[LAAMN] No More Victims - Video
No More Victims Watch the Video: http://www.nomorevictims.org/ END THE OCCUPATION NOW Recommended Resources http://www.kpfk.org/ http://www.kpfk.org/ http://www.commondreams.org/ http://www.commondreams.org/ Ara [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] --- LAAMN: Los Angeles Alternative Media Network --- Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Digest: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Help: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Post: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Archive1: http://www.egroups.com/messages/laamn --- Archive2: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/ * Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional * To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/join (Yahoo! ID required) * To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
[LAAMN] This fatal complacency
This fatal complacency Climate change is already destroying millions of lives in the poor world. But it will not stop there Desmond Tutu Saturday May 5, 2007 The http://www.guardian.co.uk Guardian What if dealing with climate change meant more than a flick of a switch? Would our friends in the industrialised world think differently if the effects of climate change were worse than extended summer months and the arrival of exotic species? Cushioned and cosseted, they have had the luxury of closing their minds to the real impact of what is happening in the fragile and precious atmosphere that surrounds the planet we live on. Where climate change has occurred in the industrialised world, the effects have so far been relatively benign. With the exception of events such as Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the inhabitants of North America and Europe have felt just a gentle caress from the winds of change. I wonder how much more anxious they might be if they depended on the cycle of Mother Nature to feed their families. How much greater would their concerns be if they lived in slums and townships, in mud houses, or shelters made of plastic bags? In large parts of sub-Saharan Africa, this is a reality. The poor, the vulnerable and the hungry are exposed to the harsh edge of climate change every day of their lives. Read the Full Article Here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2072984,00.html#article_continue Recommended Resources http://www.kpfk.org/ http://www.kpfk.org/ http://www.commondreams.org/ http://www.commondreams.org/ Ara [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] --- LAAMN: Los Angeles Alternative Media Network --- Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Digest: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Help: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Post: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Archive1: http://www.egroups.com/messages/laamn --- Archive2: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/ * Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional * To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/join (Yahoo! ID required) * To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
[LAAMN] Iraqi Lawmakers' Majority Reject Occupation, Hard Bigotry of the New York Times
Hi. I'll be away for a few days right after tomorrow morning's email, so these two essays are both headliners and a bit longer than usual. This afternoon's is quite fascinating, a very different analysis and proposal around Israel and Palestine. Don't miss it. . Ed http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/51624/?page=2 Majority of Iraqi Lawmakers Now Reject Occupation By Raed Jarrar and Joshua Holland, AlterNet: May 9, 2007. On Tuesday, without note in the U.S. media, more than half of the members of Iraq's parliament rejected the continuing occupation of their country. 144 lawmakers signed onto a legislative petition calling on the United States to set a timetable for withdrawal, according to Nassar Al-Rubaie, a spokesman for the Al Sadr movement, the nationalist Shia group that sponsored the petition. It's a hugely significant development. Lawmakers demanding an end to the occupation now have the upper hand in the Iraqi legislature for the first time; previous attempts at a similar resolution fell just short of the 138 votes needed to pass (there are 275 members of the Iraqi parliament, but many have fled the country's civil conflict, and at times it's been difficult to arrive at a quorum). Reached by phone in Baghdad on Tuesday, Al-Rubaie said that he would present the petition, which is nonbinding, to the speaker of the Iraqi parliament and demand that a binding measure be put to a vote. Under Iraqi law, the speaker must present a resolution that's called for by a majority of lawmakers, but there are significant loopholes and what will happen next is unclear. What is clear is that while the U.S. Congress dickers over timelines and benchmarks, Baghdad faces a major political showdown of its own. The major schism in Iraqi politics is not between Sunni and Shia or supporters of the Iraqi government and anti-government forces, nor is it a clash of moderates against radicals; the defining battle for Iraq at the political level today is between nationalists trying to hold the Iraqi state together and separatists backed, so far, by the United States and Britain. The continuing occupation of Iraq and the allocation of Iraq's resources -- especially its massive oil and natural gas deposits -- are the defining issues that now separate an increasingly restless bloc of nationalists in the Iraqi parliament from the administration of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose government is dominated by Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish separatists. By separatists, we mean groups who oppose a unified Iraq with a strong central government; key figures like Maliki of the Dawa party, Shia leader Abdul Aziz Al-Hakeem of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), Vice President Tariq Al-Hashimi of the Sunni Islamic Party, President Jalal Talabani -- a Kurd -- and Masoud Barzani, president of the Kurdish Autonomous Region, favor partitioning Iraq into three autonomous regions with strong local governments and a weak central administration in Baghdad. (The partition plan is also favored by several congressional Democrats, notably Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware.) Iraq's separatists also oppose setting a timetable for ending the U.S. occupation, preferring the addition of more American troops to secure their regime. They favor privatizing Iraq's oil and gas and decentralizing petroleum operations and revenue distribution. But public opinion is squarely with Iraq's nationalists. According to a poll by the University of Maryland's Project on International Public Policy Attitudes, majorities of all three of Iraq's major ethno-sectarian groups support a unified Iraq with a strong central government. For at least two years, poll after poll has shown that large majorities of Iraqis of all ethnicities and sects want the United States to set a timeline for withdrawal, even though (in the case of Baghdad residents), they expect the security situation to deteriorate in the short term as a result. That's nationalism, and it remains the central if unreported motivation for many Iraqis, both within the nascent government and on the streets. While sectarian fighting at the neighborhood and community level has made life unlivable for millions of Iraqis, Iraqi nationalism -- portrayed as a fiction by supporters of the invasion -- supercedes sectarian loyalties at the political level. A group of secular, Sunni and Shia nationalists have long voted together on key issues, but so far have failed to join forces under a single banner. That may be changing. Reached by phone last week, nationalist leader Saleh Al-Mutlaq, of the National Dialogue Front, said, We're doing our best to form this united front and announce it within the next few weeks. The faction would have sufficient votes to block any measure proposed by the Maliki government. Asked about the Americans' reaction to the growing power of the nationalists, Mutlaq said, We're trying our best to reach out to the U.S. side, but to no avail. That appears to be a trend.
[LAAMN] UC Students and Alumni to Hunger Strike to Demand Nuclear Weapons Lab Severance (commondreams)
Home | Contacting Us | About Us | Donate | Sign-Up | Archives var mydate=new Date() var theYear=mydate.getFullYear() var day=mydate.getDay() var month=mydate.getMonth() var daym=mydate.getDate() if (daym Wednesday, May 09, 2007 Home Progressive Community NewsWire For Immediate Release Printer Friendly Version E-Mail This Article FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MAY 8, 2007 6:16 AM CONTACT: Nuclear Age Peace Foundation Ellen McClure, 2nd-year UCSB student: (858) 663-9326 Mark Valen, 3rd-year UCSC student: (619) 395-2794 Chelsea Collonge, UC Berkeley alumna: (408) 813-5625 Will Parrish, NAPF: (805) 965-3443 Jedidjah de Vries, Tri-Valley CAREs: (925) 443-7148 University of California Students and Alumni to Hunger Strike to Demand Nuclear Weapons Lab Severance SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA - May 8 - WHAT: UC Student Alumni Hunger Strike WHEN: Wednesday, May 9th until ? WHERE: UC Santa Barbara, UC Santa Cruz, and UC Berkeley WHO: The Coalition to Demilitarize the UC and supporters Students and alumni at three UC campuses will begin a fast this week to demand that the University of California stop designing, engineering and manufacturing nuclear bombs. Many of them pledge to go without solid food until the demand is met. The hunger strikers are calling on the Regents to pass a resolution at their next meeting -- scheduled for May 17th -- severing all ties to the nuclear weapons complex (see attached). The UC has managed, since their inception, the two US national labs responsible for all nuclear weapon design in the U.S., Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). This bold act of principled non-violent resistance is timed in response to the US Nuclear Weapons Councils recent announcement that LLNL would design the first new Hydrogen bomb since the end of the Cold War, as well as to the planned resumption of plutonium bomb core (pit) manufacturing en masse at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in 2008. These programs are the first step in plans to revamp the entire nuclear weapons complex, under the auspices of the DOEs Complex 2030. There has never been a more critical time for the UC Regents to take a principled stand against the US nuclear weapons programs, says Will Parrish, a UCSC alumnus (2004) who has pledged to go without solid food until the Regents meet the demand for severance. They are in a very powerful position to do so: They can withdraw their management of the Los Alamos and Livermore labs, which are the keystone institutions in the US nuclear weapons complex. They could cast the UC's enormous political and intellectual weight on the side of international law and morality, and seize this opportunity to work toward nuclear disarmament. To do otherwise is to continue to provide a much-needed veneer of academic legitimacy to the creation and maintenance of weapons that poison communities and endanger the entire world. According to second-year UCSB student Ellen McClure, The university should not be involved in any way with the production of weapons of mass destruction. The UC's involvment has done nothing to make the research at the labs more transparent or less deadly. Jedidjah de Vries, outreach director of Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment (CAREs), said: The programs of the UCs nuclear weapons labs threaten our security by driving foreign nations to develop their own weapons, as well as our environment by continuing to contaminate the already heavily-polluted nuclear weapons complex sites. It also opens the door to new nuclear tests, something the U.S. has not done since 1992 and is banned under the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Not only is severing ties with the labs the right thing to do, but it would have a real impact on the ability to carry out this plan and begin building new nuclear bombs. During the week the hunger strikers will camp at central locations on their individual campuses. You can follow their progress at: http://nonukeshungerstrike.blogspot.com. On May 17th they will converge, along with supporters, at the regents' meeting in San Francisco to hold the Regents accountable to the will of the students and to the moral responsibility of the university. Student governments at multiple campuses have passed resolutions opposing the UC's ties to the weapon labs, and more are considering similar resolutions. The students of the UC have a long history of organizing and taking action on this issue. The multi-campus Coalition to Demilitarize the UC has worked on several fronts to sever the UC's nuclear ties, including writing letters, generated petitions and speaking at Regents meetings during the public comments period. Most recently, this past November, they undertook an act of nonviolent civil resistance, disrupting the Regents meeting
[LAAMN] Henry Lowi on Avnery/Pappe public debate
From: Sid Shniad On Public debate ONE or TWO STATES with Avnery Pappe Gush Shalom Forum, May 8, Tel-Aviv By Henry Lowi: May 7, 2007 11:21 PM Dear Friends: The Avnery-Pappe debate will take place on Wednesday, May 8th, according to the notice below. See also: English http://www.hagada.org.il/eng/modules.php?name=Newsfile=articlesid=167 http://www.hagada.org.il/eng/modules.php?name=Newsfile=articlesid=169 Hebrew http://www.hagada.org.il/hagada/html/modules.php?name=Newsfile=articlesid=5324 http://www.hagada.org.il/hagada/html/modules.php?name=Newsfile=articlesid=5332 My comments follow: The public debate between Uri Avnery and Ilan Pappe is a welcome event. Uri Avnery, who was “a machine-gunner in the Samson's Foxes commando unit,” participated as a young man from Europe in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, which Ilan Pappe has described so well in his recent book. Uri Avnery became an intrepid and tireless campaigner for a peace agreement between the State of Israel and the Palestinian leadership. Ilan Pappe is a spokesperson for the Right of Return of the Palestine refugees. The very fact that this public debate is being held is a sign of the dissatisfaction of peace activists with the old strategies and the old slogans, and an openness to new ideas, previously thought to be “beyond the pale”. Unlike Avnery and Pappe, I am not today on the front lines of the struggle in Israeli-occupied Palestine. Nevertheless, I am as interested as anyone that the political debate not get bogged down in false dichotomies or in secondary issues. Briefly put, in my view, the important issue is not the number of states, but rather the quantity and the quality of the rights enjoyed by the people. So, there needs to be a discussion about goals. There is a no less important discussion about the slogans, the immediate demands, and the transitional demands, that form part of the strategic bridge to get from here to there. Partition and Nakba It should be recognized that the “one state-2 states” debate revisits the debates of the 30s and 40s. Moreover, with the benefit of hindsight, we can ask: From the point of view of securing peace and security in Palestine, was the Partition resolution of November 29th, 1947 correct? Further, was the war of 47-48 a just war, on the Israeli side, a war for national independence and national defense? Or was it an unjust war of conquest, occupation, and ethnic cleansing? Israeli supporters of the so-called “2 state solution”, while purporting to be “realistic and pragmatic”, tend to support the Israeli side in the Nakba. They should admit this historic position openly or, rather, abandon it. The Partition resolution needs be reconsidered, and analyzed, and denounced explicitly, and in detail. There is good reason to re-visit the positions taken by those democrats, worker-activists, and socialists who opposed Partition in the 1940s. The consequences of Partition – a Zionist state that prevents Palestinian self-determination, threatens the region, and serves as a death-trap for the Israelis – must be exposed in detail. This is not a matter only of historical narrative and perspective. In October 2000, Arik Sharon noted that the 1948 war was still being fought. In fact, the “1948 file” was re-opened in Israel on Land Day 1976. The Partition resolution and the ethnic cleansing of 1947-48 must be re-evaluated in order to find the path to a peaceful modus vivendi in the Holy Land. End the Occupation One of the arguments of those peace activists who support the so-called “2 state solution” is that the oppression and suffering caused by the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip is so acute that ending this occupation, and this oppression, and this suffering, is and must be an urgent priority. This is a powerful argument for a mass movement, in Israel and the occupied territories, to demand the unconditional end to the occupation. It is not an argument in favor of the so-called “2 state solution”, either as understood by Bush-Olmert, or by the Geneva Initiative, or by Gush Shalom. The organized struggle to end the occupation need not be submerged in either “2 state” diplomacy, or in “one state” pie-in-the-sky. The strength of the anti-Zionists organized in Matzpen immediately after the June 67 was expressed in the demand: “Down with the occupation!” No ifs, ands, or buts. This is also the slogan and the goal that mobilizes most people for struggle in the occupied territories. The Palestinian activists who risk their lives to end the Israeli occupation do not thereby endorse Partition or the so-called “2 state solution”. They merely want to be free. For them, a future “independent state of Palestine” need not be one that accommodates the Zionist entity. In Israel, the fight to end the occupation is key to demonstrating solidarity with the oppressed. A commitment to removing the yoke of occupation and oppression from the Palestinian people, and thus open the way for them to freely
[LAAMN] COMMUNITY GROUPS CONFRONT LAPD AND CHIEF BRATTON ABOUT MAY DAY POLICE RIOT
Please Forward 5/08/07 If the LAPD acts like this in broad daylight in front of cameras, what do they do at night? Groups and individuals from the community had an opportunity to confront Police Chief Bratton and the Police Commission at Parker Center today regarding May Day attacks by the LAPD on thousands of peaceful demonstrators in MacArthur Park. Some of the groups represented were recently formed group of community activists called The Peoples Network in Defense of Human Rights, CopWatch, The Bus Riders Union, Chirla, Caracen, Miwon, Los Angeles Federation of Labor, the ACLU, the L.A. Community Action Network, the International Action Network, and others. People were very united in their opinions and demands today even though there had been some initial discord among some of the groups. Seen as a huge problem by many is a statement made by some of the organizers that the youth and anarchists had been responsible for inciting the police at the event. Many feel that statements like this that demonize and hang the youth out to dry are extremely unfortunate; especially since many youth had been involved with the organizing and were some of the first to reach out to protect others, suffering hits by rubber bullets for their trouble. And even more important, pointing fingers at people from inside the movement takes the spotlight away from the real culprit, the LAPD. We cannot be blamed for what the cops did, said a member of CopWatch. The LAPD are to blame, and they are the only ones to blame; was the overwhelming consensus at todays hearing. According to the speakers, the police were aggressive from the start, and there were reports that they had been rehearsing maneuvers and drills hours before the marchers even arrived at the park. This is the story that was told: The peaceful and diverse march had begun at 3:pm at Vermont and 3rd. Street. As the thousands of participants approached the park at Alvarado and 7th Streets, the police had closed the area to traffic. Since the streets were full of demonstrators and there was no traffic, the Aztec dancers created a circle to commemorate the event in a sacred and ancient ceremony of traditional dance and drums. The ceremony was well under way when, with no warning, the LAPD charged into it in full force with dozens of motorcycles in a cacophonic and frightening display of sirens and flashing lights. People were pushed and shoved into each other by motorcycles, and as some later accurately said, the onslaught was, in fact, an attack by deadly weapons. Children were screaming and elders struggled to move. When they couldnt get away fast enough, younger people stood in front of them to protect them. At least one young woman was punched hard in the belly by a police baton and had to be taken to the hospital for a cat scan. This was not the only event that happened. As I mentioned in an article I previously posted on the Free Press website, www.losangelesfreepress.com, around the same time there was something similar happening on Wilshire Blvd. where it intersects the park. Seemingly planned and coordinated events by the LAPD, as if trying to piss people off and start .what? A riot that could be later blamed on the people? And people were getting pissed. Even so they didnt lose it; they didnt riot. There was a stand off a stare off at Alvarado. The cops quickly built up their forces there; Special Forces in riot gear, squad cars, motorcycles, an army staring down a few kids. And a few water bottles were thrown ..into the street. Water bottles that were later characterized as missiles .attacks on the police. Water bottles against an army with weapons in riot gear! The supposed spark that sent the cops on the attack. And meanwhile, thousands of people, unaware of these happenings, were enjoying the post-march demonstration in the park. It was like a huge picnic with food and ice cream vendors, speakers and live music; everything from Latin Cumbias to Rock. There were free form theater groups in the grass. The band Fosforo had just started a rendition of Bob Marleys War in Spanish, a song that says that as long as there are different classes and some people are considered better than others because of the color of their skin there will be war ..and just at that point, the police attacked the crowd. There was no warning; just a well-organized army moving in like the well-documented jack- booted thugs of lore. But this legend shot 240 real rubber bullets at real bodies. This legend moved in with real tear gas in well-rehearsed military fashion; terrifying and shocking young and old. This was a real attack. And the stories. One old homeless man sleeping by a tree woke up confused, and the police beat him. Even television news crews werent exempt, and were forced into the story as cameras and equipment went flying
[LAAMN] EVENT: Survival, Dignity Well-Being of Indigenous Peoples, 5/14, NYC
Please circulate. This was the event we agreed to coordinate by consensus at the NA Regional meeting, and I hope all regions will participate. Please all, bring your tribe, organization and/or Nation banner or flag, traditional dress and regalia, and cultural presentations (drums, songs, etc) to share, We will celebrate our continued collective survival, courage and dignity, renew our spirit of struggle, and send prayers for the natural world and all our relations. Thanks to all, Andrea Carmen Executive Director, IITC 456 N. Alaska St. Palmer AK 99645 phone: (907) 745-4482, fax: (907) 745-4484 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web site: www.treatycouncil.org * Cultural Event âTHE SURVIVAL, DIGNITY AND WELL-BEING OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLESâ Indigenous Peoples celebrating our Rights! Please join us and support the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Monday, May 14th from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. hosted by the North America Region Indigenous Peoplesâ Caucus. everyone is invited Dag Hammarskjold Plaza East 47th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenues Contact Andrea Carmen and Ed John, Co-coordinators, NA regional caucus [EMAIL PROTECTED], 212-682-3633, ext. 3123 | [EMAIL PROTECTED] + Alyssa Macy Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, Oregon Indigenius Media http://www.indigeniusmedia.com + [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] --- LAAMN: Los Angeles Alternative Media Network --- Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Digest: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Help: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Post: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Archive1: http://www.egroups.com/messages/laamn --- Archive2: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/ * Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional * To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laamn/join (Yahoo! ID required) * To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
