Learn about the history of the Palestinian struggle for freedom, equality and justice by exploring major events in the history of their oppression on this day of the year.
25 July
PRO-ISRAEL SCOTTISH LAWYER THREATENS LEGAL ACTION
This day in 2017, was the deadline set by lawyer Matthew Berlow, a member of Glasgow Friends of Israel, demanding an apology and compensation from SPSC. He was offended by an article on the SPSC website arguing that when he wrote of one Israeli massacre that “Israel was right to attack”, he endorsed “Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity, Palestinian humanity”, and thus supported “the burning alive of defenceless human beings in the Gaza concentration zone”. The deadline came and went.
المحامي الاسكتلندي الموالي لإسرائيل يهدد بإجراءات قانونية
25 يوليو
في مثل هذا اليوم من عام 2017 ، كان الموعد النهائي الذي حدده المحامي ماثيو بيرلو ، عضو جمعية أصدقاء اسرائيل من جلاسجو ، مطالباً باعتذار وتعويض من SPSC. لقد زعم انه مستاء من مقال على موقع SPSC على شبكة الإنترنت تجادل في ما كتبه عن مذبحة إسرائيلية مفادها أن "إسرائيل كانت على حق في الهجوم" ، بأنه أيد "جرائم الحرب الإسرائيلية وجرائمها ضد الإنسانية ، الإنسانية الفلسطينية" ، وبالتالي دعم "حرق البشر العزل وهم أحياء في منطقة كثيفة السكان في غزة ". جاء الموعد النهائي وذهب.
On July 20th Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign received a letter from defamation lawyers instructed by a member of Glasgow Friends of Israel, Matthew Berlow, demanding an apology and financial compensation for an article written and posted on the SPSC website a few days earlier. The letter also demanded payment for the litigant’s legal costs, probably a vast sum and aiming to bankrupt the Campaign.
The issue is alleged “defamatory statements” made in the article. Judge for yourself after reading the offending piece, Scottish court yet again dismisses racism charges against Palestine solidarity activists. The letter set a deadline of 5pm on Tuesday 25 July 2017, after which it threatened “further action, including the raising of court proceedings”.
Berlow, backed by the Israeli Embassy no doubt, is using civil law to try to silence voices they disapprove of. The earlier defeats have pushed the pro-Israel gang to make this switch to civil law, where they can deploy unlimited funding to try to silence pro-Palestinian voices. With your help, they will not succeed.
We have replied to the threatening letter (available in full here), rejecting the accusations and noting that the article in question merely notes Matthew Berlow’s published support for Israeli massacres of Palestinians. The statement deemed defamatory, is this:
Berlow is a Glasgow lawyer who ‘supports Palestine’ by endorsing Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity, Palestinian humanity, the burning alive of defenceless human beings in the Gaza concentration zone as his road to ‘peace’. Lest anyone should be in any doubt as to his commitment to peace through putting Palestinians into cemeteries, while on a trip to Israel, he posed with a gun (note the large silencer) favoured by Israeli squads who assassinate Palestinians.
Berlow wrote a short piece in the Scottish Sunday Mail during the 2008/9 Israeli massacre of 1,400 Palestinian men, women and children during Operation Cast Lead. The article led with “He [MB] says Israel was right to attack”. Human Rights Watch concluded that during the Israeli attack on Gaza the Israeli military's firing of white phosphorus shells over densely populated areas during the Gaza offensive "was indiscriminate and is evidence of war crimes".
We concluded, as would any honest observer, that firing white phosphorous shells indiscriminately over densely populated areas of the most densely populated place on earth, the Gaza concentration zone, burns people alive. We don’t need such deductive powers, however, for we have the sad and intimate testimonies of survivors who have already told their stories, and will tell them again in a Scottish court if need be.
Thr
ee years later the Scottish Daily Record revealed Mr Berlow's dirty tricks aimed at smearing SPSC as 'anti-semites'
"Matthew Berlow played a key part in faking a graffiti attack at his home then used the bogus incident to smear the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign [for] Typical SPSC behaviour. criminal.” When challenged by a journalist, the Glasgow Friends of Israel activist conceded that he “named an organisation I shouldn’t have. It wasn’t my intention to blame the SPSC for a fictitious event.”
5-minute video: how the pro-Israel lobby works on US campuses. The use of legal threats to silence Palestine campaigning is international, coordinated from the Apartheid State itself.