CODEPINK Women in Gaza, global support network grows

CODEPINK from Gaza on War’s aftermath, women of peace who prevail

April 4th, 2009

WHUS Radio’s Emily Corwin and Dori Smith produced Pacifica’s Sprouts for March 26, 2009
Listen to the program here

CODEPINK, Women for Peace delegation to Gaza put pressure on Israel to end blockade. A partial victory after President Obama joins his voice to theirs on getting food into starving survivors of war.

Codepink blog re Gaza here Press coverage here
and here
as well as our previous interviews with Medea Benjamin here and there is a lot more on their web page www.codepinkalert.org

Produced by Dori Smith, WHUS, FM 91.7 at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT

Download in various formats suitable for broadcast via conventional radio station, LPFM, podcasting, or other here.

Hosted by Emily Corwin of WHUS, The Thought Spot
Left KU Channel
Thursday, March 26, 2009 3PM EST
TRT: 29:21 music fades 7 sec.

Download as broadcast quality .mp3 here

We follow the delegation’s journey to Gaza through Cairo and the Rafah crossing. Finally, the 20 month long blockade is partially ended but not before hundreds have lost their lives and thousands have been wounded.

Included in this week’s program are:

-UN Special Rapporteur to Gaza, Richard Falk
-MidEast expert Phyllis Bennis of IPS, the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.
-CODEPINK and Women For Peace: USM Col Retired Ann Wright, Pam Rasmussen, Medea Benjamin, and Gael Murphy, in Cairo, Al Arish, Egypt, and Gaza
-Clip from Democracy Now, writer Alice Walker in Gaza.
-Jordan Elgrably, Director of the Levantine Cultural Center in L.A. California, an evening benefiting women in Gaza, 3-4-09
-Don Bustany, KPFK, Middle East in Focus, his interview with actor Eric Roberts, seen in Dark Knight, The Pope of Greenwich Village, and many other TV programs and films.
-Singer Annie Lennox, clip of her speech at London demonstration protesting Gaza War
-Nile Alwardini, at the Levantine Cultural Center to Don Bustany, Middle East in Focus
-clip-Ran Yaron, Director of PHR Israel’s Occupied Territories Department

Seventy percent of 1,455 reported killed in the Gaza War were civilians, 40 percent of them were women and children. The blockade went on for more than 20 months. But in the end Israeli leaders blinked, giving in to growing pressure from CODEPINK, Hollywood stars and peace activists all over the world. They have allowed food aid into Gaza. But not until US President Barack Obama apparently heard the call you heard CODEPINK’s Medea Benjamin make at the start of the show, President Obama finally joining his voice with others complaining that Israel would not even allow vital food, the World Food Program’s chickpeas, for example, into Gaza. Chickpeas are a Palestinian food staple, used in hummus.

On March 23, 2009, Western diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the office of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, informed Washington and Brussels that all types of food will now be allowed into the Gaza Strip. (Haaretz Newspaper, Israel, 3-23-09)

On the same day Physicians for Human Rights Israel announced the release of a major new report charging the Israeli military with violations of medical ethics. The group cites the Israeli army for killing 16 medical workers and wounding 25 while they performed medical duties. The army also hit 34 medical facilities, eight hospitals and 26 primary care clinics. The report is sure to cause a stir in Israel where Israel Defense Force soldiers have been admitting they were ordered to shoot unarmed civilians, even children.

This week’s Sprouts edition is produced in Storrs, CT featuring music from Michelle Schocked, Annie Lennox, Naser Musa, and Fritz Heede

Sprouts is a weekly program that features local radio production and stories from many radio stations and local media groups around the world. It is produced in collaboration with community radio stations and independent producers across the country. The program is coordinated and distributed by Pacifica Radio and offered free of charge to all radio stations. For information, or if you would like to feature your work on Sprouts, contact Ursula Ruedenberg at ursula@pacifica.org

Don't miss this interview on Democracy Now with Alice Walker.

Photos of delegates handing out gift baskets in Gaza, plus, invitation to spend Mother's Day in Washington D.C. with CODEPINK!

CODEPINK's blogs with photos from 60 person delegation to Gaza, especially their link to ReliefWeb on Gaza. Plus this Q&A on Gaza

Codepink Alert
Levantine Cultural Center
Middle East in Focus with Don Bustany

Ellen Hodgson Brown on Escaping the Global Web of Debt

Ellen Hodgson Brown, escaping the global web of debt

April 2nd, 2009

Talk Nation Radio for April 3, 2009

Ellen Hodgson Brown, escaping the global web of debt

Listen to this week’s show here

Listen to part two of this week's show here

Produced by Dori Smith at WHUS, FM 91.7, a Pacifica Affiliate at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CTTRT: 29:28 Download at Pacifica’s Audioport here or at Radio4all.net and Archive.org here:

Ellen Hodgson Brown discusses, Web of Debt, her book about the US Federal Reserve, the so called ‘Money Trust’, and global banking. Part one of our interview looks at definitions, what are derivatives? What went wrong with the global banking industry and how quickly can it be fixed?

Ellen Brown’s 2007 book, Web of Debt, outlined the state of global economic and banking systems, and explained that there simply wasn’t enough money to bail out the banks from a massive derivatives default.

The book was a warning that when investors finally realized that the “insurance” they purchased in the form of derivatives was worthless, they would jump ship and bring the whole shaky edifice crashing down. We also learn about the little known Bank for International Settlements, in Basil Switzerland, and the rules it has imposed on global markets such as the so-called, ‘mark to market rule.’

Finally we learn how North Dakota is an example for what all US states should do, start a state bank. North Dakota is solvent, well off in fact, while most US states are operating in the red. We could set up state banks in a matter of several months, and save enough on interest to bring all US states back into solvency. Ellen Hodgson Brown blogs about the global economic collapse at webofdebt.com.

Her articles on global finance and how to repair America’s banking system can also be found at www.globalresearch.ca. Her current pieces are: ‘TURNING THE TABLES ON WALL STREET’, and ‘NORTH DAKOTA SHOWS CASH-STARVED STATESHOW THEY CAN CREATE THEIR OWN CREDIT’.

The US Federal Reserve said to be ‘extremely uncomfortable about the bailouts’ according to JEANNINE AVERSA, Economics Writer for AP. She starts out:

“While acknowledging that the Federal Reserve was “extremely uncomfortable” about last year’s bailouts of big financial companies, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said Friday the central bank’s strategy to ease the financial crisis is working.

Bernanke was referring to the Fed’s unprecedented decisions last year to step in and financially back JPMorgan Chase’s takeover of then-troubled investment house Bear Stearns and throw its first of four financial lifelines to insurance giant American International Group.” (continues here)

Also don't miss this blog on taking on the banks called A New Way Forward.

Coming up on Talk Nation Radio 3-25-09 PHR Israel on Gaza, their report on IDF violations of medical ethics and IDF war crimes during Gaza War

March 24, 2009
Dori Smith

Coming programs: Tune in Wed. at 5 PM, FM 91.7 in the greater Storrs, CT area to Rhode Island, Hartford, and parts of MA or find us on the internet at http://www.whus.org

We spend the half hour with Ran Yaron Director of PHR Israel, on Gaza Report, IDF violations of medical ethics and war crimes. He describes the difficulties their organization had during the bombing of Gaza as Palestinians contacted them in desperation, trying to get medical care and help with evacuations.

Agence France Press story here.

Their organization notes some 5,000 Palestinians were wounded and remain in Gaza. 1003 were evacuated with great difficulty, and many died because of delays in getting care.

Talk Nation Radio is produced at the studios of WHUS, FM 91.7, a Pacifica affiliate at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT and is syndicated through Pacifica Network.

We are also available at Archive.org and Radio4all.net. This week's Sprouts was produced at WHUS by Dori Smith and hosted by Emily Corwin of the WHUS show, The Thought Spot.

Listen also to Dori Smith's one hour special Friday March 27, 2009 at 6 PM EDT at WHUS. We interview Ellen Brown, author of the sensational book, Web of Debt, The Shocking Truth about our Money System and How we can Break Free.

Read her introduction here about the international banking cartel, President Andrew Jackson once called the banking cartel a "hydra-headed monster eating the flesh of the common man."

We will be discussing who owns the mega banks, who has decision making interest in international banking, who owns the Federal Reserve, and which US entities or agencies have any type of control over these all important banking systems.

Plus we will look at the US stock market, invest/don't invest? And consider how we can reverse the current economic catastrophe in the USA.

Thanks for the donations WHUS'rs

We are very grateful to Dahr Jamail for sharing the truths he uncovered, as difficult as they are to know. Dahr's next book is due out later this year, possibly in the summer, we are waiting to here from Haymarket Books about a release date. It's titled, 'Military Resisters, Soldiers who refuse to fight in Iraq'.

whusradio

During air time Wed. we received a lot of wonderful calls of support. Thank you very much for supporting the station and my show in that you wanted copies of Dahr Jamail's book, Beyond the Green Zone, Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq.

Dahr was first on WHUS back in 2003 at a time when he was not very well known and we were just starting the show in response to Bush/Cheney policy on Iraq. He very kindly agreed to update us from Iraq with spot on interviews about what he was seeing as he moved throughout Iraq free of the oversight of the USM. He was never embedded, but always free to report the story as he thought it should be reported.

We must have peace!

Peace is a state of mind for some of us, a hope we are free to consider. We are use to our rights, and to the idea of war being far away from us, something that others must tragically deal with on a minute by minute basis. I chose to look at wars on a daily basis because of the radio show. For that reason I've come to sense that the people I'm talking about in any given military occupation, America's occupation of Iraq or Afghanistan, Israel's occupation of Palestine, are considering the word 'peace' very differently. For them it may seem to equate to personal survival. They are not merely dreaming of a word or a poetic concept, they are desperate for what this word means for them and for their family.

My dream is that the word peace takes on huge proportions during 2009, that we come to all think of it as our mutual survival.

Thanks for the phone calls friends!!

photo by Dori, white rose

Dahr Jamail on US Military Policy in Iraq: Still a Failure

Talk Nation Radio for March 19, 2009

Dahr Jamail on US Military Policy in Iraq: Still a Failure
and where do we go from here?

To listen to this week's show click here.

TRT: 29:41 with 12 sec music fade
Produced by Dori Smith, WHUS FM 91.7 at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT
Download at Archive.org and Radio4all.net

We are pleased to interview award winning journalist Dahr Jamail who returned from Iraq two weeks ago and has been writing about the January elections, ongoing violence, the loss of Iraqi culture, increasing poverty and internally displaced people, environmental damage, and lack of access to health care.

Dahr Jamail is author of the 2008 book, Beyond the Green Zone, Dispatches from an Un-embedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq. He spent eight months in Iraq covering the war on the ground during 2003 and 2004 as one of only a handful of journalists traveling without the US Military. We hear clips from interviews in 2003 and 2004.

Day after day Dahr Jamail wrote about US policy failures, documenting the US failure to reconstruct Iraq after destroying much of its infrastructure with heavy bombing. He wrote about the torture in US run prisons like Abu Ghraib even before the story was finally 'broken' by CBS news, and he covered the devastating mass arrest policy that terrorized civilians and helped turn Iraqis against US forces. He also covered two sieges of Fallujah, the massive US bombing and destruction of a city that catalyzed a flood of support for the Iraqi resistance.

In his initial reports about US soldiers serving in Iraq in 2003 and 2004, Dahr Jamail noted the decline in their sense of security, soldiers who were becoming increasingly nervous as more and more of them succumbed to the infamous IED weapons.

Eventually, he saw a large increase in the number of US soldiers willing to say no to the war, and in soldiers willing to talk about the horrors they had seen or participated in in Iraq. It was a story that evolved into the Winter Soldier tour which Dahr also covered. His forthcoming book is Military Resisters, Soldiers who Refuse to Fight in Iraq, another Haymarket book.

Dahr Jamail also covered the Lebanon war, and reported on millions of displaced Iraqis living in camps in Iraq or in whatever housing they can find as refugees in Jordan. He writes for Inter Press Service, Le Monde Diplomatique, and many other outlets. His stories have also been published in The Nation, the Sunday Herald in Scotland, Al-Jazeera, the Guardian, Foreign Policy in Focus, and the Independent and other publications. He reports for Democracy Now! has appeared on the BBC and NPR, as well as other stations around the globe including WHUS, and we've been privileged to be able to contact him for interviews over the years. He is also special correspondent for Flashpoints.

Dahr Jamail's reporting has earned him numerous awards, including the prestigious 2008 Martha Gellhorn Award for Journalism, the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism, the Joe A. Callaway Award for Civic Courage, and four Project Censored awards.

Beyond the Green Zone was described as "very prescient and brave" that from Seymour Hersh, lauded also by film maker John Pilger, and journalists Robert Fisk, Jeremy Scahill, Patrick Cockburn, and many more. His next book is about the GI resistance movement.

Of note: In covering the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem, Martha Gellhorn wrote, quote: "We consider this man, and everything he stands for, with justified fear. We belong to the same species. Is the human race able -- at any time, anywhere -- to spew up others like him? Why not? Adolf Eichmann is the most dire warning to us all. He is a warning to guard our souls; to refuse utterly and forever to give allegiance without question, to obey orders silently, to scream slogans. He is a warning that the private conscience is the last and only protection of the civilized world."

Our music is by Fritz Heede

Peace Activist Tristan Anderson shot in the head in Ni'lin Village, Palestine

Tristan Anderson
Tristan, friend of Brad Will, has been critically wounded with "brain" visible after being shot in the head by a 40mm IDF shell. see story by Joshua Trost, इन्द्य्मेडिया

UPDATE
4-07-09 video of incident, shows medics rushing out with stretcher, clearly defined as medical team and they hold up an orange stretcher indicating they are about to retrieve a wounded person. Israelis then shoot another canister leaving them to struggle to breath while engaging in emergency medical assistance procedures. This seems very similar to the reports from Ran Yaron of Physicians for Human Rights, Israel.

UPDATE 3-19 ---- American shot in Ni'lin by Israeli Defense Force, surviving on life support. PSN --- Tristan’s girlfriend, Gaby, who has been tirelessly by his side, reports that he is doing much better. When the doctor asked him to put up two fingers he did so. Tristan recognizes Gaby and can squeeze her fingers in answer to different questions. He’s started his moving toes and his torso around a bit. The question is, why have US newspapers and other forms of mainstream or corporate media ignored this story? A US citizen is in a hospital on life support and the press has not reported it? Democracy Now has been covering the story and Stan Heller of The Struggle is also following it.

13th Friday 2009, Ni'lin Village: An American citizen has been
critically injured in the village of Ni'lin after Israeli forces shot
him in the head with a tear-gas canister.

Tristan Anderson from California USA, 37 years old, is currently being
taken to Israeli hospital Tel Hashomer, near Tel Aviv. Anderson is unconscious and has been bleeding heavily from the nose and mouth. He sustained a large hole in his forehead where he was struck by the canister.

Messages from Gaza, CODEPINK's Pam Rasmussen and co-founder Gael Murphy

Messages from Gaza, CODEPINK’s Pam Rasmussen and Gael Murphy

Photo from htt://www.afterdowningstreet.org
Pic 42 - Don't Shoot, Mister 02222009 Submitted by Chip on Mon, 2009-02-23 10:15 March 12th, 2009

Talk Nation Radio for March 11, 2009

Messages from Gaza
CODEPINK’s Pam Rasmussen and Gael Murphy

Listen to this week’s show here

We hear about the delegation’s progress, learn more about what they have been seeing, and hear a first hand report about a war crime as described to CODEPINK by survivors.

Produced by Dori Smith, FM 91.7 WHUS Radio at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT
TRT:30:08
Download at Pacifica’s Audioport here or at Radio4all.net and Archive.org in various formats.

CODEPINK and Women For Peace near Rafah Crossing and Gaza, USM Col Ret. Ann Wright speaks to Dori Smith

CODEPINK and Women For Peace near Rafah Crossing and Gaza, USM Col Ret. Ann Wright speaks to Dori Smith

March 7th, 2009

Talk Nation Radio special for Friday March 6, 2009

60 Member Strong Codepink and Women for Peace delegation near the Rafah Crossing,

Dori Smith interviews USM Retired Col. Ann Wright

Listen to this special broadcast here in MP3 format or download below in various formats and podcasting.

Produced by Dori Smith, WHUS, FM 91.7 at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT

TRT: 28:44
Download at Pacifica’s Audioport or Archive.org and Radio4all.net

CODEPINK and Women for Peace organized a peace delegation to Gaza and are now gathering at the Rafah crossing with mostly women and a few young people and men. The delegates come from various countries including Pakistan, Egypt, and the US, and they will be meeting up with Israeli women and others in Rafah who are all seeking to call attention to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza on International Women’s Day March 7, 2009. If they can get into Gaza.

The Codepink delegates will be handing out gift baskets for women in Gaza. They are traveling at the invitation of the Gaza Gender Initiative of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). Group leader Medea Benjamin says they will all camp out at the Rafah border if Egyptian authorities prevent them from entering Gaza. At issue they say are thousands of Palestinians who are suffering ill health and even starvation due to a blockade of all goods including food, medicine, and other vital supplies.

Hollywood actors and actresses have been organizing support for civilians in Gaza, and world famous writer Alice Walker has joined the delegation. The parents of peace activists Rachel Corrie, an American who was killed in Gaza while protesting the demolition of Palestinian homes, are also with the delegation.

Most humanitarian groups and aid workers have been denied entry by both Israeli and Egyptian authorities, so UN and independent non governmental organizations have been pressuring the U.S. government to demand that they lift the blockade. CODEPINK delegates are also asking the US to demand that Israel halt the latest round of plans for settlement expansion into Palestinian lands.

We followed the group’s journey with Retired US Colonel Ann Wright who is also a former diplomat. Colonel Wright stunned the world when she resigned her post in protest to the US invasion and occupation of Iraq.

After seeing the devastation from Israeli bombs that leveled 30,000 homes in Gaza, Ann Wright’s post in Huffington Post blog raised the question, Can Gaza be Rebuilt through Tunnels?

In addition to the leveling of civilian homes, Israeli war planes leveled government buildings, schools, medical clinics and also targeted the UN compound in Gaza where civilians had run for shelter. 1,330 people were known to have been killed and between 5 and 6 thousand were wounded.

We first reached Ann Wright on March 5th as she met with 60 other people of good will in Cairo who were all preparing to meet up with Israeli women at the Rafah border crossing March 7th. Together they might be able to reach Gaza and help international peace groups put more pressure on the Israeli, Egyptian and American governments, asking them to open the border to Gaza and let the people of Gaza rebuild their lives.

Then we hear another update from Ann Wright taped March 6th as the group continued to make their way to the Gaza crossing to try to get into Gaza.

Colonel Wright joined Pulitzer prize winning novelist Alice Walker, Cindy and Craig Corrie, parents of peace activist Rachel Corrie who went to Rafah with the International Solidarity Movement and was killed while trying to stop the Israeli Defense Force from demolishing civilian homes.

Another ISM member, Tom Hurndel, was also killed. His case led to a high profile trial that established the guilt of an Israeli sniper, Taysir Hayb, convicted of manslaughter and obstruction of justice in an Israeli military court and later found guilty of having intentionally killed Tom Hurndel when a British inquest was held.

The actions of Israeli forces in the Gaza War have been criticized by human rights groups Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. Political turmoil in Israel has led to even more confusion than usual over which leaders will determine Gaza policy.

The recent Israeli election led to such a close result that while Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni of the Kadima Party got one more vote than Likud Party head Benjamin Netanyahu, it was Netanyahu who won support from Israel’s hard right and he was asked to try to form a unity government. Israeli civilians and the military are still watching efforts to determine who will assume the most powerful leadership positions.

The Obama Administration at first held back from commenting on its policy on the Gaza War. Then President Obama appointed former Senator George Mitchell as his Palestine envoy. Mitchell was sent to the region, and later Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Israel for talks on a role set for America by the outgoing Bush administration during which an agreement was made that US troops would assist with security at Israel’s borders. That decision has proven dicey as tensions have grown within Arab states and European ones over the harshness of Israel’s bombing assaults in Gaza.

President Obama then appointed former US envoy to Saudi Arabia, Charles W. Freeman, known as Chas, to chair the National Intelligence Council. An appointment that has become controversial, though Freeman is known as someone who can negotiate effectively between the US and Arab states.

The US State Department has been revealing more about US policy toward Gaza. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said the US would make efforts to try to strengthen Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah and would deny any aid to Hamas. Mahmoud Abbas though has became very unpopular in Gaza after he was seen as working with both Israeli and US leaders during the time Gaza was being heavily bombed. Secretary of State Clinton has also issued calls for an end to rockets from Gaza, and she has promised more US millions for reconstruction that will be sent into the Palestinian Authority, not through Hamas. Arab states have also contributed to Gaza reconstruction but unless the region can be stabilized it is difficult to see how reconstruction and aid work can get started.

To make matters even more complicated, not all of the rockets into Israel have come from Hamas. The Telegraph UK has been reporting that Hamas was not responsible for some rockets launched toward Israel after a fragile peace was negotiated with Hamas. This according to Israeli security officials. The Fatah movement was thought to have launched the strikes, and at least one militia group affiliated with Fatah claimed responsibility for some of the launchings.

These are just some of the complexities peace activists and aid workers must contend with as they try to support a brokered peace and get desperately need food into civilians in Gaza.

For peace enthusiasts hoping to see lives saved in Gaza and an immediate end to hostilities, the lack of cooperation from the Israeli government and the US has been a source of growing frustration. The blockade continues, wrote Retired Colonel Ann Wright in late February. A Retired US Colonel, well known for her outspoken views on the Iraq War during the time George W. Bush was in office, Ann Wright returned to the region with 60 peace delegates that are now poised to try to cross into Gaza through Rafah in solidarity with the women of Gaza for International Women’s Day.

Colonel Ann Wright spent 26 years in the U.S. Army and Army Reserves. She was a diplomat in the State Department for 15 years, serving in the U.S. embassies of Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, Grenada and Nicaragua. She resigned in 2003 in protest of the then-impending invasion of Iraq. In 2009, she co-authored, Dissent, Voices of Conscience.

http://www.codepinkalert.org/

For more information about the peace delegation please call Jean Stevens, national media coordinator, at 508-769-2138

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Jim Lobe on Obama's Appointment of Dennis Ross, maybe you can't always get what you want, and Professor Joel Kovel on Bard termination over Israel

Talk Nation Radio for February 25, 2009
Jim Lobe on MidEast policymakers and Dr. Joel Kovel on termination from Bard College over critique of Zionism: President Obama to Dennis Ross and AIPAC–you can’t always get what you want

Listen to this week’s show here