Israeli Apartheid Week Montreal. March 5-13th 2012

8th annual Israeli Apartheid Week featuring inspiring conferences, workshops, film screenings, demonstrations, and cultural events to raise awareness around the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israeli apartheid.

Monday, March 5
Film Screening with Cinema Politica Tears of Gaza

7:00pm, Concordia University
1455 de Maisonneuve West
room H-110 (Guy-Concordia metro)
facebook event

Disturbing, powerful and emotionally devastating, Tears of Gaza is less a conventional documentary than a record – presented with minimal gloss – of the 2008 to 2009 bombing of Gaza by the Israeli military. Photographed by several Palestinian cameramen both during and after the offensive, this powerful film by director Vibeke Løkkeberg focuses on the impact of the attacks on the civilian population.

Tuesday, March 6
The Russell Tribunal on Palestine.
How can a popular tribunal help the pro-Justice movement?

presentation by Frank Barat
7:00pm, UQAM, 320 Sainte-Catherine East
Pavillon J.-A.-DeSève, room D SR340
berri-UQAM metro
facebook event

Frank Barat will give a brief historical overview of the work of the The Russell Tribunal on Palestine, including the Vietnam and South America tribunal of the 70s and will then focus on the Palestine tribunal with a strong emphasis on its last session, in Cape Town, that concluded that ‘Israel policies against the Palestinian People were in breach of the prohibition against Apartheid in International Law’. Organized by la Coalition pour la justice en Palestine-UQAM (CJP UQAM).

Wednesday, March 7
Women and Gender in Palestine: Reflections from an Anti-Apartheid Activist

presentation by Premilla Nadasen
via Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR)
179 Bronfman, 1001 Sherbrooke Street West
7:30pm, McGill University (McGill metro)
facebook event

Premilla Nadasen was born in South Africa and although she moved to the United States at a young age, she returned periodically to visit family and saw first hand the discriminatory policies of the Apartheid regime. She received her Ph.D. at Columbia University and her B.A. at the University of Michigan and she currently holds a position as an associate professor of history at Queens College (City University of New York.) In June 2011, Nadasen participated in a delegation of indigenous and women of colour feminists, activists, academics, and artists who visited the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Upon their return the delegation strongly endorsed the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Campaign and issued a call to action aimed towards their academic and artist colleagues to follow their lead.

Thursday, March 8
Workshop: Pinkwashing Israeli Apartheid 101

12:30 – 2:00pm, UQAM, Pavillon Hubert-Aquin
400 Sainte-Catherine East
room A 1850 (Berri-UQAM metro)
facebook event

This workshop and facilitated discussion will serve as an introduction to “pinkwashing,” the propaganda campaign targeting Western queers designed to secure their support for the Israeli state. Pinkwashing works by painting Israel as a haven for gays amid an intolerant, backward Middle East. Gay rights in Israel, we are told, justify the brutal, ongoing oppression of Palestinians, via policies that constitute apartheid according to many international observers. As queers, should we just learn to live with the fact that our freedoms may come at the expense of others’ subjugation and suffering, or can we look beyond our individualized identities to a larger solidarity between all those who struggle for justice and dignity? Workshop will be presented by Claire Hurtig, a member of Tadamon Montreal.

Thursday, March 8
Demonstration: Solidarity with Palestinian Women!

BDS contingent in the International Women’s Day march
6:00pm, Norman Bethune square.
Outside of Metro Guy-Concordia, De Maisonneuve Boulevard and Guy

Join the contingent with Palestinian flags and the BDS banner. This is an opportunity to express support for Palestinian women fighting against Israeli occupation and apartheid while also joining an international day of action, International Women’s Day, to support women’s liberation struggles, all around the world. Bring your own flags, signs, and noisemakers! For the full callout, visit: http://wdofdo.wordpress.com/

Friday, March 9
Film Screening with Cinema Politica Budrus

7pm, Concordia University, Library Building
1400 de Maisonneuve West, De Sève Cinema
(Guy-Concordia metro)
facebook event

Budrus is an award-winning feature documentary film about a Palestinian community organizer, Ayed Morrar, who unites local Fatah and Hamas members along with Israeli supporters in an unarmed movement to save his village of Budrus from destruction by Israel’s Separation Barrier. Success eludes them until his 15-year-old daughter, Iltezam, launches a women’s contingent that quickly moves to the front lines. Struggling side by side, father and daughter unleash an inspiring, yet little-known, movement in the Occupied Palestinian Territories that is still gaining ground today.

Sunday, March 11
Concert: Artists Against Apartheid XVIII

featuring celebrated NYC hip-hop group Rebel Diaz
Haitian hip-hop artist Vox Sambou and Chilean musicians l’Ensemble Acalanto

O Patro Vys, 356 Mont Royal (Mont Royal metro)
Doors 8:00pm, show starts at 9:00pm
Tickets: $10 in advance and $12 at the door
facebook event

Monday, March 12 – 16
Israeli Apartheid Week exhibition

Concordia University, Library Building Atrium
1400 de Maisonneuve West (Guy-Concordia metro)

An interactive exhibition via Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR) at Concordia University demonstrating the obstacles Israeli apartheid policies pose to ongoing Palestinian efforts for equal rights, justice and self-determination.

Monday, March 12
The Syrian Uprisings and the Question of Resistance

presentation by Bassam Haddad
6:30pm, Concordia University
1455 de Maisonneuve West, H – 763 (Guy-Concordia metro)
facebook event

In this presentation, Bassam will discuss the structural causes for the emergence of the Syrian uprising and the factors that explain the stalemate thus far. Special emphasis will be placed as well on critical questions of regional politics, particularly those related to the issue of resistance and the left. Bassam Haddad is Director of the Middle East Studies Program and teaches in the Department of Public and International Affairs at George Mason University, and is Visiting Professor at Georgetown University. He is the author of Business Networks in Syria: The Political Economy of Authoritarian Resilience (Stanford University Press, 2011). Bassam also serves on the Editorial Committee of Middle East Report and is Co-Founder/Editor of Jadaliyya Ezine. Lecture organized by Tadamon!

Tuesday, March 13
Closing Panel: Systematic Violence Against Indigenous Women

featuring presentations by Mohawk activist Janie Jamieson-Cook
and Palestinian activist Yafa Jarrar

6:30pm, Concordia University
1455 de Maisonneuve West
room H-763 (Guy-Concordia metro)
facebook event

Janie Jamieson-Cook and Yafa Jarrar will discuss systemic violence experienced by indigenous women in Canada, and the struggles faced by women in Palestine on a daily basis. This panel comes on the heels of the call for a UN inquiry into Canada’s human rights abuses with regards to Indigenous women. This event is hosted by the 2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy at Concordia University.

Janie Jamieson-Cook of the Mohawk Nation Turtle Clan is from Six Nations, Grand River Country. She is a political activist and the married mother of three: Jewel, Cecil, and Warren, and has one brother, and five sisters herself. Janie is a third generation survivor of the residential school system, as her mother and both grandmothers were all full-time students at the mush hole in Brantford, Ontario. Yafa Jarrar is an organizer with Students Against Israeli Apartheid-Carleton University. She was born in Jerusalem/Palestine and moved to Canada in 2003. Yafa now lives in Ottawa.”

Panel facilitated by Bianca Mugyenyi, a coordinator at the 2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy who participated in the World Education Forum in Occupied Palestine, Oct. 2010.

Israeli Apartheid Week Montreal 2012!

above is a preliminary event calendar
Full event details will be updated at www.iawmontreal.org

follow us online!
Facebook | twitter.com/sai_montreal

Accessibility

– All speaking events and workshops will have whisper translation
from English to French/French to English
– Entry to the events is by donation (pay what you can) unless otherwise noted
– All events are wheelchair accessible unless otherwise noted
– Childcare is available for most events.
– Please email us 48 hours in advance at iaw-mtl(at)riseup.net

Israeli Apartheid Week is organized by the following groups: Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (McGill and Concordia), Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG McGill and Concordia), Tadamon, 2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy, and the Coalition for Justice in Palestine- UQAM

Free free Palestine!

Israeli Apartheid Week Montreal is endorsed by the following organizations

2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy
Alternatives International
Centre d’appui aux Philippines / Centre for Philippine Concerns
Coalition pour la Justice en Palestine (CJP) – UQAM
Coalition for Justice and Peace in Palestine (CJPP)
Conseil central du Montréal métropolitain de la CSN (CCMM-CSN)
College and University Workers United (CUWU)
Canadian Friends of Sabeel
Immigrant Workers Center (IWC)
Muslim Students Association (MSA) Concordia University
Muslim Students Association (MSA) McGill University
Near East Cultural and Educational Foundation of Canada
Palestinian and Jewish Unity (PAJU)
People’s Potato Concordia University
People’s Commission Network
Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG) Concordia University
Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG) McGill University
Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR) Concordia University
Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR) McGill University
Tadamon!
Women of diverse origins — Femmes de diverses origines

Israeli Apartheid Week 2012 in Montreal
iaw-mtl(at)riseup.net | 514-848-7583