Is there a better graphic demonstrating the inhumanity of Netanyahu and the IDF and the imperative of a ceasefire? I’m for an immediate ceasefire, but also for – not as a first choice – anything that will get us there. In any case, the staggering number of deaths of women and children (and others) should give urgency to this struggle. A simple thing to do is to call the office of your Senator and House member to thank them for supporting a ceasefire if they have or to urge them to do so if they haven’t.
I watched a few clips of the Oakland city council meeting last night during which a few speakers defended Hamas and considered the slaughter of 1400 innocent people an expression of resistance. Much could be said, but suffice to say (for now) that this peculiar brand of anti-imperialist politics with more than a dollop of antisemitism won’t travel well across the country and its diverse communities. It will attract an audience, but it will never fill an arena nor evolve into a political majority with the capacity to make progressive change.
At old theater house in Kingston NY waiting for Lukas Nelson (Willie’s son) and Promise of the Real! Live music is a good salve in a moment in which the seams that tie together a liveable world ( or the hope of one) feel like they are unraveling.
The Minsk agreements were interpreted differently by the Ukrainians and Russians from the start. There was never a mutually agreed upon understanding of the agreements shared by the two antagonists – the Ukrainians defending their national independence and the Russians violating it. Thus the insistence coming from a section of the left to return to the Minsk agreements, as if they settled anything, is simply bogus. It amounts to shifting the blame for the outbreak in fighting from Putin to Ukrainian leaders and Biden, both of whom it is said refused to comply with the Minsk agreements.
