People of Faith CT

1 January 2010

Freedom Marchers approved today a declaration aimed at accelerating the global
campaign for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israeli Apartheid.


Roughly 1400 activists from 43 countries converged in Cairo on their way to
Gaza to join with Palestinians marching to break Israel's illegal siege. They
were prevented from entering Gaza by the Egyptian authorities. 

As a result,
the Freedom Marchers remained in Cairo. They staged a series of nonviolent
actions aimed at pressuring the international community to end the siege as one
step in the larger struggle to secure justice for Palestinians throughout historic
Palestine. 

This declaration arose from those actions:

We, international delegates meeting in Cairo during the Gaza Freedom
March 2009 in collective response to an initiative from the South
African delegation, state:

In view of:

o Israel’s ongoing collective punishment of Palestinians through the illegal occupation and siege of Gaza;
o the illegal occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem,
and the continued construction of the illegal Apartheid Wall and
settlements;
o the new Wall under construction by Egypt and the US which will tighten even further the siege of Gaza;
o the contempt for Palestinian democracy shown by Israel, the US,
Canada, the EU and others after the Palestinian elections of 2006;
o the war crimes committed by Israel during the invasion of Gaza one year ago;
o the continuing discrimination and repression faced by Palestinians within Israel;
o and the continuing exile of millions of Palestinian refugees;
o all of which oppressive acts are based ultimately on the Zionist ideology which underpins Israel;
o in the knowledge that our own governments have given Israel direct
economic, financial, military and diplomatic support and allowed it to
behave with impunity;
o and mindful of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (2007)

We reaffirm our commitment to:

Palestinian Self-Determination
Ending the Occupation
Equal Rights for All within historic Palestine
The full Right of Return for Palestinian refugees

We therefore reaffirm our commitment to the United Palestinian call
of July 2005 for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) to compel
Israel to comply with international law.

To that end, we call for and wish to help initiate a global mass,
democratic anti-apartheid movement to work in full consultation with
Palestinian civil society to implement the Palestinian call for BDS.

Mindful of the many strong similarities between apartheid Israel and the former apartheid regime in South Africa, we propose:

1) An international speaking tour in the first 6 months of 2010 by
Palestinian and South African trade unionists and civil society
activists, to be joined by trade unionists and activists committed to
this programme within the countries toured, to take mass education on
BDS directly to the trade union membership and wider public
internationally;

2) Participation in the Israeli Apartheid Week in March 2010;

3) A systematic unified approach to the boycott of Israeli products,
involving consumers, workers and their unions in the retail,
warehousing, and transportation sectors;

4) Developing the Academic, Cultural and Sports boycott;

5) Campaigns to encourage divestment of trade union and other
pension funds from companies directly implicated in the Occupation
and/or the Israeli military industries;

6) Legal actions targeting the external recruitment of soldiers to
serve in the Israeli military, and the prosecution of Israeli
government war criminals; coordination of Citizen’s Arrest Bureaux to
identify, campaign and seek to prosecute Israeli war criminals; support
for the Goldstone Report and the implementation of its recommendations;

7) Campaigns against charitable status of the Jewish National Fund (JNF).

We appeal to organisations and individuals committed to this declaration to sign it and work with us to make it a reality.

From the One Family Fund:

We are Israel’s survivors of terrorism. Young or old, we have all 
experienced trauma that no person should ever know.  We have seen the murder 
of our parents, brothers, sisters and children.  We have suffered injury that 
– in one instant – turned our normal lives into endless nightmares of 
pain, therapy and disability.

Many think that 2009 has been a very quiet year in Israel.  But for us, a 
"quiet year" has meant 17 more people killed by terrorists.  Just last week, 
Meir Avshalom Chai was shot dead as he drove home.  His seven young children, 
the youngest just two months old, are now orphans, joining 966 other children 
who have seen terrorists kill their parents.

Senator Joseph Lieberman
United States Senate
 
Senator:
 
We are rabbis, cantors, and other committed Jews. Many of us were
delighted in 2000 when you were nominated for Vice-President and
proclaimed to all that you were an observant Jew, carrying into the
highest level of public service the values of the Jewish people.
 
Now we see with deep distress that you have announced that you will not
support the bill before the Senate to  bring health care in America
even part way toward the universal and affordable coverage that is
assumed in every other industrial country, including Israel.  You have
announced that you intend to join a quasi-filibuster against even
taking an up-and-down vote on the bill if it contains either a "public
option" provision or one extending the universally praised Medicare
system to some younger people.
 
Doing this would thwart the will of a majority of the Senate, the
majority of the American people, and the majority of the American
Jewish community.
 
In our eyes, this is not the behavior of an "observant" Jew. "Tzedek
tzedek tirdof, justice justice shall you seek,"  is among the Torah's
most important commandments. And in pursuit of justice, no autonomous
Jewish community has ever allowed the poor to go without healing. It is
clear that the present health insurance system based on private
insurance companies is broken in every aspect except assuring enormous
profits to itself. It costs Americans the highest medical costs in the
world while providing mediocre health care as measured by life
expectancies, newborn death rates, and other indices across the
developed world.
 
We recognize that major health insurance companies are headquartered in
Connecticut and that you may view your obligations to them as
constituents as an important political responsibility. Yet thousands of
Americans die each year unnecessarily because they are refused coverage
by or are unable to purchase insurance from these same companies.
 
So we believe your obligation of pekuach nefesh, saving life, saving
the lives of the flesh-and-blood citizens of Connecticut, shaped in
flesh and blood in God's Image and subject to damage of that same flesh
and blood that requires healing, is an even higher obligation than you
owe to your insurance-company constituents. Indeed, two-thirds of your
flesh-and-blood constituents support a health-care bill that includes a
strong public option.
 
We therefore call you to do tshuvah - to turn yourself again toward
fulfilling the commands of Torah and meeting the needs of the American
people. Then we will be happy once again that you are bringing the
values of an "observant Jew" to the public service of the American
people.
 
Signed,

To sign on to the letter, click here.

Jerusalem (ENI). Palestinian Christian leaders have issued a call for an end to Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory, which they described as, "a sin against God and against humanity," and have appealed for support from the world's churches.

"The injustice against the Palestinian people, which is the Israeli occupation, is an evil that must be resisted," the Christian leaders said in a document that was almost two years in the making. "Resistance is a right and a duty for the Christian. But it is resistance with love as its logic," they said. "It is thus a creative resistance, for it must find human ways that engage the humanity of the enemy."

The initiators of the statement, made public at an 11 December meeting in Bethlehem, have referred to the text as the "Kairos Palestine" document. "Kairos" is a Greek word used in the Bible for a God-given time of challenge, grace and opportunity.

The organizers said that their statement echoes the Kairos document that South African churches issued in the mid-1980s, and which helped galvanise churches and the wider public in a concerted effort that eventually led to the end of apartheid.

"It is a call to the international community worldwide to look at the plight of the Palestinians and put pressure on Israel to conform to international law," spokesperson and coordinator Rifat Kassis told Ecumenical News International.

"Despite the talk about peace and the peace process conducted for 17 years, nothing has happened and the situation continues deteriorating," Kassis said. "It is the right time for a more ethical perspective on the conflict, and that should come from religious leaders."

There can be no other explanation
except that Heaven must have needed
to dance.

Michael, for five decades,
The way you made us feel
You really turned us on
You knocked us off our feet.
Our lonely days were gone

Now that heaven and earth's seven continents
are dancing to the beat of the Primal Force,
all we can sing is:

Keep on with the force, don't
Don't stop till you get enough!
Keep on with the force, don't
Don't stop till you get enough!

We just can't stop loving you.

Introducing Greater Than AIDS, a national movement to mobilize Black Americans in response to AIDS and promote specific calls-to-action to prevent and reduce the further spread of HIV.
 
Greater Than AIDS inspires hope and promotes the possibility of change in the AIDS epidemic facing Black America through the united actions of individuals, families and communities. The campaign stresses six specific actions: being informed; using condoms; getting tested--and treated, as needed; speaking openly; acting with respect; and getting involved.
 
"We have a stake in one another... what binds us together is GREATER THAN what drives us apart... if enough people believe in the truth of that proposition and act on it, then we might not solve every problem, but we can get something meaningful done..."

Barack Obama, December 1, 2006 (World AIDS Day)
 
LEARN MORE
Stay up-to-date with information about the campaign, media partners, press releases, and more!
 
VISIT THE CAMPAIGN
Visit our interactive online space to get information about HIV/AIDS, learn about upcoming events, find a local testing center, connect with others, and make your voice heard!
 
SPREAD THE WORD
Help to promote the campaign by downloading banner ads, finding us on Facebook, and sharing the campaign with others.
 
Greater Than AIDS is a campaign of the Black AIDS Media Partnership (BAMP), a sustained commitment among major U.S. media companies to work together to address AIDS in Black America. The Kaiser Family Foundation is providing day-to-day management for BAMP, with technical support from the Black AIDS Institute, the Elton John AIDS Foundation, and a number of major civil society partners. The campaign is organized in collaboration with Act Against AIDS, a multi-year effort by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to help refocus national attention on the HIV/AIDS crisis in the United States.

by Mazin Qumsiyeh

Those who still had any illusions that peace is possible with a racist Zionist ideology should just look at reality.  Benjamin Netanyahu’s “speech” recently illustrates the litany of lies, distortions, and demands made that can only remind one of speeches by European colonial generals who gave similar speeches after committing massacres and genocides in Africa and Asia.  It shows that there is no Israeli left or right since their differences are merely cosmetic (both now agree to solve the problem of having too many Palestinians remaining on the coveted land by creating a castrated entity for them called a “state” while denying us all basic rights.

Netanyahu says he does not want to rule over Palestinians but merely wants to keep our stolen lands and want to control their airspace, water, entry and exit and otherwise relegate us to Bantustans in order to achieve the illusory security for him and the other colonizers/occupiers.  To him this is all the “Land of Israel” and yet he recognizes there are some people who remain “here” and who while having no right to their own lands, can be tolerated as long as a) they accept that the ethnic cleansing in which 530 Palestinian villages and towns were completely depopulated was legitimate (i.e. that is what is meant by accepting Israel as “a Jewish state”), that Palestinian rejection of colonization and occupation was an abnormal phenomenon and illegitimate (that is what he means by accepting no right of self-defense for the native people), and that any Palestinians allowed to continue to live in the “land of Israel” would do so as servants and subservient to the Jewish chosen people (economic peace, no Palestinian self defense or any semblance of sovereignty).

Netanyahu avoided all the vocabulary that would indicate any semblance of possibility of peace: Palestinian sovereignty/freedom, ending the occupation, complying with International law, obeying UN resolutions, respecting Palestinian rights (including rights of refugees), ending colonial settler activities, ending home demolitions, giving freedom of movement etc. Instead he cited irrelevancies (like the peace treaty with Egypt and Jordan (forgetting to mention that there is a dramatic difference since Israel sits on top of Palestine) and (like Obama) forgot to recognize that Palestinians are the ones who need security after 61 years of massacres and ethnic cleansing.

How do we fix an $8 billion budget gap?

With drastic cuts to nursing homes, job training programs, libraries and healthcare?

There’s a better choice for Connecticut.

We can’t balance the budget on the backs of middle class and working poor families.
Let’s protect vital public services by raising the income tax on the very wealthy and closing corporate tax loopholes.

Economic Crisis Facts:

• Middle and Low-income families in Connecticut pay over 10% of their income in state and local taxes.
• The wealthiest 1% of Connecticut families pay less than 5% of their income in state and local taxes.
• Connecticut spends over $300 million on corporate tax credits.
• We only collects 37% of corporate taxes and gives back the other 63% in tax credits.
• Income inequality has increased more in Connecticut than in any other state.
• Between 2001 and 2007 wages for the average Connecticut worker declined – and that was before the current recession even started.
• Every state in the U.S. saw a decline in employer-sponsored health insurance between 2001 and 2008.

The Better Choices Plan:

The Better Choices for Connecticut plan raises revenue to maintain the high quality services we all depend on without devastating cuts by raising new revenue:

• An income taxes on the state’s wealthiest residents making over $250,000 per year.
• Closing corporate tax loopholes.
• Reducing subsidies to the entertainment industry
• Increased taxes on alcohol and tobacco
• A penny increase in the sales tax

We would also help working families and small businesses by implementing a state earning income tax credit and a new small business property tax credit.

The rest of the budget gap would be filled in the state’s rainy day fund and the Federal stimulus package.

CALL YOUR STATE SENATOR Today:
Call (860) 240-8600

Learn more or get involved:
http://www.BetterChoicesForCT.org

Download flyers below:

Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

From the bosom of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe out dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God -
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

Julia Ward Howe is today best known as the writer of the Battle Hymn
of the Republic. She was married to Samuel Gridley Howe, educator of
the blind, who was also active in abolitionism and other reforms.

Julia Ward Howe published poetry, plays and travel books, as well as many
articles. A Unitarian, she was part of the larger circle of
Transcendentalists, though not a core member. She became
active in the women's rights movement later in life, playing a
prominent role in several suffrage organizations and in women's clubs.
http://womenshistory.about.com/library/bio/blbio_howe_julia_ward.htm