Action Palestine

Action Palestine is a UK wide student body, dedicated to defending Palestinian rights on campus. Action Palestine is non-party affiliated organization established in 2006. Action Palestine is concerned with building a strong movement on UK campuses for defending Palestinian rights. We aim to achieve this by facilitating cooperation between pro-Palestine societies and individuals on UK campuses.

Action Palestine works closely with over 15 Palestine societies and numerous numbers of like minded individuals on UK campuses. Our work often takes the shape of building and/or facilitating national campaigns like the Anti-apartheid week- the biggest Anti-Apartheid campus protest since the fall of Apartheid South Africa that took place in Feb ’08, and we also launched and took a leading role in the “Trapped in Gaza”, the campaign for Palestinians locked in Gaza due to the Israeli blockade.

Action Palestine is a student organization and therefore seeks to raise awareness of the plight of students in Palestine. The brutal Israeli Occupation has consistently denied the Right to Education for Palestinians – a right that is enshrined in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Its attacks on schools and Universities, the restrictions on movement and the general economic and social oppression of Palestinians are part of a frontal assault on basic rights in Palestine, especially the Right to Education.

We believe that the struggle for the Right to Education in Palestine is a crucial campaign that can highlight both the oppression suffered by Palestinians as well as the reasons for that oppression. A campaign to twin a British Students’ Union with a Palestinian one, like the recent campaigns at the LSE, University of Manchester, Leeds and many others raise many issues about the Occupation, while at the same time extending much-needed solidarity. It is through campaigns like this that we can challenge the pro-Israeli propaganda both in Britain and in Palestine.

We believe that we must work with all groups who are resisting oppression throughout the Middle East. In the past, Action Palestine has worked with Palestine Twinning Network, Right to Education Campaign, Defend Children International, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Windows for Peace, Checkpoint Watch, Jews for Justice for Palestine, ICADH UK, the Olive Co-operative, Zaytoun, Friends of Al Aqsa, BRICUP, the Stop the War Coalition and many other groups, both local and national.

2008 will mark sixty years since the Nakba and Palestinians have consistently resisted oppression from that day to this. Action Palestine wants aims for this anniversary to be properly commemorated on UK campuses. We will work with Palestine societies and other groups and individuals who are wanting work on the this issue.