National Day of Action in Solidarity with Ferguson, Saturday, August 16th:

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Written by Urban League of Portland and others Urban League of Portland and others

Published: 16 August 2014 16 August 2014

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National Day of Action in Solidarity with Ferguson, Saturday, August 16th:
 
 Join with the Urban League of Portland and a coalition of community organizations as we stand in solidarity against police misconduct and militarization in Ferguson, Missouri and in our own communities in Portland.
 
Police racial profiling and excessive use of force has claimed the life of another young black man. We join with communities around the country to achieve justice for Michael Brown's family and community.

Portland Solidarity With Ferguson: part of a national day of solidarity and action, will take place on Saturday, August 16th, at Lownsdale Square (SW 4th Ave. & Main St.) in downtown Portland at 1pm.
 
Coalition members include the Center for Intercultural Organizing, OPAL Environmental Justice Oregon, Portland African-American Leadership Forum, and the Urban League of Portland.
 
    Enough IS Enough.

Israel-trained police "occupy" Missouri after killing of black youth

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Written by Rania Khalek Rania Khalek

Published: 16 August 2014 16 August 2014

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[NOTE: Former Portland Chief of Police Mark Kroeker went to Israel for "terrorism training" as chief of police in Portland back in 2003: http://www.portlandoregon.gov/police/pbnotify.cfm?action=ViewContent&content_id=379   Not sure how much special training Portland police or other Oregon police are receiving in Israel today...  Let AUPHR know if you have information about the sending of Oregon police to Israel for "training"  at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.  ]

Since the killing of eighteen-year-old Michael Brown by Ferguson police in Missouri last weekend, the people of Ferguson have been subjected to a military-style crackdown by a squadron of local police departments dressed like combat soldiers. This has prompted residents to liken the conditions on the ground in Ferguson to the Israeli military occupation of Palestine. 

And who can blame them? 

The dystopian scenes of paramilitary units in camouflage rampaging through the streets of Ferguson, pointing assault rifles at unarmed residents and launching tear gas into people’s front yards from behind armored personnel carriers (APCs), could easily be mistaken for a Tuesday afternoon in the occupied West Bank. 

And it’s no coincidence. 

At least two of the four law enforcement agencies that were deployed in Ferguson up until Thursday evening — the St. Louis County Police Department and the St. Louis Police Department — received training from Israeli security forces in recent years. 

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Hillary Clinton Twists Herself In Knots To Avoid Blaming Israel For UN Bombing

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Written by Shadee Ashtari Shadee Ashtari

Published: 14 August 2014 14 August 2014

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The Huffington Post, August 13, 2014
 
 
The fog of war may be more of a Rorschach test, it turns out.

Here's Hillary Clinton, on the downing of a Malaysia Airlines plane in Ukraine: "I think if there were any doubt it should be gone by now, that Vladimir Putin, certainly indirectly ... bears responsibility for what happened."

And here's Clinton, on the bombing of a United Nations facility in Gaza: "I'm not sure it's possible to parcel out blame because it's impossible to know what happens in the fog of war."

The two remarks were made less than three weeks apart, and offer a window into how one's view of how the world should be can color how it's seen -- or at least how it's relayed to the public.

In her July interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria, Clinton forcefully implicated the Russian leader in a strike that claimed the lives of 298 passengers after overwhelming evidence indicated that Russian-supplied rebels shot down passenger liner MH17.

A few weeks later, on July 30, five Israeli shells rained down on a U.N. school at the Jabalia refugee camp, killing more than 15 people, mostly women and children. The attack, which also wounded more than 100 civilians, marked the second time in a week that a U.N. school housing hundreds of homeless Palestinians had been targeted.

In an interview with The Atlantic on Sunday, Clinton argued that the "fog of war" made accountability over the Israeli attacks impossible to determine.

"I think Israel did what it had to do to respond to the rockets," Clinton explained. "Israel has a right to defend itself. The steps Hamas has taken to embed rockets and command-and-control facilities and tunnel entrances in civilian areas, this makes a response by Israel difficult."

Christopher Gunness, spokesman for UNRWA, the main United Nations agency in Gaza, came out forcefully against the Israeli army in a statement following the attacks, calling the incident a "source of universal shame."

"We have visited the site and gathered evidence. We have analyzed fragments, examined craters and other damage. Our initial assessment is that it was Israeli artillery that hit our school, in which 3,300 people had sought refuge," Gunness said in July, noting that U.N. representatives had informed Israeli forces of the school's exact location 17 times. "I condemn in the strongest possible terms this serious violation of international law by Israeli forces. I call on the international community to take deliberate international political action to put an immediate end to the continuing carnage."

Asked if Israel had undergone sufficient measures to avoid the deaths of innocent civilians and children, Clinton argued that no one's perfect.

"[J]ust as we try to do in the United States and be as careful as possible in going after targets to avoid civilians," mistakes are made, she told The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg. "We've made them. I don't know a nation, no matter what its values are -- and I think that democratic nations have demonstrably better values in a conflict position -- that hasn't made errors, but ultimately the responsibility rests with Hamas."

"Some reports say, maybe it wasn't the exact UN school that was bombed, but it was the annex to the school next door where they were firing the rockets," Clinton continued. "And I do think oftentimes that the anguish you are privy to because of the coverage, and the women and the children and all the rest of that, makes it very difficult to sort through to get to the truth."

 

Visit my website www.michaelmunk.com

U.S. complicit in Israel's killing of Palestinians

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Written by Zaha Hassan on OregonLive Zaha Hassan on OregonLive

Published: 13 August 2014 13 August 2014

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Since the horrific killing of well over 1,800 innocents in Gaza began on July 8, demonstrations have been held all over the U.S., including here in Portland.

Why, Bob Horenstein asks, aren't similar demonstrations organized for civilians killed in other conflict zones? The answer is simple: because we are complicit. It is U.S. political cover and the over $3 billion in military and economic aid we give to Israel every year that has been funding the destruction and genocide taking place in Gaza.  In fact, at the same time President Obama was calling for a ceasefire, the U.S. released stockpiles of ammunition to Israel so that it could reload its guns.

So, yes, people of conscience around the country have come out by the hundreds and thousands not just to call for an end to U.S. support for Israel, but also to express our alarm at the way in which Palestinians have been dehumanized. Particularly offensive has been how the otherwise hamstrung U.S. Senate miraculously came together in a matter of hours to unanimously pass a resolution supporting Israel's "right to defend itself."  Surely killing one child per hour each day is not how a country defends itself. 

Read more: U.S. complicit in Israel's killing of Palestinians