Join the Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago to say NO CHICAGO TIES WITH ISRAEL!

WHEN: Monday, August 23rd at 11:00am

WHERE: Millennium Park, corner of Michigan and Monroe

Protest Israel's participation in the Chicago Sister City International Festival!

On Monday, August 23rd, the city of Petach Tikva in Israel will be officially represented at the Chicago Sister City International Festival in Millennium Park.

The Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago demands an end to the Chicago Sister Cities International (CSCI) program's relationship between Chicago and Petach Tikva. Petach Tikva's inclusion in the CSCI promotes Israel-US business ties while it whitewashes Israel's occupation and human rights abuses. Indeed, the chairperson of the Petach Tikva committee of the CSCI is also an executive of the America Israel Business Chamber of Commerce, so it's clear what this Sister City relationship is really about.

After remaining silent for more than one year, the board of the CSCI, responding to PSG's persistent protests, on 20 July sent a letter in which they renew their refusal to meet with us to learn about Petach Tikva's role in the continued dispossession of the Palestinian people and Israel's repression of their struggle for self-determination. We will keep our call to drop Petach Tikva and end business-as-usual loud and clear and on August 23, we will remind the CSCI that apartheid Israel has no business participating in the International Festival at Millennium Park.

About Petach Tikva:

The first Jewish-only settlement in historic Palestine, and known in Israel as the "mother of all settlements," Petach Tikva symbolizes the dispossession and colonization of the Palestinian homeland. Petach Tikva is built on the remains of depopulated Palestinian villages whose descendents are denied the right to return home. Petach Tikva is also home to one of the largest interrogation and detention centers in Israel, where Palestinians from the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip are illegally transferred and routinely subjected to ill treatment and torture.

Palestinian civil society leader in Israel, and an advocate of the Palestinian boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, Ameer Makhoul is the latest Palestinian grassroots leader to be detained and tortured at Petach Tikva. Amnesty International has declared Makhoul a prisoner of conscience as Israel tries to make an example of him and try him on trumped-up charges of espionage using "evidence" it gathered through his torture at Petach Tikva.

About boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS):

Heeding the Palestinian call for BDS, the Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago rejects an official relationship between the City of Chicago and the Municipality of Petach Tikva in Israel

We join the Palestinian call BDS on Israel; We demand that Israel ends its occupation of Palestinian lands; We support self-determination for the Palestinian people; and demand the Right of Return for all Palestinian refugees and their descendants.

Take action:

Protest Chicago's business-as-usual with Israel and demand that Petach Tikva be dropped from the Chicago Sister Cities International Program! Contact Leroy Allala - Sister City Program Executive Director (leroy.allala (at) cityofchicago.org, 312.744.1372) and demand an end to the Sister City partnership between Chicago and Petach Tikva!

Palestine Solidarity Group Chicago, www.psgchicago.org, info.psg.chicago (at) gmaill.com

Endorsers: Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago, USPCN, 8th Day Center for Justice, Jewish Voicee for Peace, Chicagoans Against Apartheid in Palestine, Chicago Coalition Against War and Racism, Students for Justice in Palestine - DePaul, Students for Justice in Palestine - IIT.