Category Archives: DISARMAMENT & SECURITY

“Culture of Peace” Recommendation for UN summit “Pact for the Future”

DISARMAMENT AND SECURITY .

Received at CPNN from Anne Creter, Peace Through Unity Charitable Trust

Today’s New Year’s Day opens with sharing the following “Culture of Peace “recommendation our UN NGO Global Movement for the Culture of Peace sub-group submitted yesterday (New Years Eve) as input to the big September 23-24, 2024 UN Summit of the Future “Pact for the Future” being developed now. 

The “actionable” evolutionary UN Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace A/RES/53/243 adopted by the General Assembly (GA) in 1999 must be integrated into A Pact for the Future (PACT) for greater UN innovation and synthesis, as it can provide a missing link helping the UN fulfill its mission to “end the scourge of war.” Aligned with the science of nonviolence, Culture of Peace is a comprehensive, UN established “blueprint” or “roadmap” of actions necessary at all levels of existence to manifest sustainable peace. If utilized in the PACT, Culture of Peace could provide a new, unified global structure for the UN to connect and coordinate worldwide peace actions for greater synergy and effectiveness. War will be inevitable until a better, rational, productive system is solidly in place providing the structure and platform for conflict resolution to routinely happen.

Chapter II: International peace and security:

The UN’s 75-year-old quest “to end the scourge of war” has paradoxically devolved into a worldwide culture of violence at this most dangerous inflection point in history. Thus, it is imperative that the advanced peacebuilding concept of the Culture of Peace be a focal point within this futuristic PACT, for it has received growing understanding and appreciation both at the UN and within civil society in the last 25 years. In keeping with its recently evolved history at the UN, A/RES/53/243 adds clear “actionable” guidance aligned with the relatively new field of peace studies at a time when the world is hopelessly paralyzed by the existential escalation of violence at all levels which, in becoming normalized, threatens even greater planetary peril. Examples of civil society “Infrastructures for Peace” based on A/RES/53/243 now making a difference in the world are the Ashland Culture of Peace Commission in Oregon USA and Rotary International showing great progress of peace at local city levels.

The landmark UN Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace (A/RES/53/243) was adopted by the GA on 13 September 1999 after nine months of hard negotiations skillfully led by Bangladesh Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury, Former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the UN; Founder of the Global Movement for the Culture of Peace, who said: “I believe this document is unique in more than one way. It is a universal document in the real sense, transcending boundaries, cultures, societies and nations. Unlike many other GA documents, it is action-oriented and encourages actions at all levels, be they at the level of the individual, the community, the nation or the region, or at the global and international levels.” It defines Culture of Peace as a set of values, attitudes, modes of behavior and ways of life that reject violence and prevent conflicts by tackling their root causes to solve problems through dialogue and negotiation among individuals, groups and nations. Per the A/RES/53/243 mandate, the Programme of Action by its pure “action” structure speaks to the PACT’s goal of “action-oriented” recommendations, citing actions at all levels that are necessary to build the Culture of Peace within the following Eight Areas of Action:

1) Fostering a culture of peace through education
2) Promoting sustainable economic and social development
3) Promoting respect for all human rights
4) Ensuring equality between women and men
5) Fostering democratic participation
6) Advancing understanding, tolerance and solidarity
7) Supporting participatory communication & free flow of information & knowledge
8) Promoting international peace and security

UNESCO was charged with writing the “Declaration and Programme of Action” led by David Adams, Former Director, UNESCO Unit for International Year for Culture of Peace. It is not by accident that the term originated at UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and “Cultural” Organization) at a meeting in Africa in 1989. For Culture appears in the very name of UNESCO which was established as the UN’s cultural organization. Culture here is defined in the broad anthropological sense, not in the narrow popular sense restricted to music, dance, and other arts. UNESCO was not concerned with culture for its own sake, but culture for the sake of peace. It made a distinction between the old concept of peace between sovereign states and a new concept of peace between peoples. UNESCO’s constitution preamble declared in 1946: “That a peace based exclusively upon the political and economic arrangements of governments would not be a peace which could secure the unanimous, lasting and sincere support of the peoples of the world, and that the peace must therefore be founded, if it is not to fail, upon the intellectual and moral solidarity of mankind.” As UNESCO stated: “Each of these areas of action have been priorities of the UN since its foundation; what is new is their linkage through the culture of peace and non-violence into a single coherent concept. This is the first time all these areas are interlinked so the sum of their complementarities and synergies can be developed.”

Question for this article:

What is the United Nations doing for a culture of peace?

A/RES/53/243 gives clear guidelines on a new mode of governance which calls on the entire UN system; all governments, and all peoples to work together to build a more free, fair, and peaceful global neighborhood through a positive, dynamic participatory process where dialogue is encouraged, and conflicts are solved in a spirit of mutual understanding and cooperation. It was a watershed moment when A/RES/53/243 was passed as never before had an “action-oriented” template been created based on the science of nonviolence articulating all the peacebuilding actions needed at every level from inner to international for world peace to take shape. A/RES/53/243 is innovative because it embodies this new peace knowledge by design, stating all the multi-dimensional, congruous actions that need to happen for the Culture of Peace to materialize. These preventative, multi-level actions by individuals and groups must be implemented and monitored in Member States to “end the scourge of war” – a function the UN could oversee by creating a “Culture of Peace Council” equal in status to the Security Council to balance its two main purposes of peace and security through developing national “Culture of Peace” Action Plans.

Culture of Peace is a clarion call for individual and collective transformation, indispensable for the safety, security and development of planet earth. Therefore, to make the PACT truly transformational, the concept of Culture of Peace must be integrated within it, reflective of the “new” positive view of peace. “Negative” peace is the absence of violence. Peace has traditionally been thought of simply as that. But we know now that peacebuilding is so much more. “Positive” peace is defined as the attitudes, institutions and structures that create and sustain peaceful societies, like better economic outcomes, measures of well-being, levels of inclusiveness and environmental performance. “Positive” peace is transformational in that it is a cross-cutting factor for progress. Use of the word ‘Peace’ connotes “negative” peace, old paradigm thinking whereas ‘Culture of Peace’ connotes a new-paradigm “positive” peace mindset.

Culture of Peace has a recent rich history of evolution at the UN in the last 25+ years since A/RES/53/243 was first adopted in 1999. We are told it takes between ten to twenty years from the time UN resolutions are passed for them to be fully understood and utilized. Culture of Peace is no exception. The term was hardly ever used at the UN in the first ten years of its passage (the first decade of the new millennium). It took 12 years before the major breakthrough of the first High Level Forum on the Culture of Peace took place in 2012. That big milestone was first conceived back in the year 2000 when the International Year for the Culture of Peace was declared, along with its 2000 Manifesto for a Culture of Peace and Nonviolence crafted by Nobel Laureates. Then from 2001 to 2010 there was the International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Nonviolence for the Children of the World, producing Mid-Decade and End-of-Decade Culture of Peace Progress Reports, including a continuously running virtual Culture of Peace News Network of actions taken each month around the world in all eight of the Culture of Peace Areas of Action. Also, a UN NGO Culture of Peace Working Group which morphed into the Global Movement for the Culture of Peace NGO Coalition, along with 12 annual Culture of Peace High Level Forums with yearly self-standing GA Culture of Peace resolutions passed. Now that these milestones have been achieved, it is time for A/RES/53/243 to be fully utilized by being integrated within this forward-looking PACT.

Integrating Culture of Peace wisdom into the PACT would make that document more UN synthesized and wholistically complete, better enabling full implementation of A/RES/53/243. Culture of Peace is a state-of-the-art concept in human consciousness aligned within the powerful new discipline of peace studies. A/RES/53/243 provides a currently missing overarching peacebuilding framework on how to construct true and lasting world peace. Rendering it essential to the PACT would endow this major futuristic document genuine “new paradigm” relevance. So let Culture of Peace (already existing in the heart of humanity) become the foundation upon which our children and their children’s children can continue building the future civilization. As unleashing the knowledge of how to cultivate world peace in this way will accelerate desperately needed UN reform and transformation.

Chapter V: Transforming global governance:

Article 5 of A/RES/43/243 states that “governments have an essential role in promoting and strengthening a culture of peace.” Per the 2023 UN New Agenda for Peace Action #3 – one recommendation is to develop national prevention strategies to address the different drivers and enablers of violence and conflict in societies and strengthen national “Infrastructures for Peace.” Further that Member States seeking to establish or strengthen national “Infrastructures for Peace” should be able to access a tailor-made package of support and expertise. Uniting these 2 UN guiding principles “Culture of Peace and “Infrastructures for Peace” together would be an impactful step forward in UN fulfillment of its peace mission. For Culture of Peace establishes this UN peace vision as normative and prescribes the roadmap of actions needed at all levels to actualize it. Governmental “Infrastructures for Peace” such as “Departments and Ministries of Peace” are the roadways or platforms of peace architecture that support essential peace actions (like diplomacy) to readily occur so peace can take root and grow. Coupled together these two constructs give shape, form, and substance to building the “capacity” for peace by operationalizing and institutionalizing peacebuilding as the missing connective layer needed to sustain peace. Both principles are designed to prevent and reduce violence thus are mutually reinforcing. Integrated within the PACT, their synergistic impact of collaborative connection would facilitate significant UN reform and transformation.

UN NGO “Global Movement for the Culture of Peace” Signatories:

Peace Through Unity: Kate Smith, Director; Iris Spellings, UN NGO Representative; Anne Creter, UN NGO Alternate Representative

Pathways to Peace: Tezikiah Gabriel, Executive Director; David Wick, President

The Good News Agency – Associazione Culturale dei Triangoli e della Buona Volontà Mondiale: Georgina Galanis, UN NGO Representative

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DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, global, United Nations,

Revista CoPaLa, Constructing Peace in Latin America, July-December 2023

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

Extracts from the Revista núm. 18, introduction by Roberto Mercadillo and David Adams

. . . after long reviews and discussions, between 2019 and 2021, the three of us (Roberto Mercadillo, David Adams and Federico Mayor) undertook the task of shaping a new Declaration for the Transition towards a Culture of Peace in the 21st century following a cognitive approach to human consciousness with four axes: recognize, remember, understand and act. . . . (with regard to action) we propose 12 strategies that can be acted on in two simultaneous routes: local and global. The local route is fundamentally pedagogical to be carried out, mainly, by organized civil society supported by local governments. The global route involves the creation of a “Security Council of Mayors” made up of representatives of the major cities in all regions of the world and the expansion of the General Assembly of the United Nations to integrate citizens of the world in the analysis, proposals and resolutions of the problems that affect us.

In February 2022, with Cristina Ávila-Zesatti, Correspondent of Paz – Mexico, Myrian Castello from Fábrica dos Sonhos – Brazil, and Alicia Cabezudo from the Global Alliance for Peace Ministries and Infrastructures – Latin America and the Caribbean, we formed a group of academics, construction companies, peace educators and journalists in Latin America to discuss the relevance of the Declaration in this region of the world and join efforts for its dissemination. . . .

In September 2002, CoPaLa Magazine opened the call to publish a special issue that would give space to experiences, Latin American thoughts and proposals focused on culture and peacebuilding that coincide with the premises set forth in the Declaration for the Transition towards a Culture of Peace in the 21st Century. As a result of this effort, the current Number 18 of the CoPaLa Magazine provides Spanish-speaking readers with 15 texts with a diversity of ways of communicating and thinking about peace . . .

(1) The first essay exposes cognitive and universalist positions on the human mind. In “Culture of peace: A selfish paradox”, Clemens C.C. Bauer reflects on Nietzsche and the life of the Bodhisattva to argue that understanding our feelings and thoughts leads us to recognize our own well-being intertwined with the well-being of others. . .

(2) It is precisely from the historical approach and from his own experience, that Edgardo Carabantes Olivares writes “Peace and Human Rights in Chile fifty years after the overthrow of Allende”. Half a century after the coup d’état in 1973, the author wonders about the inadequacies of the political, social and cultural system that keeps the people Chile in a space that is neither dictatorship nor democracy, but rather a hybridocracy characterized by hidden violence, a negative peace and manipulation of the exercise citizen. He emphasizes civil disobedience, active nonviolence, and hope as acts of resistance to always choose life and peace.

(3) Meanwhile, in “Total Peace: A New Opportunity for Peace Initiatives ex-combatants of the FARC”, Laura C. Fuentes and Juan D. Forero analyze peace initiatives from and for ex-combatants of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. These initiatives form resistance to the Colombian conflict and constitute peacebuilding strategies. The “Total peace”, proposal of the recent and current administration of the Colombian government, could provide – the authors suggest – a stable framework for the construction of a more just and equitable society . . .

Citizen organizations

(4) In “The (re)construction of peace in Mexico through communication”, Lucía Calderón observes and analyzes the violence experienced in the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico. She describes how the population became managers of information that kept them safe from the actions of criminals. She emphasizes that, to a large extent, the recovery of peace depends on the willingness of the society to rebuild itself and to become aware of the alliances they can build with their peers.

(5) From Mexico City, Arturo Ramírez Ruíz writes “Rodar el pueblo: structures of youth learning and community reception”. He describes and analyzes youth actions organized to ride bicycles and, with this, to build learning structures, community centers and spaces to coexist and live with others. Pedaling the bicycle, says the author, becomes a political act of resistance and vindication of rights that imply knowledge and know how to organize ourselves, know how to take care of ourselves, know how to show solidarity, know how to resist, know how to transform and know how to sustain ourselves.

(6) In “Chiapanecas moving collectively towards a life free of violence: challenges and learning”, Mónica Carrasco Gómez shows us a meticulous and daring participatory ethnography of a collective project of women to build economic independence and live free of violence in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico. After searching and creating safe spaces to express their voices, women reestablished a collaborative environmentthat favored their economic independence, becoming aware of their power relations and learning new ways of relating in which the intention to act or speak had no
objective of imposition, but rather the possibility of cooperation.

(7) Carolina Escudero gives us “Culture of peace in the TEB campaign on forced disappearances in Spain.” Through qualitative research, she analyzes the “We Are Here” campaign with families who are victims of the forced disappearance of babies in Spain. She describes the alliances between organizations that ensure Truth, Justice and Reparation that lead to, as one of the participants says, accepting that “We are all equal, we are a family”. The TEB campaign contributes to managing conflict, by denouncing and recognizing the abuses by the State and institutions during the dictatorship, by placing democracy as an antidote to violence, and by strengthening cohesion and group action.

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(Click here for the original article in Spanish.)

Questions related to this article:
 
Latin America, has it taken the lead in the struggle for a culture of peace?

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Education

(8) In “Teaching ethics in the face of the Technological Revolution (CRI). A hermeneutics-analogue perspective”, Alfonso Luna Martínez raises relevant ethical dilemmas for the assimilation if technological and industrial change in education. He concludes with an ethical proposal, presenting us with the need to overcome the neoliberal capitalist world and to regulate access to the data about people’s interests, so that they are not used in mass manipulation to define market and consumption trends.

(9) Jair Alejandro Vilchis Jardón writes “Thinking about neoliberalism. A critical view from analogical pedagogy of everyday life.” The author calls us to understand that the capitalist model not only acts in the economic sector, but has managed to permeate the educational system through excessive loads and/or work hours justified under the logic of production. He also invites us, collectively, to think about more humane ways of doing science with aspiration of social justice and not as productive agents of knowledge.

(10) In “Understandings about interculturality and its pedagogical implications”, Ximena Marin Hermann reflects on the relationships between interculturality and pedagogy. Interculturality, she suggests, emerges from the need to build public policies focused on social differentiation and globalization, from the resistance and defense of cultural particularities and their identities, and from the investigation to understand the problems of diversity and cultures. Its pedagogical implications lead to the construction of an inclusive intercultural citizenship that would allow us to answer the question “Can we talk about citizen and social construction based on pluriversity and what would be the keys to being able to travel this path?”

(11) Elia Calderón Leyton presents “Education for peace: reflections from literacy criticism”. Her text shows us the importance of writing and critical reading in education. Alluding to the thought of Husserl, Arendt, Habermas, Foucault and Cortina, she points out the need to practice the confrontation of knowledge and experience, as well as to distinguish inequalities in pedagogical practices. Critical thinking contributes to the pedagogy of peace and the ability to listen to others as a political act, because it places the individual in a community to transform doubt into truth, to understand and achieve authentic dialogue in Latin America.

(12) In “Educating towards a culture of peace in the 21st century: Guidelines for thinking and acting”, Anita Yudkin Suliveres proposes a positive vision of peace and a critical approach to education that prioritizes creative thinking, awareness of local problems and global, novel ways of investigating, experiencing and knowing, the cultivation of empathy and solidarity, the arts and the generation of spaces for participation. As educators, we must rethink what happens in educational processes, the experiences of training at all levels and reconsider both the study contents and the capabilities and knowledge that we aspire to promote.

(13) Mónica Lizbeth Chávez González in “School violence and interstitial spaces in Mexico. An ethnographic approach in Uruapan, Michoacán” presents an ethnography of focus groups in a secondary school. She describes how young people, through pedagogy of violence, build relationships and spaces of risk, vulnerability, impunity and defenselessness. Youth are presented as perpetrators of school violence and power through threats, certain criminal practices or the exercise of violent sexual-affective behavior. She urges us to attend to the intersection between these manifestations of violence to collectively them as daily problems.

Action and innovation

(14) In “Culture of peace, service-learning and citizen training: Experiences and reflections”, Benilde García-Cabrero, Alejandro R. Alba-Meraz and María Montero-López Lena reveal to us their proposal for education-action arising from the analysis of three psychosocial interventions carried out by themselves in Mexico. They describe the philosophical underpinnings and pedagogical methods of service-learning as an alternative to promote a culture of peace and citizen training in higher education institutions. With this, they deploy the transformative role of higher education for social awareness, the assumption of collective responsibility and the sense of responsibility. Service-learning enables groups who have a peace or social justice mission to reap the benefits of mutual support and collective action.

(15) In “Psicocalle Colectivo: A university proposal for education and construction of peace”, Lorena Paredes, Mosco Aquino and Roberto E. Mercadillo narrate the trajectory of a transdisciplinary university initiative to understand by means of neuroscience, anthropology and psychology the phenomena of street life and psychoactive substance use. They propose an action research model framed in the culture of peace and compassion as ways to connect with others and to use scientific knowledge in everyday life. Compassionate feeling and acting should motivate our action when confronted with the suffering of others. The culture of peace leads to actions towards the construction of an
active peace, conciliatory, emancipatory and resistant for life on the street and in the use of psychoactive substances.

Issue 18 of CoPaLa closes with a review of two relevant books

“The right to peace and its developments in History” (2022) published by Tirant lo Blanch, edited by María de La Paz Pando Ballesteros and Elizabeth Manjarrés Ramos: a review written by Erika Tatiana Jiménez Aceros. The book covers the history of Human Rights and the history of peace and peace research, thereby, unfolding the methodologies and objects of study of peacebuilding and allowing us to understand our history with new configurations.

“The other in the sand: 20 glances and a blink at Western Sahara” (2014) published by Gedisa and by the Metropolitan Autonomous University and coordinated by Roberto E. Mercadillo and Ahmed Mulay. This book, reviewed by Luis Guerrero, presents the vision of academics, activists and journalists from Latin America on the war, the conflict and the peace strategies developed in the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. With this review, we stand in solidarity with the Sahrawi circumstance, we remember it and make it visible in Latin America in this year 2023 that commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Polisario Front, an organization that has maintained the survival of the Sahrawi people, their quest for peace and their demand for autonomy

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, Latin America

Message from Ukrainian pacifist Yurii Sheliazhenko

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

Text of Youtube video by Yurii Sheliazhenko

Dear friends, greetings from Kyiv. Air raid alerts, cold shelter in the nearest underground parking and tragic updates about new deaths are my daily life under martial law during the criminal Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Additionally to regular pains of war experienced by all relatively lucky citizens who managed to survive mass killing, life of a pacifist is full of additional hardships. I am talking not only about everyday nonviolent resistance to war and militarism in words and deeds, burden of responsibility for a better future depending on conscience and efforts of a few enthusiasts who dare to dream and work for a world without wars in a hostile environment.


Frame from video

More painful is that peace dreamers are repressed. Conscientious objectors are jailed. I am under house arrest and risk to be tried and jailed for up to five years for alleged justification of Russian aggression in antiwar statement which condemns it. My letter to President Zelensky was dangerous, they say, because nonviolent resistance is utopia and the army don’t like conscientious objection.

See, you can’t dream about peace, you must adopt utopian ideas of the propaganda of war to make all people soldiers and to wipe Russia out from the world map. You should also think that Putin just bluffed when he said these horrible things about nukes and why he would not need the world without Russia. You must want to defeat Russia, they call it “morale.”

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Questions related to this article:
 
Can the peace movement help stop the war in the Ukraine?

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And if you live in Russia, the same sort of immoral “morale” requires to kill Ukrainians, portrayed as Nazi, and defeat Ukraine. A picture with woman showing heart by hands from behind the bars in Saint Petersburg captured my imagination: Sasha Skochilenko said “When you imprison pacifists, you delay peace,” and she was jailed for 7 years.

More than a half million people were killed, but that don’t stopped Presidents Putin and Zelensky from announcements of more military recruitment to sacrifice more lives in endless, pointless and senseless war. No equivalence here, of course: aggressor must be held accountable and reasonable self-defense is right thing to do, though I would rather do it without violence.

When you respond violently to violence, suffering and destruction multiplies. People feel it and knew it, that’s why people vote by foot against the war when it is possible. More than a million of Russians escaped Putin’s tyranny, not to mention those who fled from his complicit dictator Lukashenko, and more than a half million of Ukrainian refugees hide in Europe from cruel conscription, from abduction of draftees on the streets.

Every person saved from the meat grinder of war is a triumph of life and a step towards peace. That’s why we need to support Object War Campaign aimed at providing protection and asylum to all those who risk to be repressed for  refusal to kill in Russia, Belarus and Ukraine.

Right to refuse to kill is absolute, because human life and dignity is sacred. I wish the serfdom of conscription could be prohibited by international law, because without such an authoritarian tool it would be hard to wage long and monstrous wars.

Peace is human right, it demands care instead of hate towards others, and war is no excuse for violations of freedom of conscience. We should remember and advocate that on the eve of Human Rights Day. I congratulate you with this meaningful date coming, and I wish you peace and happiness.

Never give up your hopes and your efforts for the world where people will forget how to wage wars.

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, Europe

Nuclear Abolitionists Occupy New York

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article by Robert Dodge from Common Dreams (reprinted according to provisions of Creative Commons)

This past week New York City was invaded by nuclear abolitionists from around the world coming together as part of civil society, scientific, and affected communities, to support, strengthen, and move forward with the universalization of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, TPNW, as the United Nations convened the Second Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty . They gathered to celebrate what has been achieved and with hope and conviction for the complete elimination of these weapons to achieve a future free from the threat of their use.

closer to nuclear war  than any time since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 78 years ago. This risk is heightened by the current war in Ukraine, where Russia has threatened the use of nuclear weapons, the ongoing nuclear weapons research by North Korea, the buildup of China’s arsenal and the current war and humanitarian crisis in Israel/Palestine, where there have been suggestions of using nuclear weapons against Palestinians. The risk of nuclear war by intent, miscalculation, or accident coupled with the growing concern over cyber-terrorism and AI is growing.

The new arms race is driven in large part by the United States’ modernization of its entire arsenal in the coming decades at an estimated cost of between $1.5 and $1.7 trillion. The false illusion of deterrence theory has been the largest driver of the new arms race, resulting in every other nation following suit at modernizing and/or enlarging their new arsenals to not be outdone. This reality was acknowledged by this week’s meeting of state’s parties that correctly identifies deterrence as a significant security problem.

Trillion dollar question

The Treaty on the Probation of Nuclear Weapons arose out of the realization of the humanitarian consequences of even limited nuclear war, and the fact that all of life and everything we care about is at risk from a large scale nuclear war. A limited nuclear war using less than 3% of the global arsenals in a distant region could result in nuclear famine  killing over 2 billion people in the years that follow. The International Committee of the Red Cross notes that there is NO adequate humanitarian or medical response to nuclear war. Understanding this, the global majority represented and supported by civil society, has come together, refusing to be held hostage or bullied by the nine nuclear nations.

The entire cycle of nuclear weapons from mining, manufacture, testing, storage, and potential use impacts communities every day. Their very existence threatens communities around the world. As stated by the author Arundhati Roy, “It is such a supreme folly to believe that nuclear weapons are deadly only if they’re used. The fact that they exist at all, their presence in our lives, will wreak more havoc than we can begin to fathom. Nuclear weapons pervade our thinking. Control our behavior. Administer our societies. Inform our dreams. They bury themselves like meat hooks deep in the base of our brains. They are purveyors of madness. They are the ultimate colonizer. Whiter than any white man that ever lived. The very heart of whiteness.”

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Question related to this article:
 
Can we abolish all nuclear weapons?

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While the United States and other members of the P5 appear to be ignorant of, or oblivious to, these humanitarian consequences by giving lip service to them or simply ignoring them, there is a growing chorus in each of these nations supporting the Treaty.

While the United States and other members of the P5 appear to be ignorant of, or oblivious to, these humanitarian consequences by giving lip service to them or simply ignoring them, there is a growing chorus in each of these nations supporting the Treaty. In the U.S. this comes from the grassroots level and from a growing number of local elected officials who recognize that nuclear weapons are a local issue. A letter was presented to Biden from over 230 local elected officials  asking his administration to send an observer to the meeting. This largest U.S. intersectional movement to abolish nuclear weapons is “Back from the Brink” and has been endorsed by 471 organizations, 334 municipal and state officials, seven state legislative bodies and 76 cities and counties across the United States.

Back from the Brink works in coalition for a world free of nuclear weapons and advocates for common sense nuclear weapons policies to secure a safer, more just future. It calls on the United States to lead a global effort to prevent nuclear war by:

*Actively pursuing a verifiable agreement among nuclear-armed states to eliminate their nuclear arsenals

*Renouncing the option of using nuclear weapons first

*Ending the sole, unchecked authority of any U.S. President to launch a nuclear attack

*Taking U.S. nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert

*Cancelling the plan to replace the entire U.S. nuclear arsenal with enhanced weapons

Supporting this effort in the United States Congress is H. Res. 77  introduced by Representatives Jim McGovern of Massachusetts and Earl Blumenauer of Oregon that embraces the goals and provisions of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and Back from the Brink’s comprehensive policy prescriptions for reducing nuclear risks and preventing nuclear war. Currently there are 42 members of congress cosponsoring. Every member of Congress must be asked to take a stand and make their views of this greatest existential threat known.

Forty years after Carl Sagan and other scientists first described the concept of nuclear winter following a large scale nuclear war, the world is moving together for the total elimination of these weapons.

94 nations participated in this week’s Meeting of States Parties. The Treaty currently has 93 signatories and 69 States Parties whose nations have ratified the Treaty. In the closing declaration of the meeting the nations stated:

“We are resolutely committed to the universalization and effective implementation of the Treaty… We will work relentlessly to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons for the sake of current and future generations. We undertake and recommit to ensure that nuclear weapons are never again used, tested or threatened to be used, under any circumstances, and will not rest until they are completely eliminated.”

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, global, United Nations,

UN Rights Chief Says Israel’s Collective Punishment in Gaza Is a War Crime

. . HUMAN RIGHTS . .

An article by Jessica Corbett from Common Dreams (licensed under Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk declared  Wednesday that “the collective punishment by Israel of Palestinian civilians amounts… to a war crime, as does the unlawful forcible evacuation of civilians.”

Frame from video interview with Commissioner Türk at the Rafah Crossing

Israel’s monthlong war on Gaza has killed over 10,500 Palestinians, wounded thousands more, displaced 70%  of the strip’s 2.3 million residents, and decimated civilian infrastructure, including homes, religious buildings, and hospitals.

Türk’s comments came after he visited the Rafah border crossing that connects Egypt to Gaza, which he described as “the gates to a living nightmare—a nightmare where people have been suffocating, under persistent bombardment, mourning their families, struggling for water, for food, for electricity and fuel.”

Long before October 7, when a Hamas-led attack killed over 1,400 Israelis and triggered Israel’s retaliation, Gaza was “described as the world’s biggest open-air prison… under a 56-year occupation and a 16-year blockade by Israel,” he highlighted.The U.N. rights chief also stressed that “the atrocities perpetrated by Palestinian armed groups… were heinous, brutal, and shocking. They were war crimes—as is the continued holding of hostages.” Israeli officials say there are about 240 hostages.

“We have fallen off a precipice. This cannot continue,” he warned. “Even in the context of a 56-year-old occupation, the current situation is the most dangerous in decades, faced by people in Gaza, in Israel, in the West Bank, but also regionally.”

Türk emphasized that “parties to the conflict have the obligation to take constant care to spare the civilian population and civilian objects,” and as an occupying power, Israel is required “to ensure a maximum of basic necessities of life can reach all who need it.”

“I call—as a matter of urgency—for the parties now to agree [to] a cease-fire on the basis of three critical human rights imperatives: We need urgent delivery of massive levels of humanitarian aid, throughout Gaza,” he declared.

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Questions related to this article:
 
How can war crimes be documented, stopped, punished and prevented?

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The official also called for all hostages to be freed without condition and said that “crucially, we need to enable the political space to implement a durable end to the occupation, based on the rights of both Palestinians and Israelis to self-determination and their legitimate security interests.”

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres—who has also been pushing for a cease-fire—called out  Israel’s aerial and ground operations for their impact on civilians during a Reuters conference on Wednesday.

“There are violations by Hamas when they have human shields. But when one looks at the number of civilians that were killed with the military operations, there is something that is clearly wrong,” he said.

“We have in a few days in Gaza thousands and thousands of children killed, which means there is also something clearly wrong in the way military operations are being done,” the U.N. leader added.

According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza, the Israeli war against Hamas has killed over 4,300 children.

“It is also important to make Israel understand that it is against the interests of Israel to see every day the terrible image of the dramatic humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people,” Guterres said. “That doesn’t help Israel in relation to the global public opinion.”

While French President Emmanuel Macron’s plans to hold a Gaza-focused “humanitarian conference” in Paris on Thursday, the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is refusing to participate in the event.

Ahead of the conference, 13 human rights and relief groups called on attendees “to do everything in their power to achieve an immediate cease-fire; take concrete steps to free civilian hostages and protect all civilian populations; and ensure the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza and respect for international humanitarian law.”

Among them was Amnesty International—which, over the past month, has compiled  “damning evidence of war crimes as Israeli attacks wipe out entire families.”

Some global experts and critics have demanded  action from the International Criminal Court on “escalating Israeli war crimes and genocide of the Palestinian people” in Gaza.

In a resignation letter to Türk last month, Craig Mokhiber, who was serving as the New York director for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, condemned  Israel’s war as “a textbook case of genocide.”

“In the immediate term,” Mokhiber wrote, “we must work for an immediate cease-fire and an end to the long-standing siege on Gaza, stand up against the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, Jerusalem, and the West Bank (and elsewhere), document the genocidal assault in Gaza, help to bring massive humanitarian aid and reconstruction to the Palestinians, take care of our traumatized colleagues and their families, and fight like hell for a principled approach in the U.N.’s political offices.”

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, Mideast, United Nations,

1,500+ Israelis Urge ICC Action on ‘War Crimes and Genocide’ in Gaza

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article by Jessica Corbett from Common Dreams ( licensed under Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

Israelis Against Apartheid, a group representing more than 1,500 citizens, this week  urged  the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor “to take accelerated action against the escalating Israeli war crimes and genocide of the Palestinian people” in Gaza.


An injured child is brought to the al-Aqsa Hospital after an Israeli attack on Maghazi Refugee Camp in Deir Al-Balah, Gaza on November 3, 2023. (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“For the safety and future in the region, all elements of international law must be enforced and war crimes should be investigated,” declares the letter to the ICC’s Karim A. A. Khan, noting his ongoing Palestine investigation  and recent remarks  on the war.

The letter, dated Thursday, explains that “as Israeli anti-colonial activists, we have joined our voices to the voices of Palestinians for decades warning on the dangerous course of action pursued by the Israeli state and repeatedly called for international intervention.”

“Persistent impunity has created the conditions for the consolidation of the Israeli apartheid regime, which is intent on committing ethnic cleansing and genocide of the Indigenous Palestinian population,” the letter continues. “The acute deterioration in basic conditions of life that we are now witnessing could have been avoided if Israel had not been continuously granted impunity for its ongoing crimes.”

Officials believe Palestinian militants took around 240 hostages in a Hamas-led surprise attack on Israel October 7, which sparked Israeli forces' retaliatory air and ground assault of Gaza. Since the war began, more than 1,500 Israelis and 9,400 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed, along with at least 133 Palestinians in the West Bank, which has seen a surge in Israeli settler violence.

Over the past four weeks, as Israeli forces have killed thousands of civilians and bombed residential, medical, educational, and religious buildings, allegations of war crimes have mounted. Critics worldwide have accused Israel of committing "a textbook case of genocide," citing not only the bloodshed but also comments from Israeli leaders including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“We are extremely concerned by the Israeli institutional calls for genocide that are being loudly and clearly voiced in Hebrew and believe that they should be seriously taken into consideration as thousands, if not millions, of lives are at stake,” says the letter to the ICC prosecutor.

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Questions related to this article:
 
How can war crimes be documented, stopped, punished and prevented?

Can International Pressure Stop the War in Gaza?

(Continued from left column)

“Israeli military personnel and journalists are now openly calling for ethnic cleansing and genocide,” the letter adds. “It is evident that Israel is disregarding the lives of civilians in Gaza, ordering them to evacuate vast areas even as there is no safe place in Gaza to which people can flee.”

The letter to Khan details the remarks from Netanyahu and others calling for or justifying genocide, and urges him to:

° Issue immediate arrest warrants against Israeli political and military-security leaders who are committing war crimes and crimes against humanity;

° Accelerate your investigation into the ongoing crimes being perpetrated at this very moment by the state of Israel, its military forces, and armed Israeli citizens under military protection; and

° Be a validated and balanced platform for alleged crimes arising from the current situation, rather than making reference to unvalidated and unverified claims.

While applauding some of Khan’s statements  in Egypt after his trip to the Rafah border crossing with Gaza last weekend, the letter also says that “we deeply regret that, despite the opening of an investigation, followed by the Pre-Trial Chamber I’s 2021 decision that the court may exercise its criminal jurisdiction over the situation in Palestine, you have so far failed to take concrete action to stop the tragic trajectory of events in our region by holding Israel accountable.”

Khan said that “we need the law more than ever. Not the law in abstract terms, not the law as a theory for academicians, lawyers and judges. But we need to see justice in action. People need to see that the law has an impact on their lives. And this law, this justice, must be focused on the most vulnerable. It should be almost tangible. It is something they should be able to cling on to. It is something that they should be able to embrace when they are faced with so much loss, pain, and suffering.”

The prosecutor spoke about both the Hamas-led attack on Israel, including hostage-taking, and the Israeli war on Gaza, where civilians have been cut off from essentials like food, water, electricity, and medicine. He also highlighted an online portal to which anyone can submit information on alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, and crimes of aggression.

Khan asked civil society organizations “to send us any and all evidence that underpins their reports or their communiques or their notices that they issue,” stressing that “reports by themselves are, of course, not evidence and I cannot and will not act pursuant to my oath of office without reliable evidence that we can validate that can stand up in a court of law.”

“I also want to be clear that my office is in the business of conducting credible, relevant, professional, and independent criminal investigations,” he said. “And so I don’t, I haven’t, and I won’t be giving a running commentary on social media, or anywhere else for that matter, regarding the state of investigations in this or any other situation. But the absence of commentary does not mean the absence of investigations.”

(Editor’s note: Public opinion in Israel is seriously split, as indicated by the announcement of another group, calling itself “Doctors for the Rights of Israeli Soldiers” that called for the bombing of Gaza Strip’s largest hospital, claiming that Hamas fighters were using the civilian facility as a base. This was condemned by doctors working in Gaza.)

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, Mideast

Israeli War on Gaza Sparks ‘Largest Mass Mobilization of Jews in American History’

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article by Brett Wilkins from Common Dreams (licensed under Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proclaims in genocidal undertones  his army’s “holy mission” to invade Gaza, Jewish American peace activists are ramping up their nationwide effort to bring about a cease-fire in the three-week war.


Jewish Voice for Peace: Thousands are sitting in at Grand Central Station demanding a #CeasefireNOW

“We’re watching a genocide unfold in real-time. In just three weeks, the Israeli military has killed over 8,000 Palestinians in Gaza, among them over 3,000 children,” Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) said early Monday. “That’s more than the annual number of children killed  in conflicts across the globe since 2019.”

“Jewish people all throughout the United States are protesting in unprecedented numbers against Israel’s destruction of Gaza and the United States’ unwavering support,” JVP noted, with Liv Kunins-Berkowitz, the group’s media coordinator, calling the movement “the largest mass mobilization of Jews in American history.”

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Questions related to this article:
 
Can International Pressure Stop the War in Gaza?

(Continued from left column)

“We will not sit by as a genocide is waged in our name.”
JVP, along with Jewish-led groups—mainly IfNotNow—and allies have held demonstrations large and small across the United States since October 7, when Israeli forces launched their latest war on Gaza following the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel that killed 1,400 people.

“From Albuquerque to Minneapolis, Seattle to Miami, Washington D.C. to Detroit, students, elders, faith leaders, and activists… are organizing sit-ins in congressional offices and blocking streets as they demand an immediate cease-fire in Gaza,” the group continued, adding that demonstrations have also been held in cities including Chicago, Detroit, Denver, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York, Philadelphia, and San Francisco.

On Friday evening, thousands of JVP members and allies took over  Grand Central Station in Midtown Manhattan, where more than 400 people were arrested while holding a sit-in and hanging banners that read, “Cease-fire Now,” “Never Again for Anyone,” “Palestine Should Be Free,” and “Mourn the Dead and Fight Like Hell for the Living.”

“For decades, Jewish Americans have criticized the Israeli occupation of Palestine. American Jews are no longer willing to be silent—they are speaking up louder than ever before and taking to the streets to demand an immediate cease-fire,” Kunnis-Berkowitz asserted on Monday. “We will not sit by as a genocide is waged in our name.”

While the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden has thwarted international efforts to bring about a cessation in hostilities, a group of 18 congressional Democrats led by Rep. Cori Bush  (D-Mo.) has introduced a resolution urging the administration to push Israel for an immediate de-escalation and cease-fire in Gaza.

Some co-sponsors of the resolution—especially Muslim Congresswomen Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who is Palestinian—have faced bipartisan indignation, right-wing death threats, and in the case of Tlaib, a censure motion brought by far-right Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia. Critics have noted the irony of Greene—who once suggested that a "Jewish space laser" started a California wildfire—baselessly accusing Tlaib of antisemitism.

“There can be no business as usual while our tax dollars are used to fund a genocide in Palestine,” JVP insisted. “From congressional offices, to the halls of the Capitol, to the center of New York City, we will do everything in our power to demand an end to U.S. support for genocide and apartheid,” referencing the billions in annual U.S. military aid to Israel.

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, North America

ABC News Report Claims No Past Mass Shooters Have Been Veterans; At Least 31% Have Been

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

A blog by David Swanson

A report from ABC 3 WEAR, reports:

“Chris Lambert is a decorated Vietnam veteran whose battled PTSD for more than 40 years. Lambert’s a three-time Purple Heart recipient, all before his 20th birthday. He says after hearing reports that the suspected gunman in the Maine shooting was treated and released from a facility only weeks later, it’s clear that more long-term care for veterans is needed. However, he feels the shooting suspect’s mental health issues during his service in the military is overplayed. ‘How many people have we watched in these mass shootings and none of them are veterans,’ Lambert said. Stillm, Lambert acknowledged the suspect’s service potentially played a major role in the high number of fatalities. ‘Being a firearms instructor, how accurate he could be, I don’t care if you’re 100-50 yards and you’re jerking a little bit, you’re missing that target. But if he’s instructed and he knows how to breathe, he can take down a lot of people, and that’s tragic,’ Lambert said.”

This is a remarkable report in that, it quotes a supposed expert falsely informing us that the lastest mass shooter is the first military veteran mass shooter, when in fact mass shooters have always been very disproportionately military veterans. It is also remarkable in that it is the only report I have found about any of these veteran mass shooters that bothers to comment at all on the relevance of their training.

In the United States, only a very small percentage of men under 60 are military veterans.

In the United States, at least 31% of male mass shooters under 60 (which is almost all mass shooters) are military veterans.

That’s 40 out of 127 mass shooters in Mother Jones’ database whom I’ve been able to identify as U.S. military veterans, with no help from Mother Jones and darn little help from any media outlets at all. It is very likely that more than those 40 have actually been military veterans.

We now have reports of a U.S. Army reservist who trained others in shooting guns having committed the worst mass shooting in some time.

There is much we do not know about the latest mass shooting in the United States, but of these two things we can be certain:
The U.S. Congress will do nothing to make U.S. gun laws resemble those of a normal nation.
Media outlets will focus on mental health, rightwing politics, and anything other than military experience. There will be a hunt for “motive,” but little interest in ability.

As I reported in June, a University of Maryland report touching on this topic was virtually ignored by media outlets.

But here are the facts:

Looking at males, aged 18-59, veterans are well over twice, maybe over three times as likely to be mass shooters compared with the group as a whole. And they shoot somewhat more fatally. Counting this latest shooting as having 16 fatalities, though that actually went up to 18, I calculated that the veteran shooters on this list have killed on average 8.3 people and those who have not been identified as veterans have killed on average 7.2 people.

The numbers have changed slightly since I began writing about this:

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Question related to this article:

Do you think handguns should be banned?, Why or why not?

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° May 10, 2023: At Least 32% of U.S. Mass Shooters Were Trained to Shoot by the U.S. Military

° March 23, 2021: At Least 36% of Mass Shooters Have Been Trained By the U.S. Military

° June 4, 2019: Updated Data: Mass Shooters Still Disproportionately Veterans

(At this point it was 35%)

November 4, 2018: Mass Shooters’ Histories in the U.S. Military Most Amazing Coincidence

(At this point it was 35%)

November 14, 2017: U.S. Mass Shooters Are Disproportionately Veterans

(At this point it was 34%)

The rise from 34% to 36% and then drop to 31% is not large, and not as large as the decrease in the percentage of veterans in the overall population.

All sorts of correlations are carefully examined when it comes to mass shooters. But the fact that the largest institution in the United States has trained many of them to shoot is scrupulously avoided.

Those mass shooters who are not actually military veterans tend to dress and speak as if they were. Some of them are veterans of police forces with military-sounding titles, or have been prison guards or security guards. Counting those who’ve been in either the U.S. military or a police force or a prison or worked as an armed guard of any kind would give us an even larger percentage. The factor of having been trained and employed to shoot is larger than just the military veterans, yet carefully ignored because so many of those professionally trained to shoot have been trained by the U.S. military.

Some of the non-military mass-shooters have worked as civilians for the military. Some have tried to join the military and been rejected. The whole phenomenon of mass-shootings has skyrocketed during the post-2001 endless wars. The militarism of mass-shootings may be too big to see, but the avoidance of the topic is stunning.

Needless to say, out of a country of over 330 million people a database of 127 mass shooters is a very, very small group. Needless to say, statistically, virtually all veterans are not mass shooters. But that can hardly be the reason for not a single news article ever mentioning that mass shooters are very disproportinately likely to be veterans. After all, statistically, virtually all males, mentally ill people, domestic abusers, Nazi-sympathizers, loners, and gun-purchasers are also not mass-shooters. Yet articles on those topics proliferate like NRA campaign bribes.

There seem to me to be two key reasons that a sane communications system would not censor this topic. First, our public dollars and elected officials are training and conditioning huge numbers of people to kill, sending them abroad to kill, thanking them for the “service,” praising and rewarding them for killing, and then some of them are killing where it is not acceptable. This is not a chance correlation, but a factor with a clear connection.

Second, by devoting so much of our government to organized killing, and even allowing the military to train in schools, and to develop video games and Hollywood movies, we’ve created a culture in which people imagine that militarism is praiseworthy, that violence solves problems, and that revenge is one of the highest values. Virtually every mass shooter has used military weaponry. Most of those whose dress we are aware of dressed as if in the military. Those who’ve left behind writings that have been made public have tended to write as if they were taking part in a war. So, while it might surprise many people to find out how many mass shooters are veterans of the military, it might be hard to find mass shooters (actual veterans or not) who did not themselves think they were soldiers.

There seems to me to be one most likely reason that it’s difficult to find out which shooters have been in the military (meaning that some additional shooters probably have been, about whom I’ve been unable to learn that fact). We’ve developed a culture dedicated to praising and glorifying participation in war. It need not even be a conscious decision, but a journalist convinced that militarism is laudable would assume it was irrelevant to a report on a mass shooter and, in addition, assume that it was distasteful to mention that the man was a veteran. That sort of widespread self-censorship is the only possible explanation for the complete whiting out of this story.

The phenomenon of shutting down this story does not exactly require a “motive,” and I would like to recommend to reporters on mass shootings that they, too, devote a bit less energy to the often meaningless hunt for “a motive,” and a tad more to considering whether the fact that a shooter lived and breathed in an institution dedicated to mass shooting might be relevant.

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, North America

Calls for ceasefire in Gaza

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

A survey by CPNN

Already we have published two articles this week calling for a ceasefire:

Amnesty International describes war crimes committed by Israel and demands that Israel “Immediately end unlawful attacks and abide by international humanitarian law; including by ensuring they take all feasible precautions to minimize harm to civilians and damage to civilian objects and refraining from direct attacks on civilians and civilian objects, indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks.”

Demonstrations in over 40 countries, involving more than a million people, have demonstrated for peace in Israel and Palestine, and, in effect, for a ceasefire.

Putting “ceasefire,” “Gaza” and “Israel” in a search engine, we find many more calls for a ceasefire.

UN chief António Guterres called on Wednesday for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the Middle East to ease the “epic human suffering” in the Israel-Gaza conflict.

Five UN agencies, including the World Food Programme, the World Health Organization, the UN Development Programme, the UN Population Fund, and UNICEF called for a humanitarian ceasefire, describing th situation in Gaza as “catastrophic.”

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Questions related to this article:
 
Can International Pressure Stop the War in Gaza?

(Continued from left column)

As president of the UN Security council, Brazil proposed a resolution calling for “humanitarian pauses” to deliver lifesaving aid to millions in Gaza. The resolution would have passed except that it was vetoed by the United States, saying that “it did not mention Israel’s right of self defence.”

In the UK, over 70 INGOs urge the UK government to secure an urgent ceasefire in Israel and occupied Palestinian Territories. They include UK NGOs of Medecins Sans Frontieres, Oxfam and Save the Children.

The World Organization of the Scout Movement announced “we stand in solidarity with the international community calling for an immediate end to hostilities and violence” and have contacted the national scout organizations in Israel and Palestine.

The World Council of Churches joined a statement of the Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches in Jerusalem, appealing urgently for a immediate cessation of violence.

A petition published by Relief Web, calling for “an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and Israel to prevent a humanitarian Catastrophe” carries the signature of hundreds of organizations from around the world, including, for example, the American Friends Service Committee, Avaaz, Care International, Christian Aid, Church World Service, CIVICUS, Fundacion Cultura de Paz, Handicap International, Medecins Sans Frontieres, Mennonite Central Committee, Nobel Women’s Initiative, Nonviolent Peaceforce, Oxfam, Pax Christi International, Peace Boat, Save the Children, Search for Common Ground and The Episcopal Church.

Among church leaders, calls for a ceasefire come from Pope Francis and from the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Among heads of state, calls for ceasefire come from Chinese President Xi Jinping and from Brazil President Lula da Silva

Among regional organizations, calls for a ceasefire come from the Gulf Cooperation Council and the Assocition of Southeast Asian Nations in their first joint summit since the two regional blocs established relations in 1990.

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, FREE FLOW OF INFORMATION, global, Mideast,

US State Department Official Resigns Over ‘Destructive, Unjust’ Arms Transfers to Israel

FREE FLOW OF INFORMATION

An article by Jake Johnson from Common Dreams (licensed under Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

A U.S. State Department official announced his resignation Wednesday over the Biden administration’s decision to send more arms to Israel as it carries out a massive assault on the occupied Gaza Strip, killing more than 3,400 people, decimating the enclave’s civilian infrastructure, and strangling the population with an unlawful blockade.


Photo from Josh Paul Linked-in

“I cannot work in support of a set of major policy decisions, including rushing more arms to one side of the conflict, that I believe to be shortsighted, destructive, unjust, and contradictory to the very values that we publicly espouse, and which I wholeheartedly endorse: a world built around a rules-based order, a world that advances both equality and equity, and a world whose arc of history bends towards the promise of liberty, and of justice, for all,” Josh Paul, who spent 11 years as director of congressional and public affairs for the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, wrote in his resignation letter.

Paul helped oversee the transfer of U.S. weaponry to allies, a position that he acknowledged “was not without its moral complexity and moral compromises.”

“I made myself a promise that I would stay for as long as I felt the harm I might do could be outweighed by the good I could do,” Paul wrote. “In my 11 years I have made more moral compromises than I can recall, each heavily, but each with my promise to myself in mind, and intact. I am leaving today because I believe that in our current course with regards to the continued—indeed, expanded and expedited—provision of lethal arms to Israel—I have reached the end of that bargain.”

Paul’s resignation came hours after U.S. President Joe Biden embraced Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv and “reiterated his steadfast support for Israel” even as United Nations experts, human rights organizations, and international law scholars accuse the country of committing egregious war crimes—including genocide.

(Continued in right column)

Questions related to this article:
 
The courage of Mordecai Vanunu and other whistle-blowers, How can we emulate it in our lives?

(Continued from left column)

The U.N. Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem and Israel, said in a report  released earlier this week that “the damage and casualties caused by Israeli attacks” on Gaza “were not proportionate to the military advantage and so the actions constitute a war crime.”

The commission added that “the prevention of entry of food and medical supplies into Gaza is a violation of international humanitarian law.”

While the Biden administration helped negotiate a deal to allow limited humanitarian aid to enter Gaza through its border with Egypt, U.S. leaders have thus far refused to call for a cease-fire and pledged to continue arming the Israeli military as it prepares for a ground invasion.

HuffPost reported  last week that the U.S. State Department has instructed American diplomats not to use the word “cease-fire” in press materials, and some administration staffers have expressed concern  about retaliation if they question U.S. support for Israel’s attack on Gaza.

In recent days, U.S. shipments of ammunition, so-called “smart bombs,” and other weaponry have arrived in Israel, which was already the largest recipient of U.S. military assistance. The Biden administration is reportedly preparing to ask Congress to approve a new $100 billion military aid package  for Israel and Ukraine.

The Associated Press reported  that the Biden administration is “also getting U.S. defense companies to expedite weapons orders by Israel that were already on the books.” Without imposing restrictions on the use of American weaponry, U.S. officials are at risk of being complicit in Israeli war crimes, human rights advocates have warned.

In his resignation letter, Paul argued that the administration’s response to the deadly violence in Israel and Gaza “is an impulsive reaction built on confirmation bias, political convenience, intellectual bankruptcy, and bureaucratic inertia.”

“Decades of the same approach have shown that security for peace leads to neither security, nor to peace,” Paul wrote. “The fact is, blind support for one side is destructive in the long-term to the interest of the people on both sides. I fear we are repeating the same mistakes we have made these past decades, and I decline to be a part of it for longer.”

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY, FREE FLOW OF INFORMATION, North America