Zaytoun July 2011 newsletter
Zaytoun on August 2nd, 2011Dear Zaytoun customers and supporters,
July Newsletter
l Freedom For Palestine
l Islam and Fairtrade; Ramadan 2011
l Olive Harvest trips 2011
l Taysir’s report from Palestine
l The marvelous Mark Thomas
l Upcoming events
l Where to purchase our products
Freedom for Palestine – 4 days left to be part of it
We have a unique opportunity to get the OneWorld single ‘Freedom for Palestine’ into the charts this week and we need you to buy it today! If you haven’t heard it yet, go to http://www.freedomoneworld.com/
We’ve heard that it is currently just outside the top 40, so we need a giant push to make it into the charts this week (its launch week). It will be a complete first to get such a strong song on Palestine into the public consciousness, but it won’t work unless everyone buys it now. Please do your bit!
Get your copy now
HMV http://tinyurl.com/5u3t227 - Just 79p!
Itunes http://tinyurl.com/65ngad8 - Just 79p!
Amazon http://tinyurl.com/6862xyq – Just 69p!
“This is the anthem of our movement. Buying this single is more than just buying a track of music; it is contributing to a struggle. The people of Palestine need us to lobby our MPs, take to the streets and even get into boats to bring them aid. But just like the people of South Africa they need us to sing to them. Buy this single and sing along!” Benjamin Zephaniah
People in Palestine are relying on you to make this happen. Don’t let them down. Buy the single today – and then tell at least 10 others to do so too!
Islam and Fairtrade: Ramadan 2011
Taysir Arbasi, Zaytoun’s Director from Palestine, will be speaking at the Fairtrade Foundation Ramadan Campaign launch please do come and join us if you can.
Islam believes that people deserve decent working conditions.
Islam believes that workers deserve a fair price for what they produce.
Islam believes in putting an end to poverty and injustice.
This Ramadan let’s put these beliefs into practice.
Let’s Make this a Fairtrade Ramadan!
Friday 22 July 2011
7:00 pm – 9:00 pm
London Muslim Centre
46-92 Whitechapel Road
London E1 1JX
Zaytoun will be running a special offer until the end of August to promote the Palestinian olive oil through the month of Ramadan. If you buy from us directly please get in touch for our latest order form at order@zaytoun.org
Zaytoun is working with community groups to promote the Palestinian medjoul dates and olive oil in the run up to Ramadan; if you are a stockist of our dates please let us know so that we can promote you and if you would like to help Zaytoun in getting wider distribution for this product please get in touch with order@zaytoun.org
Olive Harvest Trips 2011
Every year, Zaytoun organises two trips to Palestine for its supporters and customers. Both of these trips are timed to coincide with the annual olive harvest, usually around the end of October and early November.
The “harvest tour” offer customers the chance to visit many of the communities who supply our products from Nablus soap-makers to olive farmers in Jenin, as well as some support and advocacy organisations who work on behalf of these communities against the injustices of the Israeli occupation. Often the trip ends with a harvest celebration in Jenin, including traditional Palestinian food and dance. Accommodation for the week’s trip is in local hotels or with farmers’ families. Harvest tour will run from October 31st until November 6th, the itinerary can be seen by following this link http://www.zaytoun.org/harvest/harvest-tour/
The “Olive Picking Trip” is a chance for volunteers to work for a fortnight alongside the olive farmers in the groves and enable them to bring their valuable harvest home. Zaytoun has worked with the International Women’s Peace Service since 2005 to coordinate the teams’ placement within different villages in the Salfit and Nablus areas. All volunteers complete an initial application form, followed by a telephone interview and a training and assessment weekend in Britain before acceptance onto the team. Harvest picking trip is being organised now – dates are 5-23 October. If you are interested please email harvest@zaytoun.org as soon as possible to receive further details including an application form and dates of training in the summer
Taysir’s report from Palestine
‘In the village of Anin – Jenin the farmers have received military orders of confiscation of about 100 dunums* of land allocated on the east side of the village, claiming that the security need requires this. The farmers are organizing themselves to protest against this confiscation.’
Many of the farmers in Anin are part of the Palestinian Fair Trade Association and have been selling their products to Zaytoun since 2005. Mahmoud Issa is the Chairman of the PFTA and lives in Anin – some of you may have met him during his UK tour for Fairtrade Fortnight in 2009.
‘PFTA is also currently working to better establish the programs of women development and wider reach of women groups. In the past 3 months they have trained about 10 women groups on the production quality and safety in addition to the concept of Fair Trade and marketing. Products targeted are couscous, dried tomato, za’atar.’
As Taysir has reported in a few newsletters this year the village of Deiristya is facing ongoing loss of land due to illegal settlement expansion. Riziq Abu Nasser, from Deiristya, has toured the UK in 2009 and 2011 for Fairtrade Fortnight and is keen to keep engagement with the people he met on those tours.
‘On 28th of June 2011 the farmers of Deiristya woke up at the loud noise of the bulldozers, and more than 50 of the military and settlers equipped with their weapons, and they have been destroying the olive groves and uprooting the trees, in the lands that are on the edges of the Valley of Wadi Qana, hundreds of trees were cut and uprooted and 10s of dunums were bulldozed.
Claiming that these lands are close to the bypass road of the settlements and for security reasons should be cleared in order to avoid attacks from among the trees at settlers’ cars. These olives have been planted recently on the frame work of the planting project Of Wadi Qana.
While the planting is still on going, where some money received from donation of Mark Thomas, and the farmers have bought trees and they are planting them.’
* dunum, is a unit of land measurement dating back to the Ottoman Empire, it is 1000 square metres.
The marvelous Mark Thomas
Mark Thomas’s ‘Extreme Rambling’ tour continues: During 2010 Mark decided to go rambling in the Middle East and walked the entire length of the Israeli Separation Barrier, crossing between the Israeli and the Palestinian side. ‘This is the story of 300 000 settlers, a 750 km wall, six arrests, one stoning, too much humuus…’ Zaytoun products should be available at all the gigs and Mark is donating the profits from his programme sales to our work in Palestine. This link has more info on the tour http://www.markthomasinfo.co.uk/ His comedy and insight into the issue of Palestine has been a great way for us to engage with new people about what we are trying to achieve with Zaytoun. If the tour is in your area and you would like to help run a stall please contact manal@zaytoun.org
And here is a message from Mark:
‘I have good news and bad:
The BAD NEWS is I am attempting to cycle from London to Paris, for charity obviously because you can't do any physical activity above running for the bus unless you are sponsored these days.
The GOOD NEWS is the physical exertion on a man of my fitness has a range of medical implications from severe chaffing to roadside coronary. So I could end up in severe discomfort or out of your life completely, which let's face it does have its upside.
The charity is IMET 2000 they train doctors and nurses in the poorest parts of the world to the highest standards- so the poorest places get the best doctors, which is nothing short of bloody marvelous. They do amazing work in Gaza and the West Bank which is how I came to know of them and I jumped at the chance to became a patron of IMET 2000 last year. This is the third event I have done for them this year which shows how much I respect them.
The ride takes place in September and lasts 4 days. The website you can sponsor me on is http://www.justgiving.com/Mark-Thomas8
THANKS for reading this and hopefully bunging some cash to IMET 2000
Love Mark x’
