On November 12, as part of the 9th annual international week against the apartheid wall, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign in Melbourne took to the streets to raise awareness about Israel’s occupation and apartheid policies.
In November 2000 Israel approved the first project to build a so- called “security barrier” — a 8 metre high wall (twice the height of
the Berlin Wall), with watch towers, electric fences, concrete walls, trenches, sensors and military patrols.
Israeli apartheid wall cuts deep into the Occupied West Bank, expanding Israel’s theft of Palestinian land and resources. In total, 85% of the Wall is located in the West Bank. When completed, the Wall and its associated regime will de facto annex some 46% of the West Bank, isolating communities into Bantustans, ghettos and “military zones”. This means that the Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, including almost 1.5 million refugees, will be encircled on only 12% of mandate Palestine.
Some 12% of Palestinians in the West Bank will be living in the closed military zone of the Jordan Valley or surrounded on three or four sides by the Wall or isolated between it and the green line. They face increasingly unbearable living conditions – the loss of land, markets, movement and livelihoods – and many will face expulsion.
More than 200,000 Palestinians living in Occupied East Jerusalem will be totally isolated from the rest of the West Bank by the apartheid wall, while 98% of the settler population will be included in the de facto annexed areas.
As of December 2010, 520 km of the planned 810 km, or 64%, had been completed. The Wall has destroyed a large amount of Palestinian farmland and usurped water supplies, including the biggest aquifer in the West Bank. With the completion of the Wall, at least 78 Palestinian villages and communities, which are home to almost 266, 500 Palestinian civilians will be isolated with a total population of 266,442 will be isolated and forced to live in ghettos.
Demand:
- Israel dismantle its apartheid wall and illegal settlements
- An end to Israel’s illegal siege and blockade of Gaza
- An end to Israel’s military occupation and colonisation of all Arab lands
- No Australian support for Israel — end all military and economic ties now!
