September, 19 2023, 04:56pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Quentin Scott, quentin@chesapeakeclimate.org
KC Chartrand, kc@chessapeakeclimate.org
CCAN In Solidarity with UAW for Good Jobs, Union Rights, and Auto Industry's Clean Energy Revolution
Over the past decade, Ford, GM, and Stellantis-Chrysler have raked in a staggering quarter-trillion dollars in North America profits, yet members of The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW) never received their fair share. As the Big Three invest in the essential shift towards electrification in the automotive industry, including Electric Vehicles (EVs), the UAW stands firm in asserting that the transition to a clean energy future presents a monumental opportunity to elevate autoworker standards rather than diminishing them.
Statement from Quentin Scott, Federal Policy Director:
"At CCAN, we champion a just transition to a clean energy future. Insufficient wages, job insecurity, and substandard working conditions have left both workers and their communities behind. As we move away from fossil fuels, there is a golden opportunity for American workers and their families to thrive through the electrification of the automotive and transportation sector, a vital component of the green energy revolution. Our unwavering commitment to supporting workers and communities fuels our solidarity with the UAW and all those at the forefront of the climate crisis and this imperative transition."
The Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) is the first grassroots, nonprofit organization dedicated exclusively to fighting global warming in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Our mission is to build and mobilize a powerful grassroots movement in this unique region that surrounds our nation's capital to call for state, national and international policies that will put us on a path to climate stability. - See more at: http://www.chesapeakeclimate.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view;=itemlist&...
LATEST NEWS
'This Is a Crime Against Humanity': 600,000 Children in Line of Fire as IDF Moves on Rafah
"We had already run out of words to describe how catastrophic the situation is in Rafah—but this next chapter will take it to indescribable new levels," said Save the Children International's CEO.
May 06, 2024
Humanitarian organizations and United Nations officials are warning that the lives of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian children— nearly all of whom are sick, injured, or malnourished—are in grave danger as Israeli forces on Monday moved to forcibly evacuate the overcrowded Gaza city of Rafah ahead of an expected ground invasion.
An estimated 600,000 children are believed to be sheltering in Rafah in terrible conditions and under the near-constant threat of Israeli airstrikes, which rocked the city and killed dozens of people—including at least eight kids—hours before the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) issued its evacuation directives.
"They're being told to move, quote unquote, to a 'humanitarian zone.' That's a unilaterally declared humanitarian zone," James Elder, a spokesperson for the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), said in a BBC appearance Monday. "That's not a humanitarian zone where humanitarians have been able to provide the services they need to. I've been talking to colleagues and friends in Rafah this morning, and they're terrified."
"Nowhere is safe," said Elder. "But as unbearable as this is, it's happening and it's going to be horrific."
"Its going to be horrific"
James Elder from UNICEF on Israel ordering people in Rafah to move.
When will our journalists start calling this what it is? pic.twitter.com/hYMQWyQss2
— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) May 6, 2024
Threatening "extreme force" in the area, the Israeli military on Monday ordered roughly 100,000 people in the eastern part of Rafah to move west to Al-Mawasi, a town on Gaza's southern coast. Humanitarian groups said Al-Mawasi doesn't have anywhere near sufficient infrastructure to house displaced people from Rafah and stressed that nowhere in Gaza is safe as long as Israel continues its bombing campaign.
Inger Ashing, CEO of Save the Children International, said in response to the IDF's directives that "for weeks we have been warning there is no feasible evacuation plan to lawfully displace and protect civilians."
"For weeks, we have been warning of the devastating consequences this will have for children and our ability to assist them in an already straight-jacketed response. For weeks, we have been calling for preventive action," Ashing continued. "Instead, the international community has looked away. They cannot look away now."
"The announced incursion will not only risk the lives of over 600,000 children but will at best disrupt and at worst cause the collapse of the humanitarian aid response currently struggling to keep Gaza’s population alive," she added. "Forcibly displacing people from Rafah while further disrupting the aid response will likely seal the fate of many children. We had already run out of words to describe how catastrophic the situation is in Rafah—but this next chapter will take it to indescribable new levels."
"History will judge all of those who are complicit in what is being done to Palestinians in Gaza. It must end now."
Roughly 1.4 million people, many of them already displaced multiple times since October, are currently sheltering in Rafah, which Israel's military has been threatening to invade for months amid faltering cease-fire talks with Hamas.
Reutersreported that in the wake of the IDF's evacuation order, "some loaded children and possessions onto donkey carts, some packed into cars, others simply walked" in the hopes of escaping Israel's ground assault.
"People have nowhere to go, no area is safe. All that remains in Gaza is death," Mohammed Al-Najjar, a 23-year-old man with family in Rafah, told the news agency. "I wish I could erase these last seven months from my memory. So many of our dreams and hopes have faded."
According to UNICEF, around 65,000 children in Rafah have a preexisting disability—including seeing, hearing, and walking difficulties—and nearly 80,000 are infants. Roughly 8,000 children under the age of two in Rafah are acutely malnourished.
"The 'evacuation' of Rafah is illegal," said Heidi Matthews, an assistant professor of law at the Osgoode Hall Law School of York University. "There are no 'humanitarian' or 'safe zones.' Civilians are being forcibly displaced to areas totally unsuitable to human habitation. This is a crime against humanity."
The Biden administration, which has supported Israel's war on Gaza from the start, has expressed opposition to a Rafah ground invasion absent a credible plan to keep civilians out of harm's way. On Monday, a spokesperson for the White House National Security Council said that "we continue to believe that a hostage deal is the best way to preserve the lives of the hostages, and avoid an invasion of Rafah, where more than a million people are sheltering."
The spokesperson said U.S. President Joe Biden plans to speak with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at some unspecified point on Monday.
Mike Merryman-Lotze, just peace global policy director at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), said in a statement Monday that "the Biden administration has spoken against the invasion of Rafah but continues to send billions of dollars in weapons to Israel for its genocidal campaign."
"Any invasion will only bring countless more deaths and exacerbate the risk of famine that is already high because Israel continues to block most humanitarian aid from entering Gaza. President Biden and all elected officials must act now to stop this invasion, demand a permanent and complete cease-fire, and end all arms transfers to Israel."
CNNreported Sunday that the Biden administration decided to pause a shipment of U.S.-made ammunition to Israel, but an unnamed official told the outlet that the hold was "not connected to a potential Israeli operation in Rafah and doesn't affect other shipments moving forward."
Medical Aid for Palestinians, an advocacy group based in the United Kingdom,
said Monday that "the international community knows that this invasion will be a catastrophe."
"The killing of civilians will accelerate and much more of Gaza's remaining infrastructure will be destroyed," the group said. "History will judge all of those who are complicit in what is being done to Palestinians in Gaza. It must end now."
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'Unlawful and Catastrophic': IDF Begins Forced Evacuation of Rafah
The head of one humanitarian group called the Israeli military's directives "a serious violation of international law."
May 06, 2024
Israel's army on Monday ordered roughly 100,000 people living in eastern Rafah to evacuate ahead of an imminent military assault on the area, terrifying families who have been forcibly displaced to the southern Gaza city in recent months and intensifying warnings of a bloodbath.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) dropped leaflets over Rafah ordering some of its 1.4 million residents to move to a strip along Gaza's coast, a signal that a long-feared ground assault on the overcrowded city is set to begin in the face of vocal opposition from the international community and humanitarian organizations.
The U.S., Israel's top arms supplier, has said it would oppose a Rafah assault without a credible plan to evacuate civilians from the city. Humanitarian groups and analysts have said such a plan is impossible because there is no genuinely safe place for Gazans to go. Israeli forces have repeatedly attacked so-called "safe zones" and designated routes Palestinians have used to flee in compliance with past IDF orders.
"Israel's military offensive in Rafah could lead to the deadliest phase of this conflict, inflicting horrific suffering on approximately 1.4 million displaced civilians in the area," said Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council. "The relocation orders issued by Israel today to thousands of Gazans, directing them to move to Al-Mawasi, are beyond alarming. The area is already overstretched and devoid of vital services. It lacks the capacity to house the number of people currently seeking refuge in Rafah, with no assurances of safety, proper accommodation, or return once hostilities end for those forced to relocate."
"The absence of these fundamental guarantees of safety and return, as required by international humanitarian law, qualifies Israel's relocation directives as forcible transfer, amounting to a serious violation of international law," Egeland said. "Any Israeli military operation in Rafah—which has become the largest cluster of displacement camps in the world—will cause potential mass atrocities."
"If large-scale military operations start, not only will children be at risk from the violence, but also from chaos and panic, and at a time where their physical and mental states are already weakened."
Israel
reportedly notified the U.S. of the evacuation orders overnight, and CIA Director William Burns is set to arrive in Israel on Monday to discuss the operation in Rafah, a city along Gaza's border with Egypt that has become a critical point of entry for humanitarian aid. The new evacuation orders, expected to be just the first round of directives, include Rafah's largest medical facility.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the main relief agency in Gaza, said in response to the IDF's orders that it would not leave Rafah.
"An Israeli offensive in Rafah would mean more civilian suffering and deaths. The consequences would be devastating for 1.4 million people," the organization wrote in a social media post. "UNRWA is not evacuating: The agency will maintain a presence in Rafah as long as possible and will continue providing lifesaving aid to people."
BREAKING: #Israel drops leaflets over #Rafah southern #Gaza, ordering inhabitants of eastern Rafah to immediately move to Al Mawasi (a desolate strip along the Gaza coast), cautioning them from moving to north Gaza or towards its southern and eastern perimeter fence. pic.twitter.com/tBum9ULewF
— Itay Epshtain (@EpshtainItay) May 6, 2024
The far-right Israeli government, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has been threatening a ground invasion of Rafah for months, characterizing the city as Hamas' last major stronghold. Avichay Adraee, an IDF lieutenant colonel, said Monday that the Israeli military would use "extreme force" in the evacuation areas and warned that "anyone who is close to terrorist organizations puts his life and the life of his family at risk."
According to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), around 600,000 children are currently sheltering in the city, including many who have been displaced multiple times since Israel's assault began in October following a Hamas-led attack.
"More than 200 days of war have taken an unimaginable toll on the lives of children," Catherine Russell, UNICEF's executive director, said Monday. "Rafah is now a city of children, who have nowhere safe to go in Gaza. If large-scale military operations start, not only will children be at risk from the violence, but also from chaos and panic, and at a time where their physical and mental states are already weakened.”
Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch, called the IDF's evacuation push in Rafah "unlawful and catastrophic."
"There's nowhere safe to go in Gaza," Shakir added. "The international community should act to prevent further atrocities."
The IDF began issuing its evacuation orders in Rafah a day after the Netanyahu government voted to shut downAl Jazeera's operations in the country, a brazen attack on press freedom.
"The fact that Israel banned
Al Jazeera hours before beginning its assault on Rafah is not a coincidence," said author and Middle East analyst Assal Rad. "After everything we’ve seen in the last seven months, imagine what they'll do when they think no one is watching."
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Belgian Police Arrest 132 Climate Defenders Demanding End to Fossil Fuel Subsidies
"The fact that national governments are subsidizing fossil fuels is akin to a crime against humanity," said one Extinction Rebellion organizer.
May 05, 2024
The climate action group Extinction Rebellion Belgium on Saturday decried what it called "disproportionate police violence" against nonviolent demonstrators who were arrested during a protest in Brussels demanding an end to fossil fuel subsidies.
Hundreds of Extinction Rebellion-led climate defenders blocked Rue Belliard in the European Quarter, the de facto European Union capital, during EU Open Day, when agencies of the 27-nation bloc open their doors to the public. In what Extinction Rebellion called an "unprecedented police response," officers allegedly struck protesters with batons and used chemical agents against demonstrators.
Brussels police said 132 activists—some of whom glued themselves to the ground—were arrested.
"This police behavior toward nonviolent protesters exercising their freedom of assembly is illegal and authoritarian," Extinction Rebellion Belgium said in a statement Saturday.
"We call on the police to exercise restraint and respect the right to demonstrate peacefully and without violence," the group added.
The activists are calling on European governments to stop subsidizing fossil fuels amid a worsening planetary crisis. They're also demanding the declaration of a climate emergency.
"National and European governments are spending at least €405 billion each year subsidizing major fossil fuel corporations," protest spokesperson Bertina Maes toldThe Brussels Times. "That's ten times more than what's spent on climate policy."
Maes said the Belgian government alone spent as much as €20 billion ($21.5 billion) on fossil fuel subsidies in 2020, more than 2% of the country's gross domestic product.
"The fact that national governments are subsidizing fossil fuels is akin to a crime against humanity," she asserted.
This weekend's demonstration and arrests come a month before E.U. parliamentary elections. According to an April Eurobarometer survey conducted by the European Parliament, climate action is the fifth-most important issue to voters, after poverty and social exclusion, health, jobs, and defense and security.
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