Announcement of Withdrawal by PASS Foundation – Peace for Sustainable Societies from the Global “Catalyst Now” Network
PASS Foundation – Peace for Sustainable Societies announces its complete withdrawal from the membership of the global Catalyst Now network, including its Yemen chapter under the Middle East and North Africa region.
This decision comes in protest of the martyrdom of our colleague, Engineer Samar Sadeq, a member of the Catalyst Now Palestine – Gaza chapter, and in response to the silence on human rights violations in Palestine. It is also a firm rejection of any attempts to normalize the presence of the occupying entity within the network and a complete refusal of the inclusion of entities and individuals from the Israeli occupation in the global network — a stance that contradicts the principles of justice and equity we uphold.
Below is the full text of the withdrawal letter sent to the network’s leadership:
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To the Co-Chairs of the Ethics Committee and the Governing Council at Catalyst Now,
We read your response to the letter from the Middle East and North Africa members with the eye of the heart that sees injustice, and the soul that knows that truth is indivisible. Your reply, unfortunately, reflected a choice of political convenience over the moral and ethical commitment that Catalyst Now is meant to stand for.
We thank you — for you have made us look in the mirror. Transferring the Israeli member to the European regional chapter — while it may appear to be a “neutral solution” — is an implicit admission that injustice exists, but rather than being addressed, it is merely managed. Yet we believe that justice is like water: if denied to some, it quenches no one. Catalyst Now cannot claim to promote social innovation while geographically dividing its sense of justice.
This decision is akin to rearranging the chairs on the Titanic! The issue is not the geographical placement of chapters, but the legitimacy of having a chapter that represents an occupying entity. For that reason, we reject — as a declaration of our very being — the reduction of human rights causes into “regional files,” or the measurement of justice by distances. Palestinian blood is African, European, and Asian blood. Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere. Truth is not allocated on colonial maps, and human dignity is indivisible.
We understand that your decision may stem from good intentions. But “good intentions” — in times of injustice — are not enough. Justice is not built through compromise, but through courageous stands against oppression. We do not reject your decision because we are “Easterners,” but because we reject injustice being weighed with double standards.
Accordingly:
• We refuse to be mere numbers in the records of regional chapters. We are partners in a justice that knows no borders. We say clearly: “Whoever stands for justice — from any land — is of us, and we are of them.”
• We refuse to be tools in a system that fragments rights or reduces human issues to administrative matters.
• We categorically reject all forms of normalization with human rights violations, or dealing with them as geographical matters.
• We collectively announce our withdrawal from the network as members of the Yemen chapter of Catalyst Now, because justice is not negotiated in the corridors of regional chapters, but in the arenas of human conscience.
We will not respond to fear, but to the call of conscience that says: “Truth cannot be erased, blood cannot be divided, and justice cannot be locked in drawers.”
Yemen Chapter – Catalyst Now
catalystnow.net