Category: Peace

Oppose Attacks on Venezuela, Support Socialists There

by Stanley Heller, Administrator, Promoting Enduring Peace

By the time you read this, Trump may have launched an awful attack on the Venezuelan mainland. His Department of War is already killing scores of Venezuelans under the guise of fighting drugs, bombing boats he claims are bringing drugs to America, while making fantastic claims on the number of US lives he’s saving. The idea that you could wipe out crime just by killing “criminals” left and right was shown false long long ago (besides being morally revolting).

Of course, it’s likely part of a plan desensitizing Americans to the plan to invade and seize the assets of another fossil fuel giant (this one having the biggest oil reserves on the planet).

Promoting Enduring Peace came up with this brief statement on its views:

“We condemn the Trump Administration’s bombings of boats supposedly running drugs to the U.S. Criminal activity is not ‘war.’ Alleged criminals should not just be killed nor is this legal under US or international law. All these boats could easily have been stopped by naval authorities.

“As far as the military threats to Venezuela and Colombia, only the citizens of those countries have the right to determine who should be in power, not the US government. We stand in solidarity with Venezuelan socialist and democratic forces who organize for the rights of the Venezuelan people against dictatorship and imperialism.”

If the attack or invasion comes, we hope there will be a massive outpouring of anger all throughout Latin America led by the Left.

One problem is this disastrous idea that Venezuela is a “socialist” country and the blind support many on the Left give to the Maduro regime. He leads a country with the lowest minimum wage in Latin America, a government that enforces extreme austerity measures, and repression of all dissidents. None of the socialist parties were allowed to run in the 2024 presidential election, not even the Communist Party which had been Maduro’s ally until just a few years ago. We can support Venezuelans without supporting Maduro and discrediting ourselves.  Learn more about this from Venezuelans. See PEPeace.org.

City of New Haven Peace Commission Projects

by Paul Bloom, Peace Commission member

The City of New Haven Peace Commission is a city commission initiated by the United Nations 32 years ago. We were one of the first cities designated by the UN for their Peace Messenger Cities project, and only one of four cities in the United States of the more than 100 member cities worldwide.

The Peace Commission has numerous small projects in which we engage, and which are always changing, but there are several projects and events that are ongoing. Each year we plant a peace tree at a school or other New Haven site, we commemorate the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with an event on the Green, and we commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King with an event at City Hall (see peacecommission.org). Our other significant ongoing project is the West River Peace Garden located at the intersection of Ella T Grasso Boulevard and MLK Jr. Boulevard. The Peace Garden was also established by the United Nations and is a small site that promotes quiet, peace and introspection. Please consider stopping by anytime  (but most especially when winter has passed) to visit and to meet with friends (see westriverpeacegarden.org).

There is also a new project which we are just starting to engage in, and which we want to invite you to consider joining. That is: working with other organizations and individuals in New Haven and the surrounding region in order to develop a regional strategy which effectively rejects the promotion of nuclear war and the development of nuclear weapons. We are just starting to make connections with other organizations that would like to engage with us on this issue, and we look forward to having other individual area residents join us in this mission.

If you would like to contact us, please note the following:

For general Peace Commission information: Roberto Irizarry, Chairman, Peace Commission, rocolino@yahoo.com.

For information about the Peace Garden: Aaron Goode, lead person of the Peace Garden project, aaron.goode@gmail.com.

For anti-nuclear information: Paul Bloom, Peace Commission member, paul.bloom.arc.70@aya.yale.edu.

A Petition in Response to a Movie about Nukes

by Stanley Heller, Promoting Enduring Peace

It may seem like a simple ask, a call to have the president take part in a nuclear war drill. Actually, it could have enormous consequences. On Oct. 24, Netflix streamed the movie A House of Dynamite. At one point the fictional president says, “I had one briefing when I was sworn in…one.” In an interview, a technical advisor for the film said that no president since Ronald Reagan has taken part in the national security drills involving nuclear war. Annie Jacobsen makes the same point in her 2024 book Nuclear War: A Scenario. She quotes President Reagan’s memoirs, “Six minutes to decide how to respond to a blip on a radar scope and decide whether to release Armageddon! How could anyone apply reason at a time like that?”

So, after talking with folks from Back from the Brink, our organization came up with a petition, “Urge President Trump experience a nuclear war drill to see the folly of nuclear weapons.”  You can see it on Change.org. Here’s a quick link: tinyurl.com/nuclear-drill.

It may seem futile to try to educate Donald Trump about anything given his politics and his persona but the 1980s have an interesting lesson for us.  Ronald Reagan came in with far-right views and made all kinds of aggressive threats. He faced pushback from the Nuclear Freeze movement and the million-person anti-nuke rally in NYC in 1982. Two movies were produced in the ’80s: WarGames and The Day After, both with stark messages about the results of nuclear war. Reagan saw both movies and they strongly affected him. Within a few years he negotiated with Gorbachev and came up with a treaty that sharply reduced the number of nuclear weapons.

The petition background lists a number of interim measures that could make the world safer, like taking weapons off hair-trigger, abandon “launch on warning,” pledging no first use. Please sign the petition and spread it around.

Dr. Ira Helfand and Dr. Bárbara Cruvinel Santiago to speak at Yale 7-8:15 p.m. Thursday Oct. 9

Location: William Harkness Hall, Room 119, 100 Wall St, New Haven, CT 06511

Speakers: Dr. Ira Helfand (Back From the Brink; International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons), Dr. Bárbara Cruvinel Santiago (Yale Physics; Berkeley College)

As global tensions evolve, nuclear weapons continue to raise questions of security, peace, and existential risk—concerns that have grown more acute in recent years. This event will: examine why the dangers posed by nuclear weapons are growing and urgent; explore the humanitarian and environmental consequences of nuclear weapons use and the risks embedded in current U.S. nuclear policies and posture; and provide useful information about how Yale students, faculty and staff and the general public can get involved and help reduce these threats.

Opening remarks provided by the Yale Chaplain’s Office. Additional remarks provided by Rishi Gurudevan (Yale College; Students for Nuclear Disarmament) and Cassady Mullaney (Yale Physics; Kimball Smith Series).

Visit tinyurl.com/yalenuclearweapns to register.

Resistance Toolkit Zines

by City of New Haven Peace Commission

The Peace Commission has created a new community resource https://heyzine.com/flip-book/19c5ceb599.html for activism in New Haven in the current political moment.

Be sure to check out our website peacecommission.org for our bilingual Resistance Toolkit Zines, created by Nelani Mejias for the Peace Commission.

[To read more about the Resistance Toolkit, please see bit.ly/3IcUglQ]

 

Know Your Rights https://undocumented.media.uconn.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/3141/2025/03/Know-Your-Rights_One-Pager_Bilingual-2.pdf

Famed Professor to Speak on Biodiversity and Sustainability in War-Wracked Palestine

by Yann van Heurck, First Unitarian Universalist Society

Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh will speak via Zoom at First Unitarian Universalist Society of New Haven during the 10:30 a.m. church service on Sunday, Oct. 19.

Dr. Qumsiyeh, former professor of biology and genetics at Yale and author of many academic papers and books, including Sharing the Land of Canaan, is currently director of the Palestine Institute for Biodiversity and Sustainability, and of the Palestine Museum of Natural History, at Bethlehem University in Occupied Palestine. A Christian Palestinian, Dr. Qumsiyeh will share the groundbreaking work of the Institute to preserve the flora, fauna and human populations of the region amid devastating attacks on the environment.

Unitarian Universalism is a multiethnic, multireligious faith that encourages social activism in a context of spiritual awareness. Everyone is welcome to join our service at the meeting house (608 Whitney Ave., New Haven) or by Zoom link. Email Yann for the link at janinawoelfin@gmail.com. We urge all friends of nature and justice to join us!

Pedal for Palestine, Sunday, Sept. 21

by Ellen Rubin, JVPNH

Jewish Voice for Peace New Haven (JVPNH) invites you to join us on September 21, 2025 for Pedal for Palestine. We will be cycling in “slow motion” through the streets of New Haven to create connection and community with Gaza and Palestine. We welcome bright banners with clear messaging and visibility, noisemakers of all types, high spirits and riders of all ages and abilities – with safety as a priority. Please wear your helmets, honk horns, ring bells, blow kazoos, follow the marshals and make new friends!

We will start at 10 a.m. at the Mill River by Cross High School to highlight the destruction of educational resources in Gaza, stopping at the water treatment plant, public library, local hospital, and media outlets to highlight the corresponding devastation of life-sustaining resources in Gaza today. We will end by the Sea at Long Wharf around 2 p.m., with plans to get to know one another, enjoy the food trucks, and hopefully dance! The goal is to promote solidarity, education and funds for the families in Gaza facing famine, genocide, and internment camps. Folks can join at any of the planned stops (maps will be provided) or join us at the start or finish or anywhere in between. If you are not a bike rider, you can help with refreshments, leafletting, fundraising to the grass-roots organizations providing food, healthcare, and children’s services in Palestine (MECA and RAWA) &/or just party with us. We stand and pedal for Peace and Justice in Palestine. Join us!

For more information and to register to ride, go to jvpnh.org/pedal-for-palestine.

Signs for the Times: the New Haven Sunday Vigil for Peace and Justice Continues

by Joan Cavanagh, Vigil Participant

“Never Again for Anyone;” “No More Money for Genocide;” “Resist Fascism Now- Before It’s Too Late;” “Arms Embargo Now;” “Food Distribution, Not Population Annihilation;” “Silence Is Not an Option;” and, of course, “Resist this Endless War,” are among the messages made visible every week by the New Haven Sunday Vigil for Peace and Justice.

Ongoing weekly since 1999 throughout the administrations of five different presidents, the vigil’s theme has been consistent: the wars and military interventions abroad and repression at home are all part of one assault aimed at consolidating enormous wealth and power into the hands of a very few people at the expense of the rest of us and the health of our planet.

After the U.S.-enabled destruction of Gaza and its people following the HAMAS attack on Israel, culminating now in a campaign of mass starvation and population removal, the vigilers decided to continue this weekly presence well beyond its 25th year.

Today, with all three branches of the United States government caught in the stranglehold of a global movement toward fascism, visible street resistance to all manifestations of the “endless war” is a crucial part of our refusal to be silenced. This is what fascism looks like:

  • Mass institutional compliance with the dictates of Trump and his lackeys on every issue, including the abolition of D.E.I., the removal of healthcare from certain groups of people, the rewriting of U.S. history and the criminalization of dissent.
  • The federal takeover of the Washington, D.C. police force (a prototype for takeovers of more U.S. cities).
  • The invasion of our cities by masked ICE thugs and the illegal arrests, detainments and deportations of U.S. citizens as well as immigrants.
  • The criminalization of poverty and homelessness.
  • Massive cuts to vital social services needed by millions in our country, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security.
  • And, of course, the never-ending blank check for war-making, weapons production and military intervention handed to the President of the United States.

Currently, three to six people attend the vigil. With more urgency than ever, we invite others to join: 12 to 1 on Sundays at Broadway, Park and Elm streets. This is what democracy looks like. (https://newhavensundayvigil.org).

News about New Haven’s Peace Garden

by Paula Panzarella, Friends of the West River Peace Garden

On July 23, a contingent from Friends of the West River Peace Garden met with managers from Cofield Estates to talk about mutual programs and community resources. The West River Peace Garden is bounded by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Ella Grasso Boulevard, and Legion Avenue. The Cofield Estates is a new housing development that abuts the garden.

For decades, where Cofield Estates now stands, this was an empty parcel of land. Members of the West River Self Help Investment Plan (WRSHIP) worked to bring housing to this area for almost 25 years. Finally, it’s been created.

We talked about how the garden became a designated United Nations Peace Garden and why New Haven is a Peace Messenger City. Previously, Mayor Justin Elicker was in contact with Cofield Estates about the Peace Garden.

We mentioned that the Peace Garden would like to have access to a water spigot, and that we can help involve Cofield Estate residents in neighborhood and environmental organizations. We can set up canoe rides at West River Memorial Park, offer bicycle safety classes and repair workshops, and have residents’ teenagers earn volunteer hours at the Peace Garden.

The representatives of Cofield Estates were enthusiastic about the various ways we could help bring programs to the residents, the first of whom moved into the new 56 apartment complex in April.

Within a week of our July 23 meeting, Friends of the West River Peace Garden were given a key to the water spigot on one of the buildings. We now can run lengths of hose to the garden to keep the plants and trees watered. We also can fill up a rain barrel that will store enough water to keep the garden in good shape for two weeks. We look forward to the residents joining us in the garden and in other collaborative projects.

Please consider volunteering! For more information, contact Aaron Goode at aaron.goode@gmail.com, or 203-507-8985. Our website is https://westriverpeacegarden.org.

Peace Activists Attend Yale Commencement 2025

by Susan Klein and Henry Lowendorf, New Haven peace activists

On Monday, May 19, Yale University’s commencement procession filled several blocks of Elm Street with over 4000 graduates in caps and gowns, while their happy families and friends in colorful spring attire lined the sidewalks. Led by a marching band and black-gowned dignitaries of the Yale administration and Yale Corporation, students from each of Yale’s colleges streamed from Cross Campus on High Street to the upper Green on College Street before entering Old Campus through Phelps Gate for the commencement ceremony.

Everyone had to pass half-dozen keffiyah-clad community activists from the Greater New Haven Peace Council, Veterans for Peace, and Jewish Voice for Peace, along with one Yale student, standing at the intersection of College and Elm.

We held posters reading “Celebrate Yale Grads with Moral Clarity to Demand Ceasefire and Divestment,” “Yale Divest from War” with QR codes linking to the Hunger Strikers, and “I Stand Against Genocide.” The response was overwhelmingly positive, many of the students also wearing keffiyehs, with resounding cheers, call and response chants and thumbs up from both graduates and families.

On the previous day, five seniors chosen by their fellow students on the Class Day Committee had highlighted campus free speech and activism, according to this article in the Yale Daily News: https://tinyurl.com/2drctn84.

After the undergraduates had passed, we moved up Elm Street to greet the postgraduate degree recipients from the Yale School of the Environment, many wearing keffiyehs and whimsically decorated caps as they entered Old Campus through Battell Chapel. Their response was equally enthusiastic.

Some of us had stood at commencement in 2024, just after university police violently dismantled Yalies4Palestine’s encampments. This year’s graduates may have been even more responsive to us, after Yale’s continued repression of pro-Palestine student activism and of caving to the Trump regime’s suppression of free speech and academic freedom. The repression led to a group of pro-Palestine Yale students entering a hunger strike on May 10. The QR code links to their demands on Instagram.

80th Anniversary of the US Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

An estimated 140,000 people died in the US bombing of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Three days later, on August 9, an estimated 74,000 people perished in the US bombing of Nagasaki. Mostly all killed were civilians.

The bombing of Nagasaki was the last time nuclear bombs were used in warfare.

The United States is the only country to have used nuclear bombs in warfare.

This year, as in years past, on August 6 and 9, the New Haven peace community will gather to remember the dead, call for an end to war, and demand the abolition of nuclear weapons. On Wednesday, August 6 at 8 a.m., the commemoration will be by the flagpole on the New Haven Green to hear a statement from the Mayor of Hiroshima, voice our concerns, and share thoughts on the horrors of war and how to effectively work for peace. On Saturday, August 9 at 10:45 a.m., we will gather at the Amistad statue in front of City Hall, 165 Church St., to hear a statement from the Mayor of Nagasaki. There will be featured speakers from the peace community and time for attendees to address the audience. Please call Henry Lowendorf of the Greater New Haven Peace Council for additional events that will commemorate the bombings: 203-389-9547.

Martin Luther King Love on March Wed. Jan. 15

WYBC Radio, 94.3 FM

Join 94.3 WYBC and Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church for the annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Love March on Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2025, in New Haven.

The MLK Love March in New Haven has been going strong for over 50 years and it celebrates the life and work of the late civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Love March will begin at Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church located at 100 Lawrence St. and continue to Whitney Ave. to Edwards St. to State St. to Lawrence St. We will march on this day rain or shine to commemorate the dreams and aspirations of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Love March, which was started by Shiloh’s late Founder and Pastor, Rev. George W. Hampton, Sr., has been a positive force in the community of New Haven for more than 50 years. The Love March was created to preserve the notion of nonviolence.

Come out and lend your voice of support to the community in making New Haven a better place to live. Scheduled to attend will be some of our political leaders from New Haven and the State of Connecticut.

For more information, please call (203) 776-8262, by email at secretarysmbc100@gmail.com, or visit www.smbcnh.org.

Dr. King’s ‘Beyond Vietnam’ Speech

Henry Lowendorf, GNH Peace Council

The annual public reading of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s revolutionary Beyond Vietnam speech will take place Wednesday, Jan. 15, at noon in New Haven City Hall, 165 Church St. It is being organized by the Greater New Haven Peace Council, City of New Haven Peace Commission, and Veterans for Peace.

This speech shook the establishment into denouncing King because, among other things, he connected the movements for peace, civil rights and economic justice.

If you are interested in receiving a pdf of the speech and/or reading a page of the speech on Jan. 15, please email grnhpeacecouncil@gmail.com.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki Vigils – We Remember

by Millie Grenough, New Haven Peace Commission

On August 6, peace activists gathered at the New Haven Green to remember the devastation caused by the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and to advocate for the abolition of nuclear weapons.

Youth activist Manuel Camacho from Ice the Beef and the City of New Haven Peace Commission opened the event by highlighting the lack of awareness among his generation regarding the nuclear threat. He emphasized that the United States was the first to use nuclear weapons and continues to develop more powerful ones that could endanger the planet.

The vigil included readings of a proclamation from Hiroshima Mayor Matsui Kazumi

Youth activist Adrian Huq from the New Haven Climate Movement spoke of the two existential threats, nuclear weapons and climate change.

The vigil included readings of a proclamation from Hiroshima Mayor Matsui Kazumi, who reminded the audience of the catastrophic human toll of the bombing and the ongoing risks posed by nuclear weapons. Former Mayor Toni Harp reflected on the personal significance of August 6, as it coincides with her birthday and the tragic events in Hiroshima.

The commemoration continued August 9 at New Haven City Hall, marking the 79th anniversary of the Nagasaki bombing. Henry Lowendorf, Chair of the Greater New Haven Peace Council, stressed the importance of remembering past atrocities to prevent future ones. Mayor Justin Elicker expressed gratitude to those who work tirelessly for peace, noting that funds used for nuclear weapons could better serve community needs. Roberto Irizzary, Chair of the New Haven Peace Commission, read a proclamation from Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki, urging global action for peace.

Youth activist Manuel Camacho from Ice the Beef and the City of New Haven Peace Commission opened the event by highlighting the lack of awareness among his generation regarding the nuclear threat.

Youth activist Manuel Camacho from Ice the Beef and the City of New Haven Peace Commission relates details about the deaths, city destruction, and ongoing deaths and diseases brought on by the August 9 bombing.

Atomic veteran Hank Bolden shared his harrowing experience of being used in a Defense Department experiment to test the effects of radiation, describing the long-term health consequences he and others endured. Despite the ongoing challenges, the events were a powerful reminder of the urgent need to abolish nuclear weapons, a call echoed by many speakers, including Manny Camacho, who again underscored the horrific legacy of these bombings and the continuing dangers of nuclear proliferation.

Resolution 77: End the Madness of New Arms Race

by Ann Froines, CT Back from the Brink

As a representative of Back from the Brink (BftB), I spoke at the Hiroshima/Nagasaki Remembrance events this August 6 and 9 in New Haven, asking the attendees to join the campaign to get House Resolution 77 passed in the U.S. Congress. Experts are sounding the alarm that the risks of nuclear war are greater than ever since the beginning of the Atomic Age. (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists has an excellent, free, online newsletter to keep up to date on the risks of nuclear war.)

The events were organized by the Greater New Haven Peace Council, the New Haven Peace Commission, and Veterans for Peace. Each organization had representatives who spoke movingly about the human suffering after the Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings and the existential threats from a future nuclear exchange, whether intended or accidental.

House Resolution 77 calls for our government to actively pursue negotiations for arms control with other nuclear powers, to end the madness of a new arms race, and to take nuclear weapons in the U.S. off hair-trigger alert. Forty-four Congresspeople have signed on to the Resolution, and BftB groups are working nationwide to get support from a majority in the House.

None of the five CT members of the House of Representatives has yet endorsed the resolution, and BftB and other groups will pursue this goal into 2025, when there will be a new House of Representatives and a new administration.

We ask you to write your Congressperson and urge him or her to cosponsor House Resolution 77. You can reach Congressional offices through their switchboard at 202-224-3121. For further information on getting involved in CT, please contact Joe Wasserman at joewass64@yahoo.com.

Visit the website of Back from the Brink at www.preventnuclearwar.org to learn more about the urgency of communities working together to stop the arms race and reduce the threat of nuclear war before a catastrophe happens that could threaten human existence on the planet.

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