MPPM celebrates the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian people with a public meeting in Lisbon

Ambassador Mufeed Shami, Carlos Almeida and Adel Sidarus were the speakers at a session, chaired by Julio de Magalhães, held at the Casa do Alentejo, Lisbon, on November 29, which evoked the struggle and suffering of the Palestinian people and stressed the urgent need for an intensification of international solidarity with this martyred people.

Carlos Almeida noted that the United Nations General Assembly resolution 32/40, of December 2nd 1977, establishing the observance of International Day of Solidarity with the People of Palestine, stated in its first part, that a lasting peace in the Middle East was inseparable from the establishment of a just solution to the Palestinian question, and that this could only be achieved on the basis of the realization of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, first the right to independence and national sovereignty, as well as right of return of refugees.  He evoked, then, the World Conference of Solidarity with the Arab nation and its Central Cause - the Palestinian Question, held in Lisbon in 1979, the first major meeting of solidarity with the Palestinian people of a country in Western Europe. Translating the Israeli violence against Palestinians in the brutality of the numbers, Carlos Almeida denounced the expansionist policies of Israel and the complicity of the international community. He concluded by calling for international solidarity now more than ever necessary

Spoke then Adel Sidarus who raised the issue of Christians in Palestine. He recalled that the founders of the most radical groups of the Palestinian national movement were Christians and evoked the names of some Christians who more radically criticize Israel, to denounce the pressure exerted by Israel on Christians to leave the country. After referring the violence of the Israeli occupier which forced the mass exodus of the Christian population of Palestine, Adel Sidarus ended by denouncing the current process of Judaizing Jerusalem.

The last speech of the session came from the new diplomatic representative of Palestine in Portugal, Ambassador Mufeed Shamati. He began by welcoming those present on his own behalf and on behalf of President Mahmoud Abbas and Foreign Minister of Palestine, Riad Al-Malki and continued by recalling that November 29 was the day when, in 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted Resolution 181 which provided for the partition of Palestine between Jews and Palestinians, so that 55% of the land for the Palestinians to stay and rest for the Jews. But the intentions of the United Nations were never materialized. The Ambassador recalled the heroic resistance struggle of the Palestinian people and warned that the occupant is practicing more and more crimes and taking up more and more Palestinian lands, refusing to acknowledge the rights of the Palestinian people and the fulfilment of international resolutions and conventions. Mufeed Shami believes that the International Day of Solidarity with Palestine results from  the recognition by the United Nations of historical injustice against the Palestinian people. Finally, Ambassador Mufeed Shami said the Representation of Palestine in Portugal would rise to the level of a Diplomatic Mission headed by an ambassador.