Concerned Families of Westchester Newsletter
February 5, 2023
Hi All – In recent months we have seen an escalation in the kind of weapons that the USA and other NATO countries are shipping to Ukraine. First there was artillery, and then there was the Patriot anti-missile system, and a week ago there were tanks. Now a Ukrainian request/demand for fighter jets is on the front burner. Increasingly, Americans (and Europeans) are asking, where is the going? And where will it end?
In the first months of the war, the Biden administration was cautious about sending advanced weapons to Ukraine, restricting weapons that had the capability of firing into Russian territory. The guidelines were to avoid provoking the Russians into an attack on NATO countries, which would risk nuclear war. But as each weapon-system delivery went by without a military response from Russia, and as Russia achieved little against the Ukrainian military, the USA/NATO has become bolder. Now there is talk about assisting Ukraine in retaking Crimea, an obvious Russian red line, but a core military objective for Ukraine.
It seems that both the Pentagon and the Biden administration are divided on the question of whether Ukraine can "win" the war, or whether a World War I-style stalemate will emerge. In either case, a military stalemate or military success by Ukraine (and its NATO supporters), the danger that Russia will use a nuclear weapon looms large, with escalation to nuclear war very likely. But what are the alternatives?
In recent months, this newsletter has supported the framework presented by Code Pink in arguing that US peace activists should focus on generating support for immediate negotiations, starting with talks between Washington and Moscow, and working for negotiations between Russia and Ukraine. As part of this effort, Washington should end its escalation on the kinds of weapons sent to Ukraine. Is this realistic? A good question, but where is the realism in allowing more tens of thousands of Russians and Ukrainians to die, in being blind to the risk of nuclear war, and allowing the collateral damage of this war – ignoring the climate crisis, enabling famine, etc. – to continue unchecked? As the USA and NATO now hold the purse strings and supply the weapons for one side in this conflict, we/they have not only the ability, but also the obligation to pursue a strategy of immediate cease fire and negotiations, rather than to bet everything on a Ukrainian military victory and the gentle demise of Russia.
Some Useful Reading on Weapons and War in Ukraine
(Video) The War in Ukraine: Contrasting Views with Medea Benjamin and Bill Fletcher
From the Central Jersey Coalition Against Endless War [
---- Two prominent activists, Medea Benjamin and Bill Fletcher Jr. were recently hosted by the Central Jersey Coalition Against Endless War for a 2 hour debate and discussion on the war in Ukraine and what an internationalist, anti-imperialist left response should look like. [See the Program]
Who's sending what to Ukraine: A new wave of Western weapons explained
By Ellen Francis, et al., Washington Post [February 2, 2023]
---- A new surge of increasingly elaborate weapons from Western countries could change the balance on the battlefield in Ukraine as Kyiv's major backers agree to successive requests that once made them balk. …Those weapons include Javelin antitank missiles, drones and High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) launchers. U.S.- and European-made weapons including tanks and air defense systems are expected to complement or replace largely Soviet-era technology in use by Ukrainian forces and allow them to use ammunition manufactured in the West. The deliveries could provide a significant advantage to Kyiv, although experts warn of technical and logistical hurdles still to be overcome. Here is a guide to some of the key weapons and vehicles that Ukraine's allies have recently agreed to send. [US, Germany, UK, France, Poland tanks, etc.] [Read More]
(Video) Prof. Richard Wolff: The Economics of the Ukraine War
From acTVism [Munich] [January 15, 2023]
---- In this episode of The Source, we talk with Professor Emeritus of Economics (University of Massachusetts) and founder of Democracy at Work, Richard Wolff, about the economic impact of the Ukraine war. We assess the impact of Western sanctions on Russia as well as how the war has affected the West economically. [See the Program] Also of interest is "Ukraine: Free Market Will Not Win the War," by Šuliokas Justinas, Against the Current [Link].
News Notes
NW Yonkers Neighbors for Black Lives Matter held a vigil last Monday to protest the murder of Tyre Nichols. It received TV coverage from News 12 and CBS and from a good article in The Yonkers Ledger [pictures by CFOW's Susan Rutman].
CFOW Nuts & Bolts
Please consider getting involved with Concerned Families of Westchester. Weather permitting, we meet for a protest/rally each Saturday in Hastings, at 12 noon at the VFW Plaza (Warburton and Spring St.) A "Black Lives Matter/Say Their Names" vigil is held (winter schedule) on the first Monday of each month; the next vigil will be February 6th, from 5:30 to 6:00 pm in Yonkers at the intersection of Warburton Ave. and Odell. Our newsletter is archived at https://cfow.blogspot.com/; and news of interest and coming events is posted on our CFOW Facebook page. Another Facebook page focuses on the climate crisis. If you would like to join one of our Zoom meetings, each Tuesday and Thursday at noon, please send a return email for the link. If you would like to support our work by making a contribution, please send your check to CFOW, PO Box 364, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY 10706. Thanks!
Beauty as Fuel for Change
A new project for CFOW is "Beauty as Fuel for Change." This is an arts project that brings together creators in many media around the theme of Beauty as an essential part of enabling work for positive social change. Several dozen artists are represented, including many Masters School art students. The exhibit will continue until February 17 at the Wenberg Family Art Gallery, Fonseca Center, Masters School, 49 Clinton Ave. in Dobbs Ferry. The exhibit is open Mondays through Fridays from 8:30 am to 4 pm.
Rewards!
This week's Rewards for stalwart readers are built around the sweet ballad by Carsie Blanton, "Rich People." Perhaps because of the insightful yet fair-and-balanced lyrics, the song/video went viral and gave Ms. Blanton a well-deserved career boost. Which is what she talks about – her career, not the song - in this interesting article from The Nation, "When My Song "Rich People" Went Viral, It Didn't Make Me Rich." Enjoy!
Best wishes,
Frank Brodhead
For CFOW
CFOW Weekly Reader
Featured Essays
(Video) Noam Chomsky on the 50th Anniversary of the End of the Vietnam War
From Green and Red [Australia] [January 24, 2023] – 60 minutes
----January 27th will mark the 50th Anniversary of the peace treaty that ended the American war against Vietnam, and Bob had a long discussion with Noam Chomsky about that event. They discussed the motives for the U.S. getting involved in Vietnam, the destruction unleashed by the U.S. against Vietnam, particularly the southern half, the betrayals during the negotiations, and the legacy of Vietnam. [See the Program]
How Russians, Indigenous People and Belarusians are uniting to resist the War in Ukraine
By Eleftheria Kousta, Waging Nonviolence [February 5, 2023] |
---- Even as diaspora Russians often find themselves on the receiving end of scornful sentiments, many are joining with antiwar activists in Russia and neighboring Belarus to form a growing global network of resistance that's gone largely overlooked. Despite the intense repression — where even a city council official can receive a 7-year prison sentence for criticizing the war — antiwar Russians and Belarusians can be found everywhere, engaging in resistance activities under the unifying phrase of "Free Russia, victory to Ukraine, justice for Belarus." It's these demands and a strong belief in people power that keep the movement alive despite adversity. [Read More]
Egalitarian Paradise Lost: David Graeber and the Pirates of Madagascar
----The search across the globe and in history for egalitarian societies turns up some strange finds. One anthropologist, the well-known, radical, recently deceased, best-selling author and a founder of the Occupy movement at Zuccotti Park, David Graeber, discovered such a world in Madagascar, in the settlements of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century pirates, recording his observations in a posthumous book, Pirate Enlightenment, Or the Real Libertalia. This portrait of a vanished almost-utopia is no idealization; Graeber lays it out in detail, but the conclusion is unavoidable: citizens of these pirate port towns had far more freedom than your average twenty-first century American prole moiling long hours for monopoly corporations. They also appear to have enjoyed a lot more happiness, you know, that thing we Americans are supposedly free to pursue. [Read More]
War & Peace
How local Peace Work changes Culture, Town by Town, Generation by Generation
---- Signs abound in Greenfield, Massachusetts' downtown shop windows, among them PEACE, ART NOT WAR, FOOD FOR ALL NOT WAR, SOLAR NOT WAR, MAKE TEA NOT WAR… Why have so many shop owners and institutions, including the Greenfield Library and Greenfield Community Television, agreed to offer their store windows and inside spaces for these signs? "Because there's nothing better than peace, John Lennon had it right," said Mindy Vincent owner of consignment boutique, Hens and Chicks. … Imagine: with peace education in grades K-12 of Greenfield schools, isn't it likely that disciplinary incidents, among them disruptive behavior, fighting, bullying and skipping school would continue their downward trend, as reported in the January 14 Greenfield Recorder. Would that not be one of the most useful education skills for life that we could give students? Good for them and good for the society they inhabit and will impact. [Read More]
The Pentagon Saw a Warship Boondoggle. Congress Saw Jobs.
---- The 387-foot-long warships tied up at the Jacksonville Navy base were acclaimed as some of the most modern in the United States fleet: nimble, superfast vessels designed to operate in coastal waters and hunt down enemy submarines, destroy anti-ship mines and repel attacks from small boats, like those often operated by Iran. But the Pentagon last year made a startling announcement: Eight of the 10 Freedom-class littoral combat ships now based in Jacksonville and another based in San Diego would be retired, even though they averaged only four years old and had been built to last 25 years. … Then the lobbying started. [Read More] Also of interest is "War Racketeers Won't Reform Themselves," by William Astore, The Nation [February 2, 2023] [Link].
Civil Liberties
On Targeting an Arab Woman
---- The complaint alleges that GW "discriminated against first-year Jewish and Israeli students in its professional psychology program" (sic). As an Arab woman professor teaching in the United States, I am accustomed to demands to prove that I am not antisemitic as a precondition to engaging relationally. Similarly, as someone who has been involved in abolitionist and anti-oppressive movements in the field of psychology for years, I immediately recognized that I was the next target of choice. In recent years, right-wing advocacy groups have intensified their harassment, red-baiting and attack campaigns, vilifying academics (and clinicians) who critically engage settler-colonialism, white supremacy, anti-blackness, gender (especially trans issues), sexuality, disability, reproductive rights. … What the facts, in glaring clarity do support, is that, like others before me, StandWithUs exploited students' political beliefs and targeted me because I am an Arab woman who is involved in scholarship and activism for Palestine and Palestinians. [Read More]
The State of the Union
This Is a Moral Crime ["Robbed of a Space to Mourn"]
By Charles M. Blow, New York Times [February 1, 2023]
---- Not only is their loss staggering, but their ability to grieve that loss has also been altered and interrupted, converted into politics and performance. Privacy is unavailable to them. As Hunter Demster, a local organizer, told me, the family has endured "vigil, after protest, after news conference, after news interview." Although he was leery of saying for certain, he didn't believe they'd "had a moment to sit and grieve." Mourning, properly, slowly and messily if needed, shouldn't be a luxury. It's the least that any of us deserves when tragedy befalls our families. [Read More] Also of interest – "The Memphis Police Are Not Bystanders to the Death of Tyre Nichols," by February 1, 2023] [Link].
'Stop Cop City' Forest Defenders Deserve To Be Protected Like Whistleblowers
By Kevin Gosztola, The Dissenter [February 1, 2023]
---- Forest defenders in Atlanta opposing the construction of a "Cop City" deserve the same protections that many believe should be extended to whistleblowers. However, activists organized under the banner of "Defend The Atlanta Forest" have been criminalized as "domestic terrorists," and Manuel Esteban Paez Terán, a forest defender, was killed by police on January 18. … Terán's death was a shock to American climate activists because police do not typically kill such activists in the United States. Global Witness has spent more than a decade documenting the deaths of defenders like Tortuguita. The organization contends that governments must "create a safe environment for defenders" by expanding laws to protect them just as they have done to protect whistleblowers. "Where such laws do not exist, new frameworks must be established." [Read More] Also of interest is "Deadly Violence Against Protesters Is the New Normal," by Michael Gould-Wartofsky, The Nation [February 2, 2023] [Read More]
Israel/Palestine
"We Shouldn't Grow Up Dreaming That Our Friends Don't Get Killed"
By Mohammed El-Kurd, The Nation [February 1, 2023]
---- The last year was, according to those who keep track, the deadliest year for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank in the last two decades. Israeli forces killed 190 Palestinians, 154 of them in the West Bank. And the new year is already proving to be a lot more deadly. When I first sat down to write this, there had been 15 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces, including four children, in the 18 days since 2023 began, yet global and often even national reactions have been increasingly apathetic. In the time since, Israeli forces have killed 17 more Palestinians, nine of whom were killed during a brutal raid of the Jenin Refugee Camp last Thursday, raising the death toll to 35. … Now, with the rise of an even more extremist Israeli government, soldiers and police are expected to have yet more freedom to harm than ever. According to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights, the new Israeli government's Jewish Power Party conditioned joining the coalition on codifying "Israel's policy of near-blanket impunity to its armed forces in cases involving Palestinians." The head of the party, Itamar Ben-Gvir—now the minister of national security—has asserted that each confrontation with Israeli security forces "will end with a dead terrorist." [Read More]
In Latest Visit Blinken Offers Nothing to Palestinians
ByFebruary 3, 2023]
[FB - Mitchell Plitnick is the president of ReThinking Foreign Policy. He is the co-author, with Marc Lamont Hill, of Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics.]
---- U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken made a quick tour of Egypt, Jordan, Israel, and Palestine this week, and the results were both predictable and revealing. Blinken warned the new Israeli government that its efforts to limit the democracy it offered to its Jewish citizens, via the gutting of its judiciary, would cause Israel problems in the United States. And he made clear to the Palestinians that the administration of Joe Biden would remain indifferent to their plight, offering no more than a few meaningless and empty gestures. … Blinken's approach here reflects the Biden administration's decision to focus on the question of Israeli "democracy." The administration has chosen to focus its attention there because if Israel cannot be portrayed as a democracy, it makes covering for its crimes harder and generally complicates efforts by Democrats to maintain their blind support for it. [Read More]
Also of interest – "Palestinian Lives In Peril As Israel Reinforces Apartheid," from [Link]; and "The myth of the 'cycle of violence'", by Amjad Iraqi, +972 Magazine [Israel] [January 31, 2023] [Link].
Our History
[FB – It is noteworthy that Black History Month arrives at a moment when lots of history – not just Black history – is contested and under attack in many states in the USA. To help us understand this, the admirable Historians for Peace and Democracy has compiled "The Culture Wars Against Education Archive," which you can access here.]
To Fight Attacks on "Critical Race Theory," Look to Black History
By Keisha N. Blain, The Nation [February 18, 2022]
---- In February 1926, historian Carter G. Woodson, known as the father of Black history, devised a strategy to address the failure to teach Black history in classrooms across the nation. By first establishing "Negro History Week," Woodson provided an avenue for educators to recognize and celebrate the history of people of African descent in the United States. In so doing, he disrupted educational norms shaped by white supremacy and anti-Blackness. Woodson and members of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History—the organization he had established several years earlier—created and distributed books, lesson plans, and other curriculum materials to aid teachers across the nation. Within five years of the program's creation, 80 percent of Black high schools in the United States were celebrating Negro History Week. [Read More] Also of interest – (Video) "Are conservatives trying to erase and rewrite US history?" From Aljazeera [Marc Lamont Hill] – 12 minutes - [Link].
(Video) Shattering the myth of Rosa Parks reveals the civil rights movement's true history
February 2, 2023] – 46 minutes
---- Sanitized histories of the Civil Rights Movement have erased the long history of activism and struggle that defined the life of Rosa Parks long before she defied Jim Crow codes on a Montgomery bus. Yet Rosa Parks's dedication to the Black freedom struggle preceded the Montgomery Bus Boycott by decades. She joined the campaign to free the Scottsboro Boys in 1932, and was elected secretary of the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP in 1943. As an NAACP member, Parks investigated the gang-rape of Recy Taylor, a Black woman from Alabama, and helped organize the Committee for Equal Justice for Recy Taylor, which brought national attention to the systemic sexual assault of Black women and helped lay the organizing foundations of the future Civil Rights Movement. [See the Program]
