The Russell Tribunal on Palestine is coming to New York in two weeks and here is a great video they’ve put up of the wonderful Wallace Shawn explaining why he cares.
And here’s the press release from the Russell Tribunal:
“As an American taxpayer and sometimes voter, I’m very directly responsible for the crimes that have been committed against the Palestinian people,” says one of America’s most famous faces, character actor and playwright Wallace Shawn in this 2.5-minute video clip endorsing the upcoming Russell Tribunal on Palestine, coming to New York City October 6–7, 2012.
Shawn, who is Jewish and is a member of the Advisory Board of Jewish Voice for Peace, recorded this 2.5-minute video clip endorsing the need for a full investigation into the crimes against the Palestinian people by Israel financed by US tax dollars.
Shawn invites everyone to join him in hearing the world’s most prominent public intellectual Noam Chomsky, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker, and civil rights leader Angela Davis who will be offering and weighing testimony at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (RToP), an international people’s tribunal that was created to expose human rights abuses and stir people to action in opposition to Israel’s violations of international law. In addition, Russell Means and Dennis Banks, dubbed by the LA Times, “the two most famous Indians since Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse,” will join Israeli historian Ilan Pappé, former Palestine Liberation Organization legal advisor Diana Buttu, and a who’s who of international human rights figures at RToP in New York City, Oct. 6-7, 2012.
RToP was launched in 2009 following Israel’s bloody assault on Gaza, which killed more than 1400 Palestinians, and has since worked to bring together legal experts, scholars, activists, and other people of note to help shed light on the reality of Israel’s 45-year-old occupation of Palestinian land. RToP also shines a light on the active role that third parties—foreign governments and corporations—play in perpetuating human rights violations in Israel-Palestine.
Walker, Davis, Means, and Banks are among the Russell Tribunal participants to issue an “urgent call to others who share our commitment to racial justice, equality, and freedom.” They invite people to attend the hearings in New York City on October 6 and 7, writing, “Each and every one of us—particularly those of us and our fellow jury members who grew up in the Jim Crow South, in apartheid South Africa, and on Indian reservations in the United States—is shocked by what Israel is doing to the Palestinians.”
Previous sessions of the tribunal have been held in Barcelona, London, and Cape Town. These hearings have addressed, respectively, European Union support for Israel, the complicity of corporations in the occupation of Palestine, and the question of whether Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid. The fourth and final session will be held in New York City this October 6-7, and will examine the role of the United Nations and the United States in perpetuating Israel’s impunity in depriving the Palestinian people of their right to self-determination.
great stuff…wish I could be there for the RToP
i’ve always like shawn, or at least the parts i’ve seen. ‘my dinner with andre’, and ‘scenes from the class struggle in beverly hills’ are two great movies. and a conscience too.
Interesting to observe the style of Jewish Shawn in contrast to Jewish Bill Kristol’s. Is there a connection with the content of each? What is it? Anything more than ivy league education makes you an articulate, cool-speaking sociopath?
I guess not, looking at wiki on Shawn.
Anybody can explain?
Wish I could be there, too — I’ll be traveling. :(
But I have to admit, every time I see Wallace Shawn, for just one second I think, “Wait, wasn’t he killed by the man in the black mask?” I guess some movies stick with you a little too much…
Zionist apartheid entity Israel should be of special concern to all Americans because it’s our government that’s backing the Zionist entity. Jewish Americans have an additional concern/motivation in that Israel claims not only to represent Israeli Jews but Jews worldwide, which means that any Jew who supports or condones (or, perhaps, just remains silent) Israel in the face of its crimes against humanity, when the day of reckoning arrives, risks being held complicit in said crimes. That’s why “Not In My Name.” Aside, that is, from one’s responsibility to support justice for Palestine because it’s the right thing to do!