Solidarity

Recently, I received a message from Walaa Alghussein, a wonderful journalist from Gaza, about unfolding events in Palestine. In few, but very prescient words, she summed up the on-going explosive resistance on the ground: “cheers to the 90’s generation . . . it’s proving that this generation of Oslo was just being underestimated.” Walaa, an activist member of this generation herself, got me to thinking — she always does; this time about defiant resistance, our youthful rebels and our collective future.

Unlike the Republican carnival sideshows masquerading as debates, the first Democrat Party presidential nomination candidates debate was actually significant and historic (yes, yes, you’re right, it was a highly choreographed, staged event and it was in no sense a real debate, but it was historic nonetheless). All the five candidates presented themselves a social-liberals, the first time that has happened in more than four decades.

Here I go again – the at-will piece of human detritus that I am, according to Oregon’s great employers, twice now, non-profits, sacking me because I pushed the state’s vocational rehabilitation careerists outside their pathetic Little Eichmann lives by pushing for my clients – adults with developmental-intellectual-psychological disabilities – to get as much out of the state’s bureaucracies that are filled with middling folk who do not give a shit about people.

My fellow revolutionaries, internationalists, and travelers on the road to social justice,
I’m writing this letter to praise the legacy of a great man, and to remind you of how much we owe to his selfless efforts.  A phrase is etched into his monument and mausoleum in Santa Clara, Cuba beneath his towering, south facing sculpture.  He signed all personal correspondence with those same immortal words:  “Hasta la Victoria Siempre”.  Until Victory, Always.

A small town of Distomo is just 150 kilometers from Athens, positioned in the heart of Greece, literally squeezed between two great world heritage sites: Delphi, the cradle of the European democracy, and a stunning Byzantine monastery of Hossios Luckas.

From July 24-26 over 1500 registered Black activists and organizers from all over the U.S., Canada and even the Caribbean converged in Cleveland, Ohio for the 2015 Movement for Black Lives Convening. In addition to police terror and state violence, pertinent issues such as mass incarceration, economic empowerment, education, culture, housing and Black health were all working parts to an overwhelmingly incredible weekend.

As many of you already know, Alison Weir (no relation, and she pronounces her name WEER while mine is pronounced WAH-YER) and her organization, If Americans Knew (IAK), have been expelled from the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation (USCEIO). I decided to get to the bottom of this important development, so I got in touch with Rube Joshner at the USCEIO, who agreed to be interviewed on condition of anonymity.
Barb Weir: For our readers who may not know, could you please explain why the USCEIO expelled IAK and Alison Weir from your organization?

 by Syria Solidarity Movement
 We are Palestinians and Palestinian organizations that declare our solidarity with the Syrian people in their historic struggle for survival, now in its fifth year.  We are in a unique position to understand and appreciate the challenges facing our Syrian brothers and sisters, because we face the same challenges.

Please be advised that the Free Palestine Movement resigns from the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, effective immediately.
We resign because of the disgraceful, disrespectful and unjust treatment of Alison Weir and her organization, If Americans Knew, in the procedures to expel her from the Campaign on the spurious grounds of insufficient avoidance of anti-Semitic persons and institutions.
We resign because it is clear that the decision had been made to expel IAK before the proceedings to do so had ever begun.

We are Palestinians and Palestinian organizations that declare our solidarity with the Syrian people in their historic struggle for survival, now in its fifth year.  We are in a unique position to understand and appreciate the challenges facing our Syrian brothers and sisters, because we face the same challenges.