The campaign to twin the London borough of Tower Hamlets with the Palestinian town of Jenin continues. Local residents and activists have collected thousands of signatures on their petition, and used council procedures which allow local residents to raise motions, to speak at a full council meeting.

While it seems unlikely that Tower Hamlets council will agree to full twinning, nobody objected to the issue being raised, and recognised that this issue was of importance to the local population. It would seem likely that some positive action will result from the campaign. Already some local school children are settnig up 'pen pal' communications with children in the palestinian town.

The campaign to Twin, involves a large variety of local residents, peace campaigners and other activists, who hope to both raise solidarity with the Palestinians, campaign against arms sales to the Israeli government, and educate people in our area to the realities of what is happening in Palestine.

Further discussions between councillors and campaigners are due to take place next week, and a final decision will be made by the council in September.

The campaign has received large amounts of press and radio coverage both locally and nationally.

Campaigners recognise that even if Twinning does not take place, all the discussion and debate, meetings and public stalls that have taken place, have made the whole activity worthwhile.

Tower Hamlets has along tradition of local residents uniting against oppression and racism. From the "Battle of Cable Street" when local people stopped the march of Oswald Moseley's fascists, to more recently when local people campaigned and organised against the BNP, there have been many occasions when people from all backgrounds and communities have united together.

Our campaign involves people from a Jewish and Arabic background, as well as Christians and Muslims. We all hope that our campaign can be part of creating a peace middle east, where Jews, Arabs and all others can live together.