IJAN organizers from the United States, Spain, Catalonia and Switzerland attended the 2013 World Social Forum in Tunis from March 26th to March 30th. In addition to participating in the Opening March and the Land Day March in solidarity with Palestine, IJAN helped organize two self-organized activities and participated in a third. In addition, Liliana Cordova with the Spanish anti-capitalist movement and IJAN spoke about IJAN’s work around BDS in a plenary session.
During the Case of Jews Against Zionism workshop, IJAN members Lee Gargagliano of the United States, Laurent Cohen of Catalonia, Gabriel Ash of Switzerland and Liliana Cordova presented on what underpins an anti-Zionist framework among Jews and the role of and organizing done by anti-Zionist Jews. There were approximately 40 people in attendance, filling the room. Video from this workshop will be available shortly in both French and English.
IJAN along with Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, the National Lawyers’Guild (U.S.), the United States Palestinian Community Networkand others hosted a popular tribunal focused on the role of Israel in the global arms trade and the “homeland security” services industry. Building off of the preliminary people’s tribunal hosted in Porto Alegre, Brazil, this edition featured testimony from Rafeef Ziadah of War on Want and the Palestinian Boycott National Committee and Annette Groth a German MP as well as from activists from Brazil, the U.S., France, and Spain. Testimony focused on the impacts of Israeli arms sales in the UK, Spain, France, the European Union, the United States and Brazil and highlighted BDS campaigns including the one targeting G4S, the world’s largest security company, and another pushing for a global military embargo against Israel. After the panelists spoke reflections were offered by Rose Brewer of the Gender Justice Working Group of the US Social Forum and Mireille Fanon of La Fondation Frantz Fanon and daughter of the revolutionary, Frantz Fanon. As this project continues to grow, we hope to foster local tribunals focused around local issues of repression and the impact of the Israel security industry which will in turn feed into campaign work that strengthens all of our struggles. Click here to visit the website Israel’s Worldwide Role in Repression.
