Concerned Families of Westchester Newsletter
January 8, 2023
Hello All – Last week President Biden signed a $1.7 trillion spending bill for the coming year. The bill included $3.8 billion for Israel. Also last week, a new government in Israel was sworn in. This government is the most right-wing government in Israel's history. Led by ultra-conservative Benjamin Netanhayu, it includes members from religious parties that are even more conservative.
During 2022, 231 Palestinians were killed by Israeli soldiers or by "settlers" illegally squatting on lands in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Already in 2023, the terror against Palestinians has increased, with a Palestinian killed each day.
The new government has announced that it will step up its repression of Palestinians. There is even talk of "annexing" the West Bank and East Jerusalem to the State of Israel. This would be illegal under international law, and would end even the pretense of a "two-state solution" to the conflict between the State of Israel and the Palestinians.
It is long-past time for the United States to end its $3.8 billion annual military assistance to Israel, and to cease vetoing resolutions critical of Israel in the UN. CFOW supports the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (BDS), and calls on all people supporting justice in Israel/Palestine to do so also.
Some useful reading on the new turn in Israel/Palestine
Netanyahu Ushers in the Most Anti-Palestinian Government in Israel's History
By
---- Benjamin Netanyahu has been sworn in for his sixth term as prime minister of Israel. While his prior tenures resulted in the commission of war crimes against the Palestinian people, Netanyahu's new regime promises to be the most right-wing and religiously conservative in Israel's history. … "The ministers of Netanyahu's new government have been salivating for weeks at the thought of what they will change once in power," Phyllis Bennis, director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, told Truthout. "Now that they've been sworn in, there is no doubt plans are already afoot for massive settlement expansion, establishment of de facto (albeit illegal) annexation of large parts of the West Bank, widespread increases in house demolitions and forced evictions of Palestinian families, all aimed at escalating what earlier governments also called the 'Judaization' of occupied East Jerusalem and most of the West Bank." [Read More]
(Video) Israel's New Far-Right Gov't Entrenches Apartheid System with U.S. Support
From Democracy Now! [January 5, 2023]
[FB – Palestinian lawyer Diana Buttu recently had a thought-provoking Op-ED in The New York Times. Gideon Levy, a writer for the prestigious Israeli daily newspaper Ha'aretz , spoke in Greenburgh about 10 years ago.]
---- Far-right Israeli politician Itamar Ben-Gvir's Tuesday visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem is being roundly condemned across the Middle East. Ben-Gvir is a key part of Benjamin Netanyahu's new far-right government, which includes ultranationalist and ultraorthodox parties that are calling openly for the annexation of the West Bank. "The international community has to speak with one voice in rejecting this extremism and rejecting those terrorists and those elements of fascists in the Israeli government," Palestine's ambassador to the U.N., Riyad Mansour, urged Wednesday. [See the Program]
231 Palestinians were killed in 2022. These are their stories.
By, Mondoweiss [December 31, 2022]
---- 2022 has been the deadliest year for Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in decades. In the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem specifically, this year marked the highest number of killings of Palestinians in the territories since the UN began recording fatalities in 2005. The killings began almost instantaneously, with the first two Palestinians killed within the first week of January — one by an Israeli soldier, and one by an Israeli settler. From then on, the killings did not stop. Since the start of the year, Mondoweiss has kept a record of all the Palestinians killed by Israeli forces and settlers. … At the time of publication, the total number of Palestinians killed in 2022 stood at 231. This number also includes 53 killed in Gaza, 49 of whom were killed during Operation Breaking Dawn in August, and five Palestinians with Israeli citizenship who were killed inside the territory of the Israeli state. [Read More]
Also of interest – "Decoding Israeli 'Extremism'", by [Link]; "As Israeli gov't takes 'bold' extremist steps, some in U.S. call for sanctions," by Philip Weiss, Mondoweiss [January 4, 2023] [Read More]; and "On Palestine's Looming Armed Revolt," b, Antiwar.com [January 2, 2023] [Link].
News Notes
Dr. Rabab Abduladi of Westchester, and a member of JVP-Westchester, has been awarded the Jere L. Bacharach Service Award by the Middle East Studies Association, "recognizing her lifelong work for freedom and liberation." For an illuminating report on the work of this outstanding "action intellection," go here. This review of Dr. Abduladi's academic and political activity concludes: "An inspiration to generations of women and feminists, to scholars and social movements globally, she has indelibly shaped the western academy and field of Middle East Studies, along with the struggle for justice in Palestine. In the spirit of the indivisibility of justice that exemplifies Dr. Abdulhadi's life, career and commitments, the recognition of her invaluable contributions through this award has never been more timely or appropriate."
On death row in Oklahoma for decades, Richard Glossip faces his eighth scheduled execution date, by lethal injection, on February 16th, one week after his 60th birthday. He is asking for clemency. Another person has confessed to the murder, and now retracts his claims that Glossip coerced him to do the deed. Glossip's case attracted nationwide attention in 2015, when he received a stay of execution at the last minute. (See the Democracy Now! reports here and here.) As this informative report from The Intercept notes: "his clemency hearing — tentatively set to take place later this month — may be the last chance for authorities to spare the life of a man whose case has become emblematic of the profound problems with Oklahoma's death penalty system and capital punishment as a whole."
Do you ever wonder why the stock market jumps up when the government reports a rise in unemployment? All is explained in this useful article from The Intercept, "Financial World Celebrates Slowing Wage and Employment Growth in New Jobs Report" [Link]. Is a recession and massive unemployment necessary to curb inflation? As the article notes, "not all experts agree." "Some argue that the medicine of rate hikes and their attendant costs to workers, including higher unemployment and lower wages, can be worse than the inflationary disease." Of course, one's view on "high unemployment and lower wages" depends in part on which side of the bread your butter is on.
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 4th, from 5:30 to 6:00 pm in Yonkers at the intersection of Warburton Ave. and Odell. To learn about our new project, "Beauty as Fuel for Change," go here; and to make a financial contribution to the project, go here. (And for Susan Rutman's video of October 2022 in Vermont, go here.) 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. 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 support our work by making a contribution, please send your check to CFOW, PO Box 364, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY 10706. Thanks!
Rewards!
The Newsletter's Rewards offer stalwart readers a brief rest stop before plunging into "The Weekly Reader." This week's Rewards look back at the 1970s group The Pointer Sisters, whose lead singer, Anita Pointer, died last week. The Pointer Sisters launched themselves by amplifying the Black pride and Black power movements emerging from the late 1960s, here with "Yes We Can Can". Anita Pointer headlined another one I like, "Slow Hand." And here is their version of a Bruce Springsteen song, "Fire." Enjoy!
Best wishes,
Frank Brodhead
For CFOW
CFOW Weekly Reader
Featured Essays
Noam Chomsky: Another World Is Possible. Let's Bring It to Reality.
An interview with
C.J. Polychroniou: Noam, as we enter a new year, I want to start this interview by asking you to highlight the biggest challenges facing our world today and whether you would agree with the claim that human progress, while real and substantial in some regards, is neither even nor inevitable?
Noam Chomsky: The easiest way to respond is with the Doomsday Clock, now set at 100 seconds to midnight, likely to advance closer to termination when it is reset in a few weeks. As it should, considering what's been happening in the past year. The challenges it highlighted last January remain at the top of the list: nuclear war, global heating, and other environmental destruction, and the collapse of the arena of rational discourse that offers the only hope for addressing the existential challenges. There are others, but let's look at these. Washington has just agreed to provide Ukraine with Patriot missiles. Whether they work or not is an open question, but Russia will assume a worst-case analysis and consider them a target. We have few details, but it's likely that U.S. trainers come with the missiles, hence are targets for Russian attack, which might move us a few steps up the escalation ladder. … Let's turn to the environment. On global warming, the news ranges from awful to horrendous, but there are some bright spots. The Biodiversity Convention is a major step toward limiting the lethal destruction of the environment. Support is almost universal, though not total. One state refused to sign, the usual outlier, the most powerful state in world history. The GOP, true to its principles, refuses to support anything that might interfere with private power and profit. … Let's turn to the third factor driving the Doomsday Clock toward midnight: the collapse of the arena of rational discourse. Most discussion of this deeply troubling phenomenon focuses on outbursts in social media, wild conspiracy theories, QAnon and stolen elections, and other dangerous developments that can be traced in large part to the breakdown of the social order under the hammer blows of the class war of the past 40 years. But at least we have the sober and reasoned domain of liberal intellectual opinion that offers some hope of rational discourse. Or do we? [Read More]
(Video) Brazil: Hope for the First time in a Very Long Time
With Michael Fox and Greg Wilpert, ZNet Video [January 7, 2023] - 35 minutes
---- Lula da Silva was inaugurated for a third non-consecutive term as president of Brazil, dramatically reversing the country's trajectory of the past eight years. In the first few days in office, Lula presented more progressive policy changes than many believed would be possible, says freelance journalist Michael Fox. [See the Program] Also of interest – (Video) "What can Lula deliver for Brazil?" From Aljazeera/"Inside Story" [January 2, 2023] - 25 minutes [Link]
(Video) "Latinos, Race and Empire": A Talk by Juan González
From Democracy Now! [December 23, 2022]
---- Democracy Now! co-host Juan González recently spoke at the CUNY Grad Center in the final of his three "farewell" speeches in New York before he moved to Chicago. In a speech titled, "Latinos, Race and Empire," Juan talked about his time with the Young Lords, the future of Puerto Rico, corporate America's embrace of DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion), and more. [See the Program]
The War in Ukraine
(Video) "We Need Ceasefires Everywhere": Bishop William Barber's Message of Peace for Ukraine & the World
From Democracy Now! [January 6, 2023'
---- Russian President Vladimir Putin has unilaterally declared a 36-hour ceasefire in Ukraine to mark Russian Orthodox Christmas on January 7. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky rejected Putin's overture, however, saying that Russia wants to use Christmas as a pretext to stop Ukrainian advances in the Russian-occupied Donbas region. Putin's declaration comes after about 1,000 U.S. faith leaders called in an open letter last month for a ceasefire during the holidays, inspired by the Christmas truce of 1914 during World War I, arguing that a pause in the fighting could create room for negotiations to peacefully end the conflict. We air a recent sermon by Bishop William Barber, one of the signatories, in which he discussed the need for a Christmas truce. "We need a ceasefire to interrupt this warring madness," Barber said. "A ceasefire doesn't mean both sides are equally culpable for starting the war, but it can have the impact of stopping the massive, massive killing on both sides." [See the Program]
Can NATO and the Pentagon Find a Diplomatic Off-Ramp From the Ukraine War? By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies, Code Pink [January 3, 2023]
---- NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, known for his staunch support for Ukraine, recently revealed his greatest fear for this winter to a TV interviewer in his native Norway: that the fighting in Ukraine could spin out of control and become a major war between NATO and Russia. "If things go wrong," he cautioned solemnly, "they can go horribly wrong." It was a rare admission from someone so involved in the war, and reflects the dichotomy in recent statements between U.S. and NATO political leaders on one hand and military officials on the other. Civilian leaders still appear committed to waging a long, open-ended war in Ukraine, while military leaders, such as the US Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley, have spoken out and urged Ukraine to "seize the moment" for peace talks. … So why are US and NATO military leaders speaking out so urgently to reject the perpetuation of their own central role in the war in Ukraine? And why do they see such danger in the offing if their political bosses miss or ignore their cues for the shift to diplomacy? [Read More]
Read more about the Ukraine war – "Where the war in Ukraine could be headed in 2023," by Anatol Lieven, Responsible Statecraft [January 6, 2023] [Link]; and "Putin's Brief Ceasefire is a Prelude to Further Escalation of this Bitter War,"' b [Link].
The Climate Crisis
By Kenny Stancil, Common Dreams [January 5, 2023]
---- As interlinked extreme heat and drought events grow in intensity and frequency amid the ruling class' ongoing failure to adequately slash planet-heating fossil fuel pollution, over 90% of the global population is projected to suffer the consequences in the coming decades. Compound drought-heatwave (CDHW) events are "one of the worst climatic stressors for global sustainable development." … Put plainly, drought and extreme heat are intertwined. Increasingly arid and hot conditions are undermining the capacity of land-based ecosystems to absorb carbon dioxide, with a lack of water considered even more consequential than higher temperatures…. The study estimates that even under the lowest emission scenario, "over 90% of the global population and gross domestic product could be exposed to increasing CDHW risks in the future, with more severe impacts in poorer and more rural areas." [Read More]
Civil Liberties
Liberty for Julian Assange
---- WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's vindication seems– maybe, perhaps, imaginably—achievable. … Freeing Assange had appeared almost insurmountable not long ago. Whereas, given the painstaking pursuit to free Assange by a pitifully small coterie of determined supporters, some success may be at hand. Their movement's goal is clear: the U.S. government must drop its extradition order. Then, Assange should be released from Britain's notorious Belmarsh prison, where he's held only on a charge of dodging a bail hearing. Then, if faced with further legal action, his lawyers argue, he should be detained in his own country, Australia. … A few weeks ago, the world heard Assange's name after a decade-long blackout. Unexpectedly, on Nov 28th those same press giants largely responsible for that blockade and for defaming Assange, decided to speak against his prosecution by U.S. authorities. Their plea became headline news—as if the case was just discovered. [Read More]
The State of the Union
By Ralph Nader, Common Dreams [January 7, 2023]
---- What follows is an encore for a column I wrote in 2018 for the new progressive Democrats elected to the House of Representatives. The Democratic Party won control of the House in 2018, and again barely in 2020. … I am now sending to the entering class of 2022 these helpful tools to strengthen both their efforts and those of the citizen groups in the halls of Congress. The rapidity with which the Democratic Party's political cocoon wraps itself around newly elected legislators, who arrive in Washington determined to change the culture and output of our premier branch of government, is beyond astonishing. Unlike the red-line-drawing so-called "Freedom-Caucus" among the House Republicans, who topple their leadership, or at least are power factors, the Democrats toe the line and surrender to their dictatorial leadership. Until the quieted progressives form their own voting bloc, the national citizen groups will remain as powerless as the dominant corporate Democrats in Congress want them to be. [Read More]
Biden's Border Plan Drapes Trump Policies in Liberal Rhetoric
By Natasha Lennard, The Intercept [
---- "Cruelty is the point" became a popular liberal refrain to describe the motivations behind what, at the time, Democrats called intolerable Trump-era policies. President Donald Trump's moves to detain and deport immigrants at the southern border, including tearing families apart as policy, were highlighted as key justifications for the catchphrase. There's no doubt that a gleeful viciousness attended the Trump administration's decisions to round up, cage, and expel desperate, nonwhite migrants. Cruelty is, however, more than an affect. The United States border regime is cruel whether or not its maintenance is enforced by a president spewing racist slurs or a president appealing to the need for "safe and orderly processing" while he announces a plan to turn away thousands of migrants en masse — as President Joe Biden did on Thursday. [Read More]
Our History
Popular Rule: Has the United States Ever Been a Democracy?
By Sophia Rosenfeld, The Nation [January 3, 2023]
[FB – This is a review of Two Cheers for Politics: Why Democracy Is Flawed, Frightening—and Our Best Hope, by Jedediah Purdy.]
---- Purdy sees a better politics hinging on an expansion of the definition of "the people" to the point that ballot access is open to "everyone who is here," the nation being for him the "here" that consistently matters. Purdy has considerable faith that if we just let the whole population vote—which is to say, institute real majority rule—good things will follow. His heroes in this story appear to be Hobbes, "an alchemist of political imagination" for first arguing that laws come from the people and that politics is a way to make collective choices, and W.E.B. Du Bois, for insisting that truly universal suffrage is essential to shaping a just economy as well as political life. In the end, Two Cheers for Politics is a panegyric not to individual rights or to the rule of law (though he stresses the importance of the peaceful transfer of power) but rather to what he calls "a collective decision among equals about how to live together"—or, really, hard-fought battles over values and policies, followed by mass elections. [Read More]
