The Palestinian ambassador joined councillors and campaigners to raise his nation’s flag at Newham Town Hall.
The raising of the Palestinian flag comes as campaigners are calling on the council to divest its pension fund from companies “complicit” in Israeli settlements.
Ambassador Husam Zomlot said the council’s decision to fly the flag showed “the relationship between this unique and diverse part of London and my people”.
In a statement issued after the event, he said: “The difficulties facing men, women and children in Palestine are well-documented, but for those living through the daily atrocities in Gaza and the West Bank, it is always important to know there are people around the world who will never forget them.”
Zomlot joined Newham’s Labour mayor Forhad Hussain, opposition leader Mehmood Mirza of the Newham Independents, and Green group leader Arshan Baskaran for the flag-raising ceremony yesterday (Tuesday 15 September).
James Asser, the Labour MP for West Ham and Beckton, also attended.
Promise
Hussain had promised to raise the Palestinian flag in July, following his election as mayor in May.
In a statement issued afterwards he said the ceremony “sent a clear message that the Palestinian people are not forgotten”.
The town hall’s decision to raise the flag comes as the Newham Palestine Solidarity Campaign is calling on the council to withdraw pension fund investments from “companies involved in the genocide of the Palestinian people”.
Councillors voted in July to launch an audit of the authority’s pension fund investments and to declare its intent to divest from companies “complicit in human rights abuses, war crimes or illegal settlements”.
The move was proposed by the Newham Independents and the Greens.
Lobbying
Miriam Scharf, a long-standing Palestine campaigner who has presented petitions to the council calling for divestment, said it was “brilliant” to see the flag raised at the town hall.
She told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS): “The residents of Newham in a vast majority have been wanting this and will celebrate that it finally has.”
Scharf said campaigners would lobby the council’s next pensions committee meeting, on Wednesday 21 October.
She added that she hoped Labour councillors would join the Palestine Solidarity Campaign’s national march in central London on Saturday, 10th October.
Cllr Mirza said he had long been calling for the council to raise the Palestinian flag.
He said the council should now “get their act together to move their investments to places with nothing to do with Israel or any conflict zones”.
Complicity
Cllr Baskaran also said he was “very happy that the flag has been flown at the town hall”.
He said the council must now divest to “stop that complicity in genocide”.
The council did not invite the media to the flag-raising ceremony. Scharf, Cllr Mirza and Cllr Baskaran said they were only notified shortly after 5pm the day before.
Scharf said with more notice campaigners could have brought “hundreds or thousands of people to celebrate and listen to the ambassador and cheer this achievement”.
