WASHINGTON (Dispatches) – A resolution condemning the Zionist regime’s brutal military regime and “apartheid” has been passed by America’s second largest teaching union, the American Federation of Teachers.
Teachers, staff members and instructors voted to adopt a resolution by AFT Guild Local 1931, which serves colleges and education faculties in San Diego, and a statement in support of Palestine that was approved earlier this month.
In a lengthy statement that included denunciation of the regime’s occupation and its practice of apartheid, the union began by saying: “AFT Guild condemns the forced removal of Palestinian residents in West Jerusalem (Al-Quds), the bombing of civilian areas in the besieged Gaza Strip, and the continued human rights violations committed by the Israeli regime during its 73-year occupation of this land.”
Commenting on the recent forced eviction of Palestinians from their homes in occupied East Al-Quds they said that it “follows a 73-year pattern of disenfranchising Palestinians of their rights, property and the opportunity to live with dignity.”
The statement highlighted that a large number of Palestinian lives have been lost and essential infrastructure destroyed in the Gaza Strip as a result of the regime’s use of advanced weaponry in its indiscriminate bombing of the impoverished coastal enclave.
Moreover, AFT Guild Local 1931 criticized the absence of an even-handed U.S. foreign policy, in addition to massive unrestricted military aid to the regime.
The group emphasized that such an approach “emboldens Israeli militarism, and contradicts our policy regarding the status of the occupation of the Palestinian lands.”
The regime occupied East Al-Quds, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip during the Six Day War in 1967. It later had to withdraw from Gaza but has been occupying the other territories since.
About 700,000 Zionists live in over 230 illegal settlements built in the West Bank and East Al-Quds since then. The international community views the settlements as illegal under international law but has done little to pressure the occupying regime to freeze or reverse its policies.