Tag Archives: human rights

Not in Our Name: Ceasefire/Peace/Justice in Palestine/Israel ~ Nov 9 Event ~

“Cease fire demonstration at the state capitol, Madison Wisconsin this afternoon. Of course, this is not to excuse attacks on civilians by either side. Neither side is my enemy. My enemy is war.”

Thursday Nov 9 – Larry Orr of VFP Madison

Brad and Jane.
Jane has held that poster since the days of America’s war in Vietnam.
If only our leaders could read….

Esty and friends with our Madison-Rafah Sister City project.

Thousands of mothers and children are dead tonight in Gaza. More will die tomorrow… unless we can get a cease fire, and allow drinking water to flow, and allow hospitals to be hospitals, and, and, and….

Thank you, dear friends.

Thank you, again.

Milana, age 3, was killed in Gaza.

More and more…

indeed

The eyes that have been closed.

Now

 

CEASEFIRE NOW

“Lights up for a ceasefire” picture featured on post.
Friday Nov 10 – Palestine Partners Action
2700 University Ave in Madison

 

Palestine Partners on Facebook

Jewish Voice for Peace Facebook

Decry the Merchants of Death – Kathy Kelly

Merchants of Death website 

Tribunal: November 10-13, 2023 


article at Decry the Merchants of Death – Progressive.org
by Kathy Kelly

“Days after a U.S. warplane bombed a Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, killing forty-two people, twenty-four of them patients, the international president of MSF, Dr. Joanne Liu walked through the wreckage and prepared to deliver condolences to family members of those who had been killed. A brief video, taped in October, 2015, captures her nearly unutterable sadness as she speaks about a family who, the day before the bombing, had been prepared to bring their daughter home. Doctors had helped the young girl recover, but because war was raging outside the hospital, administrators recommended that the family come the next day. “She’s safer here,” they said.

The child was among those killed by the U.S. attacks, which recurred at fifteen minute intervals, for an hour and a half, even though MSF had already issued desperate pleas begging the United States and NATO forces to stop bombing the hospital.

Dr. Liu’s sad observations seemed to echo in the words of Pope Francis lamenting war’s afflictions. “We live with this diabolic pattern of killing one another out of the desire for power, the desire for security, the desire for many things. But I think of the hidden wars, those no one sees, that are far away from us,” he said. “People speak about peace. The United Nations has done everything possible, but they have not succeeded.” The tireless struggles of numerous world leaders, like Pope Francis and Dr. Joanne Liu, to stop the patterns of war were embraced vigorously by Phil Berrigan, a prophet of our time.

“Oppose any and all wars,” he urged. “There has never been a just war.”  “Don’t get tired!” he begged people, adding, “I love the Buddhist proverb, ‘I will not kill, but I will prevent others from killing.’ ”


People who’ve embraced his message continue meeting at the Pentagon, as happened December 28 when activists commemorated the “Feast of the Holy Innocents.” Christians traditionally dedicate this day to the remembrance of a time when King Herod ordered the massacre of children under two years of age because of a paranoid belief that one of the recently born children in the region would grow up to oust Herod from power and kill him. Activists gathered at the Pentagon held signs decrying the slaughter of innocents in our time. They’ll protest the obscenely bloated military budget which the U.S. Congress just passed as a part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023.

As Norman Stockwell of The Progressive recently noted, “The bill contains nearly $1.7 trillion of funding for FY2023, but of that money, $858 billion is earmarked for the military (‘defense spending’) and an additional $45 billion in ‘emergency assistance to Ukraine and our NATO allies.’ This means that more than half ($900 billion out of $1.7 trillion) is not being used for ‘non-defense discretionary programs’—and even that lesser portion includes $118.7 billion for funding of the Veterans Administration, another military-related expense.”

By depleting funds desperately needed to meet human needs, the U.S. “defense” budget doesn’t defend people from pandemics, ecological collapse, and infrastructure decay. Instead it continues a deranged   investment in militarism.  Phil Berrigan’s prophetic intransigency, resisting all wars and weapons manufacturing, is needed now more than ever.

Outraged by the reckless slaughter of innocent people in wars ranging from Vietnam to Afghanistan, Phil Berrigan insisted that weapons manufacturers profiting from endless wars should be held accountable for criminal activity. The weapons corporations rob people, worldwide, of the capacity to meet basic human needs..


The appallingly greedy Pentagon budget represents a corporate takeover of the U.S. Congress. As the coffers of weapons manufacturers swell, these military contractors hire legions of highly paid lobbyists tasked with persuading elected officials to earmark even more funds for companies like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon United, and General Atomics. According to militarists, stockpiles of weapons must be used up, in order to justify more weapons manufacturing. Media complicity is necessary, and can be purchased, in order to frighten U.S. taxpayers into the continued bankrolling of what could become worldwide annihilation.

 

Phil Berrigan, who in his lifetime evolved from soldier to scholar to prophetic anti-nuclear activist, astutely linked the racial oppression he opposed as a civil rights activist to the rising oppression caused by militarism. He likened racial injustice to a terrible hydra that contrives a new face for every area of the world. Throughout his life, Phil Berrigan identified with people menaced by the hydra’s new faces of war. Elaborating on this theme in a book called No More Strangers, published in 1965, he wrote that the dispassionate decision of people in the United States to practice racial discrimination made it “not only easy but logical to enlarge our oppressions in the form of international nuclear threats.”


Golden Rule Sails Down Mississippi

 

The Golden Rule is a project of Veterans for Peace that promotes a peaceful world without nuclear weapons.

 

hat tip to Phil Fransen for many of pictures on this web post.

September in Minnesota with Golden Rule

VFP Golden Rule Project | Advancing VFP Opposition to Nuclear Weapons and War

No to Nuclear ~ Help Strengthen the Treaty

Roxane Assaf-LynnATTENTION STUDENT GROUP LEADERS: You’re invited to sign on as a co-sponsor to “Defuse Nuclear War” on the 40th anniversary of a history-making event in Central Park, New York. 
Thanks from RootsAction.org CONTACT: Rox@RootsAction.org

Sign Up Your Organization to Co-Sponsor the “Defuse Nuclear War” Live Stream Event June 12 

 



sign on, if you agree 

 

STATEMENT ON THE EXISTENTIAL THREAT OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS 

AND ON THE TREATY ON THE PROHIBITION OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS

The power to initiate a global apocalypse lies in the hands of the leaders of nine nations.

As 122 nations of the world indicated when they adopted the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in July, 2017, this is unacceptable.

As concerns about the threat of nuclear weapons re-enter the public consciousness, it is important to know that humankind is not without an answer to the nuclear threat. The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which entered into force on January 22, 2021, provides a clear pathway to the elimination of the nuclear threat.

We call on all nuclear armed states to take immediate steps to:

  • engage the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons,
  • attend the First Meeting of States Parties, and
  • sign, ratify and implement the Treaty.

We also call on the US media to recognize the existence of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and to include the Treaty in discussions, articles, and editorials regarding the nuclear threat and methods available to address it.

 


Talk World Radio:
Norman Solomon on Defusing Nuclear War

David Swanson:  “This week on Talk World Radio, we’re talking about Ukraine and nuclear weapons with Norman Solomon who is Co-Founder and National Director of RootsAction.org. Norman also founded the Institute for Public Accuracy in 1997 and is its executive director. Immersed in anti-war, social justice, and environmental movements since the late 1960s, he is the author of a dozen books including “War Made Easy” and “Made Love, Got War.”

 

artist:  Yoshitomo Nara