Aug 04, 2010
by Joe Lombardo
Dear Friends,
The United National Peace Conference in Albany brought together
people from around the country and overseas. Although two people from
India were denied visas to come to the conference, 520 pre-registered
and 256 additional people registered at the door, for a total of 776
participants. Some who pre-registered did not show and some who
showed did not register. Therefore, I believe the 776 is an accurate
number. I will soon be able to go through the registration forms and
give a better breakdown of where people came from.
The Sanctuary for Independent Media provided live-streaming of major
segments of the conference to the Internet, provided a place for
people to upload pictures and tweets and posted major presentations
on Youtube. The day after the conference, the Youtube videos got over
17,000 hits, making them the most viewed videos from a non-profit
organization for that day. This enabled thousands who could not
physically make it to the conference to nonetheless experience it.
The core leaders of the anti-war movement were all there, including
Media Benjamin, Col. Ann Wright, Kathy Kelly, Dahlia Wasfi, Michael
McPherson from UFPJ and VFP, Kevin Martin from Peace Action, Blasé
Bonpane, Mark Johnson from Fellowship of Reconciliation, Glen Ford
from Black Majority Report and Black is Back, Kevin Zeese, Fahima
Vorgetts, Mike Ferner, Michael Eisencher from US Labor Against the
War, Larry Holmes from the International Action Center, Nada Khader,
Debra Sweet, Leila Zand, and others. Cindy Sheehan also came but had
to leave immediately when her daughter went into labor back in
California. Additionally, Ethan McCord, a former soldier on the
ground in Iraq who was seen on the first leaked Wikileaks video,
spoke out publicly for the first time. War resisters, GIs who have
refused to deploy, skyped into the conference from Canada, since they
could not be there in person.
Leaders of other movements were also at the conference; these include
leaders of the Labor movement, such as Donna Dewitt, President of the
South Carolina AFL-CIO,. Leaders of SEIU/1199 came to ask the peace
movement to support their upcoming October 2nd, 2010 march on
Washington. The conference was welcomed by Mike Keenan, president of
the Troy Area Labor Council. Present were Margaret Flowers and other
leaders of the single payer movement, as well as Lynda Cruz, Teresa
Gutierrez, and other leaders of the immigrant's rights movement.
Palestinian rights activists played a big role in the conference, as
did leaders of the movement against intervention in Iran, Columbia,
Honduras, and Haiti. Leaders of the environmental movement were as
were leaders of the Muslim solidarity movement and student leaders
like Blanca Missa, one of the central leaders of the recent student
protests on the Berkeley campus against California's cuts to
education. Dr. Margaret Flowers, a central leader of the movement for
single payer healthcare led a workshop with other healthcare
advocates and spoke at the press conference that preceded the
conference at which she made a strong connection between the movement
for universal healthcare and peace.
Noam Chomsky spoke Saturday morning via video. Following by another
keynote address given by Donna Dewitt, President of the South
Carolina AFL-CIO, and leading member or the National Assembly and US
Labor Against the War. We listened to Mumia Abu-Jamal's audio taped
message to the conference from death row and to the narration of Imam
Aref's, one of the wrongly prosecuted Muslims from Albany from his
prison cell. Ralph Poynter, husband of imprisoned civil rights
attorney Lynne Stewart, read her message to those assembled. Lynne
was a member of the administrative body of the National Assembly to
End US Wars and Occupations, the group that had initiated the
conference. She was also a founding member of Project Salam, one of
the other 31 co-sponsoring groups.
During panels held on Friday night and Saturday, movement leaders
discussed the future direction of the anti-war movement. Throughout
the weekend, the backdrop to the stage and podium was a beautiful 40
foot mural painted by Mike Alewitz and Jerry Butler, who teach art at
Central Connecticut State University. Mike was an anti-war leader at
Kent State University 40 years ago, during the period when National
Guardsmen killed four student anti-war protestors. Jerry was at
Jackson State when, 10 days later, police shot and killed students on
that campus.
The conference presented thirty-three workshops on topics related to
war and social justice. Presenters came from a range of perspectives,
faith-based peace groups, immigrant's rights advocates, the
Palestinian rights movement, the labor movement, active duty GIs and
veteran's movements, and many more. The workshops and presenters are
listed on the conference web site (http://www.nationalpeaceconference.org).
The conference operated democratically, with every person in
attendance having a voice and a vote. Out of this process came an
Action Proposal and a set of resolutions. All of this material will
be posted in the near future on the national peace conference web
site (www.nationalpeaceconference.org). Basically, the Action
Proposal calls for local actions in the fall and bi-coastal
demonstrations in New York City and California in the spring. The
spring actions will be accompanied by separate and distinct
non-violent civil disobedience actions. The proposal also calls for
support of and collaboration in building the mobilizations being
called by the labor and civil rights movements in the coming months.
These include demonstration planned for Washington and Detroit on
August 28 and a large October 2nd demonstration being organized by
SEIU/1199, AFL-CIO, the NAACP, and others. The action proposal
includes a strong stand in support of Palestinian rights and against
the threats directed at Iran. It calls for coordinated teach-ins,
lobbying efforts, and campaigns to pass city, town, and village
resolutions on the issue of war spending and its impacts on the economy.
One theme running throughout the conference was the connection
between the anti-war movement and the Muslim solidarity movement.
Both the wars and the attacks on Muslims are the products of
Washington's phony war on terror. The wars have been called
preemptive wars, and the prosecutions of Muslims have been labeled
preemptive prosecution. These concepts are used by the government as
theoretical justifications for the wars going on at home and abroad.
The Muslim solidarity issue was highlighted at a poignant and
symbolic march from the peace conference to the Masjid-Al Salam
mosque on Central Avenue where the imprisoned Albany Muslims used to
worship. At the Mosque, a rally was held where family member and
supporters of the wrongly prosecuted Muslims spoke along with leaders
of the anti-war movement such as Kathy Kelly, Medea Benjamin and Sara
Flounders of the International Action Center. Also, on Saturday, a
lunch time presentation was given by Shamshad Ahmad, the president of
the mosque. A statement was read by Imam Aref, the former Imam of the
Mosque, now in prison for 15 years
Why Albany? Some people have asked why the conference took place in
Albany. My answer is that it could not have happened any where else.
On the national level, the peace movement has been weak and unable to
capitalize on the fact that the majority opposes the wars and the
fact that trillions is being spent on war as education, healthcare
and other human needs are being cut. Consequently, the National
Assembly to End US Wars and Occupations decided to forgo its own
national conference in favor of building a unity conference of the
entire anti-war movement, understanding that the lack of unity in the
US anti-war movement has been a major factor in the weakness of our
movement. The Albany area has a strong peace movement in which all of
the groups work together. In addition, when Muslims were attacked in
our community, the peace movement and eventually the media and large
sections of the non-Muslim community stood behind them. In many other
areas of the country, this didn't happen, as some peace groups felt
that being associated with the unjustly prosecuted Muslims might
alienate them from the politicians and others in the non-Muslim
community. But what people in Albany realized is that the wars and
the pre-emptive prosecutions of Muslims are two of the faces of the
same phony war on terror. So as we took up the fight against the
attacks on Muslims and the racism these attacks have engendered, we
undercut the war on terror justification for the wars of occupation
while, at the same time, finding new allies in the struggle for
peace. Building bridges between the Muslim and the non-Muslim
communities is exactly the opposite of what the government wanted,
with its use of agent provocateurs and fabricated terror plots,
The conference was the right thing to do at the right time; it came
to a close literally hours before the explosive Afghan War Diaries
were published by Wikileaks and right before Congress voted for
additional funding for the perpetual U.S. wars and occupations. The
conference gave our movement a powerful voice at a very critical
time. It also succeeded in bringing together thirty-one peace groups
with diverse perspectives. We brought together the peace movement
with leaders of other movements that have mobilized millions in their
own right. In doing so, we took a step forward not only for peace but
also for human rights and justice in general.
We also brought together the Albany community with the broader
movement nationally. National leaders like Jerry Gordon of the
National Assembly, who played a leading role in organizing the
National Peace Action Coalition during the Vietnam War era, was a
central figure bringing all of this together. The National Assembly
put everything it had into this conference. The International Action
Center and the Bail Out the Peoples movement, which have a strong
base in New York City, also played a major role in the success of our
conference. Veterans for Peace, Peace Action, the Fellowship for
Reconciliation, the Women's International League for Peace and
Freedom, US Labor Against the War, Progressive Democrats of America,
Kathy Kelly and her Voices for Creative Non-Violence, and Project
Salam were also the pillars on which the conference was built. Code
Pink, World Can't Wait, National Lawyers Guild, After Downing Street,
Black Agenda Report, the Granny Peace Brigade, Office of the
Americas, Military Families Speak Out, and others also played a
significant role in building the conference.
The involvement of these groups will be very important as we build
actions for next spring in New York City and California.
Locally, a contingent of around 40 people put their all into making
the conference run smoothly. The incredibly professional work of the
Sanctuary for Independent Media gave us an international presence.
The Albany media coverage, with the exception of the attacks on the
conference by Carl Strock of the Schenectady Gazette, was excellent.
The Times Union published four articles and an op-ed piece on the
conference. Despite our competing with the opening day of the
Saratoga Race Track, the TV and radio news covered us as well.
There also were some shortcomings. Outside of some alternative media,
the conference was not covered by the national media, in stark
contrast to the coverage of the Tea Party convention which, despite
having fewer in attendance, was given prime time live coverage by CNN
and other outlets. Maureen Aumand who, along with Mary Finneran,
organized the media in Albany alerted the New York Times to the
conference on several occasions. The Times tried to explain to her
why they would not cover the conference, but the real reason it
wasn't covered is because the powers running the corporate media in
the US want to build a right-wing, not a progressive, left-wing movement.
In addition, our audience was mostly older and white. Although polls
show anti-war sentiment being greatest among youth and African
Americans, we haven't seen a lot of participation in the anti-war
movement from these groups, and this was reflected at the conference, as well.
Finally, there were some tests of our unity at the conference, the
most significant one being around the issue of Palestine. Important
leaders of the Palestinian movement were in attendance, and a caucus
was formed by Palestinian rights activists to discuss how best to
integrate the Palestinian issues with the broader peace issues. They
put together a resolution and an amendment to the Action Proposal on
Palestine, which passed by a large majority. However, some felt that
the wording was too strong and therefore fought to change it. This
was a serious disagreement, and my hope is that it will not cause any
deterioration in our unity.
Pulling together a unity conference with thirty-one different groups,
each with its own perspective on how to bring about peace, was a real
achievement. However, our true test will be in how united we remain
as we build future actions to end the wars. Towards this end, the
conference passed a proposal for a continuations committee that will
be chaired by Jerry Gordon. It will meet for the first time on August
16th, with the goal of continuing our work and broadening it to
include other forces at the local and regional levels.
The peace conference came together at just the right time and place.
It happened at the same time when other progressive forces (like the
labor and civil rights movements) also are mobilizing (on August 28
and October 2). The labor and civil rights leaders who have called
these actions may see them in the context of the mid-term election
but they come at a time that millions are being victimized by the
wars at home and abroad and are looking for a way to fight back. The
unity we attained with the conference was significant. If we can
continue and broaden this unity with our allies within and outside of
the peace movement we can change the world.
Peace,
Joe Lombardo
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