Courageous Resistance Appears

Debra Sweet | July 9, 2014

A hearty “thank you” to Courage to Resist, which just issued a call to “all U.S. military personnel to resist any effort to pursue a new military attack on Iraq via troops, bombs, drones or any other means.  In keeping with our Mission Statement, we affirm that, just as there was never any legitimate reason for the United States to send military forces to Iraq in the past, there is not now any reason for the United States to participate militarily in the affairs of the people of Iraq.”

It is absolutely essential to put before the US public the need for visible resistance to US re-escalation and occupation of Iraq. 

Jason Ditz writes on Antiwar.com that 750 US Special Forces are in Iraq and weapons are pouring in. “300 Hellfires the US already sent were burned through weeks ago, and the Maliki government is requesting another 1,400.” Ditz also reported, “All signs point to the US ‘advisers’ getting ready for direct combat operations in both Iraq and Kurdistan, with the Pentagon shipping Apache attack helicopters to Baghdad to ‘protect American interests’ in the capital, and deploying combat troops to fly them.”

Related reading:
Drone Memo Concentrates What’s Not Legit about US Targeted Killing

When ICE buses tried to drop children off at a US detention center in Murrietta, CA on July 3rd, a crowd of anti-immigrant “go home” protesters blocked the buses.  The sight recalled nothing so much as the White Citizens Councils greeting Freedom Riders in the South, or racist crowds demanding segregation of schools.

In a most bizarre twist, the Dean of Morgan State University’s Journalism school suggested sending the children to Guantanamo because there’s a lot of empty space there. NO! Close that torture camp now.

But on July 4, and since, immigration rights supporters showed up in equal and larger numbers. Revolution reported:

“People came to the immigration detention center in Murrieta from all over Southern California and beyond on the 4th of July to insist that the children with and without parents flooding across the border in Texas be treated humanely, with care and concern, and not as animals or criminals. And they came to challenge and confront the reactionaries whose ugly anti-immigrant xenophobia and pro-USA chauvinism has been given center stage in the national—and international—news all week…

“A high school student, dressed in white, told Revolution she had set up an event page on Facebook calling on friends to come dressed in white, and to march silently from the Wal-Mart a half mile away to the detention center. Though she was only familiar with a couple of her new ‘virtual’ friends, 30 people showed up for the July 4th march!

“A number of people from Murrieta came to oppose the racists. Two sisters from Murrieta—one in high school, the other in college with a young daughter—came together, carrying two handmade signs that each said: ‘Our Land Is Your Land. Bienvenidos!’ over a rippling American flag. They had first come to the detention center on Tuesday after hearing that anti-immigrant forces were out there.”

A few photos capture a little of the chaotic and very political scene, which has continued for days.

A very popular Tweet: 

Debra Sweet is the Director of World Can’t Wait.