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Dive deeper into the week’s biggest stories from the Middle East and around the world with The National’s foreign desk. Nuances are often missed in day-to-day headlines. We go Beyond the Headlines by bringing together the voices of experts and those living the news to provide a clearer picture of the region’s shifting political and social landscape.
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Wednesday Jan 10, 2018
Wednesday Jan 10, 2018
This week, Israel banned twenty activist organisations over their support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement against Israel or BDS for short.
The movement, whose co-founder we speak to in the show, is built upon three founding ideas: To put an end to Israeli occupation of all Arab lands and dismantling the wall as per international law; second, to recognize the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and finally, to respect and protect the right of Palestinians refugees to return to their homes as stipulated by the United Nations.
These three causes reflect what are widely recognized as the basic human rights Palestinians deserve. For supporting the cause, twenty international groups were banned from entering Israel.
Host Naser Al Wasmi is also joined by an activist from one of the organisations that were banned, Ariel Gold. The American is an activist at Code Pink: Women for Peace, an NGO aimed at providing a peace and social justice movement. The organisation identifies as women-initiated and has done a lot of work within Gaza. However, with the boycott, the international organisation will be unable to reach those Palestinian beneficiaries who benefit from their work.
Another one of the twenty organisations that were banned earlier this week was the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Fatin Al Tamimi speaks to us on how this move will interfere with her work promoting Palestinian statehood.
BDS: bdsmovement.net; @bdsmovement
Code Pink: codepink.org; @ArielElyseGold