Friends,

This morning’s Sunday Syracuse Post-Standard features a page one article by P-S reporter Dave Tobin, “Unmanned Drones, Controlled by Air National Guard from Hancock Airfield, Will Fly Over the Adirondacks”: http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2011/02/unmanned_drones_controlled_by.html

In 2009 the P-S ran several lengthy gee whiz articles about the reaper drone newly arriving at Hancock. Once we began protesting the reaper in our midst, the P-S discontinued the series and has said little more about the reaper. The P-S, which had occasionally published my op-eds on a range of subjects in the past, chose not to publish them on the drone issue.

Today’s article is a marked departure from that silence.

To make sure that the P-S is aware that upstaters actively oppose having the deadly reaper based here, please write a letter to its editors at letters@syracuse.com and/or post a comment at the bottom of the article.

Among the points that you might make in your own language are:

• The reaper maims and kills and destroys the homes of civilians/noncombatants especially in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
• Such wanton killing is itself terrorism and surely serves as a recruiting tool for those who would oppose U.S. military forces in the region. The reaper’s tactical strength is thereby a strategic weakness – one risking expanding hostilities and keeping the war pot boiling.
• Such killing is cowardly; it violates Judeo-Christian and Islamic morality and international law.
• According to the article, Hancock not only is the national reaper maintenance center (which we’ve known), but flies missions over Afghanistan. Further, Hancock is to become a training center for reaper pilots – both from the U.S. and other countries (which we haven’t known). Basing the reaper in upstate NY makes this region a part of the battlefield. The people of upstate NY weren’t consulted about becoming potential targets of reprisal.
• As the article indicates, the drone is coming home to roost: it is becoming a clear and present threat to our own civil liberties. The reaper’s high tech surveillance capability, tested over there, is now being tested over here, around northern NY. Thanks to the reaper, we are now sliding down the slippery slope of the national surveillance state.

There is local as well as regional organizing going on about the drones. Contact Carol or 315.472.5478.

In solidarity,

ed

The U.S. cannot “win” the war in Afghanistan. It was losing the war when Barack Obama took office. In March 2009, President Obama ordered another 30,000 troops. Rather than reverse the outcome, the U.S. and NATO effort lost even more ground. Now President Obama has ordered another 30,000 troops to Afghanistan.

Attempting to deflect growing opposition to the announcement of his dramatic escalation of the war in Afghanistan, President Obama is simultaneously claiming that U.S. troops will start to be withdrawn in July 2011.

The Generals and Admirals, and now the White House, are unwilling to accept responsibility for a military setback. The President knows they cannot win and yet is unwilling to leave. Since no leader is willing to take responsibility, they are instead sending thousands more to their deaths.

Bush and Cheney ordered the invasion thinking it would be easy going. They thought Iraq would be easy, too. They were going to wipe out the governments in Iran, Syria and North Korea. This colonial-type fantasy, nourished by “great nation” arrogance and the acquiescence of a caste of corrupt politicians in Congress, set the stage for the current catastrophe of a war without end.

After eight years of war, more than 140 armed insurgent groups of Afghans now exist as a response to the invasion and they control large parts of the country. The people in Afghanistan perceive the occupation as a colonial-type takeover of their country. September 11 was a pretext, but there were no Afghans or Iraqis who hijacked the planes. The people of Afghanistan, like the people in Vietnam, will never accept foreign military occupation in their country.

In the 1968 election Nixon ran on a platform of a “secret peace plan” for Vietnam. In reality, Nixon’s “peace plan” meant more bombing of Vietnam, expansion of the war into Cambodia, and “Vietnamization” – the building up of the South Vietnamese puppet army under the direction of U.S. “advisors.” The puppet army was supposed to do the fighting and dying in the place of U.S. troops in an increasingly unpopular war.

The new plan for Afghanistan calls for more bombing and drone attacks, and “Afghanization” – the building up of a puppet Afghan army trained and led by U.S. commanders. This follows President Obama’s escalation of massive bombing of the people of Pakistan.

Bush Policy – Obama Policy

On Jan. 20, the day that Barack Obama took the oath of office, a government helicopter carrying George W. Bush lifted off and made the ceremonial flight away from the nation’s capital, signaling the end of one era and the start of a new administration.

It was a remarkable event to witness. As the Bush helicopter passed over the inaugural throng, millions of people on the ground started cheering spontaneously. The official pomp of the transfer of power was overwhelmed by the euphoria of those who hated Bush and his policies.

But was there a transfer of power? The personalities change, but the institutions of militarism, war and empire remain intact.

Since Obama took over as president, the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan has nearly doubled, and that’s before the new deployment of 30,000 more soldiers.

Today, less than a year since Bush departed, there are actually more combined U.S. military forces occupying Iraq and Afghanistan than at any time during Bush’s tenure. Between official military forces, private mercenaries and other contractors, by the middle of 2010 there will be nearly a half-million U.S. personnel in the two countries.

At a time of deep economic crisis, with tens of millions out of work and losing their homes, the cost of the wars and occupations in Afghanistan and Iraq is already running at over $225 billion per year or $1.2 billion every two days. Escalating the war will escalate that cost.

The war is not about “the security of the people of the United States being at stake.” If it was, there could be no talk about exit strategies and announced plans for withdrawal.

Starting today, there will be a growing escalation of anti-war protests in the United States. Tonight and tomorrow there are demonstrations across the country.

On Saturday, March 20, 2010, tens of thousands will march in Washington, D.C., with coinciding mass actions in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Real change comes from below. It comes from the millions who are suffering from unemployment, foreclosure, evictions and poverty. It comes from the young people who are being driven from college because of soaring tuition. The children of working-class families are the ones who do the bleeding and the killing, and they are told they do it for “national security.”

This is not our war. This is a war for empire, one that has gone very badly for the occupying force. How many more will die for the U.S. to avoid the appearance of defeat?

The ANSWER Coalition, in partnership with scores of organizations and echoing the sentiment of millions of people who want the wars to end, will be in the streets today, tomorrow and in the months to come. That is now clearly the only prescription to end the violence and occupation of the American Empire.

Click here to become an endorser of the March 20th National March on Washington, D.C.

To support the anti-war movement, click here.

download/view full-sized poster. For background music, start audio podcast below:

Come celebrate the 50th anniversary of the triumph of the Cuba revolution and 20th Pastors for Peace Cuba Caravan

Ithaca has been a host city for the Pastors for Peace Cuba Caravan since the 3rd caravan in 1993. That year, mayor Ben Nichols signed a mayoral proclamation designation US-Cuba Freinedship week in the City of Ithaca. Though we have missed some years, the record has been consistent, though the scope of the annual effort has dropped since the early years. Here are some highpoints.

• 6th Caravan in 1996. What was supposed to be a mini-caravan on the west coast collecting medical computers to connect hospitals, schools, and clinics to the backbone of the the Cuban medical information system, INFOMED, was stopped by US Treasury agnets at the border with Mexico. The stand-off led to the 94-day Fast for Life. We drafted a pastoral letter to Treasury signed by area clergy. Immediately after the seizure, we mobilized and in a month’s time had collected a truck load of donated computers to replace those that had been seized. Peter De Mott drove our truck to the Canadian border in Highgate Vermont. The computers were seized, but in the end all were released to be sent to Cuba, with many times their value contributed to Cuba from supporter in Europe. As individuals, we participated in an amazing Grassroots campaign by phone and fax, with different targets each week of government officials, political leaders, and most importantly the media who had been refusing to tell the story.
• 7th Caravan In 1997. We sent six dialysis machines as a gift to the Cuban people from the Taino Nation of the Antilles. That may have also been the year that local artist John Ewing enlisted the help of volunteers for a banner painting project on canvas depicting José Martí and Martin Luther King, Jr. The MLK banner was not finished in time, but the Martí banner graced our truck on the caravan and currently hangs at the Martin Luther King Memorial Center in Marianao, the working class barrio in Havana, also known as the location of the original Buena Vista Social Club.
• 15th Caravan in 2004. Our focus that year was on freedom to travel and Cuban cinema. Mayor Peterson signed a a proclamation declaring June 18-24 Cuban Friendship Week in the City of Ithaca, which included screening Cuban films at night on the Ithaca Commons and working cooperatively with Cornell Cinema around their screening of Bolseros.

This year’s caravan is emphasizing tools and materials for hurricane re-construction as well as medicines and medical supplies. We haven’t done a full aid collection in many years, having found it simpler to raise funds for Pastors for Peace and thereby support the work of other communities collecting and send aid, as well as direct purchase and procurement of aid by Pastors. This year, Trumansburg artist Dan Burgevin will be a driver on the caravan for the third consecutive year. Though we have not organized an aid collection, the possibility is there for carrying a small amount of high value items. A tool chest, for example, packed with needed tools for hurricane reconstruction. If you have a donation, please contact Dan Burgevin and Cris McConkey.

The 20th Pastors for Peace Cuba Caravan occurs during the 1st year of the Obama administration, and on the 50th anniversary of the Triumph of the Cuban Revolution. Obama has relaxed restrictions on family travel and remittances, but we have a long way to go. Please come out and support the local effort and also consider what you might do as the year progresses. We really should re-form a local Pastors for Peace support and Cuba solidarity group. After 2004, we lost several key members who left the area.

Volunteers are needed for set, clean-up and kitchen.  ‘Catered pot-luck’ means that we are largely depending on ourselves to do the catering.  Thus far we will have tostones (fried plantains), yuca con mojo (yuca in olive oil & garlic sauce), a savory fish stew, and of course congrís (beans and rice).   If you need a recipe, just Google ‘Cuban recipe’  and you’ll have zillions to choose from.  Maybe you have a good picadillo recipe.  Of course we will need vegan dishes.  Google “Cuban vegan recipe”.   Please contact Cris McConkey 607/387-9830 if you can help out.

José Martí banner hanging in the cafeteria of the Matin Luther King Memorial Center in Marianao

Our entertainment this year includes master percussionist Hiram Jímenez along with Jonathan Kline, known locally as a craftsman who makes fine black ash baskets but who also has been studying with Hiram and has advanced to being assistant instructor with Hiram with the PROYECTO ¡PA’LANTE! Afro-Caribbean percussion classes iat Cornell. This will be followed by a demonstration of rueda de casino or “salsa circle” by members of the Palante Salsa en Rueda Dance Troupe to which we are all encouraged to try to learn some steps. We don’t know how it will all pan out.  Maybe we’ll have some “comparsa”.  thrown it. Regardless, it will certainly be a lot of fun.

On January 1, 1959, Fidel Castro and the 26th of July Movement swarmed into Havana.   Fulgencio Batista had departed the night before and a new Cuban government was established ending Batista’s corrupt and oppressive regime, and with it the casinos and organized crime that became so emblematic of that regime.

‘Casino’ also happens to be a dance style known outside of Cuba as ‘Salsa’, but it’s origins really don’t have anything to do with the gambing establishments run by the mob that attracted such a large U.S. clientele.  (Of course that clientele needed to be entertained.  The film Mambo Kings deals with the brutal exploitation of musicians and entertainers at that time in Cuba.)

Velazquez Spanish-English dictionary defines ‘casino’ as “a room or building used as a public resort, for dancing, social, or club meetings”.  It is from roots within the Cuban social club that the Casino style emerged, where steps were named and called out to dancers on the floor.  Rueda de Casino is a form involving at least two couples, exchanging partners and responding to calls.  Rueda means wheel or circle, and so Rueda de Casino might be translated as “salsa circle”.

Jacira Castro has an summary editorial article on the origins of  Rueda de Casino on salsapower.com, What is Rueda de Casino? Why do some call it “Casino Rueda”?

The Spanish language entry in wikimapia.org for “Casino Desportivo” says of the pre-1959 club in Havana often associated with the origin of the Casino dance style that it was “not for rich, as many think.  Working and average class could be associates”.   After the truimph of the revolution, many of these social clubs were shut down.

In an unattributed  “Letter from Havana” re-published on jewishcuba.org, there is an interesting account of the Casino Desportivo as a focal point for the Jewish Community at that time:

The very wealthy did discriminate against Jews, as they did against the poor, blacks, Chinese or anybody of mixed parentage, the latter constituted at the time somewhere around 40 % of the population of Cuba.

What this meant was that Jews were limited to attending the poor man’s Club: Casino Deportivo de La Habana. Clubs were very important to the resident of Havana. It was not only a place of social life and activities, but also the only easy access to beaches, or swimming pools, a dire need in our long hot summer.

The owner of the Casino Deportivo de La Habana, Alfredo Hornedo, an unsavoury Cuban politician, was originally the owner of a newspaper, El Pais, and later on a Theatre, which included an ice skating rink, named Blanquita, after his first wife, and later on renamed Karl Marx and a Hotel, Rosita, named after his second wife, much visited by the mob, later on renamed Sierra Maestra and now being refurbished

As his was not an exclusive club, and required of no large initial fee, some working class Cubans were members. I remember on Saturdays and Sundays the large Jewish membership, which kept very much apart, they did not want their girls and boys to fall in love with non Jews, and also because in many instances they carried their kosher lunch. The only members allowed to bring in food, the rest were expected to attend either the restaurant, cafeteria or bar managed by the Club.

After the revolution these clubs were turned over to the different unions but for lack of adequate maintenance, some collapsed, some are closed and others are still open to the public at large. But they do seem to be en route to disappearing in the near future as they are located in an area in which a lot of real state development is going on. One of the most luxurious, which catered to the very wealthy and exclusive society, the Havana Biltmore, has just been beautifully refurbished and turned into the Havana Club, catering to foreign business men and diplomats residing in Havana. It is also open to tourist. Cubans come in as guests.

This is a similar story to that surrounding the Buena Vista Social Club movie. The podcast toward the top of this post explores some of the faulty conclusions and fabrications coming out of the movie’s construction. “Critic’s Choice”, is a radio interview program on WFMT, Chicago’s Fine Arts and Classics station. WFMT’s Critic-at-Large Andrew Patner spoke with Reese Erlichon the mythology surrounding BVSC which is the subject of Erlich’s recent book, Dateline Havana. What I find interesting in the Jewish account of the Casino Desportivo is that class as much race enters into the picture, and the characterization of the club’s owner as an “unsavory politician”. Neither is the mob out of the picture.

The Buena Vista Social Club story as depicted in the movie is really a rather clever construction. Ry Cooder did not in truth rescue some extremely talented but starving musicians whose music had all but been totally forgotten. As Reese Erlich explains, Cooder met them at Cuba’s Artex recording studio. That the phenomenon of the CD and movie brought much renewed world-wide attention to some of the older styles is something appreciated by and validating for many in Cuba who have an equal affection for those older styles. But what is seriously wrong is the implication that the Cuban Revolution somehow stopped this rich cultural and artistic expression. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The status of the old social clubs may be in question, but the Cuban public’s access to their culture is a top priority and indeed the arts have flourished. Cubans congregate more than ever around music and dance and their culture.

Dare I say that the social aspects of Cuban dance may reflect a national character of social interaction that helps explain Cuba’s success in all sorts of areas of community organization from medicine and education, to hurricane preparedness?

The mission statement for Projecto Palante, the local group that is helping with Cuba Night, concludes as follows:

Proyecto ¡Pa’lante! promotes some of the most exciting Latin and world music nightlife happenings at Cornell and in the Central New York area. We engage nightlife and culture not as a distraction and antithesis to the grind of exploitative labor regimes and ascetic cultural norms, but as integral to a social endeavor that extols cooperation, connection and sensuality as cornerstones of an alternative society. As alternative to mainstream cultural production and its drive toward commercial monopoly, gender, racial and sexual categorization, and the destruction of artistic diversity, we offer an experience of high-energy Latin and world music and dance in a collective and non-pretentious atmosphere open to everyone. Our productions serve as community benefits and mobilizers and in so doing highlight the oneness of collectively created pleasure and social justice.

I think that sums it up pretty well.

¡Baila!

Rueda de Casino

During this year’s AIPAC conference in Washington, Executive Director Howard Kohr warned the 7,000-plus crowd that the global movement to “delegitimize Israel” was gathering steam.

“These voices are laying the predicate for an abandonment,” he said. His sentiments were almost apocalyptic: “The stakes in that battle are nothing less than the survival of Israel, linked inexorably to the relationship between Israel and the United States. In this battle we are the firewall, the last rampart.”

The age of Barack Obama has unleashed a global wave of Jewish unease over Israel’s future and the Diaspora’s relationship to the self-described Jewish state. It’s a debate that is long overdue.

Zionist organizations in Australia campaigned loudly in May against the allegedly “anti-Semitic” play Seven Jewish Children, a ten-minute think-piece written by an English playwright accusing Jews of complicity in violence against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

A Jewish columnist for The New York Times, Roger Cohen, argued in June that the key word among Palestinians now is “humiliation.”

“It’s not good for the Palestinians, the Israelis or the Jewish soul,” he wrote. The Jewish Week editor chastised him for such views – for “the anger, blame and one-sidedness of his argument” – and wondered “whose heart?has grown brutal?”

An upcoming academic conference at York University in Toronto exploring the “one-state, bi-national solution” to the conflict was slammed last week by Gerald M. Steinberg, chair of the Department of Political Science at Bar Ilan University, for fueling “the vicious warfare and mass terror” against Israelis and Palestinians.

The decades-old ability of Zionist groups to manage the public narrative of Israeli victimhood is breaking down. Damning critics has therefore become a key method of control.

But, writes Salon.com’s Glenn Greenwald, a leading Jewish-American blogger, “whereas these smear tactics once inspired fear in many people, now they just inspire pity. They no longer work.”

He may be overly optimistic, but alternative Jewish voices are rising who are less concerned with being accused of “self-hatred” or treachery. They see it as their duty to damn what is wrong and not simply support Israeli government policies.

A thinking, more enlightened Judaism is emerging, a necessity in the face of apartheid realities. The cause is human rights, not Zionist exclusion.

Obama’s recent speech in Cairo reflected the new Jewish consciousness. American Jews were certainly an intended audience because if it this group that must challenge their conservative spokespeople to undo years of following Likudnik thinking. As a candidate in 2008, the then Illinois senator said that, “there is a strain within the pro-Israel community that says unless you adopt an unwavering pro-Likud approach to Israel that you’re anti-Israel and that can’t be the measure of our friendship with Israel.”

Many Jews in the Diaspora have never imagined anything else; it’s been an imagined Israel in their minds for decades. Lawless behavior in the occupied territories is ignored through willful ignorance. Tellingly, the most reliable information about these truths in the West is found online, through blogs and activist Web sites, and not generally in the mainstream media. The gate-keepers are clinging on to the Exodus myths for dear life.

Defining a humane Judaism in the 21st century means condemning the brutal military occupation in the West Bank and resisting the ongoing siege of Gaza.

Jewish-American blogger Phil Weiss, who recently returned from the Strip, quoted a young Gazan saying in dismay: “We are being experimented on.”

The Palestinian narrative is routinely ignored or dismissed in the U.S. and beyond. This must change quickly for any chance of peace to break out in the Middle East. However, peace without justice is guaranteed to fail.

After Obama?s speech in Cairo, where which he almost acknowledged the Palestinian “Nakba” without mentioning it by name, most major Jewish-American groups reacted with caution.

The Anti-Defamation League said it was “disappointed that the President found the need to balance the suffering of the Jewish people in a genocide to the suffering of the Palestinian people resulting from Arab wars.”

This was code for “Nakba”-denial, as pernicious as Holocaust revisionism.

But the liberal J Street lobby, still clinging to the delusion of a viable two-state solution and a “democratic, Jewish homeland,” praised Obama?s “active diplomacy” and claimed that the “overwhelming majority of American Jews” supported an end to the West Bank colonies.

Consistent polls suggest they are right, but the devil is in the detail. Is there real will to back the necessary steps, namely the removal of hundreds of thousands of Jewish settlers in the West Bank?

Co-Author of The Israel Lobby, Stephen Walt, said recently that he couldn’t understand why more American Jews didn’t realize the cliff Israel was running toward. Did they not see that repression in the occupied territories had defined Israel in the eyes of the world? Perhaps apartheid didn’t bother them. Out of sight and out of mind. Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent speech at Bar-Ilan University suggested he wasn’t too fussed, either.

I recently attended the Salute to Israel parade in New York ? picture 100,000 American Jews marching to celebrate the state, waving flags in praise of the IDF. It was a thoroughly depressing affair. Palestinians didn’t exist; they were invisible. The world’s biggest public display of pro-Israel feeling had no room for 20 percent of the Israeli population (let alone the millions in the West Bank and Gaza.)

These events are actually a sign of desperate projection, not strength. Mainstream Zionism wants to completely shield Jews from the uncomfortable facts of the Israeli occupation and Palestinian self-determination. Jews were a proud people, a clever people and a victimized people. There was no time to indulge in frivolous Arab trivialities.

But facts have an uncomfortable way of seeping back into view. Colonel Itai Virob, an IDF brigade commander in the West Bank, recently told an Israeli court that, “a slap, sometimes a punch to the scruff of the neck or the chest, sometimes a knee jab or strangulation to calm somebody [a Palestinian] down is reasonable.”

Where is the Jewish outrage over this?

Antony Loewenstein is a New York-based journalist and author of My Israel Question.

Given Bellingham’s reputation, it is an especially stinging affront that four AWOL soldiers of conscience have been housed in our jail. Most of us in this city consider people like Robin Long and Cliff Cornell heroes for their refusal to bear arms and kill. … As it stands, law enforcement is under no obligation to report AWOL soldiers to the military. We are asking our city to abstain from doing the military’s job. These individuals have broken no law. Our local resources should not be spent on their apprehension and detention.

On October 9, 2006, Bellingham became the first city in the state of Washington to pass a Troops Home! Resolution.  The issue now is a sanctuary resolution.  “The ordinance is not about adjudication” states Marie Marchand in her op-ed. “The Sanctuary City Movement … is not asking police to break the law.” Tim Carpenter, a Whatcom County resident and Vietnam veteran who wrote the opposing view Sanctuary city Con: Sanctuary idea would do more harm than good has a different take on the question of law:

Federal law provides, under the category of Treason, Sedition and Subversive Activities, that it is a crime for any person to advise, counsel or urge insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny or refusal of service; to conspire to commit those acts; or to harbor any person who commits such an act. Does the city council’s involvement facilitate and abet treason?

He attempts to paint proponents of the sanctuary resolution as “emotional rather than rational” and finds that their arguments “rely on unsubstantiated statistics, or attempt to reach a logical conclusion built upon an inherently false premise”.   He really doesn’t cite anything to support this, just innuendo.

On the issue of Free Speech (around which Ithaca’s Sanctuary Resolution turned) he writes that “This is not a ‘free speech’ issue. The right of free speech is not absolute. Speech that advocates the commission of a crime is not protected.”

The attendant legal questions appear to be the most productive ones to pursue, and it would be well worth the effort for sanctuary supporters in the Ithaca area to engage  in the debate in Bellingham not only out of solidarity, but also to hone our own arguments for what may lie ahead.  It is easy to imagine a similar scenario developing in Ithaca were war resisters jailed here, or were the city sanctuary resolution strengthened to explicitly instruct law enforcement not to arrest anyone on the basis of their military status when had not broken the law.   (As an aside, I recall that Trevor Loope was arrested in St. Lawrence County on bogus charges of bounced checks, not for being AWOL).  It would be really good to solicit wider legal opinion on this debate over what the law requires.

Wing-nuts seem to dominate the story chat on the Bellingham Herald (just like in Ithaca).  It only takes a few minutes to register in order to comment.  Pleasew consider doing so.

Russell Brown has been blogging on the situation in Bellingham on adoptresistance.org.  You can also follow posts on the website/blog of Veterans For Peace Corporal Jonathan Santos Memorial Chapter 111 in Bellingham. –Cris McConkey

Tool of the Rich
Originally posted by peezfulmindz on the vetsandsurvivorsmarch list
Fri Jun 5, 2009 10:14 am (PDT)

What part of Obama’s speech in Cairo should give us hope for a new relationship with the Islamic world? Rhetoric is just rhetoric when actions contradict. Obama has become the new salesman for the American royalty of rich power brokers and entitled elitists.

The significance of Obama’s journey to the Middle East to give a polished speech he began writing before his election is window dressing and disingenuous. His destinations of Saudi Arabia and Egypt are the cues to his lack of sincerity toward the Muslim world. He chose the two most repressive regimes of the region to curry favor with the long misunderstood and vilified people of Islamic faith. He spoke eloquently about peace in Palestine and even dared to challenge Israel but his failure to speak of the repression of Egypt’s Mubarak and the Saudi royal family makes his words hollow and hypocritical.

Progressives and liberals may want us to give Obama time but families sending their sons and daughters off to the quagmires of Iraq and Afghanistan war wonder when enough is enough after multiple deployments of their loved ones. Yes, there is still two wars being waged in the name of this nation and billions each month is being spent to fund them. Billions that could be spent to “bail-out” the millions who have lost jobs due to the handling of the phony economic crisis.

What goodwill is being gained by this nation when we continue to wage illegal and immoral wars in nations of large Islamic populations? And how do we stem the hatred toward Americans when we send drones into Pakistan and make multiple mistakes in bombing the homes of innocent civilians instead of the alleged enemy?

As expected the new deal of Obama has turned out to be the same old deal of oligarchy, imperialism and nationalistic insanity. As expected Obama has sold out to the self appointed “royalty” of America. The richest families and multi-national corporations continue to wield the greatest influence and power in this alleged democracy. Locally and nationally special interests buy the elected political prostitutes while the poor and diminishing middle class go begging for table scraps of the great American dream.

While Obama speaks with a charisma not heard since JFK, like JFK he is merely a tool of a corrupted system never meant to be about “we, the people”.

Wm. Terry Leichner, RN

Denver VVAW member

Despite the difficulties with parking for an event downtown just after the Ithaca Festival parade, 50 people attended the screening and discussion. If you missed the Ithaca screening, you still can see it in Oneonata (May 29), Corning (June 1), Cortland (June 4), Binghamton (June 5), or other locations in the Mohawk Valley and Sugerties scroll down for schedule).

The Social Justice Council of the First Unitarian Church of Ithaca is screening “From Mills River to Babylon and back… the Jimmy Massey Story”, a 67-minute documentary by Otsego County filmmaker Joseph C. Stillman. The film chronicles the life of Jimmy Massey, a former twelve-year career Marine who refused to continue killing in Iraq, and examines the political, legal, moral, and human rights implications of the war.

Filmmaker Joseph Stillman and Massey himself will be present for discussion afterwards. A $10 donation is suggested to help cover part of the production cost of the film, but all who want to come are encouraged to attend.

The event, part of an eleven-city tour in Upstate New York, will be held in the sanctuary of the First Unitarian Church, at the corner of Buffalo and Aurora Streets in Ithaca, on Thursday, May 28 at 7:30 p.m.. Screenings are also being held in Syracuse, Cortland and Corning. For more information, go to the filmmaker’s web site: lapalomafilms.net.

This is the premier screening of the film, which was shot in 14 states over the past 4 years and features interviews with Scott Ritter, Cindy Sheehan, Martin Sheen, Maxine Waters and numerous other congresspersons and human rights activists.

The film shows Massey’s early life and the tragic death of his father, his decision to enlist in the marines due to economic hardship, illicit recruiting tactics that target single parent families by recruiters (Massey was a Marine recruiter), weapons of mass deception, depleted uranium use and its effects on soldiers and civilians. Stillman explains, “I believe it’s particularly important for parents and young people especially, to understand the tactics military recruiters will use to fill their quotas at the expense of the youth in our community.”

Stillman says, “This project has opened my eyes to many of the facts that Jimmy has raised and the tragedy of an ongoing war that didn’t have to be fought. I sadly learned, for instance, that the U.S. has dropped massive amounts of depleted uranium, used in ammunition and bombs, in Iraq and Afghanistan since the first Gulf War and that it is presently having disastrous effects on our returning military personnel and especially on the civilian populations in those countries.”

Jimmy Massey last visited Ithaca in March 2005, when he spoke at Cornell GIAC. and shared his first hand knowledge of how military recruiters lie and prey on our youth, especially low income kids, with promises that will seldom be fulfilled.

“FROM MILLS RIVER TO BAYLON AND BACK… THE JIMMY MASSEY STORY” DOCUMENTARY SCREENINGS
Contact: Joseph C. Stillman-Filmmaker 607.433.0811/267.6646 lapalomafilms@yahoo.net

Date | City/Organization | Screening Location | Time

May 27 (Wed) Syracuse Syracuse Peace Council, Jessica Maxwell TBA
315-472-5478 www.peacecouncil.net

May 28 (THU) Ithaca 1st Unitarian Church, Buffalo & Aurora 7:30
cris@tompkinsagainstwar.org
607.387.9830

May 29 (FRI) Oneonta Foothills Performing Arts Center 7:30
La Paloma Films, 607.433.0811

May 30 (SAT) Vestal H.S. Broome County Veterans for Peace 7:00
607.321.8537

May 31 (SUN) Hudson Time & Space Limited, 434 Columbia St. 8:00
518.822.8100 fyi@timeandspace.org

June 1 (MON) Corning Palace Theater, 17 East Market Street 7:00
607.329.6173

June 2 (TUE) Hudson Time & Space Limited, 434 Columbia St. 8:00
518.822.8100

June 3 (WED) Andes Roundtable, Andes Hotel 7:00

June 4 (THU) Cortland Lucky’s, 77 Main Street, 607.842.6801 7:00

June 5 (FRI) Binghamton Broome County Veterans for Peace 5:30/7:30
First Presbyterian Church 42 Chenango St. 607.321.8537

June 6 (SAT) Troy Bethleham Neighbors for Peace/NY Media 8:00
Alliance at The Sanctuary 518.321.8537

By Mary Anne Grady Flores

I was deeply saddened to see that it was our friend Bassam Abu Rahmah that was killed this past Friday, April 17th, 2009, in the village of Bil’in, Palestine. He was killed by an Israeli soldier firing a high velocity tear gas canister into his chest from only 100 feet away!  This happened during a non-violent protest at the illegal barrier fence which cut off Bassam’s village land by 60%, so that an Israeli settlement can be built on it.

We, Americans, just paid for this crime when we paid our taxes last Wed, April 15th, with $10 million a day that we give Israel! We, Americans, must inform our leaders of these crimes and re-direct our money to peace making, to building schools and hospitals, and to our own infrastructure. We should not be paying for racist policies of Israel to wantonly kill Palestinians, as was done under “Operation Lead Cast”, killing 1,400 in Gaza, and as was done to Bassam, and many others in the West Bank.  I plead, too, with Israeli soldiers to please gain courage to say no to the illegal and racist commands of the Israeli Military.

In 2007, three Puerto Rican activists, including Tito Kayak, Dara Guadalupe and Ivan Torres and I met Bassam in Bilin, Palestine. He was an enthusiastic, gentle big man with a warm smile and an eagerness to reach out to us internationals. Bassam traded t-shirts with Tito in the patio of the international house. Tito wore the Gush Shalom shirt which has a circle with both the Palestinian and Israeli flags within its circumference, signifying the two peoples living in peace side by side. Tito wore that shirt as he climbed the Israeli surveillance tower unfurling a Palestinian flag that very day.   Bassam wore a shirt from our Catholic community in Puerto Rico, the Community of Jesus the Mediator, commemorating the Feast of the Three Kings.
Bassam Abu Rahmah and Dara Guadalupe in the yard where we stayed. Bassam is wearing the t-shirt of the three kings.

Another time with the Gush Shalom t-shirt that he gave to Tito.

I’d like to briefly tell of these three kings who came to Jerusalem from foreign lands to ask where to find the new born king Jesus, that they learned of from the bright star they had followed. The local King Herod, a puppet of the Roman empire, was surprised and jealous to learn of the birth of a new king and asked the three kings to return and inform him of his where abouts, so he, too, could give homage to the child. After seeing the baby, the three kings were visited by an angel who warned them not to return because Herod wanted to kill the child, so they took a different route home.

There is great significance to this feast in that it is a signal to turn another way, the non-violent way, which is what Bassam and the people of Bil’in have chosen, and as people throughout all of Palestine have chosen in their struggle against the Israeli occupation for the last 60 years. There are brave Israelis and Internationals standing with our Palestinian brothers and sisters in Bil’in and in many other villages that are under attack, under seige, having their lands taken bit by bit. The US must stop supporting Israel’s racist policies.

We must continue non-violent resistance here in our streets, in our congressional and senate offices, in our local newspaper offices demanding that the story be covered,and in front of our Israeli embassies. We must not let business go on as usual. No more military aid to Israel. We must hold citizen tribunals on the war crimes of Israel in Gaza and the West Bank and expose the truth to our own citizens, as we all pay for these crimes.

Our delegation, three Puerto Ricans and one Irish, were apart of the peaceful demonstration with Israelis, Internationals, media and with the Palestinian people who live in Bil’in, who’s land has been stolen. The Israeli High Court ruled that the barrier fence must be moved to give back the land to the people of Bil’in. We demonstrated to have the land returned peacefully, marching, chanting, singing and holding banners. There is no need for Israeli guns, tear gas or their live bullets. Bassem wore the Gush Shalom t-shirt with the hope of peace for both peoples.

This shooting will not bring peace. Only justice and peaceful tactics will bring peace. Keep on struggling for Peace in Palestine.  Please read below and look at other photos of Bassam when he was shot in Friday’s protest.

Salaam, Shalom,
Mary Anne Grady Flores

Palestinian killed in Bilin protest

Local demonstrator seriously injured by tear gas canister hit to his chest during anti-fence rally, dies of wounds shortly after reaching hospital. IDF says protest was violent. Demonstrators: We’re like sitting ducks; soldiers fire at anything that moves; army, PA investigating

Ali Waked and Anat Shalev Palestinian sources reported Friday that a local demonstrator was killed after being hit in the chest by a tear gas canister during a protest against the separation fence in the West Bank village of Bilin. The man, 30-year-old Bassem Ibrahim Abu-Rahma from Bilin, was evacuated to a Ramallah hospital in serious condition, where he then died of his wounds. The army confirmed the report of Abu-Rahma’s death. Representatives of the IDF and the Coordination and Liaison Authority met with Palestinian officials later in the day as part of the joint investigation into the incident. Palestinians reported that IDF and Border Guard officers used live fire, rubber bullets and tear gas against the protesters, and claimed that the shooting began while those present were in the middle of their Friday prayers.

A left wing-activist who took part in the demonstration called the IDF’s conduct “murderous,” adding “we are like sitting ducks.” Roni Barkan, a member of the “Anarchists Against the Fence” group, told Ynet that the rally was peaceful and that “no stones were thrown.” “The soldiers, who were standing less than 30 meters (about 100 feet) from us, immediately began to throw stun grenades in our direction,” he said. “A few minutes later I overheard the commander tell the soldiers to prepare to throw tear gas canisters. There were two or three shots, and then Abu-Rahma was hit. I tried to stop the bleeding.”

‘I tried to stop the bleeding.’ Abu-Rahma after being hit (Photo: Lazar Simeonov)

According to Barkan, “it seems that since Operation Cast Lead IDF soldiers and commanders have been conducting themselves in an even less moral and humane manner; they are firing at anything that moves.”

April 14, 2009 – 12:00am
By Ariela Rutkin-Becker

“If only the Palestinians had better leadership.” I often hear this point from well-intentioned, but in this case at least misguided, pro-Israeli friends and colleagues. They continue to bemoan, “If only they had a Ghandi or an MLK.”

And one can surely make a logical case about previous and current Palestinian (and other Arab) leadership missing the mark. But there are a few more interesting points here. First of all, a Ghandi or an MLK prototype a priori requires the background of either an oppressive colonizing regime or a brutally racist one. Either scenario is not quite ideal, and is fascinating to me that folks, in trying to highlight flawed Palestinian resistance, inadvertently draw this moral parallel to today’s Israel.

Go to story and comments on the Cornell Daily Sun web edition.

There is much anticipation that President Obama will use the April 17-19 Summit of the Americas to announce the lifting of Cuba travel and family-remittance restrictions for Cuban-Americans.

Although a welcome step toward crafting a common-sense U.S. policy toward Cuba, it is not enough. As a Cuban American, I benefit from the removal of these restrictions but am uncomfortable that my fellow Americans are denied the right to travel to Cuba by virtue of not having relatives living on the island.

Moreover, Cuba is the only country to which our government restricts travel by American citizens, a policy that makes little geopolitical sense.

One might think Cuban-Americans oppose lifting travel restrictions for all Americans, but the evidence suggests otherwise. A December poll by Florida International University showed that 67 percent of all Cuban-Americans support unrestricted travel to Cuba by all Americans. This is a substantial increase over the 55 percent who favored removing such restrictions when the same question was asked by the university in March 2007.

Congress appears to be listening. The House and Senate have each introduced legislation titled “The Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act,” which proposes to lift all restrictions on travel to Cuba by American citizens. The proposed act has garnered an impressive 121 co-sponsors in the House and 18 in the Senate from across the ideological spectrum.

Passage of the Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act would be an important step in lessening the isolation of the Cuban people at a time of change on the island. Isolation is also a two-way street, and the current travel restrictions have isolated the United States from Cubans likely to play leadership roles in a post-Castro Cuba.

We do not know how the Castro regime will respond to a unilateral lifting of American travel restrictions. However, such a move, at minimum, will heighten existing pressure on the Cuban government to grant greater freedom for its citizens to travel abroad.

The Cuban government’s response is not as important as ensuring that U.S. policy on Cuba is consistent with our values and possessive of common-sense objectives.

The Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act is an important opportunity to end the isolation of the American and Cuban people from each other and bring new thinking to our relations with Cuba. All Americans should support passage of this important legal initiative.

Ignacio Sosa serves on the board of directors of several Cuba-related charities.