[pjw] REPORT BACK: Police Are Anti-Protestor: Friday rally #96 since stay-at-home orders

[Peace and Justice Works]

Hello again Iraq Affinity Group supporters

First let me say the subject line this week refers to a news item, not to 
the Weekly Friday Rally, which went fine yesterday. Once again six of us 
were there, masked up and distanced. We had a lot of support (and at least 
one confused person yelling out a car window). In fact, the crowd in front 
of the Rialto bar usually at best nods as we go by, but one woman cheered 
and said "I love it!" last night. Third week in a row of winter with no 
rain, too.

As usual I'll start with the national/international news we spoke about at 
the rally and then get to the Portland Police.

--Saudi Arabia bombed a prison in Yemen, killing dozens of people. Will 
there be any consequences? (Or will the US shrug it off as usual?)

  https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/01/21/saudi-bombings-kill-scores-civilians-including-children-yemen

--News just came out that in 2017, the US bombed Syrian dam that should 
have been off limits and could have resulted in huge civilian casualties:

  https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/20/us/airstrike-us-isis-dam.html

--You probably heard that President Biden first said a small 
Russian incursion into Ukraine would be ok, then walked it back.

  https://www.npr.org/2022/01/20/1074466148/biden-russia-ukraine-minor-incursion

...but did you know Secretary of State Blinken visited Ukraine and claimed 
Russia is planning to invade?

  https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-ukraine-attack-short-notice-blinken/

--Political violence is up in Iraq as Moqtada Al Sadr is set to take 
power. While he is a Shia Muslim, he calls attention to the need to unite 
among Shia, Sunnis and Kurds even though the Constitution the US forced on 
Iraq after the 2003 invasion is set up to reinforce ethnic divisions.

  https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1/18/iraq-faces-growing-violence-as-political-rift-deepens

--Secretary Blinken also says the Iran nuclear deal is tenuous and only 
has a few weeks more to succeed or fail

  https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/us-nuclear-talks-iran-decisive-moment-82374261

... but the European Union seems to think the negotiations are on the right 
track and about to be completed.

  https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/nuclear-talks-with-iran-right-track-final-agreement-eu-official-says-2022-01-21/

OK, so for the local news about the anti-protestor police-- you may have 
seen (since this story also made the NY Times) that the Portland Police 
training materials on crowd control created in 2018 included a slide
demeaning protestors and encouraging violence by police.

  https://www.portlandmercury.com/blogtown/2022/01/14/37952603/portland-police-used-right-wing-meme-threatening-violence-in-training-presentation

Not only did the US Department of Justice, which is supposed to approve 
PPB training, not know about this slide, but it only was released to the 
public because the City Attorney had to provide it to the plaintiffs in a 
lawsuit about their violent crowd responses in 2020.

Hmm.

Also as an FYI, in addition to the Joint Terrorism Task Force Report I 
wrote about yesterday, there are two other items coming up on Wednesday's 
Council agenda-- one is the amendments to the DOJ Agreement including 
requirements for body cameras, the other is setting aside $2.6 million for 
a pilot program of body cams. Which is weird since the City hasn't yet set 
its body camera policy, so how do they know which kinds of cameras they 
need?

Along the march route, I noted that an Israeli General invoked the memory 
of the 1948 purge of Palestinians from their land, saying there may need 
to be a modern day repeat of this violence as part of a civil war.

  https://english.alaraby.co.uk/news/israel-should-repeat-1948-operation-negev-says-general

As we came back to the Square, I relayed the story that a group of Nobel 
prize winners are encouraging all countries to cut military spending by 
2%. This would generate $1.5 trillion for human needs.

  https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinero/2022/01/19/nobel-prize-winners-are-urging-every-country-to-cut-military-spending-by-2/?sh=4bb23db36dde

The article adds: "As one anonymous signer has commented, 'Spending on 
military hardware only lasts for a fixed period of time. Then we have to 
spend again to maintain, upgrade or change to a new one. Spending on 
human welfare will bring about change for a lifetime in the human's 
life."

The Ann Huntwork Peace Memorial Sign made it all the way past the Gucci 
Store on 4th AND the Apple Store on Yamhill. My trick? I didn't say 
anything about it! Unfortunately, one of the other protestors did and 
right at 5th & Yamhill the sign turned off. Supernatural, obviously.

We always welcome more people though if we ever get a large enough crowd 
we'll probably split to two corners to stay safe, especially with the 
Omicron variant out and about.

peace
--dan handelman
peace and justice works iraq affinity group