From: "Eli Pariser" <bulletin@9-11peace.org>
To: <9-11peace@complete.org>
Subject: 9-11peace: Peace at the Grass Roots
Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2001 06:27:36 -0500
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9-11PEACE.ORG BULLETIN, Issue 3
Available online at http://www.9-11peace.org/bulletin.php3

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CONTENTS
---------
1. Introduction: Keeping the Peace
2. Protective Accompaniment
3. Conscientious Objection
4. Case Study: Olive Trees in the Middle East
5. Education
6. Featured Actions
7. Get Involved
8. About the Bulletin


INTRODUCTION: KEEPING THE PEACE
--------------------------------
The visible peace process between countries and groups in
conflict is often carried out at the diplomatic level.  We
see Yasser Arafat and Ehud Barak at Camp David, or David
Trimble and Gerry Adams shaking hands in Northern Ireland.
But in order for such political negotiations to have a
lasting impact, they must be bolstered by work at the
grass-roots level.  If warring groups can't learn to trust
and accept each other, there is little hope that they will
be able to coexist in the long term.

In this week's Bulletin, we take a look at the incredible
work people are doing around the world to create the
conditions for peace.  Although they rarely show up on the
major news networks, the people and organizations featured
below have come up with techniques and processes which allow
deeply divided peoples to reconcile their differences
without violence. In the words of the Shalom Center, a group
that works in Israel, they are effective because they are
"grass-roots approaches, people-to-people connections, that
do not need to wait for governments, but can get governments
moving again in a peaceful direction."

These are the tools that just might save the world, and they
are sorely needed in these militaristic times.  As you
browse, consider what you can do to strengthen these efforts
in your community and around the world.


PROTECTIVE ACCOMPANIMENT
--------------------------
Protective accompaniment involves having ordinary people
accompany activists who are working for peace in their
countries of origin.  The constant presence of an observer
from the international community often helps to protect
activists from suffering harm or even death.  Observers may
carry cameras to record what they see, and are backed up by
emergency action networks that can quickly notify officials
if something does happen.

One of the leading organizations that trains and mobilizes
volunteers for protective accompaniment is Peace Brigades
International.  Peace Brigades International was founded in
Canada, but is an international organization with chapters
in many countries of the world.  PBI is celebrating its 20th
anniversary this year, and was nominated for the 2001 Nobel
Peace Prize.  To learn more about PBI's use of protective
accompaniment, visit:
http://www.9-11peace.org/r.php3?redir=6

The above link also contains two further links to articles
written by volunteers about their experiences.

The Global Non-violent Peaceforce is an organization that
aims to train and mobilize an international standing
peaceforce that uses non-violent means to intervene in
conflicts.  For more information visit:
http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/proposal.htm


CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION
------------------------
Conscientious objectors are people who refuse to take part
in the mechanisms of war.  This may involve refusing to
fight or to pay taxes, since the wars our countries wage on
each other are supported by the taxes we pay.  In the U.S.,
for example, over 50% of income taxes goes to pay for
military efforts.

The first step to becoming a conscientious objector is
deciding where you stand on war and why, and educating
yourself on the different types of conscientious objection.
The website of the Center on Conscience and War has a
worksheet designed to help you consider the available
options:
http://www.nisbco.org/What_Do_I.htm

Currently, there is a US effort, supported by a number of
Representatives, to allow conscientious objectors to pay
taxes for peace development rather than the military:
http://www.peacetax.com/details.html
You can support this bill by writing to your representative.

Until this bill is passed, or if you live outside of the
States, it is still possible to refuse to pay all or part of
one's taxes as a conscientious objection.  This action does
have some risk associated with it, but for a person of
conscience, this risk may be a better alternative than
funding a war effort that is killing thousands of people.
http://www.nonviolence.org/issues/taxes.htm

You may also consider contributing to the War Tax Resisters
Penalty Fund, which helps pay the taxes of American
conscientious objectors who are being prosecuted for war tax
resistance.  This action carries much less personal risk and
still expresses a financial objection to the war effort.
http://www.9-11peace.org/r.php3?redir=7

For a quick look at war tax resistance over the last 30
years as told through pictures:
http://www.9-11peace.org/r.php3?redir=9


CASE STUDY: OLIVE TREES IN THE MIDDLE EAST
-------------------------------------------
Long-term, grass-roots peacemaking takes a lot of empathy,
commitment, and, perhaps most of all, creativity.  The story
below is a terrific example of the kind of action that is
required to bridge the gaps that exist.  Here is part of the
Shalom Center's online statement about their program:

"In some Palestinian towns, Israeli soldiers and settlers
have even destroyed the olive trees that have been the
economic and ecological basis of the town for centuries past
and must be for decades to come. In the village of Hares,
for example, the Israeli rabbis of Rabbis for Human Rights
found 1500 olive trees destroyed - many in places far from
where they could have been used as cover for violence.

These olive trees were not decorative. They were the
life-support of the village. Some of the trees were hundreds
of years old, having produced for this village oil and
olives for all that time. Each one of them paid the cost of
year after year of schooling for a child. Or the cost of a
room built for a growing child. Or a dowry for a girl about
to be married.

So we [The Shalom Center] are joining in an act of
people-to-people peace-making . . . to help purchase new
trees for several Palestinian villages, and then to replant
these trees and help meet the humanitarian, human-rights,
and environmental needs of these villages while the trees
regrow."

Rabbis for Human Rights needs monetary support as well as
people to help spread the word about the program.  For more
information:
http://www.shalomctr.org/html/peace27.html


EDUCATION
----------
Education is often the best way to establish peace at a
grass-roots level since it helps people understand each
other's differences.  Racism and violent behavior are often
learned, and the principles of tolerance and non-violence
can be learned as well.  You can work to train yourself in
non-violent conflict resolution and pass this knowledge on
to others, especially children.

UNICEF Canada has an amazing website that not only has an
interactive, 400 page online manual that teaches conflict
resolution, but also a free interactive game in which you
can mediate an historic child labor dispute in Bangladesh,
or make a decision about how to deal with a refugee camp set
up outside a village in Burundi.  It is aimed at children,
but I think it's just as educational for adults:
http://www.softpower.org

There are also several profiles on the site about how
teachers in various countries are helping to resolve
conflict through what they teach the children in their
schools. Two extremely interesting ones are about fighting
racism in a school in the U.S. and resolving conflict in a
school in Northern Ireland. These articles can be found
here:
http://www.softpower.org/peacemaker/index.html

Visit this page on the Global Non-violent Peaceforce website
for a list of books to read, resources to use, and actions
to take to help learn peaceful conflict resolution:
http://www.9-11peace.org/r.php3?redir=8

It is also important to become informed about other
countries and learn about non-Western points of view, in
order to fight racism and get a better understanding of your
country's foreign policy.

For background information on the nations of the world,
including Afghanistan, visit http://www.countrywatch.com.
This site includes details and statistics on the political,
cultural, and military histories of the countries of the
world, as well as current news on each country.  It is
important to get a better understanding of this kind of
information, especially as America threatens to bring the
"new war" to countries besides Afghanistan.

Or visit TFF, the Transnational Foundation for Peace and
Research, which has a new website that contains links to
news sources around the world.  The site provides users with
access to original sources and perspectives produced by the
media in regions around the world, both mainstream and
alternative.   It is meant to help its readers develop an
international rather than a national focus.
http://www.transnational.org/new/TNN.html


FEATURED ACTION
-------------
This week, I challenge you to take some kind of direct
action for peace.   Here are three suggestions:

1) Visit a mosque.  You may want to bring flowers, both as a
memorial to the innocent people of the Muslim faith that are
dying in Afghanistan, and as a symbol of your understanding
that Islam is a religion based on peace.

2) Write a letter to the editor.  The paper can be local or
national.  Just express why you believe that the military
action against Afghanistan should be stopped.  In this way,
you can let others know that there are many people who
oppose the war, as well as educating people about the
reasons why. Some things you may want to mention are: the
need for a pause in the bombing to allow aid convoys to get
into Afghanistan; the fact that bin Laden could be brought
to justice through the U.N. sponsored International Criminal
Court; the fact that innocent people are being killed by the
bombing campaign; and the fact that this violence will only
increase anti-American and anti- Western sentiment, and thus
increase the risk of further terrorist attacks on our
countries as well.

For more reasons to call for a peaceful response to 9-11:
http://www.9-11peace.org/peace.php3

For a sample letter (printed in the Washington Post):
http://www.magma.ca/~pax/ehosec06.htm

3) Find out about and attend an event for peace in your
area.
For events lists:
http://pax.protest.net
http://www.tao.ca/earth/damn/


GET INVOLVED
-------------
If you would like us to include an action, giving idea, or
news article or source in the Bulletin, please write to
bulletin@9-11peace.org and describe your item in the subject
line.

The 9-11Peace.org Bulletin is also looking for volunteers to
do research, proofreading, and translation into Spanish and
French. If you think you've got the time, know-how, and
energy to do this well, please write to
editor@9-11peace.org, put "Volunteer" in the subject line,
and add a brief paragraph summarizing your experience and
interest.


ABOUT THE BULLETIN
-------------------
The 9-11Peace.org Bulletin is a weekly newsletter providing
resources, news, and action ideas to over 17,000 people
around the world.  The full text of the Bulletin is online
at http://www.9-11peace.org/bulletin.php3; users can
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Bulletin is a project of 9-11peace.org.  Contact
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