It is mid-​2012 and in Palestine the 64 year-​long struggle against Israel’s polit­ical, eco­nomic, and cul­tural occu­pa­tion and viol­ence con­tin­ues with an ever-​increasing intens­ity. The state of Israel, sup­por­ted by cent­ral London’s power­ful polit­ical elite, con­tin­ues to con­trol the dis­course on the eth­nic cleans­ing of Palestine. Though it attempts to drown out the voices of mil­lions across the world call­ing for an end to its racist pro­gramme of Zion­ism, grass roots groups the world over are fight­ing in solid­ar­ity with Palestine, to lay bare the work­ings of Israeli oppres­sion, and so to end it.

On 1^st June 2012 one of cent­ral London’s lost and aban­doned build­ings was reclaimed from the shame of dis­use by and for the com­munity, to be trans­formed into a rad­ical centre for dis­cus­sion, action, and edu­ca­tion around the issue of Palestine. We call it Palestine Place.

We have already had a host of incred­ible events, from renowned Israeli his­tor­ian, Ilan Pappe, to the first UK inter­view, by live video stream from Palestine, with inspir­a­tional and vic­tori­ous Palestinian hun­ger striker Khader Adnan, to film screen­ings, dis­cus­sions of polit­ical clown­ing in Palestine, spoken word artistry, culin­ary mar­vels and of course the odd lec­ture. Actions have spon­tan­eously sprouted from within the space, like Tuesday’s protest across cent­ral Lon­don against the con­tin­ued deten­tion, without charge or trial, of Mah­moud Sar­sak, who has been on a stag­ger­ing hun­ger strike since 19^th March. We run reg­u­lar intro­duct­ory work­shops on the top­ics of ‘Israeli apartheid’ and the ‘Boy­cott, Divest­ment and Sanc­tions’ move­ment, an inform­at­ive dis­cus­sion space for the expert and unini­ti­ated alike. We are a pub­lic space – we are yours to use and enjoy, to teach and learn in, and for all of us to learn from.

The found­a­tional polit­ics of our action of solid­ar­ity is uni­fied by the three basic demands of Palestinian civil soci­ety in their call for a boy­cott of Israel (BDS Move­ment):

• An end to the occu­pa­tion and col­on­isa­tion of all Arab lands occu­pied since 1967.
• Equal Rights for Palestinian Cit­izens of Israel (1948 Palestine).
• Respect­ing, pro­tect­ing, and pro­mot­ing the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their lands as stip­u­lated in UN Res­ol­u­tion 194.

Palestine Place is already an inspir­a­tion to every­one involved and more besides, and we can say this without arrog­ance because it does not belong to us. It is open and dir­ectly demo­cratic. All import­ant decisions are made through con­sensus after an open group dis­cus­sion, to which every­one is invited and all are wel­come to express their opin­ion. Des­pite (per­haps because of) hav­ing no cent­ral organ­isa­tional com­mit­tee, Palestine Place has grown and sprawled organ­ic­ally along hori­zontal lines of com­mu­nic­a­tion and self-​organisation, which cre­ate order out of an abund­ance of cre­at­ive chaos and set a pre­ced­ent for a new kind of non-​violent res­ist­ance, com­bin­ing build­ing occu­pa­tion, skill shar­ing, dis­cus­sion, art and dir­ect action. We all con­trib­ute to the well­being of the place and each other, while claim­ing full respons­ib­il­ity for actions within and without, for example by insti­tut­ing and main­tain­ing our ‘safer spaces’ policy, aimed at com­bat­ing sex­ism and racism within the space. Palestine Place, reach­ing the end of the first week of its exist­ence, is becom­ing a mature and legit­im­ate form of act­ive, polit­ical, peace­ful resistance.

We invite the pub­lic to come and share this space with us, and we invite act­iv­ists, NGOs, aca­dem­ics, and dir­ect action groups as well as all other inter­ested parties to bring their sup­port and know­ledge to Palestine Place and to take part in this incred­ible event.

Con­tact:

Web­site: http://​palestine​place​.org

Email: palestineplace@​riseup.​net

Twit­ter: @PalestinePlace

Face­book: Palestine Place

Tel: 07448613383

24 Grays In Road
Lon­don
WC1X 8HP

Nearest tube: Chan­cery Lane, Cent­ral Line.