[pjw] REPORT BACK: USA vs. Syria & Afghanistan: Friday rally #184 since stay-at-home orders

[Peace and Justice Works]

Hello PJW supporters

For the second week in a row, the Friday Rally for Peace and Justice had 
11 people in attendance. I guess that's both uplifting and a little 
disappointing since this was the special event around the anniversaries of 
the US wars in Afghanistan and Syria. We handed out a bunch of fact 
sheets, which I neglected to upload to the web yesterday, so I will send 
the content and the link to that tomorrow.

We had a lot of supportive honks from vehicles and a suitable number of 
supportive pedestrians. One person and a small group with them decided to 
heckle us for a large part of the rally, They implied they might want to 
get violent but our folks stayed calm and de-escalated. They inadvertently 
came back upon us during the march. The main person put their foot out to 
try making the wagon tip over, very mature.

I forgot to mention last week that, as in a long line of such occurrences, 
a Palestinian-American came up to thank us for the signs about ending 
Israel's occupation.

Oh, and also about last week: I did not realize until talking to someone 
and confirming on the internet that Oktoberfest originally was in October 
but people complained about the weather and it moved back to September. 
So, you learn something new every day.

Here are some highlights from the rally talk this week, which began with a 
run-down of some of the facts about "U.S. Bombs and Troops Still in Syria,
Nine Years Later... After 22 Years, USA Mostly Gone from Afghanistan":

--In Syria, the US has at least 24 military bases despite not having 
authorization from the UN, Congress or the Syrian government to be there.

---The US presence has led to many close calls with Russian aircraft, 
including a series of incidents where Russians struck American drones over 
the course of a recent month.

---Israel has bombed Syria repeatedly since their civil war broke out in 
2012 with no repercussions.

--While US troops are (as far as we know) all out of Afghanistan, America 
keeps an "over-the-horizon" presence as illustrated by the knife-breaking 
drone killing of an alleged Al Qaeda leader there in 2022.

---The US maintains about $7 billion of Afghanistan's money in its banks 
while ordinary Afghans are facing dire conditions.

---A horrifying remnant of the US invasion of Afghanistan is the continued 
operation of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (itself a symbol of US 
imperialism... why does the US have a base on Cuban soil?). 30 people 
remain there.

---Recent news, which came in too late to put in the fact sheet: One 
Guantanamo inmate was declared incompetent to stand trial because his 
mental health was irreversibly damaged by US torture. Remember, he's been 
in prison for over 20 years.

  https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/guantanamo-judge-rules-911-defendant-unfit-trial-after-103413955


In other headlines:

--Russia is going to increase its military budget by 68%, bringing it to 
$111 billion. But for comparison, the US has already sent Ukraine 
$113 billion since February 2022. Also, $111 B is one eighth the US' 
proposed budget of $886 billion.

  https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/europe/russia-unveils-huge-spending-hike-to-battle-hybrid-war/articleshow/104020636.cms

--In what could be a sign that the war is really ending, Yemen dissolved 
its 2014 government, planning a transition with Saudi input to what looks 
like it could be a coalition government.

  https://new.thecradle.co/articles/yemeni-govt-dissolved-as-resistance-urges-radical-change

--Back here in the US, the House voted against banning cluster bombs being 
sent to Ukraine on a vote of 160-269, with 75 Democrats voting for the 
ban.

  https://news.antiwar.com/2023/09/27/house-kills-gaetz-amendment-to-ban-transfer-of-cluster-bombs/

---How did Oregon do? For banning these horrifying weapons, Bonamici, 
Hoyle and Salinas. Against? Republicans Chavez-Deremer and Bentz, along 
with... supposedly anti-war champion Earl Blumenauer???

  https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2023439

--In Iraq, Prime Minister al Sudani says they need to set a timeline for US 
troops to exit. He's been making deals to keep "advisors" in the country 
but is facing increasing pressure to get the Americans out, recognizing 
their continued presence leads to violent attacks on US bases and more.

  https://new.thecradle.co/articles/foreign-troops-must-exit-iraq-to-take-away-excuse-from-armed-resistance-pm

--As part of his goal to start a war with China (guess the Cold War was 
the "good old days" and we need a new one!) President Biden hosted 18 
Pacific Island nations at a summit, and promised two of them new security 
pacts.

  https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/biden-announce-new-diplomatic-ties-two-pacific-island-nations-rcna105642?ex=digest

I threw out three local news stories I was going to talk about when, at 
about 3 PM yesterday, the Oregonian broke the news that when Portland 
Police killed Immanueal Clark-Johnson last November, he was (a) unarmed 
and (b) not the robbery suspect they were even looking for. He was a 30 
year old Black man and was shot in the back by an AR-15 rifle. Cue 
protests in the streets? Or did they delay his grand jury case so long to 
mute the public outcry?

  https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2023/09/portland-police-stopped-wrong-car-after-armed-robbery-call-then-fatally-shot-unarmed-man-running-away-from-car-testimony-reveals.html

Along the march route, I talked about how a Saudi minister visited the 
West Bank fro the first time in many years in order to reassure the 
Palestinians that any talks about normalizing relations between Israel and 
Saudi Arabia must include justice for Palestine.

  https://themedialine.org/top-stories/saudi-envoy-makes-historic-ramallah-visit-in-attempt-to-reassure-palestinians-amid-israel-normalization-talks/

As we headed back to the Square, I noted that the Senate's version of the 
stopgap bill to avoid a government shutdown (less than 9 hours to go as I 
write this!) included $6 billion more for Ukraine... while people are 
living in the streets, getting inadequate health care and can't afford 
education.

  https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/26/politics/mccarthy-government-shutdown-latest/index.html

(QUICK UPDATE: About 1/2 hour before I started writing this report, the 
House passed a 45-day spending bill WITHOUT the Ukraine money:

  https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/30/politics/us-government-shutdown-latest/index.html

The vote was 335 to 91.

https://www.kosu.org/politics/2023-09-30/house-passes-45-day-spending-stopgap-sending-bill-to-senate

--end update--)

Probably regardless of the juvenile prank played by our heckler, the Ann 
Huntwork Peace Memorial Sign went out completely by the Gucci store, the 
most common place for the bizarre ghostly "unplugging" to occur.

At the end of the rally I noted that we're going to focus on Peace in 
Ukraine next week, on the 6th, as part of international actions that 
start today.

(I was going to paste in the United National Antiwar Coalition's 
action page here, but something's wrong with the site. Here's the home 
page in case it clears up soon:

https://unacpace.org )

Please join us any Friday night at 5 PM at SW Yamhill and Broadway if you 
can, it's always a pleasure, even when we have people who don't agree with 
wanting peace for some reason. Stay safe and mask up!

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