Gaza

From Oxford Stop the War Coalition

Following the massive attack Israel launched on Gaza today, Oxford Stop the War Coalition has organised a protest at Carfax 6pm to 7pm today (Sunday). Please come along and bring candles and placards.So far the sudden attack on Gaza has killed over 200 people and injured a further 300.

The violence is continuing. Beginning without warning, the attacks began by targeting police stations in order to undermine the internal security of the Gaza Strip. Over 50 of the dead were reportedly killed when the Gaza security headquarters was hit with a missile. Images coming out of Gaza City and other areas show dozens of men in police uniforms, dead or horribly injured, lying in the street as other civilians rush to bring the wounded to local hospitals. Timed when Children are leaving school.This attack comes after more than a year of strangulating sanctions which has left hospitals without basic materials or medicines to treat the mass-casualties. Israel has said this is "just the beginning" and has been threatening a massive strike on Gaza after a new ceasefire could not be negotiated and the previous 6-month ceasefire between Hamas and Israel expired last week. The previous ceasefire was negotiated on the basis that Israel would open the crossings into Gaza, allowing desperately- needed food, medicine, and other humanitarian needs in. Israel never kept up their end of the agreement, keeping the crossings closed except for a few, token openings letting in less than 25% of the needed supplies.

There are also national protests organised by Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Stop the War Coalition, Palestine Return Centre, British Muslim Initiative, Friends of Al Aqsa, Muslim Association of Britain, Respect and the Islamic Human Rights Commission.These are taking place opposite the Israeli Embassy, Kensington High Street (nearest tube is High Street Kensington) as follows:Sunday 28 December 2.00 pm - 4.00 pm and Monday 29 December 4.00pm - 6.00pm.

Oxford Left Alternative activists petition inside Cowley Woolworths

Oxford Mini, MFI, Woolworths, City Council, Oxfam, Oxford Archaeology…

Stop the jobs massacre- why no bail out for workers?

With £13 billion handed out in London city bonuses in 2008 alone it is an outrage that thousands of people are being left to face redundancy and repossession without more government support.

Support for Woolworths Staff

Left Alternative supporters have been petitioning inside Cowley centre Woolworth's at the tills in the last few days. Activists Ian and Julie report…

“We made a brief announcement and then 6 of us petitioned the queues across the store. We said that the Local Labour MP and the government should be doing more about the collapse of Woolies and potentially the loss of 30,000 jobs. EVERYBODY AGREED. We talked about the need for a generalised fight back over jobs, pointing out if the government can bail out the bankers they can keep people in work. 200 people signed the petition during our visits on Friday and Saturday, pretty much everybody we asked in the time we spent in the store. Staff took leaflets to hand out to their workmates. People were not only sympathetic about the Woolworth workers but also want action on growing unemployment, with one person already having lost their printing job and home as a result of the crisis. Others faced fights to get benefits for disabled children and worried about their jobs. Our first signer was the wife of ex-post worker who took the opportunity to add to our announcement the fact the Oxford post workers are also fighting for their jobs.”
To support the petition e-mail oxfordrespect@yahoo.co.uk

Proposed Immigration Removal Centre at Bullingdon

Information below from CABIRC...

In May 2008, the UK government announced plans to increase immigration detention 

capacity in the UK. An 800-place centre is to be built across the road from Bullingdon 

Prison. 

 

The ‘Accommodation Centre’ all over again? 

You may recall Home Office efforts to build an Accommodation Centre in 2002. 

Planning permission was unanimously refused by Cherwell District Council, whose 

decision was upheld at public inquiry. The application went to judicial review, and, 

finally, to the Court of Appeal. Work began on the site in 2005. But objections to the 

planning proposals continued. In June 2005, government plans were abandoned. An 

estimated £29.1 million of public money was wasted on this aborted project. 

 

Local popular opposition was the key to this success. It is the 

key to challenging the new detention centre. 

 

Coalition against Bullingdon Immigration Removal Centre 

A local campaign group, known as ‘CABIRC’, has been established to oppose the new 

centre on grounds that: 

• indefinite detention is inhumane and an abuse of human rights 

• expansion of detention is unnecessary given the falling number of asylum 

applications 

• the centre would be an enormous and ill-affordable public expense, costing 

an annual estimated £32 million to run 

• there are planning and environmental objections to the proposal, as there 

were to the Accommodation Centre.  

 

What can you do? 

The planning application was received by Cherwell District Council on 8 December. A 

decision is likely to be recommended at the meeting of the South Area Planning 

Committee on either 19 February or 12 March 2009. 

 

Residents are encouraged to: 

• study the planning application (ref. no. 08/02511/F), available online via the 

planning portal, http://cherweb.cherwell- 

dc.gov.uk/publicaccess/tdc/DcApplication/weeklylist_searchform.aspx 

• write to oppose it, to your district councillors, and to Cherwell District Council 

(Planning), Bodicote House, White Post Road, Bodicote, Banbury OX15 4AA 

• write to Tony Baldry MP, House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA 

• write a letter to the local press: bicesteradvertiser.letters@nqo.com; 

letters@oxfordtimes.co.uk 

• join CABIRC to campaign against the centre, or make a donation. 

 

Reasons to oppose the application 

• unnecessary: there are already two designated prisons for foreign national 

prisoners; and the number of asylum seekers is a quarter of the number in 2000 

• a rural location, not identified as a site for employment growth – development 

here undermines local planning policy  

• a large unsustainable site, with poor public transport: unacceptable increases in 

traffic congestion; a danger to pedestrians 

• a brightly-lit and noisy site causing light and noise pollution in a rural area 

• environmental impact: including harm to the countryside, wildlife habitats, water 

supply and disposal in an area with existing water problems 

• human rights and safety considerations: the history of nearby Campsfield IRC 

shows that protests by detainees, fires and escapes are to be expected. 

 

For further information, please see www.cabirc.org.uk, or email info@cabirc.org.uk. 

OLA Winter ‘Grassroots’ newsletter out now

The latest edition of the OLA Grassroots newsletter is out now in 2 and 8 page format. To order a copy e-mail oxfordrespect@yahoo.co.uk

Oxford activists support climate march

There was a good turnout from Oxford on the London Climate march on December 6th। In addition to a coach organised by the Campaign against Climate change (to be featured on French TV Channel 4), many people made their way down to London under their own steam. The march was very lively this year with a clear focus on four issues 1) No new Coal power stations 2) No to expansion of agro-fuels 3) No third runway 4) Yes to investment in Green jobs.

BBC News: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7768867.stm

The CaCC urgently needs funds to build on the work it has done, please visit: http://www.campaigncc.org/ for more info

Close Campsfield (15th Anniversary Demonstration)

Around 100 people joined a protest last Saturday to mark the 15th anniversary of the opening on the Campsfield detention centre।

Over 2,600 people, nearly all of them asylum seekers, are locked up indetention camps and prisons in Britain, without trial and without timelimit and with no automatic right to bail. The government is building newdetention centres with a target capacity of 4000. The asylum seekingprocess is arbitrary and punishes innocent refugees not for anything theyhave done, but in the hope of deterring others from exercising their rightunder the Geneva Convention to claim asylum in Britain
For more information सी:
- Campaign to Close Campsfield - http://www.closecampsfield.org.uk/- Barbed Wire Britain - http://www.barbedwirebritain.org.uk/