Category Archives: Meetings

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War on Gaza:  The Crucial Role of the Anti-Apartheid Movement in the US

Meetings

Please share with your contacts.This is an opportunity to attend a presentation by 

Dr. Philip FarahWar on Gaza:  The Crucial Role of the Anti-Apartheid Movement in the US 
Albuquerque Center for Peace and Justice
202 Harvard SE 
March 22, 2024 at 7 pm 

Philip Farah was born four years after the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, a moment known as the Nakba to Palestinians around the world. He was raised in East Jerusalem, Jordan. The Farah family became part of the Palestinian Diaspora when they were barred from returning to their home in Israel. In 1976, he was arrested, tortured, and spent two months in an Israeli prison without a public trial. He immigrated to the US at the age of 27.

Philip holds a doctoral degree in environmental economics from UNM and did his undergraduate work at the American University of Beirut. He has taught in Birzeit University in the occupied West Bank. He is a founding member of the Palestinian Christian Alliance for Peace (2012) and a member of the Virginia Coalition for Human Rights. He has spoken across the United States and on NPR after the bombing of St Porphyrios Church in Gaza where he has extended family. He recently retired after a 35-year career as an economist in Washington, DC. 

Please bring dates to share in honor of those in Gaza celebrating Ramadan.

Co-Sponsors –
Southwest Coalition for Palestine
Jewish Voice for Peace—Abq

ARMS RACE = SUICIDE RACE

Information, Meetings

By Lora Lucero

Koohan Paik-Mander, a Hawaii-based journalist, is currently on a speaking tour in the U.S. to ring an alarm bell – to wake up Americans. The paradigm shift in the way we wage war is rapidly pushing us over the proverbial cliff. The U.S. government is building a “high speed kill web” to encircle the entire planet with 5G capability to summon unmanned weapons and spacecraft at a moment’s notice, all operating on a sea-land-space infrastructure comprised of satellites and a “smart ocean” made up of undersea sonar and radar networks. The data cloud for the new war fighting paradigm will be developed by Amazon, Microsoft, Oracle and Google, which collectively received $9 billion last December from the Pentagon to begin research.

The facts and figures rolled off her tongue quickly as Koohan explained how this hyper-costly infrastructure is creating a new reality with dead oceans and atomized warfare. “A weaponized Pacific is a dead Pacific. And a dead Pacific is a dead planet.” Her pictures and diagrams showed how whale poop is keeping our oceans alive. Their poop is rich in nutrients that stimulate the growth of phytoplankton, capturing an estimated 40% of all the carbon dioxide produced. But roughly a 100,000 whales are being killed each year by the U.S. military using the Pacific Ocean and islands as a testing ground for new weapons systems and live-fire training, along with the use of sonar for anti-submarine warfare training.

Continue reading ARMS RACE = SUICIDE RACE →

Rebirth of Albuquerque Peace and Justice Center on May 20, 2023

Information, Meetings

Cheers and a sigh of relief filled the community room in the new International District Public Library in Albuquerque on Saturday, May 20th. That’s when more than 70 members came together to vote on new bylaws for the Peace and Justice Center, and then elected a slate of new council members.

Many of us had not seen each other in person since before the Covid pandemic hit three years ago, and it felt like a mini reunion of sorts. Although the average age was probably north of 60 years, it was encouraging to see the young people, including the council’s new president, Joshua Orr. 

Given the challenges of the past few years, the new council has a lot on its plate. Everyone appears ready to roll up their sleeves and get to work. The next regularly scheduled council meeting is 6/20/23 at the Center.  More details to follow.

The new council members are: Cecilia Chavez, Bob Anderson, Jeanne Pahls, Katarina Robinson, Torrence Green, Joshua Orr – chair, Alan Wagman, Aiden Hendrickson, Andreas Archuleta, Ilse Biel – secretary, Nancy Henderson, Anamargarita Otero – treasurer, and Bob Kermott.

Communication with the council members can be directed to Jeanne Pahls at  jeannepahls@comcast.net and Joshua Orr at orr.d.joshua@gmail.com with a cc. to board@abqpeaceandjustice.org

CRITICAL WIPP Meeting

Meetings

CRITICAL WIPP Meeting April 4th 6:30-8:30pm
Santa Fe Convention Center
201 W Marcy St Santa Fe, NM 87501

The DOE and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) are breaking the agreement made with the people of New Mexico concerning operation of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) east of Carlsbad, NM. The agreement was a covenant that the facility would begin to close down in 2024, and there would only be a specific amount to transuranic (TRU) waste deposited there. New Mexico agreed to accept WIPP so that legacy waste could be disposed of. Now NNSA & DOE want to deposit NEWLY generated waste from pit production in NM and SC.

Two top NNSA executives have agreed to attend a meeting facilitated by Santa Fe County Commissioner Anna Hansen. It will be Tuesday, April 4th from 6:30-8:30pm in the Santa Fe Community Convention Center. This is the public’s first and last opportunity to address NNSA and DOE leadership specifically on the WIPP prior to NMED’s issuance of a 10-year operational permit which will be issued by NMED in 2023. It may last past 8:30pm.

The precise format of the meeting hasn’t been announced, BUT it is critical there be a VERY LARGE TURNOUT to show these officials the people of New Mexico do NOT want the facility expanded in terms of volume or time it is open.

PROMISES MADE; PROMISES BROKEN.

Willard Hunter
PDA Central NM