September 18, 2009
Independent Jewish Voices (IJV) wholeheartedly supports and endorses the Toronto Declaration.

We applaud the organizers and signatories of the declaration for the courageous, principled and successful effort to shine a spotlight on Israel ’s attempt to use the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) to whitewash its war crimes through the so-called City to City program. It is clear for all to see that the TIFF spotlight on Tel Aviv this year is an integral part of a campaign to ‘re-brand” Israel . The attempts to dismiss the Toronto Declaration as “anti-Israel” are deeply misleading given the initiative has many Jewish and Israeli signatories.

As noted by renowned movie critic Roger Ebert, the City to City program “was part of a deliberate plan to “re-brand” Israel in Toronto , as a pilot for a larger such program. The Festival should never have agreed to be used like this. It was naive for the plan’s supporters to believe it would have the effect they hoped for.

It is clear that TIFF organizers misled the public in claiming that the spotlight on Tel Aviv at this year’s festival had nothing to the with Israel ’s re-branding campaign. The Mayor of Tel Aviv has publicly stated that the TIFF took the initiative to use this year’s festival as part of Israel ’s re-branding campaign. As noted in the Canadian Jewish News, “He said that while the City to City program was initiated by the festival, the Israeli ministry of foreign affairs was involved as part of its Brand Israel media and advertising campaign, which was launched last year.”

As the Toronto Declaration notes, in choosing to focus on Tel Aviv – the economic and military heart of Israel – in this year of all years, TIFF has chosen a side, and that cannot go unchallenged. In this year, when the people of Gaza were attacked without mercy, Israel ’s actions are indeed nothing to celebrate.
Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip earlier this year “killed 1,387 Palestinians during the course of the three-week operation. Of these, 773 did not take part in the hostilities, including 320 minors and 109 women over the age of 18,” according to Israeli human rights group B’Tselem.
This week’s UN report on Gaza from the Goldstone Commission, adds further credence to B’Tselem’s analysis, detailing the war crimes committed by Israel during Operation Cast Lead. Justice Richard Goldstone, who is Jewish and one of the world’s most respected jurists, went to Gaza to see what actually happened and found prima facie evidence of war crimes and perhaps crimes against humanity perpetrated by Israel.
The orders that led to these war crimes came from Tel Aviv, the city TIFF mistakenly chose to celebrate this year. In this year, when the heartless and illegal siege of the people of Gaza continues, and attempts to bring an entire people to their knees, the Toronto Declaration is indeed unstoppable. Israel ’s so-called re-branding campaign will fail. Here is why.

Apologists for Israel ’s inexcusable actions say that ‘there is more to the country than the conflict’. But with the continuation of the occupation, the construction of the Wall, the settlements, the siege of Gaza , the increasing state-sanctioned racism against Palestinian citizens in Israel , the country is increasingly being defined by its immoral and illegal actions.

The truth is you can’t re-brand war crimes, human rights violations and illegal occupation. You can’t re-brand the illegal siege that continues against the people of Gaza and the illegal settlement construction that continues unabated in the West Bank . And you can’t re-brand the growing international movement to boycott, sanction and divest (BDS) from Israel , which IJV supports and is encouraging other organizations to join. The BDS movement has recently been joined by Jewish organizations in Israel as well as the Trade Union Congress in the UK , Britain ’s national trade union federation, which represents 6.5 million workers.

In short, war, occupation, and Apartheid can’t be re-branded – they can only be ended. Until that day comes, the movement to shine a light on the truth will continue to grow. Now is the time to join that movement. An important step is to take a moment to support the Toronto Declaration at: torontodecla ration.blogspot. com.

In solidarity,

Independent Jewish Voices

www.ijvcanada. org