San Jose, CA – On April 19, around 30 people gathered at the Arab American Cultural Center in San Jose for an educational community event to commemorate Palestinian Prisoners Day. The event focused on the case of famed Palestinian political leader and longtime political prisoner Marwan Bargouthi, who has been imprisoned by Israel on false charges for over 20 years due to his role as a leader during the Second Intifada.

Palestinian Prisoners Day, commemorated annually on April 17, was established in 1974 as a day dedicated to the freedom of Palestinian political prisoners and support for their rights. According to the most recent available statistics from this past December, 9619 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli custody, Bargouthi among them.

The evening began with a screening of Tomorrow’s Freedom, a documentary which tells the story of Bargouthi and his family, as he endures harsh prison conditions and organizes his fellow prisoners in a hunger strike. The film also shed light on Bargouthi’s long history as an organizer and leader in Palestine, beginning with his days of student activism at Birzeit University, his work as a politician in the 1990s, and his role as a leader of the Second Intifada in 2000-01.

Bargouthi was arrested by Israel in 2002 and subject to an unfair trial, resulting in a five consecutive life sentences. The film follows his wife and sons as they navigate Israel’s discriminatory prison visitation system, advocate for his freedom internationally, and suffer the pain of his absence in their family. The film culminates with Bargouthi undertaking a hunger strike with his fellow prisoners in protest of their living conditions, as his family worries for his health.

After the film, organizers held a question and answer session with Bargouthi’s niece, Areej Bargouthi, who provided updates and answers about his case via Zoom. “There is not any kind of communication with my uncle [since 2022], through me or the whole family,” she explained. “Not even phone calls, or visiting the jail at all.”

“They don’t have any rights. They don’t have the right to see their families,” Areej Bargouthi stated. “They used to have a break, around 45 minutes, to walk outside. Now they don’t have anything. They give them just a small piece of bread with a few olives for the whole day, and that’s it. Prisoners come out having lost 50 or 60 pounds.”

The evening’s discussion was particularly timely, as Israel’s assault on Gaza has halted the prisoner exchanges that took place during the ceasefire. These prisoner exchanges resulted in the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners, including Palestinian political leader Khalida Jarrar of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and caused speculation that Marwan Bargouthi may be a candidate for release in future prisoner exchange negotiations.

#SanJoseCA #CA #AntiWarMovement #Palestine #PoliticalPrisoners

Portland, OR – On Sunday evening, February 2, pro-Palestine protesters gathered at the Newmark Theatre in downtown Portland to oppose Oregon Senator and apologist for Israel, Ron Wyden, who was speaking at an event promoting his new book.

Despite the cold weather, around 40 people showed up to stand against Wyden. The protest was organized by Portland for Palestine.

The protest began shortly before the event and went on well after its end. The crowd gathered at the intersection in front of the theatre. They held Palestinian flags and signs that read “Stop arming Israel” and “Gaza will be your political grave.” Opposite the main crowd, another group of protestors held “War crimes Wyden” and “Boycott Ron” banners. With high energy, chants of “Ron Wyden shame on you, war crimes is what you do!” and “From the belly of the beast, no justice no peace!” rang throughout the crowd. Passersby and attendees received a pamphlet detailing Wyden’s complicity in genocide.

Portland for Palestine member Mutaz Alshawa gave a speech about continuing to fight for Palestinian liberation and the ongoing attacks on the West Bank. “The genocide is still going on,” exclaimed Alshawa, “they are bombing Jenin right now. When we say never again, it’s never again for anyone! We can’t let Zionists like Wyden come into our city and continue their business as usual!”

Wyden is one of the top recipients of AIPAC, a pro-Israel lobbying group. He voted in favor of defunding UNRWA, the main supplier of humanitarian aid in Gaza. While he releases and promotes a book on progressive politics, Wyden remains backwards on Palestine, refusing to acknowledge the genocide in Gaza.

#PortlandOR #OR #AntiWarMovement #Palestine

Columbia Heights, MN – On Saturday, November 23, over 100 protesters gathered along Columbia Heights’s busy Central Avenue to protest U.S. support for Israel’s slaughter of Palestinian and Lebanese civilians. The protest called for solidarity with the resistance in Lebanon and Palestine, an end to U.S. aid and weapons shipments to Israel, and for the state of Minnesota to divest from Israel.

Lina Jebara, a member of the Minnesota Anti War Committee gave a moving speech, “The aggression in Lebanon has left over 3600 Lebanese dead,” and “hearing the stories of Lebanon’s latest martyrs has made something very clear: that in the eyes of Israel and its imperialist benefactors, Lebanon and Palestine are one and the same. The tactics that Israel has been using in Lebanon – the means of collective punishment, the deliberate targeting of civilians, journalists, aid workers and critical infrastructure – are not foreign tactics for all of us who have been watching what’s been happening in Palestine.”

Israel’s violence against Lebanese and Palestinian civilians escalated in recent months. The Israeli military tried to annex northern Gaza and attempted to invade southern Lebanon. This was a futile attempt to push Hezbollah back to the Litani River.

In Gaza, Palestine, the Israeli forces cut off all aid shipments to the north in an attempt to starve out the people living there. Israel is intentionally destroying the civilian infrastructure necessary to maintain life, such as hospitals, bakeries and civilian shelters.

Low estimates of the death toll in Gaza say 44,000 are dead with 108,000 wounded by the Israeli military. Many bodies are buried beneath rubble and go uncounted. The thousands of bombs that Israel has dropped on Gaza, the most densely populated area in the world, are equivalent to two nuclear bombs in terms of destructive power.

The protest also heard from Taher Herzallah, a member of America Muslims for Palestine. Herzallah was a recent victim of a Zionist smear campaign spearheaded by Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and the Jewish Community Relations Council, a Zionist organization. The smear campaign was intended to prevent Herzallah from speaking to the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) Local 59 about the genocide in Palestine.

Taher responded to Mayor Frey’s attacks, “On Tuesday I woke up to some messages from some folks, saying the boy-mayor of Minneapolis, Jacob Frey, had made a video condemning me personally. Typically, I would be concerned about such things, but considering this is the George Floyd murder mayor, considering this is the [homeless] encampment destroyer mayor, considering this is the union-busting mayor, I really didn’t feel a sense of worry.” The teachers union event proceeded as planned despite Zionist attempts to shut it down.

MFT 59 is one of a number of Minnesota unions whose pensions are invested via Minnesota’s State Board of Investment. The investment board allocates approximately $5.4 billion of that fund to Israel, Israeli corporations, and other corporations that are complicit in Israel’s genocide in Gaza and its occupation of Palestine. Rank-and-file union members around the state are increasingly speaking out against their hard-won pension funds being used to fund Israel’s crimes in Palestine.

The Minnesota Anti-War Committee is holding a Human Rights Day march at Washburn Fair Oaks Park in Minneapolis at 1 p.m. on December 8, both to mark the annual holiday and as part of a statewide week of action demanding that the Minnesota State Board of Investments eliminate all its investments in apartheid Israel.

#ColumbiaHeightsMN #MN #AntiWarMovement #Palestine #Lebanon