Why we took action to highlight Britain’s complicity in Israel’s apartheid of Palestinians

Last week the Copwatch Network hacked ads across the capital to expose the role of politicians, business people and media figures in the oppression of Palestine.

On Fri­day 17th Novem­ber, ahead of the nation­al day of action for Pales­tine, Cop­watch Net­work hacked over 100 ad spaces at bus stops and on tubes across Lon­don. Our ad hack par­o­died the Met police’s author­i­tar­i­an want­ed’ posters in which they post­ed pho­tos iden­ti­fy­ing pro-Pales­tine protesters.

In our adhack, we sought to instead high­light the insid­i­ous role of UK politi­cians, arms com­pa­ny CEOs and key main­stream media per­son­nel in fund­ing, prof­it­ing from and enabling Israel’s ongo­ing geno­cide of Pales­tini­ans in Gaza and across their occu­pied land. The British state has blood on its hands – it’s them who should be want­ed’, not us.

As part of the Cop­watch Net­work in the UK, we recog­nise our col­lec­tive respon­si­bil­i­ty to stand in full sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Pales­tin­ian strug­gle for lib­er­a­tion and to active­ly resist the British state’s long-stand­ing com­plic­i­ty in Israel’s set­tler-colo­nial régime. 

Our strug­gles against polic­ing, sur­veil­lance and mass incar­cer­a­tion in the UK are com­plete­ly bound up in the strug­gle against the sharpest edges of the prison and mil­i­tary indus­tri­al com­plex in Pales­tine. This is why it is vital that we con­tin­ue to ramp up the pres­sure, take direct action and mobilise our com­mu­ni­ties to fight for a free Pales­tine in our lifetimes.

Britain has played an instru­men­tal role in jus­ti­fy­ing Zion­ist ide­ol­o­gy and sub­se­quent­ly enabling Israel’s white suprema­cist, apartheid rule: from the Sykes-Picot agree­ment, in which colo­nial pow­ers includ­ing the UK and France secret­ly decid­ed to land-grab parts of Pales­tine after World War I; to the 1917 Bal­four Dec­la­ra­tion, where the British state promised Pales­tine to Zion­ists; to the British Man­date’ in Pales­tine which all ulti­mate­ly result­ed in the cre­ation of the state of Israel in 1948.

To this day, the British state con­tin­ues to prof­it — finan­cial­ly and polit­i­cal­ly — from Israel’s set­tler-colo­nial project. British cor­po­ra­tions have seen record prof­its in recent years, includ­ing through sell­ing arms to Israel, whilst two-fifths of Labour’s cur­rent shad­ow cab­i­net have received dona­tions since they became MPs from a pro-Israel lob­by group. 

The vile anti-Pales­tin­ian and Islam­o­pho­bic rhetoric from the UK’s polit­i­cal and media class­es have fur­ther served to man­u­fac­ture con­sent for this geno­cide, with head­lines across main­stream media dom­i­nat­ed by racist and pro-Zion­ist narratives.

This is why we have high­light­ed the inter­con­nect­ed roles of British politi­cians, arms com­pa­nies and the media; because ulti­mate­ly we know that togeth­er, they form part of a British rul­ing class which has a vest­ed polit­i­cal inter­est in oppres­sion in the UK and world­wide, includ­ing Israel’s vio­lent occu­pa­tion of Pales­tine — which it has sus­tained for the past sev­en­ty-five years.

Now, dur­ing this lat­est stage of Israel’s bom­bard­ment of Pales­tine which has killed at least 12,000 Pales­tini­ans and labelled a text­book case of geno­cide’ by experts in the field, Britain con­tin­ues pro­vid­ing uncon­di­tion­al sup­port. Just last week, Par­lia­ment vot­ed against a cease­fire, despite hun­dreds of thou­sands of peo­ple turn­ing up on the streets of the UK to demand one.

There could not be a big­ger dis­con­nect between polit­i­cal and cor­po­rate inter­ests and those of the pub­lic. In our mil­lions, peo­ple across the coun­try are call­ing for an imme­di­ate cease­fire, with a recent YouGov poll indi­cat­ing that 76% of adults in the UK sup­port this demand.

Through mass protests, sit-ins, pick­ets out­side arms fac­to­ries, local com­mu­ni­ty actions, and school strikes, thou­sands of us are also call­ing for an end to the occu­pa­tion and a lib­er­at­ed Pales­tine — with those across strug­gles unit­ed in our calls — from cli­mate jus­tice groups, to queer col­lec­tives, to trade unions. We know our move­ment for Pales­tin­ian sol­i­dar­i­ty is only grow­ing by the day. When Cop­watch took action last week, com­muters were over­whelm­ing­ly sup­port­ive — cheer­ing us on and even ask­ing to help.

The British state is afraid of our col­lec­tive pow­er, which is why it has aggres­sive­ly tried to sup­press this wide­spread dis­sent, using every tool at its dis­pos­al — even hyp­o­crit­i­cal­ly com­plain­ing about being named and shamed for last week’s vote. One tool has been the vio­lent polic­ing of Free Pales­tine protests, which has includ­ed mass arrests, oppres­sive protest restric­tions, the racist brand­ing of these protests as hate march­es’, and pro­test­ers being charged with racial­ly aggra­vat­ed offences’, and even hit with ter­ror­ism’ charges.

In Lon­don, the Met police has start­ed to dig­i­tal­ly sur­veil and tar­get pro­test­ers online, by post­ing pic­tures of people’s faces on social media and ask­ing the pub­lic to help find them. But we know the police are the real per­pe­tra­tors of vio­lence, danc­ing to the tune of the British state and assist­ing the repres­sion of Pales­tin­ian sol­i­dar­i­ty from peo­ple across the country.

Cop­watch Net­work stands against all forms of racism, includ­ing anti­semitism, Islam­o­pho­bia, and anti-Black­ness, and will chal­lenge it wher­ev­er it aris­es in our move­ments. But we will not stand by whilst the British state weaponis­es anti­semitism to try and sup­press our col­lec­tive move­ment for Pales­tin­ian lib­er­a­tion; a move­ment led by work­ing class Pales­tin­ian, Arab, Mus­lim, Black and Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ties, and sup­port­ed by those who share in our struggle.

We hope our action encour­ages more peo­ple to learn about the his­to­ry of vio­lent occu­pa­tion in Pales­tine, the impe­ri­al­ist aims of the set­tler-colo­nial state of Israel and its West­ern sup­port­ers, and the British state’s long-stand­ing com­plic­i­ty in enabling these injustices.

Now we must all stand in full sol­i­dar­i­ty with the peo­ple of Pales­tine and take action to ampli­fy their calls: to stop arm­ing Israel, for an imme­di­ate cease­fire, and for an end to the occu­pa­tion. Only with an end to Israel’s set­tler-colo­nial, apartheid rule, the return of Pales­tin­ian land and the right of dis­placed Pales­tini­ans to return, can there be true jus­tice and peace.

In the same way that sys­tems of oppres­sion are all con­nect­ed, from polic­ing, pris­ons, bor­ders to the Mil­i­tary Indus­tri­al Com­plex, so too are our strug­gles for lib­er­a­tion. In the words of Angela Davis: If we say we abol­ish the prison-indus­tri­al com­plex… we should also say abol­ish apartheid, and end the occu­pa­tion of Pales­tine!” Because none of us are free, until we are all free.

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