CEASEFIRE NOW! Demilitarize and Decolonize! was the theme of the 39th Veterans For Peace National Convention held online Friday through Sunday, August 16 to 18. Click here to access the entire program.
This year’s convention was dynamic, informative, exciting, and brilliant. One of the Friday keynotes was Jewish U.S. Army Major Harrison Mann, who explained why he resigned over U.S. support of the Israel-Hamas war. Senior Airman Juan Bettancourt discussed his public declaration as a conscientious objector. And Black Agenda Report editor Margaret Kimberley, a well-known radio personality shared her perspective on current events.
The focus on Gaza continued Saturday, with a panel that included Palestinian American activist and lawyer Huwaida Arraf; Israeli military refuser Elik Elhanan, who co-founded the Israeli-Palestinian Combatants for Peace; and legislative specialist Odeliya Matter, who works as a Program Associate on Middle East Policy at the Friends Committee on National Legislation. Freedom Flotilla participants were featured panelists for Sunday’s program, “We Sail Until Palestine is Free."
Call for a Permanent Ceasefire and Emergency Food and Medical Aid to Gaza
We are reaching out to you as military veterans who have fought in multiple US wars, and who continue to uphold the US Constitution and international law, to organize for justice and equality in our home communities, and to advocate for a peaceful foreign policy.. <Full Statement>
Call to Action: “September Days of Solidarity with the People of Palestine”
Members of Veterans For Peace do not need to enumerate or recount the horrors that have engulfed the people of Gaza in order to rekindle the blood-boiling anger we have felt for many months. We witness those horrors every day in real time as the bombs we pay for rain down day and night on innocent people. <Call to Action>
Members In Action
Jack Gilroy Breaks Down Reality of Genocide in Gaza to Reporters
Imagine if Broom County had 6,000 bombs dropped on it. These people confined to that tiny strip are undergoing terror from above. <Watch>