The Asiatic Island arrived in the Italian port of Livorno on Friday.
The port workers, organized in L’Unione Sindacale di Base, discovered that the ship was loaded with arms and explosives bound for the Israeli dock of Ashdod thanks to a report from the Genoa Autonomous Collective of Port Workers and the Weapon Watch association.
These weapons and explosives will be used to destroy Palestinians, who have already been subjected to a brutal Israeli military offensive that has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of people, many of whom are children.
Shortly after, the union declared that it would not allow this or any other armament shipments to sail to Israel.
In order to avoid military equipment from reaching Israel, dockworkers’ groups in Italy are attempting to collect more information about ships arriving at their ports.
They just got word yesterday that hundreds of armored military vehicles were waiting to be loaded onto another ship, the Molo Italia.
The L’Unione Sindacale di Base will be marching in Livorno this Saturday in solidarity with the Palestinian people, demanding an end to the bombing of Gaza and the evictions of Palestinians from their homes.
This example of workers’ solidarity, if multiplied and expanded internationally, could be powerful enough to stop the criminal attacks of the State of Israel against Palestine.
In the United States, the labor movement must take this example into its own hands and actively mobilize against the Biden administration’s policy of “unwavering support” and military aid for Israel and boycott any U.S. shipments of weapons destined to be used against the people of Palestine.
We must take up the example of sectors of the labor movement that in 2008 took action in the U.S. against the imperialist war against Iraq.
The international solidarity actions with Palestine called for this Saturday in the United States and around the world could be the beginning of an anti-imperialist movement in the heart of the U.S. empire, one that takes up the cause of the Palestinian people as its own.
Unions must move from declarations and words to deeds and mobilize to demand an end to U.S. military aid to Israel and the bloody occupation of Palestine.
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