SAN FRANCISCO
50 organizing centers mobilize 35,000 throughout West
By Brenda Sandburg
and Adrian Garcia
San Francisco
As in Washington, D.C., the San Francisco protest of 35,000
people on April 20 marked an historic turning point. Never have
so many people in the United States protested for Palestinian
rights.
A sea of Palestinian flags filled the march route from
Dolores Park to the Civic Center. The multinational crowd
included thousands of families and youths from the Arab and
Muslim communities.
The march was so big it took 90 minutes to leave the park.
The demonstration was an opportunity for Muslims, Palestinians
and their supporters to come out and express their rage about
the genocide the Israeli military committed with the backing of
the U.S. government.
The demonstration had been called by the ANSWER (Act Now to
Stop War and End Racism) coalition to protest war, racism and
poverty after the Pentagon began bombing Afghanistan last fall.
But on March 29 the Israeli military began a brutal attack on
the West Bank cities of Ramallah, Bethlehem, Nablus, Hebron,
Qalqilya, Tulkarem and Jenin refugee camp. The ANSWER coalition
then shifted the focus of the protest to support of the
Palestinian people.
"It's about time that the people here, the anti-war
movement, the peace and justice movement, stood with the
Palestinian people -- because their struggle is the same
struggle against colonialism and for liberation and for
justice," said Richard Becker, West Coast coordinator of the
International Action Center and a member of ANSWER's national
steering committee. "No peace or anti-war movement today is
worthy of the name unless it raises high the banner of the
long-suffering, long-struggling, never-to-be-defeated
Palestinian people."
Fifty organizing centers throughout California and the
Pacific Northwest sent more than 40 buses to the protest,
including 10 from Los Angeles, five from Nevada City and others
from San Diego, Riverside, Sacramento, Fresno, Eureka, Santa
Cruz and Mendocino County. One organizer from Orange County
called the International ANSWER Coalition 48 hours before the
demonstration to request two buses.
Signs of resistance against U.S. foreign policy were evident
in San Francisco even before the protest began. As masses of
people entered the city in buses, they were pleasantly
surprised to see altered billboards containing defiant messages
like "Stop U.S. Aid to Israel" and "Free Palestine.
The protesters who descended upon Dolores Park represented a
wide variety of groups and organizations. Speaker after speaker
addressed the barbaric attacks being waged against Palestinians
by the Israeli government with the financial backing of the
U.S. government.
Confronting the global empire
"We are standing strong against the annihilation of our
people," said Eyad Kishawi of Free Palestine Alliance-USA. "Not
only because we have to live and exist, but it is also because
we want to confront the global empire of the United States of
America.
"We salute you from Haifa and Yaffa. We salute you from
Ramallah, from our dear Al Quds in Jerusalem, from Golan, from
5-1/2 million Palestinians living in exile, all demanding the
right to go home to our beloved Palestine," Kishawi said.
"As I speak, our people in Jenin are scrambling through the
rubble to pick up what is left of their loved ones, bits and
pieces, barbarically bulldozed in their own homes because they
refused to leave."
Hatem Bazian, a University of California-Berkeley professor
and well-known Islamic leader in the Bay area, noted the
worldwide support for the Palestinian people. "The streets of
Palestine are a juncture where the world is meeting," Bazian
said. "The streets of Washington, the streets of Madrid, the
streets of London, the streets of Rome, the streets of Paris,
the streets of South Africa, the streets of Venezuela, the
streets of Mexico, every street in this world is recognizing
that the Palestinians are stand ing on behalf of justice. And
they are also undermining the United States foreign policy and
their puppet regimes in the Arab world and throughout the
world."
Kate Raphael of Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism
reported on her recent experience visiting refugee camps
outside Bethlehem. She said she saw stores devoid of food and
houses ripped apart. She heard volleys of machine gun fire
sounding the end of curfew and daring people to go outside.
At a mosque in Jenin, she said, the military ordered women
to take their clothes off and walk in the street. The women
refused. "At that moment I was so ashamed to be a Jew and an
American because it is our money, our F16s flying overhead and
our tanks rolling," Raphael said. "Yet I am also proud to be
part of a growing anti-Zionist Jewish movement in this country
and around the world."
John Parker of Workers World Party evoked the chilling image
of the lynchings of Black people in the South, comparing them
with the fascist terror against Palestinians by Israel and the
United States. He also spoke of the root cause of the
oppression of Arab people in the Middle East: capitalism.
"Reforms are good but they have to be for the purpose of
changing the system," Parker said.
Other struggles were also highlighted at the demonstration.
Los Angeles activist Ana Duarte spoke on behalf of the National
Committee to Free the Five Cuban Political Prisoners. She spoke
of the heroism of these Cubans who were convicted by the United
States for defending their country from terrorist attacks. She
also denounced the Human Rights Commission's recent vote
against Cuba, which was engineered by the United States.
"How dare the United States accuse Cuba of human-rights
violations," Duarte said. "The United States that has blockaded
that island for 43 years . . . The United States that gives
billions of dollars in weapons to Israel, the United States
that has killed almost 2 million Iraqi people through
sanctions."
Lilia Carreon, a Filipino who works as a bag screener at San
Francisco International Airport, spoke of the abuse and
pressure against immigrant bag screeners. Out of 1,200 workers,
850 are non-citizens; 450 stand to lose their jobs
immediately.
Although five unions have begun organizing drives among bag
screeners, because of the U.S. Patriot Act and the fact that
screeners are to become federal employees, all bag screeners
will be prohibited from joining unions.
The opening and closing rallies were chaired by Gloria La
Riva of the International Action Center, the Rev. Dorsey Blake
of the Church for the Fellowship of All People, Miguel Molina
of KPFA Radio and Noura Erekat of Students for Justice in
Palestine.
Mumia Abu-Jamal sent a taped message to the demonstration.
Other speakers included International Longshore & Warehouse
Local 10 President Richard Mead, American Arab
Anti-Discrimination Committee San Francisco President Osama
Qasem, Tony Gonzalez of the International Indian Treaty
Council, Barbara Lubin of the Middle East Children's Alliance,
M.C. Ettinger of Jews for a Free Palestine, Zulma Olivera of
the Vieques Support Committee, and Cobi Kwasi Harris of the
Vanguard Public Foundation.
"This was the greatest thing," an Arab organizer from Orange
County told a member of ANSWER after the demonstration. "I
didn't know there were North Americans who supported the
Palestinian cause."
Reprinted from the May 2, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: ww@workers.org
Subscribe wwnews-subscribe@workersworld.net
Support independent news http://www.workers.org/orders/donate.php)
HOME
:: U.S. NEWS ::
WORLD NEWS ::
EDITORIALS ::
SUBSCRIBE ::
DONATE
Email
this article
Printable
page