Concerned Families of Westchester Newsletter
August 18, 2024
Hello All – The intersection of foreign and domestic politics is a constant in the US management of its many wars. This is especially true this week, as the Democrats attempt to finesse a national convention without disruption from broad opposition to its support for Israel's war on Gaza. On Thursday, when Kamala Harris will be officially nominated as the Democratic presidential candidate, negotiations to end the war on Gaza, or at least to establish a ceasefire, will resume. The failure to reach an agreement will very likely plunge the Middle East into a regional conflict, with Israel and the USA at war with Iran, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Yemen. If/when this happens, all bets are off, both in the Middle East and in the US presidential election.
What should our peace movement do? We have moved from calling for a ceasefire, a slogan parroted by insincere politicians, to a demand that our government send "not another bomb' to Israel – an arms embargo. The Harris campaign had stated that this is totally unacceptable, that Israel has the right to defend itself against Iran (!) and its "proxies." The Democratic National Committee, through its actions and proclamations, has made it clear that pro-Palestinian actions at the Convention will be stifled – even though an arms embargo as a step toward ending the war is supported by a majority of Democratic voters.
If, as many experts on Israel/Gaza are now discussing, next week's talks fail to reach a useful agreement, the USA and Israel will do what it can to spin this disaster as being the fault of Hamas. If this is not true, if Netanyahu's insistence that Israel can continue or renew its war against Gaza whenever it wants to is the cause of the negotiating impasse, the antiwar/peace movement in the USA will have its work cut out for it, fighting a patriotic tide of media bias blaming Hamas, etc.
These are very difficult times, and peace activists have been hard at work for ten months attempting to educate our neighbors and persuade our politicians that the war on Gaza is unjust, viciously cruel, and terribly dangerous. We can't rest now. Work for peace.
Illuminating The Week That Was
(Video) What are the prospects for talks to Israel's war on Gaza?
From Aljazeera ["Inside Story"] [August 17, 2024]
---- Discussions brokered by the US, Qatar and Egypt to resume in Cairo. Israel and Hamas are studying proposals from mediators. But what are the chances of a ceasefire this time? [See the program]. Also of interest is "Marwan Bishara on the chances (and remaining obstacles) to a ceasefire agreement in Gaza," from Aljazeera [August 16, 2924] [Link].
(Video) Former Israeli Peace Negotiator Daniel Levy: U.S. Is Part of "Axis of Zionist Extremism"
From Democracy Now! [August 13, 2024] ---- The United States, Qatar and Egypt are urging Israel and Hamas to hold a new round of negotiations to finalize a ceasefire deal in Gaza. However, Hamas is urging mediators to enforce the ceasefire terms proposed by President Biden in May that Hamas already agreed to and that Israel rejected. Daniel Levy, president of the U.S./Middle East Project and a former Israeli peace negotiator under Prime Ministers Ehud Barak and Yitzhak Rabin, says U.S.-led efforts for a ceasefire are likely to fail as long as the Biden administration remains unwilling to pressure Israel. [See the Program]
The Ghost of Hubert Humphrey Is Stalking Kamala Harris
By Norman Solomon, ZNet [August 15, 2024]
---- After the Democrat in the White House decided not to run for reelection, the vice president got the party's presidential nod — and continued to back the administration's policies for an unpopular war. As the election neared, the candidate had to decide whether to keep supporting the war or speak out for a change. Hubert Humphrey faced that choice in 1968. Kamala Harris faces it now. Despite the differences in eras and circumstances, key dynamics are eerily similar. The history of how Vice President Humphrey navigated the political terrain of the war in Vietnam has ominous parallels with how Vice President Harris has been dealing with the war in Gaza. [Rad More] Also of interest is "Kamala's Path to Victory Requires a Message That Speaks to the Concerns of America's Multi-Racial Working Class," by Nicholas Powers, The Indypendent [NY] [August 15, 2024] [Link].
News Notes
On Saturday, CFOW hosted a "Not Another Bomb" rally, one of hundreds still taking place across the USA. We had a good turnout and a spirited protest, with people joining us from across Westchester. To see a good picture of the stalwarts in action, go here.
The "Not Another Bomb" protest movement is an attempt from pro-Palestinian, antiwar forces to move the Democratic Party (and its Convention) beyond nice words about "ceasefire now" and towards an arms embargo if Israel refuses to end its war. This site by Jewish Voice for Peace explains more, and helps us to contact our congressional representatives to demand action.
The defeats of congressional representatives Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush in primary elections in which the pro-Israel lobbies had invested millions of dollars against them calls for some serious thinking about campaign financing. A good place to start is 'Progressive anger with AIPAC rises over Bush loss," by Hanna Trudo, The Hill [August 11, 2024] [Link].
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 in Yonkers on Mondays from 5:30 to 6:00 pm 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 make out your check to "Frank Brodhead," write "CFOW" on the memo line, and send your check to CFOW, PO Box 364, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY 10706. Thanks!
Rewards!
Helping me through this weekend's writing was a new compilation of great tunes from the New Orleans band Tuba Skinny. So this 52-song music video is the reward for this week's stalwart newsletter readers, starting out with "Jackson Stomp." Enjoy!
Best wishes,
Frank Brodhead
For CFOW
CFOW Weekly Reader
Featured Essays
The Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples
By Aviva Chomsky, Tom Dispatch [August 9, 2024]
---- Indigenous peoples have been under siege by colonizers for hundreds of years, even if their struggles for land and sovereignty only gained true international recognition in the late twentieth century, a time when, ironically enough, they were experiencing new assaults on their lands globally. Since World War II, the unprecedented growth of both the world's population and global consumption levels have pushed resource use far beyond any limits once imagined. And that scramble for resources only accelerated starting in the 1990s, which meant further encroachment on Indigenous territories — and, of course, an onrushing climate catastrophe. Since then, however, the growing visibility and power of Indigenous movements have created enormous potential for fundamentally changing our world in a positive fashion. … A deeper dive into colonialism and Indigenous peoples can help clarify the nature of such movements today and, curiously enough, some of the debates around the Israeli-Palestinian question as well. [Read More]
The Geneva Conventions at 75: Do the laws of war still have a fighting chance in today's bloody world?
By Marnie Lloydd and Te Herenga Waka, The Conversation [August 12, 2024]
---- It has been 75 years since the adoption of the Geneva Conventions on August 12 1949. In theory, these rules of war are universally agreed by every nation. In practice, they are routinely violated everywhere. With an estimated 120 armed conflicts worldwide, more than 450 armed groups and 195 million people living in areas under their control, the protection of the vulnerable is as vitally important as ever. As the news headlines remind us daily, however, international humanitarian law can seem like too little, too late when faced with military might and political indifference. [Read More] Also of interest is "They Would Not Know Us," by Matthew Hoh, Counterpunch [August 15, 2024] [Link].
The War on Gaza
(Video) "Incomprehensible": U.S. Approves $20 Billion in New Arms for Israel as Gaza Death Toll Tops 40,000
From Democracy Now! [August 15, 2024]
---- Health officials in Gaza said Thursday that the official death toll from Israel's 10-month war has topped 40,000, though that is believed to be a vast undercount of the true figure. The grim milestone was reached just days after the Biden administration greenlit $20 billion in additional weapons sales to Israel, including 50 F-15 fighter jets, tank ammunition, mortar rounds, tactical vehicles and advanced air-to-air missiles. The U.S. approved the sales despite growing calls for an arms embargo on Israel. [See the Program] Also of interest is "In Gaza, Israel's Military Has Reached the End of the Line, U.S. Officials Say," by Helene Cooper, et al., The New York Times [August 14, 2024] [Link].
A Wider War?
Threatened by a moderate Iranian president, Israel is pulling him into a fight
By Lior Sternfeld, 972 Magazine [Israel/Palestine] [August 13, 2024]
---- [Today's conflict with Iran] continues a long and seemingly counterintuitive tradition of Israel preferring conservative, fervently anti-Israel presidents in Iran over reformists, whom it sees as detrimental to its strategic interests. After all, part of Israel's support among American, and European governments derives from the idea that it is a Western democratic outpost in a "dangerous neighborhood," which can defeat bad actors in the Middle East before they reach Europe and the West. According to this logic, Iran is the chief enemy: an anti-Western, anti-Semitic, theocratic dictatorship that poses a clear and immediate danger to the world. When Iran elects moderate leaders, it undermines this monolithic caricature — and Israel, which refuses to change its outlook toward its regional neighbors, sees a diplomatic threat. [Read More]
The War at Home
The Quiet Success of the Israel Divestment Movement
By Marianne Dhenin, Yes! Magazine [August 6, 2024]
---- As demands for Palestinian liberation grow louder than ever before in defiance of Israel's continuing assaults on the occupied nation and its people, organizers with JVP and other groups critical of U.S. funding for Israel have ramped up efforts targeting this support in their own backyards. These efforts include the Not on Our Dime! campaign in New York state, which aims to end subsidies for New York–registered charitable organizations that fundraise to support the Israeli military and violent settler groups, and the Break the Bonds campaign, a JVP-led initiative that seeds and supports local efforts to demand divestment from Israel Bonds nationwide. [Read More]
Columbia University…Where the Only Ivy is Poison
By Stanley L. Cohen, Counterpunch [August 16, 2024]
---- As the very public face of genocide has raged throughout Palestine these past ten months, Columbia University has opened a domestic front in its own war against dissent. In the name of "public safety," Columbia has sought to silence protest and speech be it by suspension, expulsion or arrest. Utilizing an academic star chamber stoked by outside investigators and inside sham, by pretext and intimidation, it has invented an academic crisis and then marched to punish students and faculty who wish nothing more than to express ideas. [Read More]
The Climate Crisis
How Close Are the Planet's Climate Tipping Points?
By Raymond Zhong and Mira Rojanasakul, New York Times [August 11, 2024]
----For the past two decades, scientists have been raising alarms about great systems in the natural world that warming, caused by carbon emissions, might be pushing toward collapse. These systems are so vast that they can stay somewhat in balance even as temperatures rise. But only to a point. Once we warm the planet beyond certain levels, this balance might be lost, scientists say. The effects would be sweeping and hard to reverse. Not like the turning of a dial, but the flipping of a switch. One that wouldn't be easily flipped back. [Read More]
Europe's Crackdown on Environmental Dissent Is Silencing Voices the World Needs to Hear
By Christopher Ketcham, New York Times [August 18, 2024]
---- Michel Forst, the United Nations special rapporteur on environmental defenders, sees this crackdown as "a major threat to democracy and human rights," as he put it in a report in February. The effort to crush environmental dissent has come as some Europeans appear to have soured on the clean energy transition. … Truth is what the world needs, even if it must be delivered by protesters on the streets and reiterated again and again from the ramparts. The European countries suppressing dissent are smothering the sense of urgency that might otherwise compel those nations to do their part to stop this looming calamity. [Read More]
Civil Liberties
A Brief History of the Right-Wing Takeover of the US Judiciary
By Alex Aronson et al., Convergence [August 16, 2024]
---- The history of the Right's campaign to seize the courts reveals how closely the electoral and judicial arenas are linked, and how politics shapes the interpretation of the law. The structural changes that the Right has put into place are going to take decades to address, not only through Congressional action but also through informed action on the part of people. … Movement Law Lab recently hosted a webinar entitled "How Did We Get Here? The History of the Conservative Legal Movement" to help us understand the roots of our present rotten and captured judiciary, influenced by maneuvering and dark money. [Read More]
The State of the Union
(Video) Leaked Project 2025 Training Videos Show Former Trump Officials Detailing Plans to Dismember Government
From Democracy Now! [August 12, 2024]
---- As Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump tries to downplay his connection to the far-right policy agenda known as Project 2025, ProPublica and Documented have just published dozens of training videos by the group that show how the conservative movement is gearing up for the next Republican administration. It's an effort led by the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank and other groups to remake the federal government, including by replacing civil servants with thousands of partisan political appointees who would help carry out the extreme policies envisioned by Project 2025. Many of the people who crafted the policy blueprint are former top Trump officials. The training videos include discussions about undoing climate policy, combatting diversity efforts, denying freedom of information requests and more. "The first time that Trump … got elected, his operation was very unprepared. They did not have a bench of people ready. There was chaos, there was confusion, and that set back that administration for perhaps months, maybe even a year or two," says ProPublica reporter Andy Kroll. "If he is elected again, that will not be the case." [See the Program]
Our History
To Build Working-Class Power, We Need a Workers' Education Movement
By Daniel JudtIn, The Nation [August 13, 2024]
---- In December of 1936, a day into their historic sit-down strike at a General Motors plant in Flint, Michigan, autoworkers set up a school. Surrounded by idle machines, freed from the foreman's gaze, they took classes in public speaking and labor journalism, in political economy, in the history of the labor movement. This was not a spontaneous idea. Some of the key players in the strikes—the education director and several rank-and-file organizers in the nascent United Auto Workers (UAW), as well as its future president, Walter Reuther, and his brother, Roy—had spent time at Brookwood Labor College, a small independent school for workers who wanted to radicalize the labor movement. Many of the classes at the factory in Flint were based on those at Brookwood. In a way, so was the strike itself. It was at Brookwood that the Reuther brothers first studied the sit-down—a tactic that would be deployed in the coming year by nearly 400,000 workers in one of the most radical upsurges in American labor history. The start of the modern labor movement in America owed a lot, as one historian puts it, to "Brookwood's Detroit vanguard." [Read More]
