FACT SHEET

Over the past two decades, Palestinians have sat around the "negotiating table" on numerous occasions with successive Israeli governments and with a stated view of achieving a negotiated resolution to the intractable Palestine-Israel conflict. For years, Israel has claimed that the persistent failure of this so-called peace process was the result of Palestinian intransigence and of Israel having no reliable "partner for peace". However, an independently authenticated cache of confidential documents, records, contemporaneous notes and transcripts of private meetings between the two sides leaked in 2011, revealed a very different picture.

When Professor Paul Whiteley of the new Essex Centre for the Study of Integrity published his study "Are Britons getting more dishonest?" this month, he didn't have to wait very long for the answer.

Just three days later, Eirian Walsh-Atkins, the head of constitutional policy in the Cabinet Office, resigned after posting a message on Twitter saying that she hoped a group campaigning for better regulation of the lobby industry "would die". The headlines became more disturbing by the day. On 28 January the Guardian reported, "Gove awarded public funds to organisation that he advised". The Sunday Times reported on 29 January, "Internet minister in web shares row", and Monday 30 saw the Independent revealing that, "Lobbying reform official in Twitter rant never even met the campaigners she attacked".

From the moment that she refused to sign the pro-Israel pledge, claims McKinney, "war was declared on me".

She did not realise the extent to which that was going to resound in her life. "I would get phone calls from people saying they wanted to throw a fundraiser for me and then I'd say fantastic and we'd start planning it and then the question would be asked 'did you sign the pledge?'" She'd say no and then it was, "well then I can't do a fundraiser for you." And that was the way it went. "A lawsuit was filed against the district that elected me. It went all the way up to the Supreme Court." Later she found out that the Anti-Defamation League, a notoriously pro-Israel group, had been involved in filing the brief: "Clearly, the ADL didn't forget that I hadn't signed the pledge." It was a malicious case, she says, but they won and the district she represented was dismantled and she had to find another place to represent. She was targeted from day one and "even after I left I continued to be targeted". She feels that part of the reason for this may be because she started her political career so young and therefore her opponents want to make sure that she does not go back into mainstream politics with her outspoken views. She clearly blames the pro-Israel Lobby for ruining her political career; even Ariel Sharon bragged about her political demise when he visited her home state of Georgia. Her opponent was given $100,000 in a single day and Cynthia "ended up getting kicked out of congress for the second time". The ability of the Lobby to co-opt both Democrat and Republican parties "is significant", she says. 

The Guardian Weekend Magazine published a map under the title 'Welcome To Northern Israel' depicted a map of Israel encompassing the whole of historic Palestine including the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

As part of Israel's Ministry of Tourism systematic campaign of distorting facts, the misleading map implies that the entire area is Israel and that the Occupied Palestinian Territory including the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem are part of Israel.

Introduction

On 25 June 2011, the celebrated Palestinian social, political and civil rights leader Sheikh Raed Salah arrived at London's Heathrow airport at the invitation of the independent media research and information organisation, the Middle East Monitor (MEMO). The purpose of his visit was to take part in a widely publicised ten-day programme of speaking engagements across the UK. During his visit, Sheikh Raed was scheduled to address the British public and parliamentarians on issues related to the Middle East and the plight of Palestinians living in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Three days into his trip, Sheikh Raed was arrested and detained by the UK Border Agency (UKBA) and then told that he would face deportation.

HE Jacob Zuma
President of the Republic of South Africa
Cape Town
South Africa

Cape Town, 7 November 2011

Dear Mister President,

On 5-6 November 2011 we held our third session in Cape Town, hosted by the District Six museum.

Yesterday afternoon it came to our attention that at least one witness who has given evidence to the Tribunal this weekend has been subjected to reprisals because she has opposed apartheid. Haneen Zoabi, a Member of Knesset (Israeli Parliament) gave evidence to the Tribunal yesterday, Sunday 6th November 2011, and within hours of doing do so was reportedly the subject of a formal application to the Knesset's Ethics' Committee to strip her of her Israeli citizenship. The media reports of that application make it clear that it is based on the fact of her testimony to the Tribunal. We fully appreciate that the proposed action against MK Zoabi is currently initiated by another MK, which at the time of this letter has not received the support of the Israeli Government and has not been the subject of decision by the Knesset. However, the very fact of such a formal step may effectively achieve its principal purpose: to chill public debate on the issue of Israeli apartheid.

Zionist political thought continues to propose projects based on the eradication of the Palestinians as a people or, at the very least, their marginalisation inside the state of Israel. So-called 'population transfer' is a fundamental and unequivocally non-negotiable principle of political Zionism. It has been used to devastating effect for more than sixty years to carry out what historians have called the 'ethnic cleansing' of Palestinians from their land.

With increasing discussion about 'final status' issues such as Israel-Palestine borders; Palestinian refugees; the city of Jerusalem; and Israeli settlements, the Zionists establishment has now added a new dimension to its concept of 'transfer'. This has come to be known as 'geographical transfer' and is intended to destroy Palestine as a viable homeland while still referring to it as a land. It is based upon the concept of an exchange of land between Israel and the Palestinian Authority within the context of any final status discussions, so as to allow illegal Israeli settlements to officially end up as part of the Zionist state.