Support the appeal from the Palestinian trade unions: stop the Israeli war machine

 5th November 2023

Palestinian trade unions are appealing to trade unionists internationally to stop supplying weapons to Israel, to halt the Israeli war machine. We must act on their call.

Israeli forces are killing thousands of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.

And our own government is making this possible. British weapons, sold by British companies, are being used in this slaughter. Yet our government says it has no plans to suspend arms sales to Israel. It knows that British weapons are being used to kill civilians, to commit war crimes. But it refuses to stop.

The UN has warned that the Palestinian people are in grave danger of mass ethnic cleansing. This government is making that possible: with its political support and its bloody trade in weapons of death.

The companies that make those weapons, that make the profits from those weapons, have blood on their hands.

But workers in those companies and their trade unions have the collective power to stop this. It’s happened before:

Rolls-Royce East Kilbride workers in 1975 refused to handle jet engines for the Chilean junta – and that’s just one example. We can act together to refuse to make, or transport, the weapons that kill our brothers and sisters in Palestine.

Left Unity urges all trade unionists in industries supplying the Israeli military, to block and disrupt the production, maintenance and delivery of weapons and military equipment bound for Israel. And we urge workers across the movement to organise practical solidarity: to support those taking action, or threatened with victimisation. In Kent, local trade unionists blockaded the Israeli arms company Elbit Systems. We need more of this!

Dock workers from Naples in Italy have already taken action – refusing to handle arms shipments to Israel. Belgian transport unions have done the same, and there are other examples across the world. We urge all trade unionists to respond to this call for international solidarity with the Palestinian people.

Demand that union leaders support the call. But don’t wait for them. Pass a resolution in your union branch or trades council – and take action now!

That is what is needed: true international solidarity – to protect the people of Gaza and to stop the Israeli war machine. Solidarity!