[Boycott - Israel Supporters]

Union refuses to hand over £2,000 to 'Zionist' editor

Leon Symons, Jewish Chronicle
15 June 2007

Britain’s biggest trades union has been accused of antisemitism after its executive refused to make a donation to an international Labour-movement news website because its editor was a Zionist.

Eric Lee, the 52-year-old editor of Labourstart, told the JC: “I was surprised by the Unison decision because senior figures had told me there would be no problem. Unison invites Histadrut, the Israeli Labour federation, to its conference every year, and it has had a very good record of working to bring Israelis and Palestinians together.�

New York-born Mr Lee, who now lives in North London and has lived in Israel, said the union had asked what it could do to help the website, so he asked for a donation of £2,000.

The international-affairs committee agreed and the decision to ratify this went to the national executive.

He continued: “A member of the executive [whom he believes to be a Socialist Workers’ Party member] said they had three questions for me: was it true that I was a Zionist?; does Labourstart censor Palestinian news?; and had I supported the Israeli invasion of Lebanon last year?�

Mr Lee responded: “It is no secret that I am a left-wing Zionist, as are many Israelis. Labourstart has links to Palestinian sites and they take many of our news items, and I took the same view of Lebanon as did Tony Blair and the Labour government.

“The [question of the] donation was then sent back to the first [international-affairs] committee.� The issue of the donation went back to the executive a second time, “but they decided it was too controversial so they turned it down.

“Some people told me afterwards they felt this was worse than either the NUJ or UCU boycotts, because this was an attack on a Jewish person.

“One senior figure told me the discussion about me was bigoted. He was so disgusted he gave me a lump sum and monthly donations out of his own pocket.�

The website has about 500 volunteer contributors around the world and has two functions.

It reproduces hundreds of news items about trades unions, and campaigns and supports workers in the international trades-union movement.

Unison was asked to comment but the JC was told that no-one was available.

Source: http://www.thejc.com/home.aspx?ParentId=m11s18&SecId=18&AId=53345&ATypeId=1

Comment:


The letter below is in reply to an article published by the "Alliance for Workers' Liberty" attacking UNISONs decision not to finance a zionist editor. The articles twisted logic reasoned that most Jews are zionists, therefore to boycott zionists is the same as to boycott all Jews. Their initial premise is questionable considering that many of those petitioning for the boycott are themselves Jewish and that not all zionists are Jews, when we consider the Christian zionists, there are probably more non-Jewish zionists than Jewish ones. If anything its racist to suggest that Jews and zionism are inseparable - a Jew like anyone else can choose not to support racism.

Background on Workers Liberty

Alliance for Workers' Liberty is a pro-Israel, anti-Muslim leftist group. They actively defend Israel by aggressively campaigning against all boycotts of Israel and at the same time they attack any perceived signs of political Islam including even the hijab which they see as a symbol of oppression.

They are more dangerous than the usual zionist groupies because they pretend to stand with us - they were at the last enough occupation demo - their account shows that they were there to dissuade people from boycotting Israel - it will hurt the workers on both side.., and again they turned up at the UNISON conference organising a side show against the boycott just before the vote.

During the Israeli attack on Lebanon they equated the violence of the oppressor (Israel) with the violence the oppressed use in defending themselves (Hizbullah) and called for both to end - Israel stop bombing Lebanon, Hizbullah stop rockets on Israel, and thereby nullifying Israel’s crimes.

And again with regards to Iran they claim to oppose bombing Iran, but in reality they actively beat the drums of war by helping lay the propaganda foundations necessary for invasion.

Workers Liberty - a front for zionism

Reply to Workers Liberty

Anna Weekes, Trade Unionist, South Africa
2007-06-05

Note that Eric Lee only began to start doing this after many people signed onto the letter. He also removed his link to the IDF website after getting the petition.

I am posting the original letter below so that you can see it has nothing to do with anti-semitism. I really question your motives for calling a huge public sector union like UNISON anti-Jewish.

regards,

Anna Weekes
Trade Unionist
South Africa

Petition against LabourStart website’s veto of Palestinian Worker News

Anna Weekes
2004-11-18

Against LabourStart’s veto of Palestinian worker news

A group of concerned labour and social movement activists from different countries have initiated this petition, against the shutdown of Palestinian worker news on the major labour news website, LabourStart (www.labourstart.org)

Signed so far:

* PatchA, Korean Progressive Network ‘Jinbonet’
* Roland Rance - Chair, Amicus – Central London (0692); Secretary, Waltham Forest Trades Council
* Moshe’ Machover, Israeli Socialist
* Dorothy Naor, New Profile anti-militarism group, Israel
* Farid Taamallah, Palestinian Activist
* Anti-Privatisation Forum, South Africa
* Dave Parks, Exeter Socialists, England
* Frances Kelly, British trade unionist
* Walton Pantland, South African union activist
* Els Hendricks, X Minus Y Solidarity Fund, Netherlands
* Na’eem Jeenah - President, Muslim Youth Movement of South Africa and spokesperson, Palestine Solidarity Committee - South Africa
* Wits University Palestine Solidarity Committee, South Africa
* Anna Weekes, South African labour and social movement activist
* Greg Dropkin, UK activist
* Jim Gladwin, New Zealand labour activist
* Dr Jeff Rudin, Researcher at South African Municipal Workers Union
* Woody Aroun, South African Trade Unionist
* Kim Jurgensen, South African activist
* Dr Dale T McKinley, South African labour and social movement activist
* Anne Candlin, One World Centre, annecandlin@hotmail. com
* Khwezi Gule, South African activist

Source: http://www.labournet.net/other/0706/labstart1.html

[2]

Comment:

We dug up the old page on Labourstart by the zionist editor Eric Lee that had a link to the Israeli Army(IDF) before the petition scared him in to droping it. In it Eric Lee is bragging that his son is an officer in the Israeli army:

The offending article:
Unison: boycott before the boycot

Workers Liberty
2007-05-29

The Executive of the public services Unison has rejected a proposal from the relevant union committee to give money to the international trade-union news website Labourstart, on the grounds that one of the people involved in running Labourstart is a "Zionist".

It is a sort of "boycott before the boycott", a pre-emptive application of motion 54 to Unison conference, which proposes a boycott of all Israeli institutions.

Labourstart provides an unparalleled breadth of information on workers' struggles and workers' organisations worldwide, including in the Occupied Territories.

At the Executive no-one objected to Labourstart's coverage. The objection was to its founding editor, Eric Lee. Eric is now only one of 79 contributors world-wide to Labourstart.

But - and that was enough to damn the whole project in the eyes of the Executive - Eric is a Zionist. He has been associated with left-Zionist parties in Israel such as Mapam and Meretz.

Nobody proposed checking out the other 78 Labourstart correspondents for their views.

The basic argument is that the union cannot support projects, however worthwhile, if the people running them are Jewish. Supporters of "boycotting" Labourstart will reply that the objection is not that people like Eric Lee are Jewish, but that they are "Zionists". But to brand left Zionists like Eric as outside the range of people whom we can work with is to "boycott" almost all Jews around the world.

Source: http://www.workersliberty.org/node/8555

Also Of Interest

Palestine Pete joins Bin Veolia Protest at the Natural History Museum Photo-report of the fortnightly picket outside the Natural History Museum to protest against Veolia's sponsorship of the Museums Wildlife Photographery Exhibition. Veolia is complicit in Israel's occupation of Palestinian land.

Veolia Greenwashing At Natural History Museum Photo report of protest against Veolia sponsorship of exhibition at Natural History Museum, also look at the route of Jerusalem Light Rail and Veolia's complicity in the Israeli occupation.

Bin Veolia Protest at the Natural History Museum Photo report of protest againt Veolia's sponsorship of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2011 exhibition at the Natural History Museum. Veolia is complicit in Israels occupation of the West Bank.

Dump Veolia Protest at the Natural History Museum, London The Dump Veolia Campaign lead a demonstration outside the Natural History Museum to protest against Veolia's sponsorship of an exhibition at the museum. Veolia is complicit in Israel's war crimes with its support of the settlements.