Next Friday: HUMAN RIGHTS MARCH IN TEL-AVIV AND HAIFA

3 December 2011, Communist Party of Israel המפלגה הקומוניסטית הישראלית http://maki.org.il
The March המצעד http://themarch.org.il (Israel)

Next Friday, December 9, will be at Tel-Aviv and Haifa the annual Human Rights March, organized by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), an one important event of the Israeli human rights and social change community. Hundreds of organizations, communities, and activists – all come together to say: "It’s our right, to all human rights, for all human beings." Among them: Hadash (Democratic Front for Peace and Equality), the Communist Party of Israel, TANDI (the Democratic Women's Movement in Israel) and Hagada Hasmalit (Progressive Culture Center in Tel-Aviv and radical website).

According to ACRI "the March has room for all the different flags, for all the groups and initiatives that view human rights as the moral and social foundation for change. Many voices that are not frequently heard, or even not heard at all – thousands of activists for freedom of expression, protest, and movement, for the right to privacy, for human dignity; activists for migrant workers, asylum seekers, homeless persons, the unemployed, Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, and Palestinian citizens of Israel; for the adequate housing, health, and education that we all deserve. Once a year, just before International Human Rights Day, we join forces: all of the rights, all the activists, all the groups and organizations, all the believers come together".

And more: "Anti-democratic winds are sweeping through Israel, but last year’s Human Rights March proved that Israeli civil society is wide awake, working and struggling to protect human rights and democracy. The winds are blowing and anti-democratic legislation continues to be promoted, as though the people never flooded the streets in a demand for social justice. And yet the Israeli society has now changed – we are more united, we know how to protest, we know how to demand. So join us in the Human Rights March – this is your stage!"

Meeting point in Tel-Aviv at Habima Square,10:00 am. Rally in Rabin Square, 12:00 pm.

Read more in the March Blog in English: http://themarch.org.il/?cat=38
Attend and share the Facebook event: http://on.fb.me/tpFL55


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SPREAD THE RUMOR – MARCHING IN HAIFA!
The March המצעד http://themarch.org.il (Israel)

ehud בקטגוריה English 1/12/2011

Two weeks ago, on the phone, Matan was dead-serious: "After what we did this summer, it is obvious we will hold the Human Rights March in Haifa as well".

We couldn't resist the committed volunteers – and we are proud to hold the March in haifa, for the first time!

For the Haifa march on FB - http://j.mp/sSymCV
For the Tel Aviv march on FB - http://j.mp/vlqXDO

Haifa is a binational and multicultural city. More than 250,000 residents of the city are regularly creating endless affinit/identity groups, and most of them are keenly aware of their common interest in establishing an equal environment , based on human rights and mutual respect.

A multitude of people in haifa's neighborhoods demonstrated over the summer, demanding fulfillment of basic rights in education, housing and welfare- the goals of a just society.

Residents of haifa and its environs understood that they have human rights that can neither be denied, undermined or repealed.

Basic, human, elemental rights- it doesn't matter how you name them, and therefore, it is only natural that for the 1st time , the international day of human rights will be celebrated in haifa too.

This past summer, people went out into the streets, not for a higher standard of living, but for a better quality of life. The difference between these to goals may seem slight and insignificant, but it is really meaningful and important. People did not ask for free cable t.v. , for a bigger car, of for a more advanced air conditioner. They demanded that their rights be honored, that the be related to as human beings, that the authorities change their agenda, and place the human element in front of their eyes, instead of the economy and intellectual paradigms.
This protest began and continues by the people: people of different viewpoints and groupings, but with shared rights for all – the residents of b'nai david, wadi nisnas, halissa, hadar, neve yosef and carmel.

The International Day of Human Rights and the march of organizations for social change reflect a direct continuation of the events of the summer.

We are looking forward to a reality of citizens that work for social change, reject injustice and acceptance of indignity, who will struggle for equality, friendship and freedom against he anti democratic legislation currently before the knesset and for assuming a shared responsibility for our future.

COME TO MARCH – HAIFA OR TEL-AVIV!
הוספת תגובה »

Wake up. Rise up. Struggle. Demonstrate. Come to the Human Rights March in Tel Aviv on December 9, 2011.

מאת ehud | בקטגוריה English 2011 |‏ 23/11/2011
מתוך: הקונספירלה; גיא בר נבון

If this past summer proves something, it is this: we are a part of the world. Israel's tent protest did not begin in Tel Aviv's Rothschild Boulevard, it started in Tunisia and in Tahrir Square; and it didn't end with the demonstration in Rabin Square, it still echoes here and on Wall Street, in Puerta del Sol in Madrid, and on the steps of St Paul Cathedral in London. Human rights – and within them the right to the most basic elements of a dignified life: health, housing, education, and welfare – these rights have always been universal. In recent months, people from more and more nations have taken to the streets to struggle for these very rights, demanding that their elected officials act to fulfill their responsibilities and stop betraying their trust. What us currently happening in so many cities expresses our shared humanity; and in this, we too are a part of this world.

If this past summer proves something, it is this: we are not a part of this world. It would be senseless to try and lead a protest for human rights in Israel that is somehow limited only to the space west of the Separation Fence. In addition, even in this limited space – the protests that took place in the summer sometimes preferred to ignore institutionalized aspects created by social gaps based on national identity, which are the foundation for other forms of discrimination. Affordable housing is affordable housing, but if you're an Arab citizen ofIsrael, for over 60 years the state has preferred to thwart your ability to build legally. Dealing with these issues without recognizing their origins, as though they carried the same weight of the struggle for regulation of apartments for rent in Tel Aviv (an important struggle in and of itself) – doing so is not part of the solution, it is part of the problem. This kind of approach, which separates justice from the social justice storm, is what separates us from the rest of the world.

And if so, then just where are we living?

On December 9th, one day before International Human Rights Day, the Human Rights March will be carried out, for the third consecutive year . The march will pass through familiar streets – the same streets that witnessed unprecedented protests this past summer. And perhaps, after this summer, these streets are no longer the same as they were? Part of the world or not part of it, time will tell.. In any event, the reality here, in certain ways, has already changed.

The hundreds of thousands of Israelis, who demonstrated over the summer, set an international record for nonviolent, popular protest. Could there be anything more democratic than that? The fact that a middle class protest for affordable housing grew into a widespread social protest was an exceptional display of human solidarity, which is at the basis of every society aspiring for equality. The fact that after two years of raging racism against the Arab citizens of Israel, which has been led by the government and is intensifying in the Knesset– the fact that after all that, the biggest demonstrations in Israel's history placed universal, social principles at the front, rather than nationalist principles, Is not something to be ignored.

This summer was a beginning. Social justice and civil protest are a powerful beginning. In this past summer, hundreds of thousands of Israelis together did something great, and we have additional, great challenges ahead of us. Some of these challenges might seem unsurmountable at times, but who would have imagined only several months ago that the people would have enough of privatization, corporations, and a neoliberal economy? Or that from protesting the price of cottage cheese we would go to demanding a welfare state and direct employment?

In the Human Rights March, we will express all of these challenges: social justice and an end to the occupation, complete civil equality and freedom of expression, a substantive democracy and human rights for all – for refugees and for migrant workers, for women and for men, for Palestinians and for Israelis, all the 100 percent of human rights for all human beings. Nothing less. This, precisely, is the essence of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This, precisely, is the essence of International Human Rights Day. And precisely for all this we are holding the Human Rights March.

Several weeks ago, during the last (for now) social justice demonstration at Rabin Squarein Tel Aviv, a young man stood on the stage and said that for him, the summer has not ended. He said: “This summer we shouted together 'no more'.” He said: “Our joint struggle is the struggle for a different future, one future, a better future for all those who live here.” He said: “Wake up, rise up, struggle, demonstrate. We will have a new society, more democratic, more just, more equal.”

These words – spoken by Rabea Fahoum, a sociology student atTelAvivUniversity– could be wishful thinking or a passing illusion; or they could be our future, a future for all of us. In order for this to happen, we must wake up, struggle, demonstrate; not for specific rights to specific people, not each group for its own interests, but together, with enough room for each of the many problems that we must confront and with a unified and universal voice, the voice of all of us for the shared vision that we shape with our actions.

So wake up. Rise up. Struggle. Demonstrate. Yes, there will be a new society here, more democratic, more just, more equal. And precisely for that, come to the Human Rights March on December 9th.

Hagai El-Ad, Executive Director, ACRI

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About the Human Rights March, Tel-Aviv 2011
מאת ehud | בקטגוריה English 2011 |‏ 14/11/2011

Once again, we will take to the streets to call out: It's our right!

On Friday, 9 December 2011, we will walk together in the annual Human Rights March.

Join the event on Facebook: http://on.fb.me/tpFL55
Meeting point at Habima Square, Rothschild st. Tel-Aviv at 10:00.

Rally at the Rabin Square at 12:00.

The March has room for all the different flags, for all the groups and initiatives that view human rights as the moral and social foundation for change. Many voices that are not frequently heard, or even not heard at all – thousands of activists for freedom of expression, protest, and movement, for the right to privacy, for human dignity; activists for migrant workers, asylum seekers, homeless persons, the unemployed, Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, and Palestinian citizens of Israel; for the adequate housing, health, and education that we all deserve. Once a year, just before International Human Rights Day, we join forces: all of the rights, all the activists, all the groups and organizations, all the believers come together.

This past summer, the streets of Israelwere filled with believers. A belief that we can change things, that we should and we must – bring about a new policy, a new culture regarding the state's treatment of its citizens, a new approach regarding the state's obligation to promote the rights of all of us.

This belief has empowered many, who thought they were a few and alone and suddenly discovered that we are a mass. This past summer, the flag of social justice has been raised, but this is only the beginning of change, of raising consciousness to the fact that all human rights must be afforded to every human being.

Anti-democratic winds are sweeping throughIsrael, but last year's Human Rights March proved that Israeli civil society is wide awake, working and struggling to protect human rights and democracy.

The winds are blowing and anti-democratic legislation continues to be promoted, as though the people never flooded the streets in a demand for social justice. And yet the Israeli society has now changed – we are more united, we know how to protest, we know how to demand. So join us in the Human Rights March – this is your stage!

The March, organized by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), is the flagship event of the Israeli human rights and social change community. Hundreds of organizations, communities, and activists – all come together to say: It's our right, to all human rights, for all human beings!