New York, NY, December 18, 2010 – Sixty human rights advocates, many sporting Santa hats, performed Christmas carol parodies and theatrical skits calling for the boycott of Israeli diamond mogul and settlement-builder Lev Leviev outside his Madison Avenue store this afternoon. Carolers celebrated the boycott movement’s success in pressuring Leviev’s company Africa Israel to cease settlement building and demanded that Leviev’s company Leader Management and Development do the same.
Carols, including “The 12 Days of Boycott,” highlighted the achievements of growing boycott movement. To the tune of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen,” the carolers chorused, “Oh justice for Palestinian, women and men, the question is not i-i-if, but when.”
A street theater skit, “The Grinch who Tried to Steal Palestine,” unmasked Leviev’s settlement construction, saying, “If you take off his mask, and expose his dark task, you will see his true crime is to steal Palestine.” Hundreds of Madison Avenue shoppers, many clad in fur coats, took holiday card flyers with a poem inside that began, “Twas the night before Christmas in Lev Leviev’s shop, Not a customer was browsing, shopping season a flop.”
Riham Barghouti of Adalah-NY told the participants “Today’s demonstration honors Abdallah Abu Rahmah and all the Palestinian political prisoners being held illegally in Israeli jails. Abdallah was arrested in 2009 on international human rights day, mainly for his leadership in a six-year nonviolent resistance campaign being carried out by his village of Bil’in against the wall and settlements, one of which was built by Leviev’s company Africa Israel.” The State Department said this week that it has raised Abu Rahmah’s case with the Israeli government.
