Pro-Palestine movement urges break of US ties

Demonstrators shout slogans and wave Palestinian flags during a demonstration in front of the US embassy in Rome on December 9, 2017. Filippo Monteforte / AFP

A Palestinian-led movement to end international support for Israel and its oppression of Palestinians condemned US president Donald Trump's decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital and said it violated international law and UN resolutions.

“The US administration [with its decision] is violating international law and UN resolutions that do not recognise Israel’s sovereignty over Jerusalem and is directly supporting Israel’s crimes in occupied Jerusalem, its efforts to ‘Judaise’ the city and to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian community,” said the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement in a statement on Saturday.

Mr Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the disputed city has sparked outrage and protests across the Middle East.

“While international law does not respect the weak, it is inevitable to build our strength in order to force the Israelis, their allies and the US to heed to the rights of our people,” BDS said.

“It has become evident more than any other time that building a comprehensive national resistance and effective strategy is the way to reach our goals.”

The BDS movement, which was launched in 2005, urged Palestinians, including officials, to end their normalisation of relations with Israel and sever ties with the US administration, saying it is “an accomplice to the crimes Israel committed against our people”.

It also reiterated that people must boycott Israeli companies and international Israeli-affiliated organisations.

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The BDS movement chapter in Jordan will be holding a series of meetings in order to come up with a practical and escalatory action plan, said Goman Musa, the Amman-based BDS coordinator for the Arab World.
"There are two focal points, one is that we will exert more pressure on the government to cancel the gas deal with Israel and the Wadi Araba agreement," she said of the peace treaty Jordan signed with Israel in 1994 that remains widely unpopular.

"We will also attempt to again bring the gas deal to parliament's attention to vote against it and organise events in areas where the gas pipeline will pass through."
Last year, an Israeli gas consortium signed a gas deal with Jordan that would supply the country with $10 billion worth of natural gas from its Leviathan energy field for 15 years in one of the largest co-operation projects between both countries.
"On a regional level … with Trump's decision, the movement will also be focusing on boycotting USAID projects and calling for suspending relations with the US administration," said Ms Musa.