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- Go to Home Page -
Latest Content:The Kernel of Pro-War Logic: Support Murder Over Headache On Harriet Miers On Condi Rice RIT Anti War Stands Up to Marine Recruiters and Win Again Interview with Dave Zirin, Air America Sports Commentator Student Attacked by Police, Right-Wing Students, at GMU Review of Norman Finkelstein's Beyond Chutzpah Capitalizing on Tragedy: Disaster Capitalism List Highlights: Nazi Parade, Protests, Riot Nazi Parade 2 Nazi Parade 3 Nazi Parade 4 Nazi Parade 5 Heating Costs, War Heating & War 2 Heating & War 3
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Ground
October 6, 2005
Tariq Khan Speaks
October 3 Rally
First of all I want to say that what happened to me last Thursday is not an isolated incident. More and more, this society is moving in the direction of rampant militarism and vicious authoritarianism.
October 5, 2005
Full Report: Student Brutalized by Cops, Right-Wing Students, for Protesting Recruiters At George Mason University
M. Junaid Alam
A Pakistani-American who served four years in the United States Air Force as munitions personnel was beaten and brutalized by right-wing students and campus police last Thursday at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.
September 24, 2005
Rita: A Perspective From On the Ground
Dimitrije Kostic
Rita has yet to inflict her wrath on Texas as of this writing (noon on Friday). People in this area remain tense.
September 20, 2005
Satire on Campus: Israeli Soldiers Bulldoze Dana Hall, Dozens Feared Dead
Jake Hess
A squadron of Israeli soldiers, with the help of Caterpillar D-9 armored bulldozers, demolished Dana Hall early yesterday morning. Paramedics from a nearby hospital, who were fired upon by the IDF troops while attempting to evacuate injured people, fear that dozens of students were fatally crushed under the rubble.
September 20, 2005
Hunger Strike Against Censorship in Italy
Katrina Yeaw
Seven antiwar activists remain on a hunger strike in front of the Farnesina, the Italian Foreign Ministry in Rome...
Police Unleash Hell Against Peace Activists in Pittsburgh
Stephanie Adair & Others
On Saturday, August 20th the Pittsburgh Organizing Group (POG) called for a counter-recruitment demonstration...
RIT Anti War Stands Up to Marine Recruiters, Marines Retreat
Joshua Karpoff
ROCHESTER, NY When members of RIT Anti War, the student antiwar group and Campus Antiwar Network chapter at the Rochester Institute of Technology found out that six Marine Corps recruiters had set up a table in front of the Student Alumni Union, RIT Anti War knew this could not be left unchallenged. Within a half hour of first encountering the recruiters, a group of 5 activists had come together and using the Counter Recruitment Rapid Response kit, was fully armed with CR literature, RIT Anti War sign up sheets, meeting flyers and signs.
Special Release - Katrina Edition: Thursday, September 03, 2005
This is criminal': Malik Rahim reports from New Orleans
Malik Rahim
New Orleans, Sept. 1, 2005 - It's criminal. From what you're hearing,
the people trapped in New Orleans are nothing but looters. We're told we
should be more "neighborly." But nobody talked about being neighborly
until after the people who could afford to leave . left.
If you ain't got no money in America, you're on your own. People were
told to go to the Superdome, but they have no food, no water there. And
before they could get in, people had to stand in line for 4-5 hours in
the rain because everybody was being searched one by one at the entrance.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Report from World Youth Festival in Venezuela
Josh Saxe
We meet with political committees
inside the apartment complex and a group of young peasant leaders who
were in Caracas for the festival - they were fighting for land reform
and involved in setting up cooperatives. They told us about how they
had lost about 120 activists to death squads receiving support from
across the Colombian border, and then took us up to the top of one of
the apartment buildings for a magnificent view of the Venezuelan
metropolis. Then they started chanting pro-Chavez slogans, pulled out
pistols and emptied their clips into the air! We were shocked and
hoped the bullets didn't land on one of the many crowds waiting for
buses or at open-air markets, but were also impressed by these peasant
activists, by the fact they were going up against the very real
possibility of death in fighting for a different future...
Friday, July 22, 2005
July 6: Tahltan Nation (Visiting Canada's Fourth World Series)
Macdonald Stainsby
The Stikine Canyon is one of the more beautiful places in the world of nature; the area is loaded with grizzlies, brown and black bears, moose, grouse, bighorn sheep, elk and every river is traditionally a run for salmon of many kinds. The north end of the Coast Mountain range runs through the whole of Tahltan Territory, very imposing and producing creek water that, to this day, is "potable" and so clean you can barely taste it. The reason that all of these things described remain true is the resistance of the Tahltan Nation to Canadian colonialism, successfully, in recent decades.
June 30: Lax Kw'alaams
(Visiting Canada's Fourth World Series)
Macdonald Stainsby
The village of Lax Kw'alaams, officially a reserve and still usually referred to as Port Simpson, is a short floatplane ride or ferry trip from Prince Rupert. This band of the Tsimshian Nation have settled here on and off for tens of thousands of years, living off of Pacific Ocean fishing-salmon (spring, pink, coho and sockeye), halibut and north up the coast, oolichan- along with some hunting, on the central west coast of what is today known as British Columbia. A visitor will notice immediately the large number of eagles, hawks and equally powerful crows everywhere along the water. They fly in and around the area called Rose Island where they nest, as majestic as they have ever been. The eagles and hawks may not be here much longer; their diet consists strongly of various fish-fish that have been nearly wiped out. This lack of fish threatens more than these birds; the whole Nation is threatened.
Saturday, July 07, 2005
Barring Life: Letter from Jayyous, West Bank
Margaree Little
It is a hot afternoon, even for June in the West Bank, but the wind that comes from the quarry where I stand with Sharif Omar is chilling. The quarry was created by the Israeli Defense Forces, who blasted dynamite into a hillside once covered in olive trees-trees that belonged, as this land belongs, to the people of Jayyous town.
Jayyous, with the richest aquifer in Palestine, and the agricultural capability to produce all the fruits and vegetables known to the region, was once considered the breadbasket of the West Bank. Now, all six water wells in Jayyous and 75% of Jayyous land are trapped behind Israel's "security" fence, the construction of which resulted in the uprooting of 4,000 olive and almond trees belonging to Jayyous farmers.
Super-Size Release: Thursday, June 16, 2005
Class of 2010: The Next Generation of Soldiers?
Eliza Leas (Age 12)
Last Friday, June 10, I entered the cafeteria in FHT Middle School in South Burlington, VT only to be greeted by a strange sight. A large screen had been set up on the stage, and adults were milling around and passing out flyers. I glanced down at a flyer on the nearest table, and was indignant to find that this invasion of my middle school's cafeteria had been orchestrated by none other than the Police and the Vermont National Guard.
Terminating the Terminator's Speech at the Santa
Monica Community College Graduation Ceremony
Josh Saxe
One way of thinking about the role of far left
activism is that it helps channel people's individual
uneasiness, anger and frustration about the social
system into collective grassroots direct action
outside the channels of capitalist "democracy." A
group of us in Los Angeles had the honor of playing
that role in bringing together people's anger when
Arnold Schwarzenegger, the "B" movie actor governor of
California and "leader" of the world's sixth largest
economy came as the keynote speaker to the Santa
Monica Community College graduation ceremony. He had
helped cut the education budget, groped and sexually
harassed women, and attacked immigrants and teachers.
We drowned out his entire speech, getting hundreds of
people in the audience chanting, whistling and booing.
Guantanamo Bay: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom
M. Junaid Alam
About 60 people gathered in the Community Church of Boston on June 10 for a reading of the British-produced play, "Guantanamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom," and discussed ways to galvanize the larger public against the unjust treatment of detainees at US prison camps established during the war on terror.
The play, which presents US foreign policy in a critical light, is based on written and spoken materials gathered from government officials, Guantanamo detainees, their families, and military legal counsel. The plight of several detainees was depicted without hyperbole or melodrama, relying instead on the personal intimacy of their letters to their families and discussion of the lives and careers they were ripped out of by the American regime. The play was performed by members of the local community, only a few of whom are professional actors.
Status, Survival, and Solidarity
Non-Status people and the politics of precarity
Aaron Lakoff and Seth Porcello
Just a few weeks ago, Manuel, a 19-year old refugee, sat alone in a jail cell in a detention center in Laval, just north of Montreal. Frightened and tired, he awaited his deportation back to Mexico. It was one of those freakish situations where one might rack their brain to determine what the hell they did wrong. In Manuel's case, it was very simple - he was a refugee without status who chose to defy a deportation order.
Days before, Manuel had been casually waiting at a metro station in Montreal. He was picked up by police who were on the lookout for another young Latino male. In the eyes of these cops, Manuel was just another brown-skinned guy loitering in the metro - already guilty.
Latest Release: Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Repression 101: Students Sanctioned at SFSU
Katrina Yeaw and Alex Schmaus
On March 9th, Students Against War at San Francisco State University, a chapter of the Campus Antiwar Network, along with other student groups, organized a demonstration against military recruiters on our campus. Two hundred students rallied in Malcolm X Plaza and then marched inside the Cesar Chavez Student Center to confront Army and Air Force recruiters. For over 3 hours, students chanted down the recruiters and then surrounded them with a peaceful teach-in...
However, instead of defending its own anti-discrimination policy and the right of students to protest, San Francisco State University decided to launch an attack against political activists on campus.
"Bigots Out Now!"
Keith Rosenthal
BROOKLINE, Mass. - Approximately 100 people came out for a counter-protest against the right-wing, evangelical bigot, Fred Phelps and members of his Westboro Baptist Churh, on June 5th at the Brookline High School graduation.
The group of 7 bigots, descending from Topeka, Kansas, and toting placards saying "God Hates Fags," had decided to picket outside of Brookline High School because of its strong Gay Student Association (GSA) and because of the school's holding of sexual education classes that cater to heterosexual and homosexual youth.
Latest Release: Tuesday, May 24, 2005
May 21, First Report from "Canada's Fourth World" Trip: Kanehsatake
Macdonald Stainsby
The areas around the territory of Kanehsatake have been developed, but it is still very green and covered with life. There are apple orchards that produce some of the largest yields of the fruit on the entire continent. In the wooded areas you can find maple trees that produce the famous maple syrup from the region. But it is in the Pine woods that the most value is produced, getting new life from the land-the land which holds ancestors of the past and provides the basis of life for the present- and for the future. There is no numerical value on dignity, but it grows in Onentokon.
Latest Release: Friday, May 20, 2005
Poverty and the Power of Myths: Delusion at a High School
Francisco Unger
In their ongoing effort to enlighten students here at Phillips Exeter Academy, school administrators arranged a symposium, open to the public, entitled Democracy for Whom? One of the guest speakers was Gordon Mccord, a charismatic young man who serves as special assistant to Jeffrey Sachs in promoting the Millennium Development Goals.
Mccord riveted the campus with a broad speech outlining the roots of mass poverty, primarily that of Africa. He then sought to make clear the ease with which we, as an established Western power, could effect change. The campus received Mccord's sermon with great warmth. He seemed passionately altruistic, and propelled with great intentions. However, much of Mccord's persuasion was awash in a sea of self righteousness and a diversion of fault that rendered his speech meaningless, and made the warm reception ever more predictable.
Latest Release: Thursday, May 5, 2005
David Horowitz and the Hypocritical Attack on the US Academy
Deena Guzder
What do Jimmy Carter, Rashid Khalidi, Bruce Springsteen, Barack Obama and Dennis Kucinich all have in common? According to David Horowitz, they're ingeniously connected through a lethal leftwing conspiracy as delineated on his notorious website www.discoverthenetwork.org, which features unflattering mug shots of America's most progressive pundits accompanied by scathing critiques of their political views. In short, Horowitz's website seeks to mount preemptive character assassinations against any individual with whom the reactionary political commentator disagrees.
David Horowitz spoke at Columbia University last Friday, April 29th to lecture students on-of all things-the worth of "ideological diversity." As the leader of the movement to strangle independent thought at US Universities, Horowitz adoption of the language of "Academic Freedom" is Orwellian doublethink at its worst.
Student Protest Prevents Annual ROTC Information Day at UW-Madison
Chelsea Lauing and Bill Linville
The Air Force Reverse Officer Training Corps (ROTC) annual information day on April 30 was cancelled. At the information day, students were "to learn about Air Force scholarship opportunities and Air Force careers" and receive free lunch, according to an e-mail sent out to the student body. According to Air Force ROTC representatives on campus, the event was cancelled due to the threat of a protest called by the University of Wisconsin-Madison group Stop the War.
Latest Release: Monday, May 2, 2005
Students, Community Confront Military Recruiting Lies
Jon and Sam Christiansen
Coming on the heels of reports of military recruiters in Denver encouraging a youth to forge a high school diploma and falsely pass a drug test, Students for Social Justice (SSJ) held a counter military recruitment demonstration in Colorado Springs at the Citadel Armed Forces Recruitment Center. The demonstration was billed "1500 Lies" to reflect the number of American military personnel who have lost their lives in the war in Iraq and the fact that not only was the war based on lies from the Bush administration, but many of the troops fighting in it were lied to by their military recruiters in order to enlist them.
Is There A New Blacklist? A Speech on Columbia University Debacle
Monique Dols
Some of you may have heard about the intense crackdown that's been happening at Columbia University recently. But if you haven't, I am going to give you a little bit of background.
Last semester there was a film that was produced by a number of pro Israel students on campus with the support of an outside, pro Israel group called the David Project. This film brought together a number of accusations from students who claimed that they were intimidated in the classroom by a number of Middle Eastern Professors. They made this film, they called it a documentary, these screened it with upper level administrators, and with press. And what the film really amounted to was a series of unsubstantiated allegations mixed up with stories of anti-Semitism that was picked up by media and in particular by the right wing media and created a firestorm of debate around the Middle Eastern Studies department at Columbia.
Latest Release: Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Not All Blockades Are Bad:
A Palestinian on Canadian Indigenous Resistance
Tania Tabar
Through the resistance of the first Palestinian initfada (uprising) in 1987, a symbol emerged that represented the asymmetrical balance of power and the grassroots movement against the ongoing Israeli occupation. Just as the young Palestinian in front of a tank with a rock in his hand became a symbol of resistance and self-determination among indigenous communities, the people of Grassy Narrows have inspired a similar momentum.
Thousands of kilometres away, in Kenora in Northern Ontario, the people of Asubpeeschoseewagong (Grassy Narrows First Nation), youth, adults and elders, stood up against the colonization of their lands. Young children, who did not know if the logging trucks were going to even stop, laid down as part of a blockade to prevent a commercial giant from cutting down their forests.
Students, Workers Unite to Protest War and Corporate Greed in CT
Sam Bernstein
In an unprecedented display of grassroots solidarity between the antiwar
and labor movements, members of Southern Connecticut State University
(SCSU) No War and UNITE HERE Local 217, which represents the seventy
dining hall workers at SCSU, picketed and marched to demand a fair
contract for the workers and an end to the war in Iraq.
On Wednesday, SCSU No War organized a Day of Protest on campus. Army
recruiters were scheduled to table all day and former-Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright had a high-profile speaking event that evening.
Campaign to Stop Racism at NYU
Elizabeth Wrigley-Field
Two weeks after a racist, sexist anti-affirmative action "bake sale" resulted in
a spontaneous protest at New York University (NYU), students again showed their
opposition with a second protest of well over 100 students on April 20.
Latest Release: Saturday, April 16, 2005
Anti-Recruitment Ground Report from UW-Madison, Wisconsin
Bill Linville
We'll be sending more e-mails soon, but just wanted to give a brief report on the walk-out against the occupation and military recruiting in Madison. We had a rally of over 200 people today followed by a march past a recruiting center and a sit-in near the chancellor's office demanding to meet with him and kick the military off campus. It was pitched as a "troops out walk out" and was built over a long period of a month and a half. It demanded troops out now and military off campus at UW.
Latest Release: Wednesday, April 13, 2005
Protesting the Travesty in Haiti
Yves Engler
Over sixty people rallied two Tuesdays ago in Montreal in front of both the U.S and French consulates as well as the major federal government offices, marking the 18th anniversary of Haiti's post-Duvalier (Baby Doc and Papa Doc) constitution. Organisers chose these sites to highlight the role these three countries played in last year's overthrow of Jean Bertrand Aristide, Haiti's elected President. The anniversary of the constitution was seen as a fitting day to demand the return of constitutional order in Haiti, including the physical return of Aristide.
Montreal's information picket was in solidarity with a much larger mobilization in Port au Prince where, despite a terribly repressive political climate, tens of thousands gathered to march from the slum of Bel Air. Although the march was publicized well in advance, that morning U.N soldiers handed out leaflets urging people not to protest. U.N soldiers then proceeded to block the march from leaving Bel Air, preventing people from reaching their goal - the Constitutional Plaza. Later in the day the 47 year-old brother of a Montreal rally organizer was shot and killed for wearing a t-shirt with Aristide's picture.
Latest Release: Sunday, April 10, 2005
Talk Given to Brooklyn Parents for Peace
Anthony Arnove
We find ourselves in a remarkable situation today. A majority of people in the United States now believe the invasion of Iraq was not worth the consequences, including (as of today) the death of more than 1,530 soldiers in Iraq.
The official justifications for the war have been exposed as complete fallacies. No one found any weapons of mass destruction or evidence of ties between the Iraqi government at the attacks of September 11. The occupation has not paid for itself, as Paul Wolfowitz suggested it would. And U.S. soldiers have not been greeted as liberators by the Iraqi people.
Meanwhile, more Iraqis today are imprisoned than at any point during the occupation - many of them still in the notorious Abu-Ghraib prison, where some of the worst instances of prison torture have been exposed, but which is by no means unique.
Latest Release: Thursday, April 07, 2005
Student Protest Prevents CIA Recruiting Rvent at New York University
Elizabeth Wrigley-Field and Sam Pipp
A planned CIA recruiting event at New York University (NYU) was
cancelled after the Campus Antiwar Network (CAN) called a protest
demanding the CIA abandon its recruiting program at NYU. 20 hours
before the recruiting event was scheduled to begin, its organizers sent
an email to all those who had registered, headlined, "The CIA Speaker
Event scheduled for Thursday, March 31 @6PM has been CANCELLED due to
the possibility of a protest by the Campus Antiwar Network."
The event -- which was scheduled to include speakers from the CIA, a
dinner, and a raffle for prizes such as an iPod Shuffle -- was
organized by students in an NYU marketing class whose classwork for the
semester is to market the CIA to their peers at NYU. They will be
graded on their efforts; the CIA, which provided them a $2500 budget
for their project, retains ownership of the marketing campaign they
create. The CIA hired the company EdVenture Partners to broker this
arrangement.
UCSC Students Kick Recruiters Off Campus
Erin, UCSC Students Against War
Earlier today, about 300 UC Santa Cruz students led by
Students Against War (SAW) kicked Army, Navy and Marine
Corps recruiters out of the annual Career Center Job Fair,
marking yet another success for the nation-wide
counter-military recruitment campaign.
Joined by Watsonville's Brown Berets, SAW protesters
gathered for a rally at the campus bookstore and occupied
the streets in a traffic-stopping procession up to the
Stevenson Event Center where the Job Fair was being held.
Students were motivated by fiery speeches about the
racist, sexist, classist and heterosexist biases of the
military, all of which are in violation of the UC Santa
Cruz's non-discrimination policies.
Latest Release: Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Urgent Press Release:
Nemagon Workers Are Dying
Kristin McKay and Ryan Miller
Members of the Miami University Students for Peace and Justice group traveled to Nicaragua March 11th-20th on a Witness for Peace delegation to learn about United States foreign policy. While in Managua, the delegation visited a protest camp of several thousand banana and sugar cane farmers who have been lethally infected by the chemical Nemagon. Nemagon is a virulent pesticide used in banana and sugar cane plantations in Central America, the Caribbean, and the Philippines. Approximately 5000 protesters, who are living in makeshift tents of black plastic and sticks across the street from the National Assembly, say that they will not leave until their government has acted justly by recognizing the horrible conditions in which they've been left to die, covering their burgeoning medical costs, and discontinuing the use of all pesticides that contain Nemagon. The workers asked the students to take their stories back to the United States because the United States corporations Dow Chemical, Shell Oil Co. and Standard Fruit Co. exported and encouraged the use of Nemagon. The protesters claim that over 2000 people have died due to exposure to Nemagon. One worker, Juan Alejandro Varela Sanchez, said to the Miami students who'd gathered on the night of Friday the 18th, "And here we stand talking to you and it looks like we're normal human beings, but we are already dead. Nemagon has already killed our way of life, our energy, and has left us practically lifeless. That's why some of us will be burying ourselves."
Anti-War Report: Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Some Ground Reports from Second Iraq War Anniversary Protests in US
May is the month of our Summer Fund Drive. If you found this article useful, please support Left Hook by making a donation.
Fayetteville, North Carolina
March 19 Rally in Fayetteville, NC, a Resounding Success!
Report by North Carolina Peace and Justice Org.: http://www.ncpeacejustice.org/
On the Second Anniversary of the War and Occupation of Iraq, Over 4000 people marched and rallied in Fayetteville, NC, to Show Real Support for the Troops: Bring Them Home Now! This was the largest anti-war demonstration in Fayetteville's history, and signifies a historic turning point for the anti-war movement, when military families, veterans and soldiers take the lead in calling for an end to the Occupation in Iraq.
On Saturday, March 19, 2005, over 4000 people gathering in Fayetteville for a wonderful march and rally spearheaded by vets and military families. People came from all over: Tennessee, Florida, South Carolina, Minnesota, DC, Hawaii, New York. Speakers like Lou Plummer, veteran from Fayetteville, and Mike Hoffman, founder of Iraq Veterans Against the War, electrified the audience. At least 20 active duty GIs defied orders from Ft Bragg to come to listen. Performers included hip hop group Ricanstruction; a bagpipe player; Paperhand Puppet Intervention's performance of "Guernica"; Luci Murphy from DC; and the Cuntry Kings, performing a phenomenal piece featuring a former Air Force member Andy Hanson. A team of 80 Hospitality Committee members helped us build community by convening discussion circles as part of the rally.
- (Read more/see photos from: Harlem, Boston, SF, Reno, Hartford, Johnson)
A Ruthless Critique of the War:
Re-Build the Popular Resistance to US Imperialism!
Ashley Smith
Remarks at 3/20 Burlington, VT Anti-War Rally
Brothers and sisters we rally and march this weekend to rebuild the resistance to empire. Bush, with the near unanimous support of the Democratic Party, lied us into this war and occupation
They lied about weapons of mass destruction. They lied about links between Saddam and Al Qeada! They lied about Iraq being a threat to the United States. Based on lies, they have murdered over 100,000 Iraqis, tortured countless people in the jails of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and laid waste to the infrastructure of Iraq. They have spent billions of our dollars and sacrificed over 1,500 working class soldiers on this conquest.
But across the world this weekend we march to say enough is enough. We will not stand for any more blood spilt for these lies. Mr. Bush, we demand that the US bring the troops home, not on some distant day, but now, today, so that Iraq can be free.
We the forces of the anti-war movement are the vast majority of the world, the majority of the United States and the majority of Vermonters. 59% of Americans want an end to the occupation. Vermont shocked the nation with our resolutions against the war and occupation! Here in Burlington, we voted two to one to bring the troops home now! In the words of the Christian Science Monitor, our town meetings were a revolt against war and occupation.
Critical Reflections on American Complicity:
"The world is waiting for an answer: Are we Americans, or human beings?"
Robert Jensen
Speech at 3/20, Austin, TX, antiwar rally
What's happening is hopeful. It means that even when people are deluged daily by the most relentless and sophisticated propaganda system in the world, they can see clearly the issues, see clearly what's at stake, and take action.
But we can't be na�ve about the struggle. We have to face the serious obstacles to real justice and peace in the world, which can't be overcome by one day's protest. Let's be clear about those obstacles.
The first, and most obvious, problem is: George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, and the Republican Party. We have to commit ourselves not just to getting these the ideologically fanatical reactionaries out of office but also to challenging them for control of the public conversation -- the heart of democracy -- which they have so effectively narrowed and degraded.
The second, and equally obvious, problem is: John Kerry, John Edwards, Hillary Rodham Clinton and the other corporate toadies who run the Democratic Party. I know there are some in the antiwar movement who believe the Democratic Party can be a vehicle to challenge the U.S. empire. But that wasn't true in the last half of the 20th century, when Cold-War liberals promoted imperial policies, and it isn't true in the 21st century, when War-on-Terrorism liberals are doing their part to prop up the empire.
Those are the easy targets, the people in power. But we face other challenges that run deeper.
We have to confront the deeply embedded racism in the United States that makes it so easy to mobilize public support for war, as long as the targets are not white.
Latest Release: Monday, March 21, 2005
A European Columbia Student's Experience: Campus is Fanatically Pro-Israel, Anti-Muslim
"Mark Roberts"
- Introduction by M. Junaid Alam
Readers who have been following the attacks on Arab professors at Columbia University may have read my recent investigative article on the subject. The piece elicited many positive responses, including from Columbia staff and students. One such respondent was a recent European graduate who shared some startling revelations about the university's real atmosphere. Relating his experience below, and using the pseudonym "Mark Roberts" to avoid the kind of vicious attacks Zionist groups are notorious for, he describes how Zionist students have attacked Muslims inside and outside the classroom, and exposes the heavily pro-Israel nature of Columbia Law School.
May is the month of our Summer Fund Drive. If you found this article useful, please support Left Hook by making a donation.
Before studying at Columbia University I hadn't thought much about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Coming from Europe I had no specific links to the area. Then, after finishing my undergraduate degree in Europe and enrolling at Columbia as a graduate student, what struck me most was just the opposite of what some are complaining of nowadays: that is, how fanatically pro-Israel Columbia was.
Dershowitz's Demagogy:
Thoughts on Alan Dershowitz at Columbia University
Dr. Victor Sasson
On February 7th, 05 I arrived at Lerner Hall, Columbia University, where Alan Dershowitz was giving a talk about the controversy surrounding the Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures department (MEALAC). Although I arrived about ten minutes late, I heard most, if not all, of his talk. I should mention that I had never before seen Dershowitz in person, and I doubt if I have read anything by him. But I knew he is a well-known law professor and has published a number of books.
The auditorium was almost full (with about 400 people, mostly students). Only holders of the University ID card were admitted. There were about fifteen vacant seats at the back. For about twenty minutes after my arrival, people kept coming in twos and threes.
Dershowitz complained that he could not get someone from Columbia to introduce him.They considered him, he said, to be too divisive. I think Columbia made a wise decision on that point, as my reader will soon discover
In the Spirit of Rachel Corrie:
Confronting Caterpillar in San Leandro
Ben Terrall
On the second anniversary of the death of Rachel Corrie, killed by a Caterpillar D9 bulldozer while defending the home of a Palestinian civilian, around sixty people gathered at the gates of the Peterson Tractor Company in San Leandro, California. The activists, organized by Jewish Voice for Peace [www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org], held a spirited protest against Caterpillar's continuing sales of bulldozers to the U.S. Department of Defense (which are then delivered to the Israeli military under a Foreign Military Sales Agreement).
As a line of protestors displayed banners to passing traffic condemning Israeli Defense Forces use of CAT equipment to destroy Palestinian homes, others gathered at a partly open gate and began saying Kaddish, the traditional jewish prayer for the dead, for Corrie. (Jewish Voice for Peace also paid tribute to Corrie in this fashion last year, when they swarmed into Peterson's corporate offices on the first anniversary of her death.)
Latest Release: Thursday, March 17, 2005
Week of Campus Resistance Update
Military Recruiters Target Campus Activists
Hadas Their and Katrina Yeaw
On Wednesday, March 9, I and two other students from the City College of New York (CCNY), Justino Rodriguez and Nicholas Bergreen, were brutalized and arrested by campus security guards for peacefully protesting the presence of military recruiters at CCNY's "career fair." We were charged with misdemeanor counts of assaulting an officer, resisting arrest, and disturbing the peace, among other things. Hospital records from Mt. Sinai confirm that Bergreen and Rodriguez suffered multiple contusions and post-concussion syndrome. Our court date is set for April 5.
What was the reaction of CCNY's administration to these events? Without so much as a phone call to see if we were alright, or to find out our side of the story, Gregory H. Williams, the president of our college, sent an email to the entire faculty and student body repeating the allegations against us as if they were facts.
A Report on an Iraq Vet Speaking Out, and Some Reasons to be Optimistic
Derek Seidman
In his talks, Patrick tried to give the attendees an idea of what he experienced in Iraq, to present the reality of the war and occupation that the US media refuses to show. He had a slide show with pictures he took from Iraq- pictures he originally never intended to show to anyone other than friends and family.
Latest Release: Monday, March 14, 2005
More From the Youth Anti-War Front
The Week of Campus Resistance is now upon us. Several
major actions, described in this space ten days ago, have already taken place on campuses in protest
against the war in Iraq. Below are two more ground reports, with accompanying press articles, about
important actions which took place just four days ago. Left Hook will keep its readers updated
on developments for this crucial week of planned actions as diligently as possible.
May is the month of our Summer Fund Drive. If you found this article useful, please support Left Hook by making a donation.
On March 9th, Students Against War (SAW) at San
Francisco State University-a chapter of the Campus
Antiwar Network (CAN)- cooperated with other campus
student groups to organize a protest against the
presence of military recruiters on SFSU's campus.At
11am, over 200 students rallied outside the student
center expressing their outrage at the presence of
military recruiters in the nearby job fair. People
spoke out against the war in Iraq, the budget cuts,
the bigoted anti-gay, racist and sexist policies of
the military, and the fact that while money for
college is increasingly hard to find the Military is
getting more funding for recruitment.
"Recruiters Off Our Campus!":
The growing crisis facing the military
Desmond Gardfrey
"It is a challenging recruiting environment right now."-- Marine Corps spokesman Maj. David Griesmer
In other words, recruiters better watch their backs.
The military is pushing harder to sign people up for the war. Signing bonuses for new recruits have gone up a few thousand. The military plans to hire several thousand more recruiters. The department of defense is spending billions of dollars on advertising. But there are millions of people outraged at the idea that more lives will be wasted for empire.
This outrage has exploded on the frontlines of high schools and college campuses-key targets for military recruiters.
N.Y. officials fire left-wing professor:
Witch-hunt at Columbia
Jonah Birch
NEW YORK'S state government has escalated the attack on left-wing professors at Columbia University. The New York Department of Education (DOE) fired Professor Rashid Khalidi from a program that the DOE runs jointly with Columbia to help public school teachers discuss the situation in the Middle East with students.
Khalidi, a respected historian and director of Columbia's Middle East Institute, hhas been targeted for his political views. He was fired just one day after the New York Sun, a right-wing tabloid, published an article blasting Khalidi for describing Israel as a "racist" state.
Latest Release: Wednesday, March 2, 2005
Youth Anti-War Actions Heat Up
As the second anniversary of the Iraq invasion approaches against the backdrop of increasing US bellicosity against other Middle Eastern states, anti-war student groups have started to mobilize and demonstrate strongly against the war. In at least two cases, students have been arrested for interfering with salesmen of death - military recruiters - operating on campus. Below are news and inspiring ground reports of some of the latest actions.
Latest Release: Thursday, February 24, 2005
Punishing Poor Schools: A Letter of Protest
Alex Sheremet
This is a letter I wrote the NYC Board of Education. My school has been officially declared an "impact school," and, upon the request of my English teacher, the class was to write a letter expressing its feelings regarding the unflattering label. "Impact schools" are supposedly poor, violent and plagued by inferior educational quality, problems to be "corrected" by turning the school into a police state.
May is the month of our Summer Fund Drive. If you found this article useful, please support Left Hook by making a donation.
Dear Honored Guests,
I am writing to you in regards to the recent condemnation of Abraham Lincoln High School as an "impact school." Before I discuss the implications of the unflattering title, please allow me the time to examine the "impact" process that determines whether or not a school will be considered under such a category.
Action Alert: Friday, February 02, 2005
Fox News Crosshairs on Professor Alam
The Editors
Dear Left Hook readers,
We urge everyone to take note of an impending attack by Fox News on Northeastern University professor M. Shahid Alam, father of Left Hook co-editor M. Junaid Alam. Professor Alam's statement explaining the circumstances behind the attack are included below (the statement also appeared in today's edition of Counterpunch).
For those who don't know, Professor Alam is an economics professor at Northeastern University. He writes often for journals like Counterpunch, criticizing US foreign policy and the political culture in which it is embedded. According to Professor Alam, Bill O'Reilly is going to attack him on his show tonight. Professor Alam has also related to us that Fox News has seemingly failed to get Northeastern University officials to come on the show and attack him.
Nonetheless, the dangers of this type of right-wing assault obviously remain real. While clearly an important political incident, the attack on M. Shahid Alam is also a deeply personal thing for us at Left Hook. Please read the professor's statement below and write to the listed administrators.
The attack on Professor Alam is coming off the heels of the controversy surrounding both Ward Churchill and a pro-Palestinian professors at Columbia University. It is part of a much broader attempt to create a new McCarthyism in a post-9/11 America, where anyone (especially scholars) who dares to criticize the policies of the US government is deemed un-American.
Please defend Professor M. Shahid Alam. You can help by contacting Northeastern University and telling them to defend Professor Alam.
The contact information for President Richard Freeland is available
at: http://155.33.227.141/president/letters.nclk
Also contact:
Ahmed Abdelal
The contacts for the leading people in the President's office are
available here: http://www.president.neu.edu/cabinet.html
The contact info for the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences is:
James Stellar
Thank you,
May is the month of our Summer Fund Drive. If you found this article useful, please support Left Hook by making a donation.
Statement by M. Shahid Alam
February 2, 2005
O'Reilly's Fatwah on "Un-American" Professors:
FoxNews Puts Me In Its Crosshairs
I published an essay, "America and Islam: Seeking Parallels," in Counterpunch on December 29, 2004. A day later, I began to receive nasty and threatening emails, all at once. These were orchestrated by a www.littlegreenfootballs.com. Shortly thereafter, other right-wing websites got into act, posting excerpts from the essay; these included jihadwatch.org, campuswatch.org, frontpagemag.com, freerepublic.com, etc. The messages posted on these websites were equally vicious, and some of them, containing explicit death threats, were 'kindly' forwarded to me.
What did I say in this essay? I made two points. First, that the 9-11 attacks were an Islamist insurgency: the attackers believe that they are fighting--as the Americans did, in the 1770s--for their freedom and dignity against a foreign occupation/control of their lands. Secondly, I argue that these attacks were the result of a massive political failure of Muslims to resist their tyrannies locally. It was a mistake to attack the US.
I followed the first essay with a second one, "Testing Free Speech In America," where I elaborate on the points I had made earlier. This too was published in Counterpunch.Org on Jan 1/2, 2005.
The emails to me and the University continued for another two weeks, eventually tapering off. In the meanwhile, I was speaking to people at the ACLU, Boston, and the ADC, Boston. On the suggestion of the ACLU, I contacted the campus police and the police in my hometown to let them know about the death threats posted against me.
I had a feeling this was not the end of the matter. So yesterday, February 1, I received an email from Fox News asking for a TV interview; they were producing a program "on me." At this point, I spoke to people at ACLU who advised me against going on the program. I received the same advice from other friends. I wrote back to Fox saying I could not do the interview but would be glad to answer any questions. They did not take me up on my offer. Clearly, this would not help them in their designs against me.
It appears that Bill O'Reilly is doing a series on 'unAmerican' professors on US campuses. Last night, my wife tells me, he did a piece on Ward Churchill. Tonight will be my turn. I expect he will make all kinds of outlandish accusations that will resonate well with the left- and Muslim-hating members of his audience. This will generate calls and emails to Northeastern and to me containing threats, calls for firing me, and threats to withhold donations. I am not sure how well NU will stand up against this barrage.
If we can generate a matching volume of emails, letters and call to NU supporting my right to free speech, it might be helpful.
What else can we do? [Northeastern Univ. contact info listed above]
M. Shahid Alam, professor of economics at Northeastern University, is a regular contributor to CounterPunch.org. Some of his CounterPunch essays are now available in a book, Is There An Islamic Problem (Kuala Lumpur: The Other Press, 2004). He may be reached at m.alam@neu.edu.
Latest Release: Friday, January 28, 2005
Understanding the Attacks on Pro-Palestinian Professors at Columbia
By Jonah Birch
As the new year begins, the attacks by the right-wing media and mainstream politicians against professors at Columbia University who are critical of Israel and the United States have continued unabated. The current round of assaults began in November of last year following the release of a movie, Columbia Unbecoming, produced by a Boston-based Zionist organization, The David Project. Columbia Unbecoming features interviews with a small number of Zionist activists at Columbia who claim that they have faced intimidation at the hands of pro-Palestinian students and professors, especially in the Middle Eastern and Asian Languages And Cultures (MEALAC) Department.
A Report on Protests from Atlanta
Desmond Gadfrey
Two recent events have made Atlanta activists more confident as of late. The annual Martin Luther King (MLK) March and the local march and rally against Bush's inauguration were both inspiring events.
The MLK march featured GLBT, environmental, antiwar, and Black Power contingents that raised relevant political issues in an event that receives much mainstream coverage and support. These groups provided a welcome surprise to attendees who expected the usual, but bland, civil rights and community empowerment messages.
The Antiwar Student Movement:
The Implications of the J20 Walkout
Richard Moreno
The January 20th walkouts were a milestone in the student-youth movement. It was a veritable step in the reconsolidation of the genuine and vivacious antiwar-campus struggle that was set into motion on March 5, 2002.
High school and college students walked out from around the globe. Indeed, as of this writing, news of walkouts from San Francisco to Seattle to Germany to Canada is over-filling the author's email box.
Here are just a few examples of some student actions.
At Seattle Central Community College, an estimated 500 students managed to kick military recruiters off their campus during their walkout, and then the students met up with 500 other students from the University of Washington (KoinNews6). In Chicago, several hundred Evanston Township High School students walked out of classes despite threats from the administration, which charged them with absences (Chicago Tribune). At Mt. San Antonio College in the Los Angeles area, students who walked out staged a mock trial of George W. Bush (SGV Tribune). In Colorado, one Boulder High School student, inspired by the Berkeley Free Speech Movement, led a walkout alongside of his English teacher (Colorado Daily).
Latest Release: Monday, January 17, 2005
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Over eighty students showed up to hear Iraq war veteran Patrick Resta (Specialist E/4) speak at Brown University on Thursday, March 10th, and about thirty people heard him speak the following night at the Cathedral of St. John in Providence. Patrick returned from Iraq in November, 2004. He is a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) and has been speaking out against the war and occupation for a several months. As he said in a recent interview, "I will continue to speak out until the last soldier leaves Iraq."