Add your signature  in support of Rho City Council

Occupied Palestine, December 16 2011

As Stop the Wall we thank the municipal council of Rho for the passing of its motion that morally and politically condemns the Italian company Pizzarotti for their participation in the construction of the Israeli A1 train line and highlights that Pizzarotti has clearly committed sufficiently grave errors in the conduct of their professional activity so as to justify the exclusion from public tenders.[1]

Since its inception in 2002, the Stop the Wall Campaign has been the main national grassroots body mobilizing and organizing the collective efforts against the Wall. It is the coordination body for dozens of popular committees in the villages affected by the Wall, including in Beit Surik, 13 Palestinian NGOs and Palestinian progressive political forces.[2]

Steps such as yours are an important support in our efforts to hold Israeli and international companies accountable for their complicity in Israeli violations of international law and human rights.

The case of the A1 train and the involvement of international companies in Israeli war crimes is just one of many. The Israeli political project is based on construction projects and infrastructure being built on the ground that steal land, destroy property and livelihoods and literally encircle Palestinian residential areas with roads, walls, checkpoints and settlements. Some 50 percent of Palestinian land will be inaccessible to Palestinians through such infrastructure projects (including the Wall, the settlements, roads, rails and checkpoints) and so-called “natural reserves” and military closed zones.

On July 9 2004, the International Court of Justice has confirmed the Wall and its associated regime as well as the settlements war crimes under international law as they are in grave breach of the IV Geneva Convention.[3] The A1 train running through Palestinian occupied land is likewise a grave breach against the IV Geneva Convention and to be considered a war crime.

The A1 train is further part of Israeli policies amounting to the crime of apartheid. The Cape Town session of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (RToP) on November 5-7 2011 has concluded that Israeli practices amount to a breach of the international legal prohibition of apartheid. The RToP concluded that “the evidence has made it plain to the RToP that since 1948 the Israeli authorities have pursued concerted policies of colonisation and appropriation of Palestinian land. Israel has through its laws and practices divided the Israeli Jewish and Palestinian populations and allocated them different physical spaces, with varying levels and quality of infrastructure, services and access to resources. The end result is wholesale territorial fragmentation and a series of separate reserves and enclaves, with the two groups largely segregated”.[4] The A1 train project is an integral part of this Israeli policy.

Based on these legal circumstances, the German government has de facto pressured its state owned company to abandon the project.

Pizzarotti is aware of this, yet continues its involvement for corporate benefit. They uphold the joint venture with Shapir that is contracted to work on construction efforts on both sides of the Green Line. De facto, the expertise of Pizzarotti is essential for the implementation of the A1 train line, i.e. the implementation of a project amounting to a war crime, as there Israeli companies do not have matching expertise in the use of tunnel boring machines as those used by Pizzarotti.[5]

These Israeli infrastructure projects would not be possible without the active support of the international community, international companies, finance institutions and the silence of governments which have so far not taken any effective action to comply with their legal obligation under international law to stop third parties from violating the IV Geneva Convention. In fact, the entire Israeli policy that since 64 years violates the rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination and countless human rights would not be possible without the connivance of the international community.

As Stop the Wall, the Palestinian grassroots campaign against the Wall and the settlements, we deeply appreciate the support of Rho municipality and civil society campaigns such as Stop That Train as the most effective form to hold complicit companies accountable.

They are an essential element in the support of the communities and our efforts to stop the Israeli wall, colonization and occupation of Palestinian land.

We thank you for the support and hope that many other municipalities in Italy and around the world will follow your principled example.

Stop the Wall Campaign
Jamal Juma’
Palestinian grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign – coordinator
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phone: +972-2971505

[1] Rho City Council Resolution [in Italian]
[2] http://www.stopthewall.org/about-us
[3] http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/131/1677.pdf
[4] http://www.russelltribunalonpalestine.com/es/sesiones/sesion-de-sudafrica/sesion-de-sudafrica-conclusionescompletas
[5] http://www.whoprofits.org/articlefiles/WP-A1-Train.pdf