NWCI Members respond to invitation from Israeli Embassy to Lecture on Migrant Women
Published: Wednesday, December 16, 2009
The National Women's Council last week circulated to its members the invitation below to an event organized by the Israeli embassy. Several members responded to say that they believed we should not have done so. The following correspondence ensued. Please give us your views:
INVITATION
The Embassy of Israel, Dublin
Invite you to:
"Migrant Women: Sharing the Israeli experience in Migrant absorption"
Lecture by:
- Ms. Joanna Tuffy T.D.
Labour Spokesperson on Environment and Heritage
- Ms. Sylvia Katete Gavigan
Honorary Consul, Republic of Uganda
- Ms. Salome Mbugua
AkiDwA Director
Date: Friday 18th December 2009
Venue: D4 Berkeley Hotel
Donnelly Suite 1, 2nd Floor
Ballsbridge
Dublin 4
Time: 13:00-14:30
Tea & coffee will be served
Please RSVP by Friday 11th December 2009,
by email to: dcmsec@dublin.mfa.gov.il
Please present this invitation with Photo ID at the entrance
Dear IPSC member/supporter,
The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign has just found out about an event being hosted by the Israeli Embassy this Friday 18th December (see the official invitation pasted below). It appears they have invited many women's rights, migrant and refugee groups to attend in what they call a lecture on "Migrant Women: Sharing the Israeli experience in Migrant absorption". This is a disgusting attempt to peddle soft-Zionism to progressive movements and organisations in Irish society. The reality is of course, very different; Israeli State racism against its own non-Jewish citizens and Palestinians in the occupied territories and the Palestinian Diaspora are well documented facts. In addition, the same Israeli State that is hosting this event regularly abuses Palestinian women's rights - for example, the UN noted in a report in February 2009:
"Palestinian women's access to adequate prenatal, natal and post-natal medical care remains a matter of serious concern, impairing the fulfilment of the right of everyone to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. It should also be noted that Israeli policies on closure may, in certain instances, amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under article 16 of the Convention against Torture. Finally it is reiterated that the issue of pregnant Palestinian women giving birth at Israeli checkpoints must be understood within the context of the broader regime of the Israeli occupation and associated restrictions on movement, impacting as they do on all aspects of life in the occupied territories."
The title of this lecture would almost be laughable were it not so serious an issue.
Therefore, the IPSC have called for a protest outside the D4 Berkely Hotel, 146 Pembroke Road, Dublin 4 (map - http://tinyurl.com/ye9bh9l) at 12.30pm on Friday 18th December. We ask you to come along and protest this spurious and entirely hypocritical lecture with us. Please bring Palestinian flags and placards if you have them - the IPSC will also be providing some on the day.
Also, if you are a member of any of the groups invited to attend this lecture, we would ask that you use your influence to get your organisation to refuse to attend the event, thank you.
In solidarity,
Freda Hughes
National Events Coordinator
Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign
Dear Susan,
Further to our telephone conversation this morning, please see below the invitation from the Israeli Embassy which was sent to us via the NWCI.
Our position is that we do not participate in any events sponsored or hosted by the Israeli Embassy as long as its occupation of the Palestinian Territories continues. The Israeli Government has consistently refused to implement any of the UN Resolutions designed to support the end of the conflict, continues to engage in an inhuman military occupation of many parts of the Palestinian Territories, holds the citizens of Gaza under siege having inflicted 1,400 deaths as well as many more injuries on them last year and continues to build settlements on Palestinian Land.
You will note that the title of the event is 'Migrant Women: Sharing the Israeli experience in Migrant absorption'. As we know the manner in which States absorbs migrants is not politically neutral. Within the Occupied Territories thousands of Palestinian people live in refugee camps and hundreds of thousands of them are not allowed back into their own country by the actions of the Israeli State.
The Israeli State stranglehold over the Occupied Territories has led to shocking levels of poverty with 1 more million people living on 50 cents a day. Of course we can be sure that it is Palestinian women who bear the brunt of managing poverty and the other effects of war.
It is against the background described above that we would sincerely ask the NWCI and its members not to participate in this event.
Yours sincerely,
Noreen Byrne
Director
Doras Bui
Dear Members,
As you know, we forwarded to you an invitation from the Israeli embassy to a lecture on Friday. In response, Noreen Byrne has sent us the letter which we attach below. While many of us are sympathetic to the points she raises, our view is that our members can make up their own minds. Some of you may wish to attend the meeting, some to boycott it, some to protest to the organizers, whether before, during or after the meeting. We will leave it to you.
All the best,
Susan
Susan McKay
NWCI Director
Dear Susan
I must admit I am very disappointed by the NWCI's response to this invitation by the Israeli embassy for the reasons outlined by Noreen Byrne. I know Salome Mbugua is one of the speakers, but I feel (as an Israeli citizen who is a political activist against the occupation and Israeli policies) that boycotting activities set up and supported by formal arms of the Israeli state is a crucial way in which we can demonstrate our non violence resistance to the occupation.
The Israeli state has shown complete disregard to the plight of Palestinian women, both within Israel and in the occupied Palestinian territory. This includes the maltreatment of Palestinian women prisoners in Israeli jails and the maltreatment of Palestinian women on the West Bank, particularly in relation to the checkpoint regime - several Palestinian women were forced to give birth at the IDF checkpoints on their way to hospital; documentary evidence is available from, among others, the Israeli human rights organisation B'Tselem:
The need for a permit is especially problematic for pregnant women, who need to get to the hospital in time to give birth. Even though the delivery date is uncertain, the permit given to women about to deliver is valid for only one or two days, as is the case for most sick persons. Therefore, women in their ninth month of pregnancy must go to the DCO every few days to renew the permit. As a result, in some instances, the mother gave birth at the checkpoint after her crossing was delayed because she did not have a valid permit. In 2007, at least five women gave birth at a checkpoint, three of them at a checkpoint at the entrance to Jerusalem (http://www.btselem.org/English/medical_treatment/index.asp)
Finally, less than a year after the Gaza war, Israel is maintaining a draconian siege on Gaza and its inhabitants, blocking the supply of most basic food stuffs, medicine etc, and not allowing the reconstruction of schools, forcing Gaza's children to go to school in ruined school buildings. Women in Gaza are experiencing gross difficulties in raising and caring for their families.
I can go on. It is clear that inviting Salome to a seminar on migrant women in Israel would result in asking her to speak in an event organised by the Israeli embassy. However, I believe that the support, tacit as it might be, of the NWCI to this event is unacceptable.
Best wishes
Ronit
Dr Ronit Lentin
Head of Department, Sociology / Course coordinator, MPhil in Ethnic and Racial Studies
Department of Sociology, Trinity College Dublin
Dear Ronit,
It is the practise of the National Women's Council to inform our members of events which may be of interest to them - and clearly an event at which the director of a member organization (in this case Aikidwa) is speaking falls into this category.
We do not at present have a policy on urging members to boycott events organized by the Israeli government. If there are members who feel we should have such a policy, they should propose this through a motion to our AGM. However, until such time as this is done, our position must be to allow our members to make up their own minds.
As the relatively new director of the NWCI, it is my belief that we should develop a strong international element to our work and that we should make policies which recognize our global responsibilities as feminists, including our responsibility towards Palestinian women. I intend to prioritise work on this in the coming period.
For the present, I take the view that informing members of the fact that an event such as this is happening will make it possible for them to attend. It makes it possible for them to attend and to raise objections to the event from the floor. It makes it possible for them to protest - whether before, during or after the event. It makes it possible for them to boycott the event. It makes it possible for them to write to newspapers. Not informing them allows for none of these things.
I think it is important to debate this, and to this end propose sending your email to me and my reply, out to members. Please let me know if you agree to this.
All the best,
Susan
Susan McKay
NWCI Director
Our members do not really have the opportunity to make up their own minds; the Israeli embassy will make them up for them as it holds a veto (on 'security grounds') as to who may attend. In other words, no-one known to be critical of Israeli policy, in short a propaganda exercise.
Margaretta D'Arcy - Women in Media & Entertainment
Dear Ronit,
I am writing to let you know that as the person who was in contact with the NWCI about the Israeli Embassy's event, I was very happy with the NWCI's response.
I am only too aware that it is very easy, particularly for academics to take positions as individuals, but for organisations it is not quite so easy.
Following the dissemination of my email to NWCI members, I received numerous emails stating their support and I was also approached by people at the City Hall event on Thursday evening also offering support.
I also received more than 20 emails from Palestinian people living in Ireland appreciative of the role of the NWCI. The Palestinian cause doesn't belong to any one group in Ireland and it is regrettable that it is being used as an opportunity to 'throw bricks' at the NWCI, something I am very familiar with as a former Chair.
Noreen Byrne
Dear Noreen
Thanks for your email. The point was definitely not to 'throw bricks' at the NWCI but to question its support for the event. As you may know, many people, including academics, artists, public activists and others, have responded to Palestinian requests for boycotting and divestment from Israel in protest of its policies. The point was not the event itself, but rather staging it as a seminar on 'immigrant absorption in Israel' while the true extent of Israel's persecution of non-Jewish migrants, as well as of Palestinian women is public knowledge.
My own stance is not simply that of an individual academic. I am an Israeli (and Irish) citizen and what is being done is being done in my name, therefore I ought to take responsibility. In this, I join a large number of Israeli people, individually and in groups such as feminist groups such as the Women's Coalition for Peace, New Profile, and general groups such as Physicians for Human Rights, B'Tselem and other human rights groups, in criticizing Israeli state policies both towards Palestinians and towards non-Jewish migrants. While not huge in numbers, we are a sizable group of people acting not as individuals but as a united front. My article in Metro (attached) outlines some of the issues affecting non-Jewish migrants in Israel.
It would be wonderful if the NWCI choose to meet with the IPSC and discuss its policy regarding the Israeli -Palestinian issue. I know there is a lot to do, but this is a hugely important cause, in which we are all, as European citizens, implicated and to which we can all contribute.
Best for the new year,
Ronit
Dr Ronit Lentin
Head of Department, Sociology / Course coordinator, MPhil in Ethnic and Racial Studies
Department of Sociology, Trinity College Dublin
Hi Ronit,
Obviously you do not know what actually happened. The Israeli Embassy forwarded an email to the NWCI for circulation to its members, the person who received it was unaware of the game the Israeli embassy was playing and simply circulated it without discussing it with anyone else. The NWCI was not hosting the event. It would be quite wrong to create the impression that the NWCI has a relationship with the Israeli Embassy. This is not the first time the Israeli Embassy tried something like this with women's organisations. Some years ago I was almost hounded by the Israeli Ambassador to attend a conference in Israel.
As a committed solidarity activist for the cause of the Palestinian people, I am only too well aware of the issues; I certainly would not be recommending to the NWCI that they engage with the IPSC given that I was driven out of it for promoting the concept of broad based work in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
Noreen Byrne
It was all about International Development !!!!!!!
Salome Mbugwe, director of Aikidwa responds to communications on Israeli Embassy event.
Some time back I received an invitation to apply to attend a 10 day training programme in Israel which was being delivered in conjunction with two reputable international organisations (IOM and GTZ). AS the training centred on the mobilisation of women leaders of Diaspora for international development in their countries of origin, I felt that it would be worth while attending as we in AkiDwA may look at this area of work in the future. (I did ask Ronit's opinion and recall her telling me that "they" - the Israelis' - would try to learn what they could from us and would probably have little to offer in return. However at no time was I told that it would be unwise to attend.)
I applied and was accepted on the programme which turned out to be a quite intensive but very worthwhile. My observations of Israel were that it was a beautiful country but with very tight security and a fear of others in the region (a particular fear of Iran was expressed by some). I have to admit that my political knowledge of the region was and is limited.
On my return to Ireland I was asked to speak at last week's seminar to share my experience. My input was to focus on our training and our plans - nothing more; there was no political agenda the run up to the seminar was one of the most stressful periods of my life. Firstly it was brought to my attention that a campaign for a boycott of the seminar was underway and that I was one of the targets of the campaign. It was particularly disturbing that I was not contacted about this before a decision was made to make negative communications about me.
Thankfully the National Women's Council did not endorse this campaign and left it to individual members to make up their own minds.
This was followed with my email in box being targeted and making it next to impossible for me to do my work. Much of the correspondence received was quite intimidating. This coincided with a number of deportations occurring in Ireland and people looking from support from AkiDwA. I never felt so powerless in all my life. As the head of a small organisation I was trying to do my best with limited time and resources and was being overwhelmed by the campaign targeted at me fora boycott. I wondered what all the letter writers were doing in relation to families being deported from Ireland. In the end I fulfilled my appointment at the Israeli embassy but did not deliver paper. I passed on the concerns raised to the appropriate persons.
I have made it clear that I am open to talk to any person from any organisation about human rights and women's equality. I have been asked would I attend a similar meeting in Israel if it were held again. The answer to this is "yes"; if it was in Israel, Palestine, Lebanon or any part of the world; if it is being led out by reputable international bodies and would ultimately benefit African women back home I would attend.
However the most burning question is would I want to continue in this sector after all I was subjected to and the effect that it had on me personally and my capacity to function in a family and in leading a national organisation. The answer here is "I don't know". There were times last week when I thought enough is enough. Times I felt it is time for a change of career and to prioritise self and family - we've done a lot in AkiDwA but we won't save the world like this. The hardest part about last week is that I'm not sure who my real friends are any more and who is to be trusted.
It's good that Christmas is coming and I will get a chance to go home to Kenya and clear my head of all of this. Who know what direction I may chose to move in 2010.
Salome Ngubwe, director of Aikidwa