PEDAL has arrived in the occupied West Bank after cycling 7,000km from London to support Palestinian and Israeli popular resistance movements.
Today we met the Bil’in popular committee (1) and participated in a bike action against Israel’s illegal separation wall and occupation of Palestinian land (2).
Abdullah Abu Rahma of the Bil’in popular committee who invited PEDAL said: “By Palestinians, Israelis and internationals standing in solidarity and taking grassroots action- we can end Israel’s illegal occupation.”
Over the last four months we have travelled through 18 countries (3) linking communities fighting social injustice and responding to the Palestinian civil society call for Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions in 2005 (4).
With the Freedom Flotilla 2 (5) and the Welcome to Palestine “Fly-in” (6) actions in recent weeks we hope that our journey adds to the mounting pressure from global civil society for Israel to comply with international law and respect Palestinian rights.
PEDALler Jen Peachey said: “We have seen governments around the world actively colluding with Israel’s illegal occupation and blockade of Gaza – whether its through US military aid, UK diplomatic silence or Greek coast guards blocking the Flotilla. We cannot trust governments to act for us and so we must act ourselves.”
During the journey we have taken part in BDS international days of action (7) and ran educational workshops about the campaign. Today’s protest in Bil’in, which has been taking place for over six years, is regularly met with a violent response by the Israeli army. Tear gas, sound grenades, as well as live ammunition fired overhead were all used today.
British food grower William Ronan added: “ We are working with the BDS movement, popular committees and dissenting Israeli organisations to challenge Israel’s illegal actions. This way we can actively support the Palestinian struggle for equal rights in the face of apartheid, colonization and occupation.”
PEDAL have been exchanging heritage variety seeds all along our route and meeting with food growers, farmers and seed savers to make solidarity links around access to land, seed and water.
During our time in Palestine we will be distributing the ‘Seedbank of Solidarity’ (8) and meeting Palestinian farmers to discuss how we can continue to make strong mutual networks for food autonomy between communities in Europe and the Middle East.
(1) http://www.bilin-village.org/english/
(2) International court of justice ruling. July 2004. http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/index.php?pr=71&code=mwp&p1=3&p2=4&p3=6&ca…
(3) UK, France, Belgium, Luxemberg, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Albania, Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Palestine
(5) http://www.freedomflotilla.eu/
(6) http://bienvenuepalestine.com/?page_id=232
(7) http://www.bdsmovement.net/2011/bds-and-anti-militarism-critical-mass-in-brussels-6342
(8) http://www.100daystopalestine.org/pedal-projects/seedbank-of-solidarity/
A big thankyou to Active Stills for use of the images- much respect to the work you do.
