The Western New York Peace Center

Cuba: Confronting COVID & the US Blockade (IFCO/P4P)
2021-05-05 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | NY
On zoom. Join LASC, ROCLA, and more for Pastors for Peace: End Sanctions on Cuba, NOW!
Preregistration will be required to join the event. A link to more info and “register button” at:
Cuba: Confronting COVID and the US Blockade

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
On Cuba’s successes in fighting COVID at home and abroad, and its progress in producing vaccines against the virus; and how to end our 60 year old economic war against the Cuban people.
With info on IFCO’s 31st Friendshipment Caravan to Cuba this coming fall, taking people and COVID related medical aid to the island; and on Cuban scholarships that train young people from humble backgrounds in the US as doctors who return home to medically under-served communities.
Our speakers are GAIL WALKER, Executive Director of Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization / Pastors for Peace, and DR SAMIRA ADDREY, Graduate of ELAM, the Latin American School of Medicine in Havana, Cuba and Coordinator of IFCO’s Medical School Project
LASC is the Latin America Solidarity Committee, a taskforce of the Western New York Peace Center. Our sister group, ROCLA, is the Rochester Committee on Latin America. For now we have meetings together, by zoom, on the first Wednesdays of each month.

Demythologizing the Work of Freedom
2021-05-06 12:00 - 14:00
On Zoom. Demythologizing the Work of Freedom: Reimagining our Vision of Theological Praxis By: Danjuma G. Gibson, Ph.D. Organized by Niagara University’s Rose Bente Lee Ostapenko Center for Race, Equity, and Mission.
Register in Advance

This talk invites participants to demythologize the lives and work of various 19th and 20th century freedom fighters and revolutionary thinkers such as Fannie Lou Hamer, Ida B. Wells, and Martin Luther King Jr. (to name a few). The insurrection on the nation’s capital in January 2021 disrupted the national illusion of racial progress and innocence. We are not who we thought we were. The quest for equity and freedom is threatened by a recent surge in white supremacist and white nationalist ideology. The Christian mandate to love our neighbor and seek justice is failing under the weight of self-interest and indifference.
Using the tools of practical theology and psychohistory, this talk seeks to humanize these historical personalities. Our current situation in 2021 is not new. It represents cycle of hatred that must be disrupted. Instead of seeing these historical personalities as great and untouchable heroes, we are better served by demythologizing their lives in a way that allows us to see our common joys and concerns across generations. Our national propensity to romanticize the lives of these historical figures is misguided and only undermines our will to act and the moral agency to “do good, seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, [and] plead the widow’s cause.”1 Alternatively, humanizing them guides us to life-giving praxis and redemption.

Clean School Buses in the Buffalo NY Region
2021-05-06 18:00 - 19:00
Webinar on zoom. Panel organized by New York League of Conservation Voters Education Fund & Sierra Club (May is Asthma Awareness Month!)
RSVP at bit.ly/2P28gmG
Event Speakers:
Assemblymember Karen McMahon, NY Assembly District 146
Senator Sean M. Ryan, NY Senate District 60 Senator Timothy M. Kennedy, NY Senate District 63 Caroline Hahn, NYLCVEF
Ben Mandel, CALSTART
Jonathan Meyers M.A., Buffalo State College
Sara Schultz, Sierra Club
Dr. Sarah Ventre, Clinical Assistant Professor, SUNY Buffalo, UBMD Pediatrics

The State Department of Environmental Conservation is committed to allocating 40% of the Volkswagen settlement money towards cleaning up buses and President Biden has proposed a $20 billion federal investment for electric school buses. The time is now for communities like Buffalo that experience some of the highest asthma rates in the state to take the lead in transitioning to electric school buses.

The ICBM Act to stop the Money Pit Missile
2021-05-06 19:00
On zoom. Please join staff from Senator Ed Markey’s (D-MA) and Representative Ro Khanna’s (D-CA) offices for a briefing and strategy discussion on their ICBM Act (Investing in Cures Before Missiles!) to stop the Money Pit Missile and invest in Covid relief instead. With Blake Narendra, Sen. Ed Markey’s foreign policy Legislative Assistant and Geo Saba, Rep. Ro Khanna’s Chief of Staff, Peace Action leaders, Q&A. Register now, and help spread the word to colleagues, friends and family. All are welcome. The panelists’ bio’s and background info is below.
Background: Plans for a new Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) carrying nuclear warheads are underway. Dubbed the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD), or more properly the Money Pit Missile, this exorbitant boondoggle is meant to replace the Minuteman III missiles housed in silos in Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, Montana and North Dakota. And it comes with an estimated price tag of $264 billion that’s sure to go up even higher.
Nuclear weapons are not the solution to our real security threats like catastrophic climate change and global health pandemics. In fact, new nuclear weapons make us less secure by destabilizing the world and launching a new arms race.
Blake Narendra is a foreign policy legislative assistant for Senator Markey (D-MA), working on issues related to his role as Chair of the East Asia Subcommittee and Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, after two years as a nuclear-security fellow for Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR). Blake has led the drafting of several arms control and nonproliferation bills including the PLANET Act to ban nuclear testing, the Prevention of an Arms Race Act which prevented (temporarily) the deployment of INF-range missiles, and an amendment to the Fiscal Year 2019 Appropriations Act which (temporarily) blocked deployment of a low yield warhead on a strategic ballistic submarine. In addition, Blake served as a special advisor and speechwriter in the State Department’s Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance Bureau and was a special assistant to the Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration during the ratification debate on the New START Treaty and during the Fukushima nuclear disaster. He received a Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School and a Bachelor of Arts from the Colorado College.
Geo Saba is the Chief of Staff for Representative Ro Khanna, who represents Silicon Valley, and previously was the Congressman’s Legislative Director and National Security Advisor. Geo helped spearhead his Yemen War Powers Resolution that passed Congress and was vetoed by President Trump. He is half Lebanese and was born and raised in the Bay Area in California. He was recently named by the think tank, New America, as a MENA National Security and Foreign Policy Next Generation Leader. He played varsity baseball at Stanford University, where he was a research assistant for former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa with honors in International Security Studies. He was a Bill Gates Scholar and received an MPhil in International Relations at Cambridge University. Before that, he interned in the White House Office of Management and Administration in the Obama Administration.

BAN KILLER DRONES webinar
2021-05-09 11:00 - 12:30
On zoom. DRONE PROLIFERATION, BORDER SURVEILLANCE
and the PERSECUTION of DRONE WHISTLEBLOWER DANIEL HALE
Sunday, May 16, 2021 11a-12:30p Eastern Time (US)
Please register here for this webinar
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

THE PANEL:

CHRIS COLE is the founder of Drone Wars UK and the author of: “Convenient Killing: Armed Drones and the PlayStation Mentality (2010)” and “Drone Wars: Out of Sight, Out of Mind, Out of Control (2016)”. He is a long-time anti-war activist and lives in Oxford with his wife, Virginia, and their children. He will speak about the spread of weaponized and surveillance drones and their growing deadly power.
MAYA EVANS has been campaigning against war and militarism for nearly two decades. For 10 of those years her focus has been around the ongoing war in Afghanistan, visiting peace and civil society groups in Kabul, running campaigns against weaponized drones, visiting schools to run peace education workshops, as well as leading a High Court Judicial Review investigating British complicity in the torture of Afghan detainees. In 2012 she was sentenced to two weeks in prison at HMP Bronzefield for protesting the NATO helicopter bombing of an Afghan village which killed 47 people at a wedding. Maya is a representative on her local council in Hastings, and she is the Cabinet lead for Parks and Recreation. She coordinates Voices for Creative Nonviolence- UK. Maya will speak about the use of drones in efforts to prevent immigrants from landing in the UK and their growing use by police and how this all relates to the war in Afghanistan.
WILLIAM NEUHEISEL is a human rights & civil liberties advocate with the Whistleblower & Source Protection Program (WHISPeR) at ExposeFacts, which provides critical legal support for whistleblowers and media sources in the national security and human rights arena. William is a longtime anti-war and human rights activist with expertise at the intersections of technology, constitutional law, and national security, and has worked closely with preeminent whistleblower attorneys Jesselyn Radack and Kathleen McClellan to support legal defense and public advocacy efforts for some of the most aggressively prosecuted truth-tellers of our time. He will discuss the unjust prosecution, and the jailing prior to sentencing, of drone whistle-blower Daniel Hale, who faces 10 years in U.S. federal prison on charges of releasing government documents damning of the U.S. drone war program.
Webinar moderator LEAH BOLGER retired in 2000 from the U.S. Navy at the rank of Commander after twenty years of active duty service. She was elected as the first woman President of Veterans For Peace (VFP) in 2012, and that same year was a member of a delegation to Pakistan to meet with the victims of U.S. drone strikes. She is the creator and coordinator of the “Drones Quilt Project.” She currently serves as the President of “World BEYOND War,” an international organization designed to abolish the institution of war.

Public Hearing on Mayor's Proposed Buffalo Budget
2021-05-10 17:00
On zoom. The Council will host a public hearing for constituents to comment on the budget. If anyone would like to comment on the budget, then they can send written remarks to councilstaff@buffalony.gov until Friday, MAY 07 at 5 PM. If anyone would like to participate in the meeting directly and give their remarks during the live meeting, they may participate by logging on to Zoom using the credentials below. Each speaker will be given 3 minutes to speak. All comments will be apart of the official public record.

To speak at the Public Hearing, log on to Zoom and use the following:
Webinar ID: 861 4463 0355
Passcode: [REDACTED]

Prohibiting the First Use of Nuclear Weapons
2021-05-15 12:30 - 17:00
On zoom. A nuclear exchange between the US and Russia would incinerate hundreds of millions of people immediately, and lead to a Nuclear Winter which would slaughter an estimated 7 billion of the Earth’s 7.7 billion people, mostly through starvation. Building back civilization would require over 1,000 years [Daniel Ellsberg talk, 12/13/2020]. A U.S. nuclear strike against China would result in a similar catastrophe.
These are the stakes. As a step toward reducing the danger of Nuclear War, a coalition of groups has called upon Congress to legislate – and the President to declare – that the United States will neither initiate nor threaten to initiate the first use of Nuclear Weapons. Register to attend: bit.ly/nfu-register.
Click here to see the full schedule.
Confirmed Speakers (partial list):

Rep. Ted Lieu (California)
Special message from Sen. Ed Markey
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (WA; video message)
William Perry (Sec. of Defense in Clinton adm.)
Ira Helfand (International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War)
Elaine Scarry (Harvard; MA Peace Action; CPDCS)
Zia Mian (Program on Science and Global Security, Princeton University)
Tom Collina (Ploughshares Fund)
Tong Zhao (Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy)
Joseph Gerson (CPDCS)
Kennette Benedict (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists)
Max Tegmark (MIT)
Tom Unterrainer (Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation)
Monica Montgomery, John Isaacs (Council for a Livable World)
David Swanson (World Beyond War)
Carley Towne (CODEPINK)
Anna Baker (GBPSR)
Kevin Martin (PA)
David Borris (CAPA)
Erica Fein (Win Without War)
Denise Duffield (PSR)
Jonathan King (MAPA/MIT)
William Hartung (Center for International Policy)
Joshua Bennett (Poet, Dartmouth)
Jillian Hanesworth (Buffalo Poet Laureate)
Bread and Puppet Theater

Breakout Topics:

Why No First Use Will Keep Us Safer
Communications & Messaging
Social Media / Street Theater / Artivism
Congressional Strategy
Recruiting/Organization Building
Back From the Brink
Stopping the Money Pit Missile and Reducing Nuclear Weapons Budgets

Declaring and legislating a No First Use policy would be a major step to help avoid:

A US nuclear attack that escalates
Russia or China attacking the US due to a false alarm
Violating the US Constitution by a first strike act of war
US threats of a nuclear attack which amount to bullying and blackmailing other countries, and which carry unacceptable risk of starting a general nuclear war.

With the support of a growing number of members of Congress, and President Biden’s 2019 statement that he has supported “No First Use” for twenty years, we have a real chance to take an important step toward reducing the risks of nuclear war in the next year by getting a No First Use policy declared and legislated into law!
Join us on May 15 at a conference to discuss and implement “Prohibiting the First Use of Nuclear Weapons.” Register to attend.
The conference is free but we appreciate donations to support this work.
Organized by Campaign for Peace, Disarmament and Common Security (CPDCS); Mass Peace Action (MAPA); with Cosponsors: Council for a Livable World (CLW); CodePINK; Chicago Area Peace Action (CAPA); NY Peace Action (PANYS); Nuclear Age Peace Foundation; Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility (GBPSR); Maine Peace Action; MIT Radius; Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR); Mahindra Humanities Center at Harvard; Public Citizen; Maryland Peace Action; Institute for People’s Engagement; PeaceWorks Kansas City; Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), Chesapeake Physicians for Social Responsibility.

Free Palestine Rally
2021-05-15 13:00 - 14:30
At Niagara Square, Buffalo (in front of City Hall, 65 Delaware Ave). Organized by Buffalo for Palestine, by Palestinian-Americans. Nakba Day. At least 100 Palestinians have been killed in the couple days since the Israeli Government cracked down at Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem; Israeli ground troops have now also reportedly entered Gaza. Join us in solidarity with our Palestinian brothers and sisters against oppression.

Riverside Salem: "A Prisoner's Humanity" --Dani Johnson
2021-05-16 16:00 - 17:30
On zoom. Sunday we will be joined by Dani Johnson, of Alliance of Families for Justice, who will talk with us about her work and recent book — A Prisoner’s Humanity. From the cover — “A Prisoner’s Humanity” is a collection of 71 poems that describe the inhumane ways that prisoners are mistreated within current day jails and prison facilities. This collection consists of 71 poems in honor of the year 1971, when prisoners within Attica Prison fought to affirm their humanity after having endured inhumane treatment. Everyone is welcome. Below is the link.
Cathy Rieley-Goddard (she/her) is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic: Riverside Salem Weekly Gathering
Time: This is a recurring meeting Meet anytime
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Investing in Cures Before Missiles - webinar
2021-05-17 10:30 - 11:30
(virtual). Women Against War explores the tradeoffs which proposed increased spending on nuclear weapons and their modernization represent. Speakers:
KEVIN MARTIN, President of NATIONAL PEACE ACTION and the PEACE ACTION EDUCATION FUND; DR. LAWRENCE S. WITTNER, historian, author of Confronting the Bomb: a Short History of the World Nuclear Disarmament Movement; MAUREEN BAILLARGEON AUMAND, member of the Pathways to Peace Committee of WOMEN AGAINST WAR.
REGISTER HERE.

Challenging Conversations: "Mirrors of Privilege" screening
2021-05-17 18:00 - 20:00
Film/Discussion/Action! – Part 1
“Mirrors of Privilege: Making Whiteness Visible” – a documentary produced by World Trust. Following the film, we will have time for reflection and a brainstorm of actions we can take within our own congregations. Organized by Union of Black Episcopalians.
Learn more about the film here:
Mirrors of Privilege
Register here: REGISTER

Clean Slate Advocacy Day
2021-05-18 10:00 - 16:00
On zoom. Join Center for Community Alternatives (organizer), Open Buffalo, WNYPC and more for a Clean Slate advocacy day on Zoom! Clean Slate means automatically expunge/seal old conviction records and end the perpetual punishment that causes. Join a press conference, meetings with lawmakers and community events to demand Clean Slate be passed. RSVP here.

Buffalo for the CCIA Rally
2021-05-18 15:15 - 16:30
At Delaware Park Rose Garden, 199 Lincoln Parkway, Buffalo 14222. Come out to stand up to #PassTheCCIA and #MakePollutersPay. Art and signs welcome, with best (from your organization and/or NY Renews) to receive a $ prize. More info here

(Nonpartisan) Primary Candidates' Forum for Mayor of Buffalo
2021-05-19 19:30
Livestreaming on Facebook; re-broadcast on Mon May 17, 1pm on WBNY 91.3FM; added to our YouTube Channel. Talking Peace w/the WNY Peace Center is holding a (Nonpartisan) Primary Candidates’ Forum for Mayor of Buffalo. We have proudly invited all ballot-qualified Primary Candidates for Mayor of Buffalo, NY to participate in this forum. The public will be able to offer questions via the Facebook livestream; or you can email them to victoryross9@gmail.com.

GDL: Afghan Peace Vols re Food Security
2021-05-21 07:30 - 21:30
Global Days of Listening:The “LIVE” broadcast can be viewed via the YouTube link posted at the time the broadcast starts on the Learning Right Relations – Global Days of Listening livestream page.

FOOD SECURITY: A Basic Human Need and a Global Human Right
Riveting photos of starving children, victims of the war and economic sanctions, have shone a bright light on the issue of the global human right of Food Security! The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations defines food security as existing “when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.” (United Nations Human Rights Fact Sheet, 34) And yet, an estimated 690 million people worldwide go to bed hungry every night.
Intentional starvation has also been used as a military tactic in such countries as Syria. On May 24, 2018, the United Nations (UN) Security Council unanimously passed a resolution condemning the use of food insecurity and starvation as a tactic of war.
These are the challenges, and the May Global Days of Listening will be examining why, in a world where there are adequate food resources, so many are starving. Some of the questions we will respond to include:
1. Healthy production of food (natural/organic/permaculture)
2. Equitable food distribution, especially in times of war and climate catastrophes
3. How can we improve food security for all, not just for those who can afford it?
View the SCHEDULE for the May 21 event here.

Lone Live Palestine Rally
2021-05-22 16:00 - 17:30
In Niagara Sq, opposite Buffalo City Hall. Buffalonians – and WNYers – for Palestine will come out to stand up for Palestinians’ human rights and an end to the blockade and apartheid systems.

(Nonpartisan) Primary Candidates' Forum for Erie Co Sheriff
2021-05-24 18:00 - 20:00
Hybrid: Both at Buffalo & Erie Co Central Public Library, and on zoom/youtube/Facebook. Organized by VOICE Buffalo; cosponsored by Partnership for the Public Good and the WNY Peace Center.
In 2021, we have the opportunity to elect equity, better quality of care for detainees, as well as safer policies. This is the year of the Activated Vote, and our power lies in the Unity of our voice! We must reform the majority of the policies and procedures that have allowed the murder and torture of innocent lives in the Erie County Holding Center. We must also stop Howard’s final act of supremacy: relocating the Downtown Holding Center to the Alden Correctional Facility. In 2021, we have the opportunity to elect a sheriff that is dedicated to the implementation of the needed reforms that will protect detainees and ensure they are receiving adequate care and their most basic needs are met.
Join VOICE Buffalo at our nonpartisan Primary Candidates forum to discuss these and other issues that greatly affect our community with the candidates.
The forum, moderated by Spectrum News Reporter Brandon Lewis, will be held in the Downtown Buffalo and Erie County Public Library on Monday, May 24th from 6pm-8pm and stream live on zoom, YouTube, and Facebook.
For more information, including the streaming information, please register for the forum HERE.

LASC Planning Meeting
2021-05-24 18:30 - 19:30

Remembering George Floyd
2021-05-25 08:00 - 17:00
in person at MLK Park, Buffalo. Remembering George Floyd and other victims of police brutality. Organized by the NAACP Buffalo.

Song of Myself - Pride Month, thru July 2
2021-05-26 10:00 - 2021-07-02 17:00
In person at 255 Great Arrow Avenue, Suite 200 Buffalo, NY 14207. Free. From the Gerald Mead Collection. Buffalo Art Movement (BAM!) is proud to honor LGBTQ+ artists from WNY who throughout history have created a body of work that celebrates queer identity. The significance of their work continues to pave the road for a new generation of artists that will further enhance the contributions of the LGBTQ+ community to the art world.
Part of the BAM! experience is to ensure that your health and safety is of priority, guests are encouraged to make a reservation before visiting the gallery by using our online reservation system: https://www.bam716.com/visit/reserve-a-time/
About Buffalo Art Movement
BAM! supports the development and works of emerging and established artists in Western New York. As an exhibition space and art incubator, we strive to foster collaboration among artists, patrons, students, galleries and art institutions within our community. We are a space free of commercial, political, religious, socioeconomic and ethnic bias, where ideas and new voices are celebrated. Our vision is to provide a platform for local artists to flourish beyond the borders of WNY.
Event host:

Jeffrey Heras
716-939-2445
jeff@bam716.com
https://www.bam716.com

Cuba: Right to Live Without a Blockade
2021-05-27 10:00 - 11:30
Webinar – “Right to Live Without a Blockade: The Impact of U.S. Sanctions on the Cuban Population and Women’s Lives.”

Haga click aquí para leer en español
Dear Victoria,
Oxfam is publishing a ground-breaking, extensive report this week titled “Right to Live Without a Blockade: The Impact of U.S. Sanctions on the Cuban Population and Women’s Lives.” It focuses on the human dimension of this cruel, 60-year policy with concrete and personal examples of how the U.S. embargo has affected the Cuban population, specifically Cuban women, and how these effects have been magnified during the COVID-19 pandemic.
To highlight the launch of this critical report, we will be broadcasting the webinar Right to Live Without a Blockade, The webinar will be viewable on CODEPINK’s YouTube page and on the New Good Neighbor Policy Facebook page.
The stellar line-up of speakers includes Alena Douhan, United Nations Special rapporteur on the impact of sanctions on human rights; Elena Schwolsky, nurse, author and activist; and Elena Gentili, Oxfam Country Director for Cuba. The webinar is being organized by the Martin Luther King Memorial Center in Cuba, Oxfam, and the Cuban Association of the United Nations.
The report “calls on the US government to immediately suspend those measures of the blockade that impede the timely acquisition of materials and inputs needed to address the COVID-19 pandemic in Cuba—including for domestic production of vaccines and medical treatments.” Nowhere is this more evident than in the 20 million syringe shortage on the island. CODEPINK, in collaboration with The Saving Lives Campaign, Puentes de Amor, NEMO – The No Embargo Cuba Movement, The People’s Forum and Global Health Partners is raising funds to purchase syringes and other medical supplies to send to Cuba. If you haven’t donated already, please do so by clicking here. If you have, please share the link with your friends, family and social networks.
Finally, please sign and share our petition calling on President Biden to normalize relations and end the blockade on Cuba in advance of the June 23 UN vote, where the world will once again reject this crime against humanity.
In solidarity,
Medea

Music & Indigenous Arts from Our Mother, Earth
2021-05-27 18:30 - 20:00
(on zoom) – Honoring Our Connections with Our Ancestors & the Seventh Generation” with Native flute player, artist, and educator, Dan Hill (Cayuga, Heron Clan). The Gathering of Good Minds 2021 Invites You to Another Very Special, Virtual Event. Please register in advance for this meeting:

https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUld-2upj8jH9CDPURyUhouuG7dSSUAgop5
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
For more info and/or more GGM events, please contact Lisa Latocha, GGM Event Planner, at llatocha@nacswny.org or 315-813-3533
Nyah-Weh! Tabutne! Yaw! Migwetch! Nyawen-ha! Thank you!

Housing & Education Workshop
2021-05-27 19:00
On zoom. Political education session. From
@OURCITYbflo
featuring Teresa Watson. This workshop focuses on the relationship between housing and education in Buffalo. Register here: https://bit.ly/3hOMkHG .

Parole Justice Rally & Speak-Out
2021-05-28 10:00 - 23:00
At 5500 Main St, Williamsville, NY. Justice for our Elders now. Come help us reunite our families and end mass incarceration. Support the #ElderParole and #FairAndTimelyParole Bills (and please call Assemblyman Jon Rivera 716-885-9630 to urge his support).

Memorial Day Commemoration (Veterans For Peace)
2021-05-31 14:00 - 16:00
Virtual. What would Memorial Day look like if we commemorated all the victims of war, and not just the military fallen from our own country? What would it be like to honor all the dead and acknowledge all the destruction wrought around the world by U.S. military actions? Join us to explore this theme, as NYC Veterans For Peace pairs Americans, mostly military veterans, with speakers who have been on the receiving end of U.S. military aggression. Register here.

Cheyenne Arapaho Nation: Larry Bringing Good
Afghanistan: Nematullah Ahangosh, Basir Bita, Kathy Kelly, Danny Sjursen
Iraq: Matthew Hoh, Lubna Mousa
Vietnam: Peggy Akers, Theresa Mei Chuc, Doug Rawlings
Japan: Susan Schnall, Kiyoko Takei, Masashi Takei
Okinawa: Ken Mayers, Teiko Yohana Tursi
Korea: Soobok Kim, Stan Levin, Georgia Wever
Palestine: Afaf Alnajjar, Miko Peled
Closing: Leah Bolger, Rory Fanning
Moderator: Susan Schnall
Music: Anthony Donovan

History of West Valley Nuclear Waste Site & Action Needed
2021-06-01 18:00
Event Series: The History of the West Valley Nuclear Waste Site

To help stop invisible but long lasting, dangerous radioactivity from getting into our air, water, soil, food and environment join us for a monthly series to learn about the West Valley NY Nuclear Waste Site. One of the most radioactive buildings at that site, and at all the nuclear power and weapons sites, in the country is slated to be demolished starting in 2021. The West Valley Action Network groups are calling for an enclosure during demolition and offsite real-time, publicly-reported radiation monitoring to see if radioactivity is getting out.

The first two programs in the series will give the history of what’s there, what was done, how dangerous it is from experts who have tracked the site for decades.

June 1, 2021, 6-7:30 PM: The History of the West Valley Nuclear Waste Site PART 1 and Action Needed in 2021. Ray Vaughan, geologist and Diane D’Arrigo, Nuclear Information and Resource Service. Learn more and register for Part 1 below.

Register Here

Capitol Calling Party: Say NO to New Nuclear Weapons.
2021-06-01 20:00
On zoom. Hosted by CODEPINK. RSVP HERE (for zoom link). Featuring:
William D. Hartung is the director of the Arms and Security Program at the Center for International Policy and a senior adviser to the Center’s Security Assistance Monitor. He is the author of Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex.
Yasmeen Silva is the partnerships manager at Beyond the Bomb, a grassroots organization building power on the local, state, and national levels to prevent nuclear war.
Nuclear rearmament versus nuclear abolition: While the 1980s witnessed the nuclear freeze and a mass movement to demand nuclear disarmament between the U.S. and Soviet Union, the 1990s gave birth to the missile caucus, the congressional engine careening the U.S. into a renewed nuclear arms race. Join us for a discussion on stopping the $1.7 trillion plan to produce new nuclear weapons, from land-based intercontinental missiles to low-yield tactical nuclear weapons.

Albany Rally to End Qualified Immunity
2021-06-02 05:30 - 21:30
In person. Trip to Albany to urge the NY legislature to End Qualified Immunity for police officers. Free bus from Buffalo (times below very approximate – rsvp provides more precise info). Organized by HALTsolitary. fIf you are able and willing to go we need as many people as possible on the bus! To RSVP for your spot please call Darlene at 631-294-0919. The bus will be leaving from the Park & Ride at University Station at the UB South Campus. More information below, with any questions please call Darlene.
The rally in Albany starts at 11:30 am. (Free buses are also going from NYC, Buffalo, and Rochester.) RSVP here.

Sanctuary & The Global Migration Regime
2021-06-02 13:00 - 17:00
Webinar from the Fellowship of Reconciliation for the 2nd program in the 4-part international webinar series on sanctuary & migration.
Tomorrow’s program will feature speakers offering diverse expertise about asylum processes from Kenya/Germany; Colombia/Canada; Mexico/USA; and the moderator from Germany.
Please find details below and register for the free live Zoom event here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_KM0aptsYS0qN6CVtS76Miw
Register in advance for this webinar:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_KM0aptsYS0qN6CVtS76Miw
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.
———-
Webinar Speakers
Claudia Gomez (Founder @Intercultural Collective Ethnicities)
Claudia Gomez is an Afro-Colombian artist, Occupational Therapist, refugee, and former resident of Romero House / Toronto. She is the founder of the Intercultural Collective Ethnicities in Cali-Colombia and in Toronto as well, in which she works as an activist through the arts (dance, theater, music, handcrafts), demanding human rights in Colombia in general and in the Afro-Colombian population in particular. She is part of the Truth Commission of Colombia Node Ontario which is looking for clarifying the truth about what happened and is happening in the frame of armed conflicts in Colombia (one of the largest and most cruel conflict around the world) and has been working with Colombian victims of armed conflicts for eight years.
Marisa Limón Garza (Deputy Director @Hope Border Institute)
Marisa Limón Garza is a native fronteriza with over 18 years of experience engaging multicultural communities through the lens of advocacy, education, strategic communications, and community involvement. She currently serves as deputy director of the Hope Border Institute, a social justice nonprofit organization working in El Paso TX, Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, and Las Cruces, New Mexico. Marisa holds a master’s in education and bachelor’s in English and Spanish literature from the University of Notre Dame and a certificate in nonprofit management from Georgetown University.
Elizabeth Ngari (Founder @Women in Exile)
Elizabeth Ngari is the founder of Women in Exile, an initiative of refugee women founded in Brandenburg/Germany in 2002 by refugee women to fight for their rights. They decided to organize as a refugee women’s group because they have made the experience that refugee women are doubly discriminated against not only by racist laws and discriminatory refugee laws in general but also as women. ‘Women in Exile & Friends’ was formed in 2011 by Women in Exile & activists in solidarity without refugee background. Together we conduct the campaign titled “No Lager for Women! Abolish all Lagers!”

Talking Peace - Israel/Palestine
2021-06-02 19:30
On our Facebook page, livestreaming. Also at Think Twice Radio (both website and Facebook Page). Please join us for a discussion with young Palestinian and Israeli/Jewish persons about their respective feelings, thoughts and experiences re the situation in Is/Pal. Re-broadcast audio on WBNY 91.3FM at 1pm Mon, June 7. (Also video will be put on our YouTube Channel.)
