SEPT 1- “End the Wars” Rally & Street Action
Wednesday, September 1, 5PM
Burnside Park near Kennedy Plaza, Providence RI
RSVP on FacebookWhen the Aug. 31 deadline date passes, there will still be approximately 50,000 US troops permanently based in Iraq and more combat brigades on the way. Since the “War on Terror” is everywhere and perpetual, the U.S. war machine embraces a worsening quagmire in Afghanistan and initiates new provocations toward Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and others. Come join the rally and street action in an effort to counter the propaganda and bring unmediated information to the public. Your presence and support would help to make this a successful event and revive your humanity.
Sponsored by the RI Mobilization Committee to Stop War and Occupation. For more info, email RIStopWar@gmail.com.
AUG 25- Honduras Today: An Eyewitness Account
See the event page | RSVP on Facebook
Featuring PROF. DEREK SEIDMAN of Trinity College, just back from Honduras on a delegation with Witness for Peace.
Honduran trade unionists plan a general strike against the government's new anti-labor laws (El Tiempo)
Since the elections of November 2009— boycotted as a sham by most of the public—the US and its allies have declared a “return to normalcy” in Honduras. But the situation is normal only insofar as the same people who overthrew the elected president in June 2009 remain in ultimate power. Under the new regime of Porfirio Lobo, the Honduran people have had to endure death squads targeting activists and journalists, military occupations of their land, and government attempts to ram through vicious anti-labor legislation—while the White House and State Department give their blessings.
Come hear an eyewitness account of Honduras today.
Contribute to the BRADLEY MANNING DEFENSE FUND! A collection will be taken at the meeting: $5 suggested donation.
Free and open to the public; light refreshments will be served. Sponsored by the RI Mobilization Committee to Stop War and Occupation. For more info, contact RIStopWar@gmail.com.
VIDEO- Michael Schwartz on US Strategy in the Middle East
Professor Michael Schwartz, author of War Without End: The Iraq War in Context, speaks on “US Economic, Strategic, and Foreign Policy in the Middle East” for RIMC. (Thanks as always to Paul Hubbard for the video.)
RIMC denounces ProJo article linking group to anti-Semitic acts
Posted by rimc in Statements on June 10th, 2010
UPDATE: The Providence Journal printed the following statement on page A2 of the June 12 issue:
A recent account of the spray-painting of a swastika on the walls of Temple Am David in Warwick made reference to a Providence demonstration the day before that called for Israel to end its blockade of Gaza. That reference was not intended to suggest that the Providence protest was anti-Semitic in nature, and the Journal regrets any such inference.
Original post follows.
While the RI Mobilization Committee to Stop War and Occupation (RIMC) appreciates the coverage in the Providence Journal last week of our protest action regarding the Israeli attack against a Gaza aid flotilla, we strongly object to the reference to the protest in a June 3 article by Journal staffer Eugene Emery, about the anti-Semitic defacing of a synagogue in Warwick (see article below the break).
The Israeli massacre aboard a ship in international waters attempting to deliver humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza, has received worldwide condemnation, including a statement by the new Conservative Prime Minister of Great Britain. To link in any way our peaceful protest of this massacre on the high seas with the defacing of a local synagogue, was unfair and an instance of poor journalism.
We have every right to engage in protests against an unwarranted and vicious action by a foreign government without being gratuitously linked with a local instance of anti-Semitism. This is unfair and insulting to our members, many of whom have made lifelong commitments to work for peace, freedom and social justice. We request that the Journal issue a retraction and an apology for conflating two stories that were totally unrelated.
JUN 2- Protest Israel’s lethal raid on Gaza aid ships!
The Israeli military has attacked unarmed Palestine solidarity activists bringing aid to blockaded and besieged Gaza. A flotilla of international activists set said for Gaza bearing food, aid, and solidarity with the Gazan people. For this “crime,” they were attacked by Israeli commandos who boarded the humanitarians’ ships and opened fire. We know of at least ten activists killed, many wounded, and all have been detained by the Israeli military. This coincides with a new assault on Gaza. Come to an emergency action in protest of Israeli’s relentless violence against the Palestinian people and those who stand in solidarity with them.
WE DEMAND:
- President Obama and Congress: Condemn the Israeli assault!
- Release the kidnapped activists!
- Let the Freedom Flotilla deliver humanitarian aid!
- Lift the siege on Gaza!
Protest initiated by the RI Mobilization Committee to Stop War and Occupation. If your organization would like to endorse, please contact RIStopWar@gmail.com.
MAY 9- Racism & Resistance: The Struggle in Arizona
RACISM & RESISTANCE: THE STRUGGLE IN ARIZONA
featuring MOLLY LITTLE, Abuse Documentation Coordinator for No More Deaths/No Más Muertes in Tucson, Arizona and Nogales, Sonora, Mexico.
SUNDAY, MAY 9, 12:30PM Olneyville Neighborhood Association 122 Manton Avenue, Providence RI (Atlantic Mills Building – RIPTA 27)$5 SUGGESTED DONATION
Sponsored by American Friends Service Committee, Brown Immigrant Rights Coalition, Brown Students for Justice in Palestine, International Socialist Organization, Olneyville Neighborhood Association, RI Mobilization Committee to Stop War and Occupation, Standing on the Side of Love Committee (First Unitarian Church of Providence).
For more information, see the event page.
Download the 8.5×11 flyer (en/sp); 4-up (en); 4-up (sp).
MAR 20- GET ON THE BUS to DC!
Thanks to everyone who helped put together a great mobilization! We reportedly made the evening news on every RI station, and received favorable coverage from the Washington Post.
The RI Mobilization Committee to Stop War and Occupation (RIMC) is joining with the ANSWER Coalition, Veterans for Peace, the National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations, Iraq Veterans Against the War, the National Council of Arab Americans, US Labor Against the War, the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation, and more than 1000 other organizations and individuals in a March 20 National Coalition to bring people from all walks of life and from all cities across the United States to take part in a March on DC on the seventh anniversary of the Iraq war.
The thousands who march will demand “From Iraq to Afghanistan to Palestine, Occupation is a Crime” and “We Need Jobs and Education, Not Wars and Occupation.” We will insist on an end to the war threats and economic sanctions against Iran. We will say no to the illegal U.S. program of detention and torture.
Join us! ROUND TRIP RI-DC BUS TICKETS ARE ONLY $60! (Student/low-income: $30)
There are two ways to purchase a ticket: 1) Call the RIMC reservations line at 401 288-3605. 2) Send an email to march20@ristopwar.org and use our secure online payment system. (In either case, please allow 24 hours for a response–we’re all volunteers with day jobs!)
See below for more details on the RI mobilization. For updated information from the national March 20 organizers, visit www.March20.org.
FEB 24- “Understanding the War Economy”
Auditorium at URI Providence Campus
80 Washington Street, Providence RI
For more info, email ristopwar@gmail.com
Download flyers: Cartoons | Pie Chart
Public Forum featuring Professor Richard McIntyre Nearly nine years since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the costs of the wars and occupations in the Middle East continue to skyrocket–before even counting the explosion of the entire “national security” budget. As Washington commits to bailing out the financial sector, can it also meet the needs of working people battered by the recession? How is the current system sustained? Can it last? And is there an alternative?
DR. RICHARD McINTYRE is Professor of Economics and Director of the Honors Program at the University of Rhode Island. He has lectured at the University of Le Havre, Euromed Marseille École de Management, Novgorod State University, the Université de Lyon II, and École Normale Superieure de Cachan, where he was a visiting researcher in 2002, as well as at many universities and colleges in the US. Professor McIntyre’s book Are Worker Rights Human Rights? was published in 2008 by the University of Michigan Press. He also edits the New Political Economy book series for Routledge Press. Professor McIntyre received the URI Foundation Award for Teaching Excellence in 1997.
FEB 3- “US and Yemen: What’s Behind the Crisis?”
Beneficent Church
300 Weybosset Street, Providence, RI
For more info, email ristopwar@gmail.com
Special educational forum featuring Dr. Hany Alashwal
With a Saudi military intervention, a US-led missile strike, and the abortive “underwear bomb” plot of a Nigerian man supposedly trained in the country, Yemen has suddenly come into the cross-hairs of the US political and media establishment. While Americans scrambled to learn about this so-called “new front in the War on Terror,” Sen. Joe Lieberman disclosed that US Special Operations troops are already there! As US wars in the Middle East expand under President Obama, it’s urgent for the progressive community to educate itself about Yemen and American involvement there.
What’s behind the crisis in Yemen? Why is the US intervening? Could there be yet another Middle East war? Come discuss this and more.
DR. HANY ALASHWAL was raised in Taiz in southeast Yemen. After undergraduate study at Cairo University in Egypt, he worked at Yemen’s Ibb University for two years before pursuing a Masters and PhD in Computer Science in Malaysia. Dr. Alashwal is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at the prestigious College of Pharmacy at the University of Rhode Island.
JAN 30- New England Antiwar Conference
UPDATE: Roughly 375 people attended the conference from across the region–well beyond organizers’ expectations! Thanks to everyone who attended and to New England United for an excellent movement-building event!
30 Jan 2010 – 10:30AMMIT Building 34-101
50 Vassar Street, Cambridge, MA
Sponsored by New England United
From the Providence, RI train station: 8:35AM commuter rail to Boston’s South Station; Red Line to Kendall/MIT (for schedules and fares, see the MBTA website)
Panel 1: The Drive Towards Empire and Endless War (10:30 AM to Noon)
- Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report & Black is Back
- Saadia Toor, Action for a Progressive Pakistan
- Bruce Gagnon, Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
- Michael Schwartz, author of War Without End: The Iraq War in Context
Concurrent Workshops 1 (12:05 to 1:20 PM)
- Domestic Costs of War led by Jon Flanders of Troy NY Labor Council and Nellie Bailey of Harlem Tenants Council
- In Our Lifetimes! Obama, the NPT and the International Struggle for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons led by Joe Gerson of AFSC
- Resistance within the Military: The Renewed Struggles Against U.S. Imperialism led by Priscilla Loundes from March Forward!, IVAW, & VFP
- Covert Operations and 911 led by Paul Zarembka, Professor of Political Economy SUNY Buffalo, and Barry Zwicker, Editor of Global Outlook
- War on Latin America led by Omar Sierra, Venezuelan Consulate; Antoine del Castro Rio, Colombia Polo Democrático; & Tito Meza, Proyecto Hondureno
Panel 2: Debunking the War on Terror (1:35 to 3:05 PM)
- Salma Abu Ayyash, Palestinian activist
- Pardiss Kebriaei, Guantanamo Attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights
- Danny Schechter, author of Embedded: Weapons of Mass Deception
- Peter Dale Scott, author of The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, & the Future of America
Concurrent Workshops 2 (3:10 to 4:25 PM)
- Cutting War Spending 25%, Funding Jobs and Neighborhoods led by Mike Prokosch of Dorchester People for Peace
- Global Warming and War led by Ted Glick, Maggie Zhou & Joel Kovel
- Student Organizing led by Wes Strong of CT Students Against the War
- Defending Palestine led Salma Abu Ayyash & Sarah Roche-Mahdi
- Crisis in Haiti with Jacques-Antoine Jean and Ashley Smith
Organizing Session (4:45 to 6:15 PM)
Organize regional campaigns to build the March 20 antiwar march on DC, to end the siege of Gaza, and to redirect military spending to human needs.
Social (starting at 6:30 PM)
To be held at a fine Central Square restaurant in Cambridge.