Az Zawiya: Call to Action
[Az-Zawiya, Salfit] Friday beginning between 9-10.00 AM villagers from Az Zawiya, Deir Ballut and Rafat together with
Internationals and Israelis will gather at 10am to walk to their land and we will join the village in prayer.
On 6 June the bulldozers came to Az Zawyia and began clearing the path for the construction of the wall. The villagers
have vowed to come everyday to their land to stop the wall. Friday will be the 5th day in a row that the villagers of Az
Zawiya, together with Israelis and Internationals have non-violently resisted the building of the wall which will cut
them off from their land and their livelihoods. If construction proceeds as planned, Az Zawiya along with three other
agricultural villages, will have their land confiscated and be surrounded by the wall. Rafat, Deir Ballut and Az-Zawiya
will be turned into isolated enclaves.
Az Zawiya is located south of Mas'ha, where the wall was completed last year. The next phase in this district will
confine the three villages of Az Zawiya, Rafat and Deir Ballut into a closed cluster which only entrance and exit will
be the narrow road entrance under Highway 5 between the village of Mas'ha and Az Zawiya. Once the Wall is completed, the
Israeli military will have total control over residents' movement as the access of these villages to the rest of the
West Bank will be easy to completely cut off.
These past few weeks, residents from other villages have been denied passage through the permanent checkpoint at Deir
Ballut. Around 64,000 people in Salfit will be severely affected by the wall.
We need your help to bring the world's attention to what is happening. We must act before the wall is built!
The International Women's Peace Service (IWPS) together with the Coalition of Women for Peace, Anarchists Against the
Wall, Gush Shalom, Machsom Watch, Ta'ayush and others…
Date: 11 June 2004 Time: Gathering between 9-10.00 AM Where: Az Zawiya
For more Information contact: The International Women's Peace Service (IWPS) Office: 09-2516-644 Kate Mobile: 067381806
(English) Abu Ladeeb – Mayor of Az Zawiya Mobile 052576344(Arabic) Francheska Mobile 050-668-0282 (Hebrew)
IWPS@palnet.com www.iwps.info www.womenspeacepalestine.org
The International Womens Peace Service (Iwps) Witnesses, Documents And Publicizes Human Rights Abuses And Peacefully
Intervenes To Prevent Them. We Support Non-Violent Resistance To The Illegal And Brutal Military Occupation Of
Palestinian Lands. We Live In Hares, Salfit
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For Immediate Release June 10th,2004
IRISH ACTIVIST BEGINS 14-DAY HUNGER STRIKE TO PROTEST C.R.H. COMPLICITY IN HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS Caoimhe Butterly
appeals for C.R.H. to divest from Israeli companies
[Dublin, Ireland] Today Thursday, June 10, 2004, Irish activist Caoimhe Butterly began the first day of a two-week,
water-only hunger strike outside of Cement Roadstone Holdings in Fitzwilliams Square.
The hunger strike has been initiated in an attempt to focus attention on direct Irish complicity in the construction of
Israel's Apartheid Wall, which violates International Law and contributes to grave human rights violations of the
Palestinian people. C.R.H. owns a 25% stake in the Mashav Group, an Israeli holding company for Nesher Cement, which is
the sole provider of cement in Israel.
Amnesty International recently stated that "C.R.H, through its subsidiaries Mashav and Nesher, is likely to be providing
the raw material of the fence/wall. If so, it would contravene the U.N. norms on the responsibilities of Transnational
Corporations and other Business Enterprises with regard to Human Rights (2003)."
The Apartheid Wall, which is 8 meters high in some places, is responsible for the de facto annexation of over 50% of
Palestinian agricultural land. Although the Israeli Authorities' attempt to sanitize its construction by referring to it
as a "security" or "defensive" measure, it has been repeatedly condemned internationally as a land grab and further
solidification of a system of apartheid. Close to 90% of the Wall is being built on Palestinian land inside the West
Bank. Where already completed, the Wall cut off families and communities from each other, separated farmers from their
land and cut off Palestinians from their places of work, schools, health care facilities and places of worship.
The Wall poses unprecedented restrictions on Palestinians' movement within Occupied Palestine. Palestinian activists and
farmers have also been killed or wounded while demonstrating against its construction. Caoimhe Butterly states, "It is
shameful that an Irish company should profit from anything that is as immoral, unjust, and destructive as the
construction of this Wall. This fast is being initiated as an attempt to pressure C.R.H. to divest from these companies.
It is the only moral option."
At a time when the Israeli military forces act with increasing impunity in their violent humiliation and brutalization
of the Palestinian people, Irish civil society must take a stand. Despite International support for the suspension of
the Trade Association agreements between the E.U. and Israel, the Irish government – in its term of presidency of the
E.U. – has refused to get off the fence and endorse the growing calls for their suspension.
In this vacuum of any dedication on the part of our government to advocate for genuine self-determination, and basic
human rights for Palestinians, companies such as C.R.H. continue to profit from the occupation. Consumer boycotts and
sanctions contributed greatly to the isolation of Apartheid South Africa. 21st-century Israeli Apartheid must be
isolated in the same manner and the courage of the growing popular resistance to the Wall, in Palestine, must spread on
the international level.
Joining, visiting or supporting the fast are a number of activists and politicians which include Dennis Halliday, former
humanitarian coordinator to Iraq, Tom Hyland, Senator David Norris and Nuria Mustafa.
There will be a constant, 24-hour presence, with candle-lit vigils at night, from the 10th-24th of June.
For more information please contact: Caoimhe Butterly: 087-213-4160 / masasa73@hotmail.com.
See these two articles published in a local newspaper of Vancouver The Republic by Chris LaVigne:
http://www.republic-news.org/archive/90-repub/90_lavigne.htm about Canadian activists' experience with the ISM in Palestine last year.
http://www.republic-news.org/archive/89-repub/89_lavigne_owen.htm about an ISM-organized demonstration in front of a local politician's office in Vancouver recently.
INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT Join the Palestinian struggle for freedom and human rights Freedom Summer Palestine
June 25 - August 19, 2004 We need you to help make this campaign a success! Please join. For more information, see:
www.palsolidarity.org