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.
Anyone with a shred of humanity beating in their heart, especially those who have seen the terrors of war, must instinctively feel what Martin Luther King so persuasively called “the fierce urgency of now.” Therefore, it unmistakably follows that we must do all in our power to nonviolently halt the ongoing nightmare in Palestine.
As military veterans who have witnessed the depravity of war and are ourselves casualties of the lies that create war, we assert our right and our duty to express our outrage and more importantly, call for a new wave of resistance that will compel our government to stop Israel’s genocide.
Specifically, during “September Days of Solidarity with the People of Palestine,” we call on all VFP members and chapters across the U.S. to commit to organize with allied organizations, the following actions from September 1 through 7:
1. Deliver to Congressional offices, weapons factories, military bases and any appropriate government or private office, the VFP letter that lists the U.S. laws violated with every arms shipment to Israel.
2. Conduct simultaneous, nonviolent, civil resistance actions to enforce those laws by preventing the daily operations of those facilities.
3. Join with or organize campaigns to get governments and other public institutions, such as universities, to boycott Israeli goods and divest Israel government bonds.
“The fierce urgency of now” demands we risk as much for a just peace as we once did for too many unjust wars. We are Veterans For Peace. And we are ready once again to answer that call.