Partial victory for Palestinian quarry workers

Submitted by Matthew on 1 February, 2012 - 2:18

The struggle of the Salit quarry workers, in the occupied West Bank (Palestine), has concluded in a partial victory, with workers winning a financial settlement but not securing a commitment from contractors taking over work at the quarry to re-employ them.

Workers had been engaged in a prolonged battle, which included a three-month strike in summer 2011, against an exploitative management which used the quarry’s location in an occupied territory to register their business as “foreign”, and thus avoid having to pay the national insurance contributions required of them by Israeli law.

The workers were organised by the Workers’ Advice Centre (Ma’an), an independent workers’ centre which organises workers (Israeli-Jewish, Israeli-Arab and Palestinian) in sectors and industries often overlooked by Israel’s mainstream trade union federation, the Histadrut.

WAC-Ma’an is also currently involved in a campaign to organise truck drivers in Israel.

• For more on the Salit struggle, see here.

• For more on the campaign to unionise truck drivers, see here.

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