OCCUPY SELFRIDGES - PARTY AND PORTEST!
3rd August, 1pm

PUBLIC MEETING - 1st August - 7pm at the London Action Resource Centre on Thursday August 1st on Fieldgate Street. Nearest tubes are Whitechapel or Aldgate East. Up for discussion will the politics behind the action, tactics to be employed on the day and legal briefings on the implications of being involved in the action.

In response to Selfridges’ continued support for the expansion of illegal settlements in the Occupied Territories by selling goods produced there, we are calling for an occupation of Selfridges!

Join the big demonstration outside the main Oxford Street entrance at 1pm or form an affinity group with some friends, dress as customers and enter the store. Bring music, entertainment and ideas for action and lets shut the store for the day!

Called by DAAWN (Direct Action Against War Now) and sponsored by: Anarchist Youth Network, Campaign for Palestinian Rights, the Wombles, Youth and Student CND, Jews Against Zionism, Stroud Valley Anarchists, Rhythms of Resistance.

Backround Information:

Selfridges has caved in to Israeli government pressure and placed back goods produced on illegal Israeli settlements for sale. Selfridges removed these goods over Christmas when they appeared to recognise a wider civic responsibility. Now they have reneged on this decision and are once again accomplices to Israel's brutal occupation of Palestinian land that has resulted in the murder of tens of thousands of innocent Palestinians since 1967.

Selfridges are supporting the illegal Occupation which the Israeli Government has tried to cement by attempting to colonise the West Bank, Gaza and the Golan Heights. Prime Minister Sharon wishes to make conditions so awful for the Palestinians living there -by sheer terror and enforced poverty- that they will give up and leave: this is effectively ethnic cleansing. By selling goods from these settlements, Selfridges are giving economic and political support to Israeli military oppression.

These settlements have been built on land expropriated from the Palestinians in the Occupied Territories. Not only are they illegal under international law, including the Fourth Geneva Convention, but their existence and continuing expansion, a symbol of the ongoing occupation, has been identified as a major obstacle to peace at this sensitive time.

The EU and international positions make it clear that settlements are not part of Israel, and therefore are not covered by any trade agreement. By stocking such products, Selfridges is in effect assisting settlement expansion through subsidising the settler economy. Whilst settlement trade flourishes, Israel continues to strangle the Palestinian economy by denying it free access to the outside world.

The products are:

Achva Halva from the Barkan Industrial Zone,
West Bank Beigal and Beigal pretzels from the Barkan Industrial Zone,
West Bank Yarden Wines from Katzrin, Golan Heights

And all can be found in the Food Hall.