PUTTING PATIENTS BEFORE POLITICS - PASS ACAA

In April we sent out a call to action to contact your MEP to ask them to support the Agreement on Conformity Assessment and Acceptance of Industrial Products (ACAA) which would allow for the upgrading of the 1995 EU-Israel Association Agreement which forms the legal basis governing relations between Israel and the EU. This is mainly concerned with trade and scientific and technical cooperation and will substantially open up the European market to Israeli goods, especially pharmaceutical products. Now we are asking you to sign an online petition to ask that the European Parliament be allowed to vote on this legislation. The link to the petition is below and we urge you to please sign the petition and to send this to your friends and colleagues to ask that they do the same. 

http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/members-of-the-european-parliament-pass-acaa

For more than two years, opponents of the ACAA deal have delayed any action on it, preventing the issue from reaching a vote in committee and, ultimately, the plenary. Their technical and legal arguments against ACAA have all been countered by the European Council, the European Commission and the legal services of all three EU institutions—including that of the European Parliament itself.


By denying our representatives the opportunity to vote on the matter, ACAA’s critics are harming the democratic process and the interests of the very people they have been elected to serve: Europe’s citizens.


And the enormous benefits of Israeli pharmaceuticals to European healthcare and the well-being of European patients are undeniable. Despite its small size, Israel is at the forefront of major medical innovation, finding new and affordable treatments for a broad range of diseases. To name just two examples: Copaxone, the world’s top selling treatment for multiple sclerosis, was developed at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, while the Israeli-produced generic version of Lipitor, the popular blood pressure medication, will be the first of its kind to hit the UK market, expected at a price 92% below the original.


Yes, Israeli pharmaceuticals can help us save not only lives but also costs. Teva is the world’s largest producer of generic medicines, which are critical to maintaining our high standards of healthcare, particularly during these difficult economic times. According to industry estimates, Europeans save nearly €25 billion annually by using generics, €2 billion in France alone.

The time has come to put European patients before personal politics!

CALL TO ACTION - EAPPI SYNOD MOTION

CALL TO ACTION - EAPPI SYNOD MOTION 

Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI) – Motion at General Synod 2012

A motion has been tabled at the Church Of England’s General Synod  in York (10 July 2012) which seeks to formally adopt and deepen the Church’s links with the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). The General Synod is the highest legislative body in the C of E. The motion affirms General Synod’s support for EAPPI, encourages parishioners to take part in the programme and urges Churches to make use of the experiences of returning participants. If the motion is passed it will significantly raise EAPPI’s profile and legitimacy.

What is EAPPI and why is it problematic?

EAPPI was founded in 2002. It takes around 20 Ecumenical Accompaniers (EAs) to Israel every year, for between three and four and a half months. They receive two weeks of residential training beforehand, of which just two hours is dedicated to the Israeli perspective. They volunteer in Hebron, Jayyous or Yanoun accompanying Palestinians through checkpoints and monitoring any perceived abuses. Of the three months in the region, they spend one day inside the Green Line, normally in Sderot. All of the Israeli groups they come into contact with are of the fringe left or right. They have virtually no contact with mainstream Israelis.

The result is the creation of a cohort of very partisan but very motivated anti-Israel advocates who have almost no grasp of the suffering of normal Israelis.

Participants are expected to fulfil a minimum of ten speaking engagements on their return, but most do many more in churches across the country and of all denominations. They are considered experts on the overall situation, despite having a very narrow experience which takes almost no account of the suffering of Israelis. This helps generate a climate of hostility to Israel in the churches.

What can you do?

The Church of England should be aware of the strength of feeling regarding this issue within the Jewish community. You can:

• Like the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Facebook page and comment on it, expressing your concerns regarding this motion.
• Write to the Bishop of Manchester as the chair of CCJ, expressing your concern – Bishopscourt, Bury New Road, Manchester, M7 4LE.
• Write to the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth Palace, London, SE1 7JU and to William Fittall, General Secretary, The General Synod, Church House, Great Smith St, London SW1P 3AZ.
• Write to the Church Times. This is the most influential Church of England newspaper – its address is Church Times, 3rd Floor, Invicta House, 108-114 Golden Lane, London EC1Y 0TG.

When you write your letters, you may want to:

• Highlight the partisan nature of EAPPI, explaining how little time participants spend in Israel with mainstream Israelis.Remind the Church of England and members of its General Synod of their duty to examine all perspectives regarding Israel/Palestine.
• Highlight how inappropriate it would be for the General Synod to be endorsing a programme which creates entirely partisan spokespeople on the issue.
• Encourage the Synod to lend support to organisations which encourage dialogue and reconciliation, not division, such as One Voice or the Forum for Discussion of Israel/Palestine.
• Do not berate or disparage them!

CO-OP EXTENDS BOYCOTT POLICY

You may already have seen the distressing news that the Co-Operative Group has extended its boycott policy from settlement goods to all produce from four Israeli companies (Agrexco, Arava Export Growers, Adafresh and Mehadrin) that source from the settlements.

The Fair Play Campaign Group, which co-ordinates UK anti-boycott work, has issued this statement:

“The Co-op’s decision to reformulate its policy on settlement goods to include a boycott of four Israeli companies is naïve and a retrograde step.

This extension is significantly less than the full boycott of Israel sought by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. However, the Co-op has not fully understood the Jewish community’s serious concerns with an ever-increasing slippery-slope boycott policy.

Despite the Co-op’s claims that they are applying their policy even-handed, goods from Occupied Northern Cyprus, for example, may still be sold in Co-ops and labelled as “produce of Turkey”.

The Co-op claims that it may buy more produce from other Israeli companies in place of these four. This remains to be seen, and we will monitor the outcome closely.”

We need to ensure that the Co-Op Group understands that people have serious concerns about this move.

If you want to express your disquiet, please write to the members of the Co-Op Group Board representing your region. Their names are here

. The postal and email addresses for contacting them are here.

If the Co-Op’s policy is going to affect your willingness to shop there, you should say this in your correspondence, so they know their policy will have an adverse commercial impact.

To shift their policy in the long-term we also need people to join the Co-Op and engage in its democratic structures as it is a membership-based organisation. You can join online here

 for only £1.

Your complaints re. the policy will carry more weight if you are a member.

If you do join, please let me know, as we want to have a presence at upcoming regional meetings to both express our concerns about the Group Board’s policy, and to vote against any more extreme positions that are put forward by members.

With thank to ‘We Believe in Israel.’

ZF LETTER TO THE CO-OP

Mr Peter Marks

Chief Executive

The Co-Operative Group

Freepost MR9473

Manchester M4 8A

30^th April 2012

Dear Mr Marks,

I am deeply disappointed and concerned with the decision that the Co-Operative Group has recently taken to no longer trade with Israeli companies that source their produce from the ‘settlements’. The impact that any boycott actions have in political and economic matters in the Middle East are negligible, unlike the distress that this policy has caused the Jewish communities in the UK. Your existing policy of boycotting settlement products and this new extension only works to divide the different communities in this country at a time when its cohesion is vital.

The debate over the use of boycotts and their benefits has been going on for many years now and it is clear that any direct action, such as the one that the Co-Operative Group has chosen goes to harm the local Palestinian population more than the companies that have been named under your this resolution. Many thousands of Palestinians are employed in the West Bank and even the main Palestinian Trade Union, the PGFTU, have publicly and openly spoken out against any form of boycotts or sanctions. I would suggest that your organisation should investigate who would be harmed the most by its actions. I would suggest that it would be the Palestinian people themselves.

Furthermore, while the motions to boycott companies complicit in ‘violations of Palestinian Human Rights’, as Co-Op member Hilary Smith puts in,  names the Israeli companies directly, there is no mention of any companies from any other country that would fall into this banner. It would, therefore, be very easy to conclude that this motion is simply an attempt to attack Israel rather than working for any potential moral purpose.

This new resolution was brought by The Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (PSC) who work to demonise and delegitimise Israel at every opportunity and even their own logo highlights their desire for one Palestinian state rather than two states living in peace. If the Co-Operative deals with these types of issues in an even handed way, then I would also question as to why it is acceptable for products from Occupied North Cyprus to be labelled as ‘produce of Turkey’ with no comments or concerns from your Board or more politically active members.

Boycotts and sanctions do little apart from to create further tension and division in an already fraught political arena. There are countless programmes and organisations that work to build bridges between Israel and the Palestinians that have a clear and positive impact on the economic and political environments of both peoples. There are better ways that your organisation can make a difference to the region without taking sides in a difficult and complicated conflict.

Yours sincerely,

Harvey Rose

Chairman

H.E. AMBASSADOR DANIEL TAUB SPEAKS AT ZF ANNUAL GALA DINNER

Ambassador to the UK – Daniel Taub

Harvey, your Excellency Ambassador Wlachovsky, General Shkedy, Colonel Miri Eisen, Alan Aziz, Ladies and Gentlemen.

You know its six months since I took up my post here in the UK and there have been quite a number of remarkable and moving moments for me. But one of the most moving moments took place on the 2nd November in the Lacarno Suite in the Foreign Office. To the be there, on the very date, in the very room, where the Balfour Declaration was signed; at an event under the hospices of the Zionist Federation, the only organisation mentioned in the Balfour Declaration, and to stand and sing the Hatikvah together was very moving indeed.

And I think that one of the reasons why it was so significant was a sense that, the mission is not yet fully over. Sadly, 95 years after the Balfour Declaration, 64 years after the establishment of the State of Israel that goal …to be a free people in our land still needs work to be fully realised.

It’s not easy to be an advocate for Israel in the current climate. There are many misconceptions and beyond that the reality itself is very complicated. There’s an old Jewish story that dates from the time of the emancipation, when the Jewish world first started opening up to Western culture and it tells of a Jew from the shtetl who went to visit one of the big cities and when he came back to the shtetl all the other Jews gathered around him and said, “What did you see there?” And he said, “I saw some amazing things. I saw a Jew who was a great Talmudic scholar and I saw one who was a complete heretic. I saw somebody who was a wealthy capitalist and I saw somebody who was a radical revolutionary. I saw a soldier and I saw a poet.” The villagers were disappointed. They said, “But we have all of those people here in our shtetl.” And he says, “But you don’t understand, they were all the same person!” And I think when we look at Israel today it can be confusing. Are we talking about a land of high tech innovation or are we talking about thousands of people in the streets campaigning for social justice? Are we talking about an embattled Island in the Middle East or are we talking about the people who are first on the ground to help after disasters in Haiti? Are we talking about the land of archaeology, theology or technology? And the answer, of course, is that’s its all of these things. But it’s a complex image to convey and when I speak to organisations and groups involved in advocacy for Israel the recurrent theme is that we need to give context; we need to give new answers and convey the complexity and, of course, they are right.

But there are also situations when what we need is actually forceful moral clarity - When we see the unspeakable hatred in Toulouse this week; when we hear European leaders who are incapable of distinguishing between that brutal terrorism and Israel defending itself from missile attacks from Gaza which it pulled out of every inch should be urging of the international community.

When we look at the situation in our region, we see the massacres and the torture and then we see the Human Rights Council in Geneva that is convinced the core of all the ills of our region is building homes in the West Bank. Then we need unambiguous clarity. We need the moral force epitomised in people like General Elyezer Shkedy, a true modern hero of the people of Israel and expressed by Miri Eisen, truly one of the most powerful and humane voices of the soul of Israel. And then we need the conviction that enables us to tell the simple and powerful truths. And it is harder to think of a voice that does this more clearly and more resiliently then the voice of the ZF. Thanks to the leadership and the passion of your remarkable Chairman Harvey and your equally remarkable Director Alan Aziz.

The ZF does it through its Ambassadors Programme. It does it through its European Young Leaders Programme and it does it, perhaps most of all, by the fact that whenever a voice is required, whenever it’s required that somebody stand up and speak for Israel the ZF is always there. The very first. Right on the front line. And to my mind it is absolutely no coincidence that those who are opposed to the State of Israel chose your website to attack and to hack in an attempt to silence your voice. They know where the power is. They know where the passion is and it’s truly a mark of honour and one that you should be proud of.

You know, a lot of groups supporting Israel like to quote Theodore Herzl ‘If you will it, it is no dream’ and then tend to put the emphasis on the ‘dream.’ But I think the success of the ZF is due to the fact that they put the emphasis where it needs to be; on the ‘will’. And it’s that passion and that commitment that makes you so affective. And the stronger your voice is the more you will give confidence to others to raise their voices and to say the things that they truly believe. And in doing that I think you are heir to a long standing Zionist tradition.

With Pesach approaching I cannot help but conclude by recalling Ben Gurion speaking before the Peel Commission and this is what he said, “Three hundred years ago there came to the new world a boat. And its name was The Mayflower. The Mayflower’s landing on Plymouth Rock was one of the great historical events in the history of England and the history of America. But I would like to ask the members of this Commission what date did the Mayflower set sail? How many people were on the boat? Who were their leaders? What kind of food did they eat? And yet more than 3,300 years ago long before the Mayflower our people left Egypt and every Jew in the world, wherever he is, knows what day they left and he knows what food they ate. And we still eat that food every anniversary, and we know who our leader was and we sit down and we tell the story to our children and our grandchildren in order to guarantee that it will never be forgotten. And we say now we may be slaves but next year we will be a free people.

To the ZF I say thank you for your passion. Thank you for your voice and thank you for continuing to tell that story.


25th March 2012

ZIONIST FEDERATION LOBBY DAY A GREAT SUCCESS

One of the Zionist Federation’s flagship events took place last week, on Wednesday 8th February 2012. Organised in conjunction with the Christian Friends of Israel, 300 people gathered in Westminster for the annual Lobby Day of Parliament. This is always an opportunity for our members to meet and hear from Members of Parliament from all sides of the House on how they express their support for Israel in the heart of British democracy. It is also a great opportunity for some of our members to meet individually with their MP to talk about this point on a personal basis and to highlight some specific issues.

This year, the main issues that were raised directly with nearly 100 MPs or their assistants were the actions of the BDS campaign against Israel and to urge them to oppose any calls to boycott Israel in any form; and the need to force the Palestinian Authority to stop its state sponsored incitement against Israelis and Jews. We also supported a third issue, that was to highlight the plight of Christian minorities in Arab countries.

While private meetings with Members of Parliament were taking place, the main group were based in two committee rooms. When I write about the ‘main group’ what I need to highlight is that the popularity of the event meant that we had to take a second committee room in order to accommodate all of those who joined us on the day. We are delighted to say that we managed to fill both rooms to capacity and with standing room only!

Throughout the afternoon, the two groups were fortunate enough to be able to hear from a number of MPs and one Peer. Invited to speak for just a few minutes, Members ended up speaking for an average of 15 minutes before fielding a fair number of questions. Some speakers were even cut short in order to be able to accommodate the queue of MPs waiting to address the room! Even after finishing, the MP was then approached to speak in the ‘other’ room. It is great credit to both the work ethic of the MPs and the reputations of the ZF and the CFI that every request to speak twice was met with a positive response. I would like to record my personal thanks here to all the MPs who gave up their time to address us on the day.

With the MPs speaking with no prior agenda, the question of the Iranian Threat proved to be an issue that united virtually all of them. The British Government has lead the way in standing up to Iran on this matter and the message from the MPs was that it will continue to do so. The other consensual issue that came through was that it is vitally important for individual members of the public to develop relationships with their Member of Parliament. Don’t be shy is the message! An MP is there to represent their constituents and also to hear and understand about the matter that are important to them. So by keeping in touch with an MP on matters relating to Israel will keep them informed and highlight that there is support for Israel within their constituency. The strength of the Palestinian Lobby was mentioned and those attending the day were urged to work to balance their effectiveness by developing relationships with their MPs. Sending them an article here and a comment there can go a long way. Don’t be a constant pest or nag, but don’t be afraid to make your voice heard when you have something important to relay. If you do not know how to contact your MP, please follow this link and you will find all the necessary contact details for all the MPs in Parliament. ClickHere

Without wishing to promote any particular MP it is important that some of their messages are relayed in this report. For example, Nigel Dodds (DUP) said that it was important that the Party leaders spoke up for Israel, not just the individual Members. Andrew Percy (Con) said it was fair for the Foreign Office to criticise Israel where and when necessary but that it must be even handed with its criticism of both sides of the conflict. Luciana Berger (Lab) talked about her involvement with the International Committee of Jewish Parliamentarians and their efforts to work in coordination with each other. And somewhat poignantly, David Burrowes (Con) reminded us of Canon Andrew White’s statement that Israel is the only country in the Middle East where Christians can feel safe.

The morning training session took place at the Emmanuel Centre, a few minutes walks from the House of Commons, where we were addressed by Harvey Rose, Chairman of the Zionist Federation, Vivian Wineman, President of the Board of Deputies, and Alon Roth-Snir, the Deputy Ambassador of Israel. The day was chaired by Professor Eric Moonman, President of the ZF, and Geoffrey Smith, former UK Director of the CFI. Thanks must also go to Robin Benson, Head of Communications at CFI, for all his hard work in helping organise the Lobby Day with us.

Although there were a few negatives on the day in that the group was so large that we could not all fit into one committee room, and more people would have liked to have had the chance to meet with their MP face to face, the overriding sense was that the day had been a great success and helped to renew and encourage those attending. It can be quite demoralising sometimes when faced with what appears to be a tidal wave of anti-Israel sentiment, so it was good to be surrounded by so many people who share the same love and support for Israel and to hear that Members of Parliament not only share this view, but are also prepared to stand up and state that publicly. We look forward to an even bigger and better Lobby Day next year, but will continue to support and work for the benefit of Israel every day…with your help.

Here is a link to a report of the day that appeared in ‘The Jerusalem Post’. ClickHere

IRAN, ISRAEL & THE WEST: A BRITISH JEW'S PERSPECTIVE

The British embassy in Tehran is sacked. Britain severs its diplomatic ties, expels the
Iranian ambassador and all other diplomats to the court of St. James. It was something
of a courtly dance, the British clearly knew what to expect, there was no surprised struggle,
no hostages and there are signs in the backchannels that the Iranians didn't want events
to go as far as they did or, perhaps, Ahmedinejad or the Supreme Ayatollah is scoring points
off the other. Where does all this sit in the grand strategy of Britain and the Arab world?
By Howard Morris

First, of course, Iran isn't an Arab country.
Most of the time this seems an irrelevant
distinction but it's important in the Middle
East where Iran strives to be the regional super
power and to champion the cause of the
Shi'ite, a minority in Islam but in significant
places forming the majority, strung across
the area in a vast crescent. In Saudi, in Oman,
Bahrain, the UAE, among the Iraqi Sunni, Iran
is feared far more than Israel is loathed. The
Arabs don't want Iran to get the Bomb. That
we know.
And so to Britain. What are its Middle
Eastern goals? Competing factors tend towards
a balance but one that persistently
nags Israel, a strategic friend, to compromise
and concede. British governments are not
and never have been driven by the Jewish
vote. There are almost twice as many Jews living in Brooklyn as in the
entire United
Kingdom. With a UK population of around
60 million, the presence of 300,000 Jews is
immaterial and while we may have disproportionate
business and professional success,
it's still not enough to make the Jewish
vote, Jewish influence, a powerful voice in
Westminster - whatever our enemies might
say, and of course they do darkly mention
"cabals" and "media ownership," more of this
later.
We need oil, so, like the U.S., this drives
Britain to want to befriend the Arabs. And
the Foreign Office has a tradition of Arabism.
Being an Arabist is a thing in Britain, like being
an Anglophile in the U.S.
But off we went to war in Iraq. A war
from which Israel tried to dissuade us and
that a million marched against. We did that
because of the "Special Relationship" with
the United States. It led to the social democrat,
Tony Blair, making common cause with
the right wing President Bush and burning
his reputation and legacy with the left in
Britain in the process. President Obama, incidentally,
is far less of an Anglophile than
previous presidents - his father saw the
British repression of the Mau Mau uprising
in Kenya. Be that as it may, Britain is closer
politically to the U.S. than to Europe and it
is expedient for America to have an ally that
militarily punches above its weight. So we
won't get out of line with the U.S.
And Britain does respect Israel. The attitude
is sometimes coloured by stereotypes
and tropes about Jews. While Nazi type racist
anti-Semitism haunts the fringes of the
near irrelevant nutty right wingers, the real
anti-Semites are on the left. They see Israel
as America's proxy. They like their minorities
to be obviously suffering and dependent
and Jews seem to do so well. Hence the
BBC's institutional bias. It's full of socialists
who have given up every vestige of true socialism
in their own lives but retain a dislike
for the U.S. and all its works. Israel is seen by
them as a creature of the imperial powers, a
view shared by the left in Europe, a colonial
imposition. In contrast Americans see Israel
as an analogue of their own struggle for liberty
in their own land. So a Labour MP who
questioned the appointment of a Jewish
ambassador to Israel because his loyalties
might be divided and who raised some ugly
implications of conspiring groups of international
Jews, was forced to apologise. But the
mainstream media hardly touched the story.
Britain, whatever its left leaning media
might say, is a friend to Israel and itself a
tolerant country. Remember it was Britain
who gave the Balfour Declaration and even
though the Irgun and the Stern Gang fought
a bitter war against the forces of the British
Mandate I don't once recall my parents or
any family members having encountered
any anti-Semitism during the period before
Independence.
In the future? Well there is a significant
Muslim minority in Britain that is growing
and will be the majority in some places.
Among them are a sizeable chunk who are
disenchanted and militant and vehemently
anti-Israel and anti-British. Britain has absorbed
minorities before but this will be a
big swallow.

Howard is an English lawyer at a major international
firm, recently seconded to their New York office.
He is accompanied by his wife, Gaby. They have
two children, both in their twenties, back in the UK.