‘Workers For A Free Palestine’ protest at Instro Precision Ltd in Sandwich, Kent, a subsidiary of arms manufacturer Elbit Systems. Trade unionists responded to a request from Palestinan trade unions and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Over 150 young trade unionists created a blockade at the entrances to a factory in Kent this morning, which is the site of an Israeli weapons manufacturer.
Holding a banner reading ‘Workers For A Free Palestine’, the demonstration targeted Instro Precision Ltd in Sandwich, Kent, a subsidiary of arms manufacturer Elbit Systems which is one of Israel’s largest arms producers responsible for making drones and artillery for the military.
Members from the unions Unite, UNISON, the NEU, UCU, the BMA, BFAWU, RMT and IWGB were represented, demanding the UK stop arming Israel, in response to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
The action was organised by a new project called Workers for a Free Palestine, set up in response to an urgent call made by Palestinian trade unions for their international counterparts to halt arms trading with Israel.
Palestinian trade unions called on global workers to take action and “end all forms of complicity with Israel’s crimes” by refusing to build or transport weapons destined for Israel and to increase pressure on governments to call for a ceasefire.
According to Novara Media reporter Ash Sarkar, multiple lorries and vans were unable to make deliveries to the weapons factory after being turned away by the group today.
This letter by Clare Farrell, Gail Bradbrook and Roger Hallam was published on 19th October 2023 on the Extinction Rebellion website – the original can be found here https://rebellion.global/blog/2023/10/19/reflections-5-years-on/
Telling the truth means being ready to accept when you have been led astray, got things wrong and so have to modify your views. Five years since the launch of Extinction Rebellion, this world we live in is changing so dangerously fast that it demands we revisit our assumptions and learn some painful lessons. It is now clear that 2023 is very likely to average more than 1.5 °C above a 1850-1900 baseline. Whilst emissions are still rising world wide. It is only through commitment to the truth that we might help humanity and wider life around as we enter a disturbing new era.
We got something wrong. We were misled. So, we misled you too. Aerosol pollution matters decisively to our global climate. There are other factors deserving of more serious attention such as forest cloud seeding and ocean health. Many factors were sidelined by scientists who were narrowly focusing on CO2. In addition, IPCC processes did not find an adequate way to address issues of extreme risk where data was deemed insufficient or where there was higher uncertainty *, such as aerosols, methane release from permafrost, and feedbacks from wildfires or droughts rendering sinks incapable of sustaining their role in the system. This misled other scientists, academics and activists including us.
Some of us have attempted over the years to responsibly communicate the extreme and cascading risks, and the severe consequences of not taking emergency action. Despite founding the movement on the precautionary principle we found ourselves being ground down. For years we were moderated, and moodsplained by experts from narrow disciplines who demanded we change our press releases, our lectures, and play down the reality and potential speed of catastrophic consequences. As we pass into the horrors of a 1.5 °C plus world, at least 10 years earlier than the worst official expectations, we realise we should have made a firmer stand. As we observe some top climatologists claiming we need to wait decades before accepting that the planet is 1.5 °C warmer, we also realise that silence about our disagreements is no longer an option for us, or the climate movement.
Understanding how this repression happened is important. We would welcome any career climatologists, academics and journalists who undermined our communications in public to make amends, especially as they have influenced attitudes amongst those who judge us. But more importantly, for the sake of life on Earth we must tackle this emergency with our eyes wide open to everything that we need to do from this point forward. The rapid heating and extreme events of the last year demonstrate that overall predictions of institutionalised climate science were less accurate than the conclusions of generalist scholars and leading climate activists, who better saw the frightening signals through the noise produced from siloes, hierarchies, and privilege. Notably, economists, politicians and consultants pulled the conversation in the opposite direction to what was needed. Because these people carry an identity associated with ‘authority’ they were not challenged enough by journalists, lay people, or activists.
XR was always about responding to the whole ecological emergency, not just the climate. We need to bring this back to the fore, as much for the climate as for nature. We need to prioritise preserving and growing forest cover, learning how to restore the oceans’ role in atmospheric modulation, experimenting with marine cloud brightening in the Arctic and exploring every option for climate restoration and cooling, and even consider reversing recent shipping fuel regulations if they are causing an aerosol ‘termination shock’. And at the same time we must reject the lie that high consumption societies do not need to power down equitably, with the rich going first. We waste vast amounts of energy, which is unspeakable in these circumstances. The rallying cry from here on is that we Must Stop Oil, end the fossil fuel era, and we must also urgently start the repair of Planet Earth, our only home.
We are entering a new era for humanity and the prospects are terrifying. We committed five years ago in October 2018 to live in truth. Our movements need to look directly at that truth and act according to reality. That means being in resistance, standing for peace, justice and freedom.
Signed: Clare Farrell, Gail Bradbrook, Roger Hallam.
October 2023
*A footnote in the IPCC AR6 SPM: “Warming levels >4 °C may result from very high emissions scenarios, but can also occur from lower emission scenarios if climate sensitivity or carbon cycle feedbacks are higher than the best estimate. {3.1.1}”
JSO Wellington Arch action 25 Oct 23. Image Denise Laura Baker.
Three Just Stop Oil supporters have painted the Wellington Arch near Hyde Park Corner to demand the UK government immediately halt all new oil and gas projects and to call on the public to march in London from 29th October.
At approximately 10:15 this morning, three Just Stop Oil supporters set off smoke flares and sprayed orange paint on the Wellington Arch, using fire extinguishers. They then displayed banners reading ‘Just Stop Oil’ and waited for police to arrive and arrest them.
One of those taking action this morning is Joshua Lane, 26, an engineer from Sheffield. He said:
“I am compelled to take action due to the severity, and sheer emergency we find ourselves in today. Future generations live in uncertainty, and we are given false promises time after time by endless pantomime governments. Humanity faces the biggest crisis in history, and yet the government continuously ignores the facts, and only thinks of themselves and the billionaire oil barons they serve. One thing that cannot be ignored is the power of ordinary people, and our voices are only continuing to grow louder.”
Also taking action today was Joe Hogan, 40, from Hertfordshire. He said:
“We are out of time; we have to act now. Not tomorrow, not next year, not 2050; NOW. But our government continues with business-as-usual, burning our futures to enrich their friends, while enacting draconian legislation to stamp out dissent. I refuse to be cowed. Traditional, managed, sanitised forms of protest have done nothing; the only way forward is through sustained, disruptive civil resistance. That’s why I will be marching in London from the 29th October and you should too. Sign up at juststopoil.org“
JSO at Wellington Arch 25 Oct 23. Image Denise Laura Baker
Today’s action comes as extreme weather continues to disrupt the UK, killing at least seven and leaving hundreds homeless after around 1,250 properties have flooded in England. The environment agency has issued more than 300 flood alerts and a new wave of heavy rain could bring flooding and disruption to much of London and southern England according to a fresh Met Office weather warning.
ISRAEL’S announcement that it will “teach a lesson” to the United Nations by denying visas to its representatives only highlights its growing isolation — and that of its Nato allies.
Its brutal bombardment of Gaza has already killed at least 29 employees of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the besieged strip, a tiny proportion of the civilian casualties but a telling sign of Tel Aviv’s contempt for international law.
The UN’s structure has prevented it from giving a clear moral lead with the United States vetoing calls for a ceasefire. But the remarks by secretary-general Antonio Guterres that have so riled Israeli leaders — that Hamas’s attacks on October 7 did not happen “in a vacuum” and must be linked to “56 years of suffocating oppression” of Palestine by Israel — were a statement of fact.
More could have been said. It is not just the decades-long denial of Palestinian statehood, the ongoing routine violence of the occupation or the siege of Gaza that set the scene for those terrifying events.
It is that the oppression of Palestinians has become rapidly more extreme in recent years, from Israel’s adoption of the racist Nation-State Law, through the massacre of unarmed demonstrators on the Gaza border during the March of Return protests, to the appointment of self-described fascist ministers who would have been beyond the political pale even five years ago.
…
It is not Western peoples who are isolated, but our politicians, as the huge Palestine demonstrations and the growing backlash against Keir Starmer for endorsing war crimes show.
If world opinion is for a ceasefire, British public opinion is too. The gulf between people and politicians should be used to build an anti-imperialist movement strong enough to stop the war.
