Source: Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA)
PSNA is to picket the Fijian High Commission in Wellington and Consulate in Auckland tomorrow at 12.30pm (June 2) to protest at Israel opening its first Pacific Islands’ Embassy in Suva.
The Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa says it is acting in solidarity with a call from the Fijians for Palestine Solidarity Network in Fiji.
Israeli Foreign Minister, Gideon Sa’ar is scheduled to cut the ribbon to open the embassy at 5pm.
PSNA spokesperson Rinad Tamimi says while the rest of the world is distancing itself from Israel for its genocide in Gaza, illegal settlements on the West Bank and invasion of Lebanon, Fiji is deepening its ties with the Netanyahu regime.
“It’s partly personal. Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka is grateful is for Israeli support for his coup in 1987, when the rest of the world were distancing themselves from the Rabuka led military junta,” Tamimi says.
“But it’s mostly the result of intense diplomatic activity by Israel throughout the Pacific, its determined attempts to reverse the trend around the world to isolate Israel and its institutions.”
“Israel is working with United States Christian Zionists to make the Pacific an Israeli pond, to deliver votes in the United Nations and embassies in Jerusalem.”
In the September 2024 landmark United Nations General Assembly resolution to order Israel out of the Palestinian Occupied Territory within 12 months, no fewer than seven Pacific countries, including Fiji, voted against, out of a world total of 14 votes against.
“It’s the same Pacific slant with embassies in illegally Occupied Jerusalem. The world would locate all their embassies on in Tel Aviv, because they didn’t recognise Israeli sovereignty over East Jerusalem. Then Trump opened a US embassy in Jerusalem in 2018.”
“Since then, only Kosovo, Honduras and Guatemala have joined the US. That is, except for the Pacific – Papua New Guinea and Fiji are now in Jerusalem and they are soon to be joined by Samoa,” Tamimi says.
“It’ll be Samoa’s only country post outside the Pacific. Is Israel paying for it?”
Rinad Tamimi
National Spokesperson
PSNA