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Palestine Summer Encounter participants live with a local family, study Arabic and volunteer with a local church, school, hospital, nonprofit or humanitarian organization. They also have an opportunity to visit sites of historic, political and religious significance such as Jerusalem, Jericho, the Galilee, Hebron, Nazareth and the Dead Sea. Participants can join the program for 1, 2 or 3 months.
More information is available at middleeastfellowship.org
“Olive Branch” Extra Virgin Olive Oil is raised without pesticides or sprays and First-Cold-Pressed. This year we are importing the oil directly from the Palestinian Agricultural Relief Committee (PARC), a non-governmental, non-profit organization in Ramallah which has been on the forefront of supporting Palestinian agriculture since the 1980’s. PARC buys its olive oil from 85 different small farmer cooperatives in the West Bank. It takes care of testing, quality control, bottling, labeling and marketing. Available in 750ml bottles, by the case (12 bottles), or more. Now more than ever, important to Palestinian farmers. For ordering and other info, please email us at palestinebostonoliveoil@yahoo.com or call Susie at 781-648-6307.
"Sir! No Sir!" energetically reveals the untold story of the GI movement to end the war in Vietnam. This is the story of one of the most vibrant and widespread upheavals of the 1960s - one that had a profound impact on American society, yet has been virtually obliterated from the collective memory of that time. This hidden history combines fast-paced archival footage with thoughtful interviews, "perfectly timed with new doubts about the Iraq War" ("Variety").
Times are listed at Brattle Film, they vary from day to day.
This film is highly recommended because it is about the organizing done by soldiers against the Vietnam war -- lessons for today.
Synopsis* *
In the 1960's an anti-war movement emerged that altered the course of history. This movement didn't take place on college campuses, but in barracks and on aircraft carriers. It flourished in army stockades, navy brigs and in the dingy towns that surround military bases. It penetrated elite military colleges like West Point. And it spread throughout the battlefields of Vietnam. It was a movement no one expected, least of all those in it. Hundreds went to prison and thousands into exile. And by 1971 it had, in the words of one colonel, infested the entire armed services. Yet today few people know about the GI movement against the war in Vietnam.
The Vietnam War has been the subject of hundreds of films, both fiction and non-fiction, but "this" story-the story of the rebellion of thousands of American soldiers against the war-has never been told in film. This is certainly not for lack of evidence. By the Pentagon's own figures, 503,926 "incidents of desertion" occurred between 1966 and 1971; officers were being "fragged"(killed with fragmentation grenades by their own troops) at an alarming rate; and by 1971 entire units were refusing to go into battle in unprecedented numbers. In the course of a few short years, over 200 underground newspapers were published by soldiers around the world; local and national antiwar GI organizations were joined by thousands; thousands more demonstrated against the war at every major base in the world in 1970 and 1971, including in Vietnam itself; stockades and federal prisons were filling up with soldiers jailed for their opposition to the war and the military.
Yet today, with hundreds of thousands of American GIs once again occupying countries on the other side of the world, these history-changing events have been erased from America's public memory.
"Sir! No Sir!" aims to change all that. The film does four things: 1) Brings to life the history of the GI movement through the stories of those who were part of it; 2) Reveals the explosion of defiance that the movement gave birth to with never-before-seen archival material; 3) Explores the profound impact that movement had on the military and the war itself; and 4) Tells the story of how and why the GI Movement has been replaced with the myth of the spat-upon veteran.
"Sir! No Sir!" is a film that challenges deeply-held beliefs not just about the Vietnam War and those who fought it, but about the world we live in today. It is a vivid portrayal of William Faulkner's famous observation that "The past isn't dead; it isn't even past."
Despite its attempt to create a socially responsible image, Starbucks' failure to meaningfully embrace Fair Trade coffee has left coffee farmers and their children teetering on the brink of starvation in the Global South. A new documentary, Black Gold (blackgoldmovie.com), reveals in detail the pained existence of coffee farmers under the purchasing practices of Starbucks and other multinational corporations. In Starbucks cafes, baristas are paid a poverty wage and the company insures a lower percentage of employees than Wal-Mart. Starbucks baristas are organizing a union (starbucksunion.org) with the Industrial Workers of the World for a better life on and off the job. In response, the company has waged a fierce and relentless anti-union campaign that tramples on workers' rights. In this union-busting operation unburdened by the law, Starbucks routinely retaliates against baristas for supporting the union. In addition, Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz recently broke the union of roasting plant employees. If you or your group is interested in getting involved with the campaign on the ground floor please contact IWW organizer and Starbucks barista Daniel Gross at dgross@iww.org or 917-577-1110.
Brian Corr is field education organizer for the ACLU of Massachusetts. In Boston since 1987, he has been involved in a range of efforts for peace and social justice--from electoral campaigns to Jobs with Justice to CPPAX to Technology for Social Change. He currently serves as co-chair of the National Peace Action board, president of the Fair Economy Action Fund and on the National Peacebuilding Committee of AFSC.
Brian will speak about government policies of unlawful domestic surveillance, kidnapping, rendition, torture, secret prisons and "ghost detainees". Also he will describe the ACLU's statewide Campaign to Restore the Rule of Law, in opposition to those policies. More than 2500 people have already attended meetings like this from Cape Cod to the Berkshires since January.
Program Director of Sunday Social Justice Education for Kids age 6-15; part time 12 hr/wk; salary is $10,500 annually. We expect to hire the Director by mid-July 2006, and the expectation is for the SJE program to begin September 2006. Go to commchurch.org/ssjdirector.doc for a detailed job description. Application requested by 7/1/06.
Under this year's title "Talk, Rock and Walk with Israel", Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Boston has announced its annual event celebrating more than half a century of colonialism and genocide against the people of Palestine. The event consists of a rally at Copley Square at 10:30 AM, a walk to Government Center, and a celebration at City Hall Plaza.
For the fifth year in a row The New England Committee to Defend Palestine calls for a protest. When Zionists "Talk, Rock and Walk with Israel," what will they be celebrating?
*The mass expulsion of 780,000 Palestinians in 1948. *Military massacres, from Deir Yassin in 1948 to Jenin in 2002 to the attacks on Jericho and Gaza in 2006. *The use of U.S. fighter jets, attack helicopters, tanks, bulldozers, and assault rifles to attack Palestinians. *Soldiers shooting children. *The razing of Palestinian villages and home demolitions. *The imprisonment of more than 9,000 Palestinians for political reasons. *Assassination of Palestinian political leaders. *5 million refugees kept by force from returning to their homes in Palestine. *Economic strangulation of Palestinian communities. *The stealing of land by a state-sponsored settlement program. *The theft of water, the uprooting of olive trees, and the building of 450 miles of 24-foot-high concrete walls to imprison Palestinian cities and villages.
Confront this racist march in Boston. Join all those for justice in Palestine at 11:00 AM Sunday, June 18 at Government Center!
Also: The owners of Boston's newest all-vegan eatery, T.J. Scallywaggle's Vegan House of Pizza & Subs (487 Cambridge, Brighton, 617-787-9884) will share a few words about their plans -- and who the original T.J. actually was! Boston Vegetarian Society 617-424-8846.
Monday, June 19 is a National Call-In Day to renew the Voting Rights Act. We urge you to join this effort by calling House leaders, and your representatives, to urge passage of H.R. 9. Read more about this below.
Last month, congressional leaders introduced a bipartisan bill to renew and restore the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA). The bill, The Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006 (H.R. 9 / S. 2703) is critical to ensuring that the VRA continues to work effectively to combat discrimination and that the gains that have been achieved for minority voters are not rolled back. In Congress and around the country, there is a building momentum to renew and restore the VRA.
While the House bill (H.R. 9) enjoys the support of more than 150 Republicans and Democrats and was approved by the House Judiciary Committee with overwhelming support (33-1), there is a small, yet vocal handful of representatives who have tried to delay or thwart renewal of this cornerstone civil rights law.
On Monday, join civil rights activists from around the country in making a toll-free call (1-866-808-0065) to Reps. Hastert and Boehner. Urge them to use their leadership positions to bring H.R. 9 to the floor and to defeat harmful amendments that, if passed, would undermine the effectiveness of the Act. Then use the same toll-free number to call your representative and urge him/her to fully support H.R. 9.
Visit Voting Rights Act and/or NVRI.org for more information about the Voting Rights Act.
We are asking you to join the Quest for Peace and Nicaragua Network in denouncing U.S. intervention in Nicaragua's elections by signing an open letter to the people of Nicaragua. This letter with signatures will be published June 23 in El Nuevo Diario and La Prensa, the two main papers in Nicaragua.
Middlesex County Sheriff James DiPaolo recently declared a public safety crisis, which he attributes to jail “overcrowding”. He is calling for 600 jail beds to be constructed immediately. Half the cells are said to be for temporary beds while the Cambridge Court House is renovated. (DiPaolo has acknowledged that the temporary beds may remain in use after the renovation ) The other 300 cells will be permanent. DiPaolo is very interested in constructing such units in Somerville.
What causes prison overcrowding? How is the community affected by jail expansion? Who decides to build or not? Will the sheriff take INS/ICE monies to detain immigrants? The “feds” are spending billions to build and lease facilities to “process” immigrant detainees.
* WHO GOES TO JAIL? * WHAT HAPPENS “INSIDE”? * * HOW COULD OUR MONEY BE BETTER SPENT? * IS IT A GOOD IDEA TO BUILD MORE CAGES IN ORDER FOR THE SOMERVILLE POLICE TO HAVE AN ENVIRONMENTALLY SAFE WORKPLACE?
Hear from and speak with your neighbors, community activists, educators and others working to stop the incarceration of ever more people. We’ll watch a short video, Rights for All, produced by Amnesty International and hear from Palak Shah, editor of Defending Justice, a resource guide published by Somerville’s Political Research Associates. Jack Cole, a Medford resident, former cop and member of L.E.A.P. (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition) will discuss the failed War on Drugs and racism. Members of the Statewide Harm Reduction Coalition will talk about grassroots opposition to the Chicopee Women’s Jail and the recent building “boom” in corrections.
Questions? Call 617-776-6624 Statewide Harm Reduction Coalition (SHaRC) Stop Chicopee Jail.org.
Come meet the caravanistas including one from England, get an update on this year's caravan by Ellen Bernstein from Pastors for Peace. Light Refreshments
Over one hundred PASTORS FOR PEACE volunteers from Canada, all over the United States and five European countries will non-violently challenge the U.S. blockade of Cuba and Government travel restrictions imposed on Americans wishing to visit the Caribbean nation. Organized for the past fifteen years by IFCO [Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization] and led by Rev. Lucius Walker, the PASTORS FOR PEACE volunteers accompany a wide range of humanitarian, medical, educational and technical materials to the people of Cuba in opposition to what they and countless others insist are immoral and legal sanctions unleashed against the people of Cuba by U.S. Administrations for over four decades.
This year, PASTORS FOR PEACE expects to collect more than one hundred tons of material aid as fourteen caravans made up of school buses, ambulances and minivans wend their way from starting points in Canada through most major American cities. After having converged in Texas, the entire Caravan will ship the aid via containers from a port in Mexico. The volunteers [caravanistas] will then fly to Havana for a week of people-to-people encounters with Cubans working primarily in medical, educational, housing, cultural and social services sectors. The two-week caravan trip will traverse fourteen separate routes . It will do so without U.S. Treasury licenses for the school buses, computers, musical instruments, educational materials and medical supplies slated for distribution in Cuba. PASTORS FOR PEACE and its supporters remain convinced that to seek such licenses would be to grant legitimacy to the U.S. Blockade of Cuba which an overwhelming number of United Nations countries agree are both internationally illegal and morally offensive.
Questions? Jim Casteris, 617-964-7932 Pastors for Peace Igc.org email link IFCO news.org NYC: 212-926-5757 Providence: 401-351-3414
Sponsors: July 26th Coalition, Community Church of Boston, IFCO Pastors for Peace (418 West 145th Street, New York, New York 10031)
Part drama, part documentary, The Road to Guant?namo focuses on the Tipton Three, a trio of British Muslims who were held in Guantanamo Bay for two years until they were released without charge.
Open to: the general public Sponsor(s): Comparative Media Studies
For more information, contact: Generoso Fierro 617.253.5038
On June 14th, 2005, seven nonviolent activists, one who was simply pursuing his profession as a photographer, were arrested on the Cambridge Common for nonviolently protesting the Iraq war and the military’s recruiting extravaganza being held that day on the Common. In addition to their function of supporting the on-going the war and the campaign to seduce young people to kill, die, and be maimed in this and other wars, the arrests were a chilling assault on our Constitutional rights of freedom of assembly and freedom of speech. Please plan to support us by attending what we expect will be a 3-5 day trial.
For more information contact: American Friends Service Committee, 617-661-6130.
434 Jamaicaway, Jamaica Plain
Conference room of the Rogerson House Alzheimer's Center
(one block from Centre Street, off of Beaufort Street)
Visit MPHA for directions.
Free and open to the public.
Refreshments will be provided.
For more information, or to RVSP contact Roberta Friedman at MPHA:
617-524-6696, ext. 103 or Rfrie-@mphaweb.org
"We are the ones we have been waiting for." We have 5 projects going or starting up. Come hear about them from participants. Choose one, and go for it!:
* Election Defense. Get trained to stop vote fraud. * Venezuela trip. Go, see, make the connections. * Gandhi Circles. Launch strategic nonviolence. * Corporations Out of Schools. Bottled water out first. * Regional Roundtables. Local-based regional economy.
- Refreshments - New England Alliance.
It will be a celebration of resistance and an opportunity for learning, networking, collaboration and enjoyment. There will be live music, speakers, food, beer, wine, coffee, a short film, info tabling, book sale, etc.
Bands include: The Grass Gypys Brian O'Connell Andrew Alexander, Boston's own Pavoratti The Tribal Groovers (Belly Dancing w/ African Drumming and Strings)
< $10 at the door but we won't turn anyone away. More info: contact Brian O’Connell, 617-947-8983
Suggested donation [$10, $5 for students]. Book signing and reception to follow with light refreshments. For information, advance reservations and directions, call (203) 268-8446 or visit our Squeaky Wheel website. Proceeds from this event benefit Squeaky Wheel Productions, distributors of the syndicated Between The Lines Radio Newsmagazine and independent programming to community media in the U.S. and globally.
Erik Marcus is the author of two significant books that have become classics in vegetarian and animal advocacy literature: Meat Market: Animals, Ethics, and Money, and Vegan: The New Ethics of Eating.
Known for impeccable research, straightforward and insightful presentation, and inspiring, thought-provoking ideas, Erik's books are ones to buy, read, and most important -- get into the hands of other people. Meat Market, his latest book, will be available for sale and signing.
Erik's presentation for us will be almost as eclectic as his weekly podcasts on Erik's Diner.
617-424-8846 Boston Vegan Society
617-254-8883 Grasshopper
An evening of music and stories from community organizers in the Greater Boston area that will highlight the tremendous role that community organizing has played in creating social change in Boston. Location: The Democracy Center, 45 Mt. Auburn St., Cambridge. Free dinner if you RSVP to TipsFromTheRoots@gmail.com before June 21st. Partner orgs include: Stand for Children, Jobs with Justice, Massachusetts Community Action Network, Union of Minority Neighborhoods, One Family, Mass Ballot Freedom Campaign, Keshet, JCRC, Tekiah, and the Eastern Service Workers Association. For more information, go to Tips from the Roots website .