Open letter response to Winston Peters defence of Israel
On 25 September, Foreign Affairs Minister, Winston Peters, replied to our email sent to him on 25 August. Here is our response to his reply:
Apartheid Israel
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Sanctions will speak louder than words
The universally-ratified Fourth Geneva Convention is recognised by the United Nations as constituting the foundation of international humanitarian law and its essential rules. Articles 146 and 147 include the possibility of criminal liability for gross violations by individual perpetrators. Israel has chosen not to incorporate the Convention into domestic law, even though this does not relieve it of its international obligations. Instead, the Convention’s applicability to the military Occupation of the West Bank has been, and continues to be, denied by successive Israeli governments.
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New Zealand Government are serving the Israel Lobby
On 25 August we sent an email to the NZ Minister of Foreign Affairs, Winston Peters, essentially similar to those already emailed to Jacinda Ardern and Ron Mark, concerning the Ministry of Defence proposal to purchase $9 million-worth of military equipment from Israel, and asking that the order be cancelled. The responses from Jacinda Ardern’s Office and Ron Mark can be seen in previous blogs.
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100% fake news about New Zealand government policy on funding UNRWA is deeply damaging to Palestinian refugees
This fake news about New Zealand funding for UNRWA is being deliberately spread by the US and fanatical pro-Israeli groups in New Zealand to try and undermine UNRWA and create a stampede of other countries to also withdraw support for the agency.
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Evasive answer from NZ Government
On 24 July this email was sent by Marian and I to our Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern: “The crimes committed…
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A new generation unites in opposing Zionism
The New Zealand Green Party MP, Golriz Ghahraman, has upset the Jewish Council here because she described Joseph and Mary,…
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GUEST BLOG: Lois Griffiths: And so it goes on! Another Palestinian Child Shot! Who Cares?
This time it was a 9-year old boy, Abdul Rahman Shteiwi. It happened, not in Gaza this time, but in a West Bank Palestinian village.
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Why Zionists avoid saying ‘anti-Jewish’
According to the online Oxford English Dictionary, the term anti-Semitism means “Hostility to or prejudice against Jews”. It defines Semite as: “A member of any of the peoples who speak or spoke a Semitic language, including in particular the Jews and Arabs. From modern Latin Semita, via late Latin from Greek Sēm ‘Shem’, son of Noah in the Bible, from whom these peoples were traditionally supposed to be descended.”
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GUEST BLOG: Lois Griffiths – We hear the cry of our Children
Noam Chomsky has described Israeli control over Gaza as ‘sadistic.’ Israeli historian Ilan Pappé has said, ‘incremental genocide’. The UN has said that Gaza will be unliveable by 2020.
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Zionism’s race-hate profiteering and vandalism
The summary of a report prepared by the Secretariat of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development on the economic costs of the Israeli occupation for the Palestinian people noted: “Throughout history, colonisation and occupations have always had economic dimensions. This is also the case in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, where the occupation imposes heavy economic costs on the Palestinian people and their economy.”