirely legitimate.
Respect fully and unconditionally supports
the cause of Palestinian freedom. We will do
everything we can to raise solidarity with the
Palestinians of Gaza, suffering today under
bombardment. And we will continue to work
alongside all those who understand that the
only way to create a peaceful and secure
Middle East is to turn the slogan ’Free Palestine’
into a living reality.
December 29th, 2008.
