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Venezuela Solidarity Committee Launched in Boston

Boston-area activists founded the Venezuela Solidarity Committee on March 5, 2016 at a meeting at Encuentro 5 in downtown Boston.  The new group will support self-determination and the rights of all historically oppressed peoples in Venezuela and oppose any form of US intervention.  In addition to serving as a media resource, activities will include education, lobbying, sister-city programs and campaigns such as supporting the Citizens Energy Oil Heat Program in Massachusetts.

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2016 has already proven to be a very active year for the peace movement, as groups around the country take action on urgent issues like the Syrian Crisis, US weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, and the catastrophic War on Yemen.

Please scroll down to learn about 3 significant mass mobilizations that United for Peace and Justice is endorsing in April.

The new drone film Eye in the Sky presents a dishonest, sugar-coated view of the U.S. killer drone operation.  It claims that they can precision-drop their bombs, only on selected known targets who will kill innocent people, so, of course, they are saving many lives.  When one child wanders into the kill zone, they agonize about the possibility of killing her, and kick it up to the U.S. Secretary of State and the British Prime Minister to get the okay.  The not-made-in-Hollywood reality is one of killing hundreds, if not thousands, of children in many countries to satisfy U.S.

The worst worries of a child’s school day should be homework. Maybe a lost book, or an argument with a friend. No child’s walk to school should routinely involve armed soldiers and fear of sometimes being chased and assaulted by angry adults. But for the Palestinian children who live with their families in the small rural villages that make up the South Hebron Hills, this is how the school day begins. Illegal settlements and outposts isolate and separate their villages and soldiers are a constant in their lives.

Add your name to Open Letter to Pres. Obama -- Stop Deporting Central American Families

Posted at Counterpunch and Common Dreams:

Remarks delivered at "Welcome Refugees - War is Not the Answer" candlelight vigil, December 10, 2015, Boston Common.   Photos

In our war culture we learn to define the "other" -- the "outsider" -- as an "enemy" from our earliest hours.  The "enemy" is depersonalized in wars to make killing easier, so that it's easier not to care and to close our eyes and hearts to the inflicted horrors that all wars are. What needs to happen is a total transformation. We need to recognize the humanity of others – one way to do that is to welcome war refugees (sometimes mistermed migrants or immigrants by the media) – as we take responsibility for the consequences of the wars waged in our names by our government.

Those of us who work for peace day after day, week after week, year after year, decade after decade are among those who do take that step toward recognition of the humanity of others. We abhor the bombs dropping on children, mothers, fathers, grandparents. I always think – hey – there are people down there – it's not shock and awe it's murder!  I find it very painful when I stand with my sign for peace and people in my community drive past shouting out justifications for bombing and killing – even one time - thankfully only one time- "nuke 'em". The violence here and wars there are out of control, we are eclipsed by events that worsen daily and our voices continue unheeded. 

A full-page ad calling for every public figure, elected politician and media outlet to stand up against the "dangerous tide of hatred, violence, and suspicion" that is being expressed across the U.S. with more than 700 organizations and individuals appeared in the Thursday, December 10, 2015 New York Times. 

The ad launches a campaign opposing racism, bigotry and violence called #We Are Better Than This.

What: Candlelight Vigil

When: Tonight, Thursday, December 10, 5:30 pm

Where: Park Street Station, downtown Boston

Boston, December 10-- With deep concern about intolerant calls to block Muslims from entering the U.S. and a growing hatred of Muslim-Americans, local residents will hold a candlelight vigil tonight outside Park Street T-Station on the International Day for Human Rights.

by Joseph Gerson and Paul Shannon

At Common Dreams: http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/12/06/war-and-fortress-america-dangerous-answers and also at ZNet:  https://zcomm.org/znetarticle/war-and-fortress-america-dangerous-answers/ 

In the early morning of Wed. Nov. 18, 2015 a protest line formed in front of the Newton Marriott saying that Water is a Basic Human Right and that the Jewish National Fund, (JNF) should stop taking land and water from Palestinians.  

November 14, 2015 - 2:20 pm

France is in mourning and in shock. We still don’t know how many people were killed and injured. In fact, there’s a lot we still don’t know—including who was responsible. The ISIS claim of responsibility tells us virtually nothing about who really planned or carried out the attacks; opportunist claims are an old story. But the lack of information hasn’t prevented lots of assumptions about who is “obviously” responsible and what should be done to them. Already the call is rising across France—“this time it’s all-out war.”

But we do know what happens when cries of war and vengeance drown out all other voices; we’ve heard them before.

There are 60 million refugees in the world, the same number as were refugees at the end of WW II. 

On October 31 in an unprecedented joint warning, the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and Peter Maurer, President of the International Committee of the Red Cross called for "states to stop conflicts, respect international law and aid refugees." Criticizing the global response to the refugee crisis, Ban Ki-moon said, "In the face of blatant inhumanity, the world has responded with disturbing paralysis."