Category Archives: Israel

The Shadow at the Pride Festival

A year ago last Saturday, the Friends Meeting I’m part of took a big step, for us: we rented a booth at the Alamance Pride Festival, held in a large park in downtown Burlington NC.

The Spring booth, with a blogger on duty at the table.

Outwardly, our booth was not particularly eye-catching. Amid the fluttering of a thousand floating rainbows, the yellow table banner we made for it is about as gaudy as we get. Spring Friends Meeting has been what many call an “affirming” congregation for more than a dozen years, and we’ve paid our share of dues for that. But we didn’t do it for publicity, and we haven’t done much of what many others call evangelism, which we’d  rather name “outreach.” We have  lots of opinions about things, but are  mostly quiet about them.

Maybe too quiet. Spring has been gathering for Quaker worship in southern Alamance County for 251 years, but we soon found out in the booth that hardly anyone we talked to knew we were there.  Which meant that Pride was a great opportunity for our outreach aspirations, but it also brought home the suspicion that maybe we had been a bit too ready to “hide our lamp under a bushel,” for much of those two-and-a-half centuries, which is something the gospel says not to do. There’s a false modesty which at bottom is mostly a mix of snobbery and pride.
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“You DO Need a Weatherman” — DNC Protest Forecast (& Cartoons)

Note: The weather forecast below is real, though I’ve jiggered the format. And reposting it is a bit whimsical, but not a joke.

Among the most effective and non-brutal “crowd control” techniques for events like the coming DNC are: rain (especially with thunder & lightning); and sweltering heat (especially with lakeside humidity). Either one holds down turnout, “dampens” or wilts activist enthusiasm, and discourages media attention, all without swinging a baton or tossing a pepper gas shell.

But this week, the Chicago weather gods are on the side of the insurgents. I’m still expecting, as explained in this earlier post, that the police (and federal backups) will be (at least initially) more professional and skillful in dealing with protests; though anything could happen, and weather can change . . . .

But here’s the data, and some provocative images, to help pass the time til the big party starts.

Continue reading “You DO Need a Weatherman” — DNC Protest Forecast (& Cartoons)

Dyer: Gaza Civilian Deaths: Who Really Cares?

Gaza death toll nears 40,000 — who cares?

Gwynne Dyer — 29 Jul, 2024

Many people around the world are calling for an end to the Israel-Hamas war and its huge toll of civilian casualties. But Gwynne Dyer argues that this chorus does not include the handful of key actors in the bloody drama.

The Palestinian death toll in the Gaza Strip since October’s Hamas attacks on Israeli settlements will reach 40,000 people in the next week or so. (It’s back up near 50-100 civilians dead a day.)

Continue reading Dyer: Gaza Civilian Deaths: Who Really Cares?

“You May Say, They Are Dreamers – But They’re Not the Only Ones” — Israeli-Palestinian Peace Movement Reviving, Expects a Long Haul

‘We all share the same pain’: can the Israeli-Arab peace movement rebuild after 7 October?

As the conflict in Gaza continues, reconciliation may seem a distant dream, but on both sides there are those working for peace

Caitlin Kelly — Tue 21 May 2024
Supported by theguardian.org

On the morning of 7 October, as news emerged of the Hamas attack on Israeli communities near the Gaza border, Naama Barak Wolfman joined thousands of others frantically texting their friends and family. “Checking you’re alright,” she wrote to her colleague, Vivian Silver, a Canadian who spent decades working to foster peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

The text was never read. Silver was one of several peace activists killed that day, though news of her murder took nearly a month to reach Silver’s friends and family. Many believed the Women Wage Peace leader had been taken hostage, even picturing her negotiating with her captors.

“We couldn’t find the right words to express the pain, the hurt, and the terror. People on both sides were afraid,” Wolfman recalls. “You shut down, you close the windows. In Israel, that’s what everyone literally did for the first few months.”

Continue reading “You May Say, They Are Dreamers – But They’re Not the Only Ones” — Israeli-Palestinian Peace Movement Reviving, Expects a Long Haul

Communist Champagne for Christmas, and Congressman Pete MCloskey — A Tribute to My Former Boss on Capitol Hill


A Weekend Read:  Pete McCloskey, GOP congressman who once challenged Nixon, just died
at 96. 


[NOTE]: Pete made a lot of impact, against the Vietnam war, for the (then-new) environmental movement, and in other ways helped save and enrich the lives of many people, both far away and in the USA. 

One  American he changed was me.

The big impact started with champagne for Christmas. But first, some background from the Associated Press:

May 8, 2024
Pete McCloskey, Back in the Day

FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — Pete McCloskey — a proenvironment, antiwar California Republican who cowrote the Endangered Species Act and cofounded Earth Day — has died. He was 96.

A fourthgeneration Republican in the mold of Teddy Roosevelt, he often said, McCloskey represented the 12th Congressional District for 15 years, running for president against an incumbent Richard Nixon in 1972. He battled party leaders while serving seven terms in Congress and went on to publicly disavow the GOP in his later years.

He died at home Wednesday, May 8, according to Lee Houskeeper, a family friend.

Continue reading Communist Champagne for Christmas, and Congressman Pete MCloskey — A Tribute to My Former Boss on Capitol Hill