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Hope in Jerusalem
Hope in Jerusalem Five thousand people, most of them dressed in black, turned up for protests in Jerusleum on December 29. They began with a March of Mourning for all the victims—Palestinian and Israeli—of the occupation. Responding to the call of the Coalition of Women for a Just Peace, people from all over the world found their way to the vigil plaza in Jerusalem. Israelis, Palestinians, Europeans and Americans walked in silence (mostly), to the funereal cadence sounded by two women drummers at the center of the long procession. It was an unseasonably balmy winter morning. A counter-demonstration staged by the extreme right wing drew only about 30 people, their angry shouts only dramatizing the dignified march.

A huge banner read, “The Occupation is Killing Us All.” Hundreds of signs said “Stop the Occupation” and called for peace, for a state of Palestine beside the state of Israel and for sharing the city of Jerusalem, loved for so long by so many.

The police tried to keep the marchers on the sidewalk, but we burst our seams and spread out into the road, blocking traffic along the route. One supporter of Women in Black in Jerusalem walked among the marchers, handing out 1,000 red roses to Women in Black. The roses ran out; the women did not.

At the broad, new plaza just outside historic Jaffa Gate, one of the main entrances to the Old City of Jerusalem, the marchers filled up the plaza, with spillover inside the gate and along the roads leading up to it. Members of the Knesset were there, as well as delegations from Belgium, Canada, England, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and the United States. Marcia Freedman, former Israeli member of Knesset and long-standing Woman in Black, read a list of 118 locations around the world where solidarity events were planned for the same day, from Adelaide to Zaragoza (see www.coalitionofwomen4peace.org for the full list).

Shulamit Aloni, first lady of human rights in Israel and former government minister, compared the struggle to end the occupation with those led by Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, reminding us that although the task is arduous, it will inevitably be crowned with success. Other powerful speeches followed: by Nurit Peled Elhanan, winner of the Sakharov Peace Prize awarded by the European Parliament and mother of Smadar, 13 years old when she was killed by a terrorist bomb in Jerusalem; Palestinian activist Zahira Kamal, who found a way to outwit the closure in order to reach Jerusalem and address the rally; Luisa Morgantini, Italian member of the European Parliament; Khulood Badawi, chair of the Association of Arab Students in Israel; and Vera Lichtenfels, a 17-year-old Portuguese peace activist, representing youth all over the world who are working for peace.

Representatives of 13 Israeli organizations lit torches for the killed, the wounded, the homes demolished, the trees uprooted, the children whose lives were fractured. A concert of Palestinian and Israeli performers filled the air with hope for peace.

After the concert, Peace Now held another rally just inside the Jaffa Gate, with Palestinians and Israelis signing a Peace Declaration and releasing doves into the sky over the city. Palestinians and Israelis wandered in and out the streets of the Old City trying to hold tight to the beautiful thaw in the air, within this long winter of violence and tragedy.

That evening, Israeli TV reported nothing about the hope for peace that had swept through Jerusalem. The lack of coverage brought to mind the words of Shulamit Aloni earlier that day: “Even though Israel’s ‘patriotic’ media seek to ignore you, there is no doubt that your voice will be heard and that a great many others will join your cause. You will break through the silence because yours is a vision of freedom, justice and peace.”

May it come to pass.

—Gila Svirsky

Wisconsinite Gets Second Prison Term
Long-time antinuclear activist Bonnie Urfer was sentenced in December to five additional months in federal prison for her refusal to pay restitution to the U.S. Navy for alleged damages from the June 2000 “Silence Trident Disarmament Action.” The sentence was imposed after U.S. Magistrate Stephen Crocker found Urfer in violation of her supervised release order, which includes restitution to the Navy of $7,492 for damage done to its submarine transmitter system, Project ELF.

Urfer, 49, already served six months in prison for the action, during which she and South Dakota activist Michael Sprong used handsaws to cut down three telephone poles—out of several thousand—that hold up the ELF antenna in Wisconsin’s Chequamagon National Forest. The action took the ELF system, which sends orders to submerged nuclear-armed and Fast Attack submarines, offline for at least 24 hours. Sprong served a two-month sentence for the action.

At the December hearing, Magistrate Crocker claimed that his “hands were tied” under U.S. mandatory sentencing guidelines. Urfer’s attorney suggested that Urfer might make a nominal payment to a veteran’s hospital rather than to the Navy, but the prosecutor, Assistant District U.S. Attorney John Vaudreiul refused to agree to the alternative. “Defendants don’t get to pick and choose who will be compensated and which court orders they will follow,” Vaudreiul said.

Urfer had earlier told her probation officer that giving money to the Navy “would make me feel like a killer.” She said, “I can’t pretend that paying restitution isn’t a bloody business, especially now with the government bombing again.” Urfer has been on the staff of the peace group Nukewatch for 16 years.

During discussion of the alternative proposal made by Urfer, Crocker said, “I agree that we really don’t gain anything by putting Ms. Urfer in jail.” Then the magistrate proceeded to do just that. “My hands are tied, even if I wanted to do something more beneficial for the society as a whole,” he said. The order for five months imprisonment also includes the stipulation that Bonnie’s sentence will be complete upon release, with no supervised release or probation, but when Vaudreiul asked whether Urfer would still owe the Navy the restitution money, the magistrate agreed she would. Urfer’s attorney noted, “You can’t squeeze blood from a turnip.”

During Urfer and Sprong’s first trial, in February 2000, they tried to make use of the unusual “advice of counsel” defense in which an act that is otherwise illegal can become lawful if committed on the advice of an attorney. However the magistrate’s instructions to the jury made it impossible for the jury to bring in a not-guilty verdict. Those jury instructions and the conviction are currently under appeal in the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Chicago.

For more information, contact Nukewatch, P.O. Box 649, Luck, WI 54853; (715)472-4185; www.nukewatch.com.

—Nukewatch

Guilty!

San Francisco demonstration at June 001 appearance by Henry Kissinger. David Hanks/Global Exchange

Supporters of East Timor have known for decades that the Indonesian government launched its bloody invasion of East Timor in December 1975 with the concurrence of President Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. As many as 200,000 Timorese died during the 25-year occupation.

Evidence against Ford and Kissinger became available to the whole world early in December, when the National Security Archive at George Washington University published previously secret documents on the World Wide Web.

December 6 was the 26th anniversary of the day Ford and Kissinger met with Indonesian President Suharto during a brief stopover in Jakarta while they were flying back from Beijing. Aware that Suharto had plans to invade East Timor, and that the invasion was legally problematic—in part because of Indonesia’s use of U.S. military equipment that Congress had approved only for self-defense—Ford and Kissinger wanted to ensure that Suharto acted only after they had returned to U.S. territory. The invasion took place on December 7, 1975, the day after their departure, resulting in the quarter-century bloody Indonesian occupation of East Timor.

Henry Kissinger has consistently denied that any substantive discussion of East Timor took place during the meeting with Suharto, but a newly declassified State Department telegram from December 1975 confirms that such a discussion took place and that Ford and Kissinger advised Suharto that “it is important that whatever you do succeeds quickly.” Two of the key documents released in December were declassified by the Gerald R. Ford Library at the request of the National Security Archive; archive staffers located other documents at the National Archives. The revelations include:
• When Suharto told Ford and Kissinger that he was about to order an invasion, the response was only to caution that “it would be better if it were done after we returned.” (The invasion began the next day).
• Kissinger told Suharto that the use of U.S.-supplied arms in the invasion—equipment that under U.S. law could not be used for offensive military operations—“could create problems,” but indicated that they might be able to “construe” the invasion as self-defense.
• On August 12, 1975, a few days after a coup attempt in East Timor, Kissinger observed that an Indonesian takeover would take place “sooner or later.”
• Six months into the occupation of East Timor, Kissinger acknowledged to senior State Department officials that U.S. military aid had been used “illegally” and hinted at his own doubts about the invasion: Washington had “not very willingly” resumed normal relations with Jakarta.

The documents reveal the importance that the Ford administration attached to maintaining friendly relations with Indonesia in the immediate aftermath of the U.S. defeat in Vietnam. Ford and Kissinger plainly viewed the maintenance of warm ties with the Suharto regime as a foreign policy priority that far outweighed any secondary concerns about the possible Indonesian use of force in East Timor, even though the use of such force constituted a clear violation of American laws.

—Robert J. McMahon

More info and links to the documents can be found at www.etan.org/news/kissinger/.

Movement Jobs

Development Coordinator, East Timor Action Network. Develop and maintain sources of financial support for ETAN to continue its work with the East Timorese. Requirements: Proven track record in grant research, proposal writing and fundraising campaigns; strong communication, research and organizational skills; self-motivated. East Timor knowledge desirable. Part-time position, location flexible, salary $10,500. Send send cover letter, resume and writing sample (maximum 5 pages) to Karen Orenstein, ETAN, Development Coordinator Position, PO Box 15774, Washington, DC 20003; (202)544-6911; fax, (202)544-6118; karen@etan.org; www.etan.org.

Executive Director with combination of administrative and program skills and Office Manager sought by small but growing nonprofit with innovative programs in land reform and community development finance in the United States and occasionally abroad. Executive Director: Should be familiar with community development and land conservation issues/practices and have excellent written and oral communication skills. Responsibilities include supervision of staff and travel. Office Manager: Should be efficient and well organized, with bookkeeping, database, information management and good communication skills. Responsibilities include payment of bills, simple accounting, maintenance of mailing lists and information resources, purchasing and phone and written communications. Opportunities for involvement in program activities and events. Compensation for both jobs modest according to need; debts and dependents included. Room and board available. Contact Equity Trust, Inc., 539 Beach Pond Road, Voluntown, CT 06384; (860)376-6174; fax (860)376-1624; info@equitytrust.org.

Events, etc.
Jan. 31-Feb. 3, New York City: World Economic Forum Counter-Summit and National Student Mobilization. For details see www.studentsforglobaljustice. org.

Feb.-March, nationwide: East Timor activist Filomena Barros Dos Reis speaking on justice and women’s issues. An underground organizer for the East Timorese resistance during the country’s occupation by Indonesia, Filomena will tour the U.S. from the East Coast in mid/late-February to the West Coast in mid/late-March. For a schedule of the tour or to arrange an appearance in your community, contact ETAN field organizer Diane Farsetta ASAP at (608)663-5431 or diane@etan.org.

And save the date:
August 3-10, Dublin, Ireland: Stories and Strategies: Nonviolent Resistance and Social Change. The first War Resisters’ International Triennial Conference of the 21st Century. For information, see www.wri-irg.org or contact WRI at 5 Caledonian Rd., London N1 9DX, Britain; (+44)20-7278 4040.