Looking for Trouble

Young Israeli prisoners of conscience show nation’s positive side

Israel gets a lot of bad press these days, and rightfully so given, among many other things, it’s refusal to seriously move forward on a negotiated peace settlement with Palestinians. But sometimes we need to be reminded that Israelis, like a lot of us, don’t necessarily agree with their government.

Today, I found a great reminder of that while scrolling through facebook.

An American grad student posted the following message and video:

“A year ago today, tens of thousands demanded the release of Israel’s youngest prisoners of conscience, the Shministim. These 12th graders courageously chose prison time over serving in the occupying Israeli army, and became heroes to us and the entire world.

“Last Chanukah, just one day after Tamar Katz was released from …solitary confinement, the young Shministim gathered to celebrate and to decide how to thank the 20,000 (and counting) Jewish Voice for Peace members who wrote letters, attended rallies, and wrote articles on their behalf.

“This is the message they carefully wrote together. One year later, as Shministit Or Ben-David sits in prison in Israel, and as Jews around the world prepare to celebrate the last night of Chanukah, it seems appropriate to share it with you again. We can’t imagine a more important message during this festival of lights.”

Shministim means “twelfth-graders” in Hebrew. In Israel, military service is mandatory after high school for young women and young men. The Shministim are Israeli youth who refuse to serve in the army because it enforces Israel’s 40-year occupation of the Palestinian lands.

There is an ongoing campaign in Israel among some high school graduates to sign public letters explaining why they refuse to serve. Many Shministim letters have been written in past years, and dozens of youth have signed the current letter for Shministim 2010. About 100 students signed the refusal letter in 2009.

According to Jewish Voice for Peace, the group that sponsors the Free the Shministi campaign, any “youth who sign the letter face jail terms in Israeli military prisons. Terms range from 21 to 28 days; those who refuse to wear a military uniform while in jail are sent to solitary confinement for the duration of their term.

After completing their sentence, they are then drafted again and if they refuse a second time, as most do, they face the same sentence. This can be a repeated process in which Shministim return home for a few days or longer and are then drafted and then imprisoned. Even through they refuse to serve, they still in a sense ‘belong’ to the military until they receive their discharge papers. A Shministi may never receive these papers, and although the Israeli military may tire of re-calling objectors into prison regularly, without these papers, an objector’s fate is always uncertain.
There is literally no end to the number of times youth might be sent back to jail.”

The Jewish Voice for Peace describes itself as “America’s largest national Jewish grassroots peace group dedicated to reaching a just peace between Israelis and Palestinians based on the principles of international human rights law.”

The group calls for a U.S. foreign policy based on promoting peace, democracy, human rights, and respect for international law; an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem; a resolution of the Palestinian refugee problem consistent with international law and equity; and an end to all violence against civilians

So, tonight, Or Ben-David, as you sit in an Israeli jail, I hope you know that your courage is an example and an inspiration to people all over the world, and a great reminder to us that all Israelis don’t support oppression. And here’s to brighter Chanukah’s to come. And to the grad student who posted about the Shministim, thank you.

Bombings continue in Iraq despite surge policy

Today, as the first of President Obama’s 30,000 additional “surge” troops begin to arrive in Afghanistan, it might be useful to take a look at the Bush surge in Iraq.

On Tuesday, a string of bombings killed nine people in two of Iraq’s largest cities, Baghdad and Mosul.

Examiner.com posted a slide show from these attacks here.

Last week, suicide bombings in Baghdad killed 127 people and wounded more than 500. Bombings in August and October, also in Baghdad, killed another 250 people.

According to The Associated Press, in Baghdad on Tuesday, “Three parked cars packed with mines and other bombs exploded within minutes of each other around 7:30 a.m. just outside different entrances to the Green Zone, just as Iraqis were coming to the area for work.”

The blasts killed five people and wounded at least 16.

The AP report said, “Four hours later and 225 miles away, in the northwestern Iraqi city of Mosul, two more car bombs and a roadside mine killed four people. The attacks appeared to target a busy neighborhood and a church, wounding up to 40 people.”

Of course, U.S. officials are quick to point out that violence, nationwide, is at its lowest level since 2003, a statistic that Iraqis may not find very comforting. It’s probably hard for many everyday Iraqis to see how the surge has changed their lives, with at least 386 people killed in bombings since August, let alone, the countless people killed in day-to-day violence.

The good news, for the United States, I suppose, is that Iraq’s prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, doesn’t see the bombings and other daily violence preventing the exit of U.S. troops, who are scheduled to leave by the end of 2011. Of course, that’s good news, too, for most Iraqis.

McDermott says he will vote against more U.S. troops in Afghanistan

Seattle Congressman Jim McDermott said today that he is against expanding the war in Afghanistan. This afternoon he sent out a fundraising email that made his position clear.

In the email, McDermott said, “Last week the President outlined the administration’s policy about the war in Afghanistan.

“I appreciate the time he took to carefully study all of our country’s options and inform our citizens of his plan.

“But at the end of the day, he simply did not convince me that escalating our country’s involvement in the War in Afghanistan is in our national interest…

“There is support in Congress to press for a vote on funding for new troops prior to sending them.

“I support the idea of a congressional vote. When that vote happens, I will vote against expanding a needless war and funding more troops.”

McDermott said he couldn’t support Obama’s troop surge because our country faces no immediate threat from Afghanistan and committing more troops to combat is not in our national interest.

He said: “We should be withdrawing troops from combat, not sending more of them into a conflict that the military cannot solve. At the end of the day, we will wind up with more people, both civilian and military, killed.”

On Dec. 2, right after Obama announced his Afghan surge, McDermott issued the following statement:

“The President’s speech tonight did not convince me that his policy is worth supporting. Last week, I attended a memorial service for seven servicemen from the same striker brigade from Fort Lewis who were killed on the same day in Afghanistan. I will not vote to send another troop to Afghanistan until I’m convinced that this strategy will succeed.

“No matter how many troops we commit, the United States cannot bring about the change necessary to stabilize Afghanistan. This responsibility ultimately falls on the Afghani government and its people, and no outsider can force this change to occur.

“Not only is this war costly in human terms, but it is bleeding our ability to provide for our own people and construct economic recovery and security at home.

“The Bush administration made a fatal mistake when it led us into Iraq and away from finishing the task in Afghanistan, and we have been paying the price ever since. I fear that we are asking our troops to fix a problem of our own making that the military cannot solve alone.”

In the fundraising email today, McDermott said, “Our country’s foreign policy toward the war in Afghanistan is another in a long list of difficult issues that Republicans will use in next year’s mid-term elections. They will also use our support of Health Care Reform and the much-needed jobs and stimulus programs in a desperate attempt to take over the Congress.

“Those of us who are outspoken advocates of progressive issues will be among their prime targets. But we cannot back down on our issues. Instead, all of us need to be ready to fight them next year.”

Ohio congressman to introduce bills calling for withdrawal from Afghanistan, Pakistan

Despite mounting public protests across the United States against sending more troops to Afghanistan, there has been little reaction from Congress. Now, there seems to be some rumblings of opposition. Yesterday, Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), following a speech on the floor of the House of Representatives released this statement:

“Today, I will begin circulating two privileged resolutions which will trigger debate and votes on a timely withdrawal of U.S troops from Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution of the United States makes it Congress’ responsibility to determine whether or not we go to war or stay at war. Consistent with Article 1, Section 8, the privileged resolutions will invoke the War Powers Resolution of 1973. I ask for your support of these resolutions, which will be introduced in the House in January.

“Yesterday, with the US Secretary of Defense at his side, the President of Afghanistan declared that his country’s security forces will need financial and training assistance from the United States for the next 15-20 years.

“We cannot afford these wars. We cannot afford the loss of lives. We cannot afford the cost to taxpayers. We cannot afford to fail to exercise our constitutional right to end the wars.

“Please sign onto the privileged resolutions to end the wars and to bring our troops home.
Stand up for the troops. Stand up for the truth. Stand up for the Constitution and Congress’ responsibility.”

Kucinich also sent the following letter to his colleagues under the heading, Require the President to Withdraw from Afghanistan and Pakistan:

“According to ABC News, Hamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan, in a joint press conference with Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, remarked that his country’s security forces will need financial and training assistance from the United States for the next 15-20 years. This is especially disturbing since the Administration is already sliding back the timeline the President established only last week. What Mr. Karzai did not say is that would cost U.S. taxpayers an additional $2-3 trillion.

“As President Obama prepares to escalate military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan, we must reassert our Constitutional prerogative as it relates to war. The United States has been involved in military action both in Afghanistan and Pakistan since the inception of the Obama Administration, despite the fact that the President has never submitted a report to Congress pursuant to Section 4(a) (I) of the War Powers Resolution.

“When Congress returns in 2010, I intend to bring to the floor of the House privileged resolutions reasserting this prerogative. My bills, which would trigger a timeline for a timely withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and Pakistan, invoke the War Powers Resolution of 1973 and are intended to secure the Constitutional role of Congress, as directly elected representatives of the people, under Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, to decide whether or not America enters into war, continues a war, or otherwise introduces armed forces or materiel into combat zones.

“Despite the President’s assertion that previous Congressional action gives him the authority to respond to the attacks of September 11, 2001, a careful reading of the Authorization of Use of Military Force (AUMF) makes clear that the AUMF did not supersede ‘any requirement of the War Powers Resolution’ and therefore did not undermine Congress’ ability to revisit the constitutional question of war powers at a later date.

“I invite you to join in reasserting Congress’ Constitutional right and obligation in these matters…”

Draft copies of the Kucinich bills can be read here and here.

Seattle anti-war protest planned as opposition to Afghanistan surge continues

Across the United States, there have been more than 100 demonstrations against sending more troops to Afghanistan since president Obama announced his “surge” plans. The demonstrations are in response to a national day of action called by Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Military Families Speak Out, The ANSWER Coalition, National Assembly, National Campaign for Non-Violent Resistance, Pledge of Resistance, Voices for Creative Non-Violence, World Can’t Wait, Code Pink and United for Peace & Justice.

And the protests are continuing. On Saturday, Seattle activists are gathering at 2 p.m. in Westlake Park at the urging of ANSWER (The Act Now to Stop War and End Racism coalition). The planned demonstration and protest is also endorsed by The World Can’t Wait, a group that began organizing in opposition to the Bush administration.

ANSWER described its opposition in a statement issued right after Obama said he was sending more troops to Afghanistan:

“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…

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.”

Meanwhile, violence in the region continues.

In Rawalpindi, Pakistan, news reports said, militants attacked a mosque near army headquarters, killing at least 36 worshippers, including six military officers, during Friday prayers. Officials said they sprayed gunfire and threw grenades before blowing themselves up.

The Associated Press said, “Violence in nuclear-armed Pakistan has escalated since the army launched an offensive in mid-October against Taliban militants in the northwestern tribal area of South Waziristan near the Afghan border.”

In Afghanistan, U.S. Marines launched a major operation today,

According to The Associated Press, “Hundreds of troops from the 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines and the Marine reconnaissance unit Task Force Raider were dropped by helicopter and MV-22 Osprey aircraft behind Taliban lines in the northern end of the Now Zad Valley of Helmand province, scene of heavy fighting last summer.”

Protests greet Obama’s troop buildup plan for Afghanistan

The protests against President Obama’s “surge” in Afghanistan were building even before he announced he would send 30,000 more troops to the war. Now, according to an Institute for Public Accuracy news release, they are in high gear.

World March organized a number of events for today in the United States and elsewhere. Ed Asner and Martin Sheen are among those joining the protests in Los Angeles. Chris Wells, the North America spokesperson for World March, said today: “We keep going down the same road. It’s important to denounce war, but we must build peace – we must change our entire mindset. During the Vietnam War, Martin Luther King Jr. said that the U.S. was the greatest purveyor of violence in the world and that if we didn’t end that military mindset we’d be protesting war in country after country. We’ll be participating in a tribute to King at the Lincoln
memorial this afternoon.”

The March has been endorsed by the presidents of eleven countries, and also by Desmond Tutu, Jimmy Carter, Noam Chomsky, Cornel West, Dennis Kucinich, Daniel Ellsberg, Cate Blanchett, Yoko Ono, Art Garfunkel, Philip Glass and hundreds more.

For more information, including a complete list of events in the United States, go to http://www.worldmarchusa.net .For events in other parts of the world, got to http://www.theworldmarch.org .

The IPA news release this morning also said Michael McPhearson, national executive director of Veterans For Peace, recently sent a letter to Obama saying: “With millions of U.S. people feeling the fear and desperation of no longer having a home; with millions feeling the terror and loss of dignity that comes with unemployment; with millions of our children slipping further into poverty and hunger, your decision to deploy thousands more troops and throw hundreds of billions more dollars into prolonging the profoundly tragic war in Afghanistan strikes us as utter folly. We believe this decision represents a war against ordinary people, both here in the United States and in Afghanistan. The war in Afghanistan, if continued, will result in the deaths of hundreds if not thousands of U.S. troops, and untold thousands of Afghans.”

Also, IPA listed a unique and more solitary protest by Thomas Mahany, a Vietnam veteran and a stonemason and artist from Michigan. Mahany has been protesting with a water-only fast in front of the White House since Veterans Day. Today, he sent a letter to Congress calling for an end to the military’s stop-loss policy, which is the involuntary extension of a service member’s active duty service in order to keep them in the military beyond the time they signed up for:

“The horrible mass murder at Fort Hood on November 5th was an alarm going off. On that day I decided I could no longer remain indifferent to such an obviously unjust Pentagon policy of troop procurement leading to rampant Post Traumatic Stress Disorder among our combat soldiers and placing unbearable hardship on the families of a very limited sector of our population.

“A new Army mental health survey of soldiers in Afghanistan shows that morale is down and mental stress increases with an increased number of deployments. Action is well past due to deal with the cruel and self-serving stop-loss strategy implemented by our military on a severely undermanned fighting force.”

While these protests are praiseworthy, it is also worth noting that Obama is only living up to his campaign promises. He said he would shift the war to Afghanistan, and he is doing that. On the domestic front, we got some “hope.” On the international front, we got a lot of goodwill toward the United States just for electing Obama. But as far as U.S. actions abroad, it’s still pretty much business as usual. We will still send our soldiers to fight for our business interests wherever those interests take us.

U.S. endorses conservative victor in Honduran presidential election

Christmas came early for the conservative victor in Sunday’s presidential election in Honduras. And, unfortunately, it’s the United States who is playing Santa.

The Associated Press reported that Porfiro Lobo, a wealthy and very conservative cattle rancher known affectionately as Pepe, called the race “the cleanest in the history of the country.” Pepe asked nations to recognize his government despite the controversy sparked by the military coup five months ago that ousted President Manuel Zelaya.

“We ask them … to see that they are punishing the people who went to vote, do so every four years and have nothing to do with what happened on June 28,” Lobo said, according to AP and other press reports on Monday.

The coup government has been ostracized internationally and most nations have said they would not recognize anyone elected under that coup government. On Tuesday, leaders from Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Spain and Portugal released a statement calling the coup “unacceptable,” saying that reinstating President Zelaya was “a fundamental step” the Central American country needed to take to return to constitutional normality. The leaders of Colombia, Peru and Costa Rica, however, had individually endorsed the election. The statement was released at the end of a three-day Iberoamerican summit in Estoril, Portugal.

“Respect for a democratic way of life has, especially in the Latin American region, a tragic history and because of that we have to defend democracy unconditionally,” Argentine President Cristina Kirchner, told a press conference.

The president of Spain, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, said all leaders opposed the coup but that “differences centered on how we evaluated the elections and their consequences.” The majority are refusing to recognize the results.

The Obama administration had previously indicated it would not recognize the results of any election unless Zelaya was first restored to power. But last week, the U.S. State Department said it backed the election process as an “essential part” of the solution to the crisis.

U.S. Ambassador Hugo Llorens went much farther on Monday, calling the election “a great celebration of democracy.”

“Pepe Lobo is a man of great political experience,” Llorens said. “I wish him luck, and the United States will work with him for the good of both our countries. … Our relations will be very strong.”

To its credit, the U.S. State Department did say that negotiations to create a unity government should continue. That unity government would hold power until Lobo takes office Jan. 27. Under a U.S.-brokered pact, Honduran lawmakers will vote Wednesday on whether Zelaya should be restored until Lobo takes office.

Zelaya, however, told BBC on Tuesday that the official turnout figures of some 60% were fraudulent. He also said he would refuse reinstatement even if Congress votes to restore him to serve out his term.

A Honduran political analyst, Eduardo Bahr, said the newly elected president would be a puppet of the United States.

“The winner in these elections has to follow the guidelines of Washington and act as an ideological cap on the progressive ideas in the south of the continent,” Bahr, director of the Honduran National Library and a political observer during the elections, in an interview to news agency TELESUR Monday.

Is this train wreck bound for a banana republic?