[22 jan] Solidariteitsactie in Den Haag voor vluchtelingen in Israel
Wanneer: 19/01/2014 - 16:18
Woensdag 22 januari is er een internationale solidariteitsdag met Afrikaanse asielzoekers in Israel. De groep uitgeprocedeerde vluchtelingen in Amsterdam die zich heeft verzameld onder de naam ‘Wij Zijn Hier’ ondersteunt deze actiedag met een demonstratie bij de Israelische ambassade in Den Haag waar wij zullen protesteren tegen het discriminerende en inhumane vluchtelingenbeleid van Israel
Begin deze maand demonstreerden tienduizenden Afrikaanse vluchtelingen in Tel Aviv voor hun rechten als asielzoeker nadat de regering van premier Netanyahu een wetswijziging doorvoerde, die voorziet in het voor onbepaalde tijd opsluiten van vluchtelingen in afgelegen detentiekampen in de woestijn. Dankzij de nieuwe wetgeving lopen meer dan 50.000 vluchtelingen risico zonder vorm van proces opgepakt en afgevoerd te worden. Vluchtelingen die via Egypte in Israel aankomen worden direct vastgezet en kunnen geen asiel aanvragen.
De eerste razzia staat al gepland waarbij de overheid meer dan duizend vluchtelingen zal afvoeren naar de Negev. Sinds de nieuwe wetgeving er door is gekomen eind vorig jaar zijn tal van vluchtelingen gearresteerd en onder druk gezet in te stemmen met een 'vrijwillige' terugkeer naar het land van herkomst. Door deze willekeurige arrestaties zijn families ontwricht en uit elkaar gerukt. De voornamelijk uit Eritrea en Soedan afkomstige asielzoekers laten zich echter niet gewillig opjagen; gegroepeerd voeren ze acties tegen de discriminerende maatregelen van de overheid.
Ze krijgen 22 januari tijdens de internationale solidariteitsdag steun van aktivisten en mensrechtenorganisaties uit onder meer Canada, Verenigde Staten, Italië, Zweden, Frankrijk en Duitsland. Ook Wij Zijn Hier uit Amsterdam is solidair met de Afrikaanse vluchtelingen in Israel. We zullen bij de Israelische ambassade in Den Haag eisen dat Israel de mensenrechten naleeft! Iedereen is van harte welkom zich aan te sluiten.
Na afloop demonstreren we bij het Ministerie van Veiligheid en Justitie om dezelfde mensenrechten voor ons op te eisen. We voeren al bijna anderhalf jaar actie tegen het inhumane vluchtelingenbeleid in Nederland, maar de overheid schendt consequent onze basale rechten waardoor we opgepakt, vastgezet en uitgesloten worden van de samenleving.
Vrijheid voor alle vluchtelingen! Geen mens is illegaal!
Woensdag 22 januari 2014 van 14.00 tot 16.00
demonstratie bij de Israelische ambassade, Buitenhof 47 in Den Haag
Verzamelen 13.30 op het Buitenhof
•petitie UNHCR
•ASSAF
•Freedom 4 Refugees in Israel
•Wij Zijn Hier
•FB Wij Zijn Hier
de demonstratie begint een half uur later : verzamelen vanaf 14.00 / demonstreren vanaf 14.30
Toespraak van Joke Kaviaar bij de Israelische ambassade:
FREEDOM and REFUGEE RIGHTS NOW!
This is the call of refugees in The Netherlands. This is the call of
refugees in Europe.
This is the call of refugees Worldwide. This is also the call of
refugees in Israel!
FREEDOM and REFUGEE RIGHTS NOW!
Today, January 22nd of the year 2014, we stand here, in front of the
Israeli embassy, united. United as people, united as refugees. And we
say NO to Israeli Apartheid and ethnic cleansing!
About 50,000 African asylum seekers and refugees live in Israel. They
have fled persecution, forced military conscription, dictatorship, civil
wars and genocide. The Israeli government members have called them a
“cancer”, propagating they are “infiltrators”. Refugees entering Israel
from Egypt cannot even request asylum. The Israeli Government’s ongoing
incitement and hate speech towards refugees has lead to racial violence
and hate crimes against their community.
This is institutionalized racism! Raids are happening as we speak. You,
inside that embassy, cannot deny it. Nobody can say: We did not know
what was going on. Because we are here to remind you!
The voices of refugees can no longer be silenced. The voice of refugees
will, shall, and continue to be heard, louder and louder. The call for
Freedom and Refugee Rights will echo across the continent, it will echo
across the Mediterranean Sea, it will echo across oceans, mountains,
rivers and deserts. It will echo and resound in solidarity.
No prison, no camp will contain this voice, will detain this resistance.
No barbed wire, no fences will stop immigration, because as long as
people need to leave their homes in search for a better life, fleeing
from violence, starvation, persecution or war, there is no stopping it.
Solidarity with African Asylum Seekers and refugees! We call upon all
governments, all states, and here and now especially the Israeli
government, to stop its inhumane policies and respect the human rights
of refugees.
Stop detention! Stop deportation! Stop the raids and arrests in Tel
Aviv! Close all borders prisons!
As of January 5, 2014, 150 imprisoned refugees went on hunger strike in
the Saharonim Prison, demanding that they be released. But instead, they
have been put in isolation. Four of the leaders were transferred from
Saharonim prison to the Be’er Sheva jail.
Today is day 18. What is the Israeli government waiting for? For the
refugees to die? How many refugees have to die before you realize what
it is you are doing?
Government of Israel. We are standing here in front of your embassy in
The Hague, the Netherlands. Here also, refugees are fighting for their
rights. Basically, their situation is no different. The demands are also
no different, so we repeat once again: FREEDOM and REFUGEE RIGHTS NOW –
WORLD WIDE! No more humiliation! No more indefinite detention! No more
raids! No more! FREEDOM NOW!
WIJ ZIJN HIER demonstreert in den haag...
About the hungerstrike: this is the letter the hunger strikers wrote to the Israeli public on January 5, 2014.
Hunger strike for freedom and human rights
To the Israeli people, human rights organizations and the press:
This is a call to all the people who believe in humanity.
We are calling for the recognition of our rights as refugees.
We are calling to put a stop to the Sudanese refugees suffering inside Israeli prisons.
We are Sudanese refugees imprisoned in Israeli prisons. We have escaped from our homeland since our lives are in danger under the terror of the Sudanese government, and since we have suffered from the scourge of war that is still raging on in Darfur, the Nuba Mountains and the Blue Nile.
All the world knows the scale of the humanitarian disaster that has happened in Sudan: killing, rape, genocide, ethnic cleansing, looting and the systematic targeting of the black African ethnicities by the Sudanese government. The persecution, torture and murder by the Sudanese security forces of political activists and the opposition groups that belong to the black African ethnicities.
We are Sudanese refugees, we escaped to the Israeli state because we had great faith that the democratic state of Israel, that respects human rights, can protect and accept us as refugees until the reasons from which we escaped are resolved.
We are Sudanese refugees. We escaped to the Israeli state to ask for protection but the Israeli government didn’t accept us as refugees. Instead, they put us in prison since June 2012 until today, January 5, 2014.
Only nine months after we were imprisoned, we were finally allowed to apply for asylum, but up until today we have not received an answer or a decision in our requests for political asylum. The supreme High Court decided to release all the prisoners from ‘Saharonim’ and ‘Ketsiot’ prison on the September 16, 2013, but the government didn’t respect the court’s decision to release us and instead they sent us to ‘Holot’ prison on Friday December 13, 2013, calling us infiltrators and not refugees.
On Sunday December 15, 2013, we left walking from ‘Holot’ prison to Beer Sheva and from there to Jerusalem to protest against the government’s decision to prevent our release. During the protest in front of the parliament we were violently arrested in front of all the media and human rights organizations. Once again, we were returned to the ‘Saharonim’ prison.
We are Sudanese refugees imprisoned in’ Saharonim’ prison; we are on hunger strike because until today we have not received the government’s answer about our asylum requests. We will continue the hunger strike until our requests will be fulfilled, or we will die from hunger. There is no point in life without human freedom.
Either we live as humans with all our basic rights or we don’t live at all.
We request:
1. Release us into Israel and deal with us as refugees according to international law and the Geneva refugee convention.
2. If the Israeli government can’t protect us and deal with us as humans and refugees in Israel, they should pass us to international human rights organizations for refugees to find for us a state that can protect us and deal with us as refugees. We cannot go back to our countries in this time and we can’t spend our lives as displaced refugees in prison.
The Sudanese refugees, ‘Saharonim’ prison, January 5, 2014