Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Peace oil or taking the piss?

Keith Parkins | 26.10.2010 15:26 | Palestine | World

Peace Oil sold and promoted by Card Aid does not appear to be quite what is claimed.

Peace Oil
Peace Oil

Peace Oil display
Peace Oil display

Peace Oil all working happily together
Peace Oil all working happily together

Peace Oil funding Middle East peace initiatives
Peace Oil funding Middle East peace initiatives


A few years ago I was at the Beyond TV International Film Festival in Swansea. A few of the film-makers had been in Palestine filming and helping to bring in the olive harvest. They brought back with them olive oil. It was one of the best olive oils I had tasted. I always regretted I had not brought any back home with me.

 http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/11/301916.html

During the summer I learnt that Holy Trinity and St Mary's Church in Guildford were expecting a consignement of Palestinian oil. But I have never been able to get my hands on any.

 http://www.holytrinityguildford.org.uk/
 http://www.heureka.clara.net/surrey-hants/gu-ford.htm

I was therefore very pleased to walk into St Mary's Church last week and find Peace Oil on sale. I bought for Christmas presents two bottles of what I thought was Palestinian olive oil.

Peace Oil is an olive oil from Israel. It is a high quality, single estate, cold pressed extra virgin olive oil. It is produced by Druze, Jews, Arabs and Bedouin working together (but not a cooperative). The trees are in the foothills of the Carmel Mountains. The olives are cold pressed within hours of being picked. Not cheap, but then the monies raised (it is claimed) goes to help support peace and reconciliation work in the Middle East.

Strange no fairtrade logo for all that is claimed!

The more I looked the more concerned I become. It is not as claimed, the different groups working together. It is an Israeli farmer employing cheap labour. It is not certified organic on the ludicrous grounds it cannot be as neighbouring farms are not organic! It is promoted by Zionist groups, on sale at a trade fair which also had property in occupied territories.

It is not, as I thought, the church selling Peace Oil, but Card Aid who are in the church in the run-up to Christmas. Questions of Card Aid have hit a brick wall. They are very defensive which of itself is suspicious. Where does the money go? They cannot say as too sensitive. And yes they are all working together because the Jews are employing the Palestinians!

A total lack of transparency, coupled with highly misleading claims.

Card Aid has pre-Christmas shops in London and the Home Counties. Please go in and ask question. Do not be fobbed off.

 http://www.cardaid.co.uk/cardaid_shops

Is it a mere coincidence that Peace Oil was launched with a massive advertising budget (ads on the Tube do not come cheap) at the same time Zaytoun olive oil was launched?

Zaytoun olive is Palestinian oil. Zaytoun is a non-profit organisation established to support Palestinian farming communities by helping to increase the market for their olive oil products internationally, and also by helping the farmers themselves improve the quality of their oil through training and equipment provision. Zaytoun is supported by UK charity War on Want amongst others. They were awarded Fairtrade certification for their olive oil in March 2009.

 http://www.zaytoun.org/

Does anyone know anything about this olive oil? I bought it in good faith believing it was the Palestinian oil that St Mary's and Holy Trinity Church brought over in the summer. But to my horror I found it was Israeli oil. The more I look, the more concerned I become. If anyone has first hand information from Israel or Occupied Palestine, that would be very helpful. In the meantime, I am asking the church to have this oil withdrawn until such time as we can get straight answers.

Also see

Peace Oil
 http://keithpp.wordpress.com/2010/10/23/peace-oil/

"Peace" oil?
 http://jewssansfrontieres.blogspot.com/2007/12/peace-oil.html

Al Zaytouna awarded Fairtrade mark
 http://www.waronwant.org/news/latest-news/16482-al-zaytouna-is-awarded-fair-trade-mark

Keith Parkins

Comments

Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech