 home
archives
last week
feedback
Rolla Peace News January 10, 2024 |
Dear Friends:Editor's notes:In this newsletter is: 1. THE MISFIT MATHEMATICIAN (Tom's column, http://tomsager.org) a) Great Rivers Environmental Law Center Returns to Rolla b) 2023: A Year of Extreme Temperatures, Droughts, Floods and Fires c) Israeli Refuseniks: The Conscience of the Nation d) Crunch Time in Gaza e) On Armies of Liberation Great Rivers Environmental Law Center Returns to Rolla Bruce Morrison, president of Great Rivers Environmental Law Center and Linden Mueller, director of development and community outreach will be at Panera in Rolla on Friday, Feb. 16, at 10:00am. This event is open to the public. Please come and welcome Bruce and Linden back to Rolla. In 2007, Great Rivers Environmental Law Center won a landmark victory saving Rolla's Buehler Park from being sold to commercial interests. In their decision, the court ruled, for the first time since 1910, that users of public property in Missouri have standing in court to sue to maintain that use. After years of advocacy by Great Rivers, the Missouri Public Service Commission recently approved the Grain Belt Express transmission line, which will bring renewable energy to Missouri and save consumers an estimated 6% on their electric energy bills. 2023: A Year of Extreme Temperatures, Droughts, Floods and Fires 2023 was a year of unprecedented heat, drought, floods and wildfires in almost every corner of the globe. Copernicus Climate Change Service estimates that 2023 was by far the warmest year since at least 100,000 years ago, 1.48°C above the 1850-1900 average, a commonly used proxy for pre-industrial times. 2023 was 0.17°C warmer than 2016, which was formerly the warmest year on record. 2024 is off with a bang: almost every state in the Union is being hit with extreme January weather. NOAA will publish their estimates on Friday, which will likely be similar to those of Copernicus. My climate catastrophe essay uses NOAA's estimates and will probably be updated over the weekend. Interestingly, climate models have again failed to keep pace with reality. As late as May, climate models failed to predict the intense warming of the past seven months. Israeli Refuseniks: The Conscience of the Nation Here's a short article by Brett Wilkins about three young Israelis who have refused induction into the military. Tal Mitnick writes: “I refuse to agree with the idea that killing civilians in Gaza would provide security for anyone... neither to the people of Gaza nor to the people of Israel. I believe that the only path to security and peace lies in coexistence.” Mitnick is serving a 30 day prison term for refusing induction. His sentence could be extended if he continues to refuse induction. Ariel Davidov says, “I cannot take part in something that is so immoral, so unjust. This is a genocide that has been going on since the beginning of Zionism.” And Ella Keidal says: “I don't wish to serve an army that is enacting an occupation, an apartheid regime.” Israeli refuseniks face far more societal scorn and ostracism than those of us who 60 years ago refused induction into the US military during the era of the Vietnam genocide. You can read more about Israeli refuseniks here. Crunch Time in Gaza Personally, I don't see this War Against Gaza continuing as it has. Either it will metastasize into a regional or even global war, possibly even a global nuclear war; or it will end. It already shows signs of metastasizing. Everybody says they don't want a wider war. Fine, then shut this war down while it is still possible to do so. The whole world is responsible for this war. The world could have collectively ended this war at any time within the last 75 years. It refused to do so. One day, Palestine will say to the world: “You supported Israelis who took my water, burned my olive trees, destroyed my home, took my job, stole my land, imprisoned my father, killed my mother, bombed my country, starved us all, humiliated us all; yet, I was to blame for my resistance.” On Armies of Liberation I'm sure you've all heard it: Claims that Hamas is just a bunch of terrorists. I've certainly heard it, even from Bernie Sanders, who claimed Israel has “the right to go to war against Hamas, who committed an atrocious invasion of their country.” Yes, I've heard it all before, many times: The FLN in Algeria, the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, Mao Zedong in China, Fidel Castro in Cuba, The Viet Cong in Vietnam, Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and, of course, the Taliban in Afghanistan. Ok, so you don't like Hamas. Well, what have you done to help the Palestinians achieve justice without resorting to armed struggle? What are you doing now to help them achieve justice? If you can't answer these questions, then how does condemning Hamas help the Palestinians to achieve justice? And once liberation is achieved, expect to hear about how Palestine was so much better off under Israeli occupation; just as we now hear how Afghan women were so much better off under foreign bombs than they are now under the Taliban government. And, oh, speaking of the Taliban, did you know that opium production in Afghanistan is down a whopping 95%, since the Taliban defeated the United States and other foreign invaders? The world should be thanking the Taliban for cutting off the supply of this dangerous drug. Instead of complaining about how the Taliban run their country after 20 years of foreign imposed war and occupation, the world should be returning Afghanistan's frozen assets so they can finish the job of eradicating opium production. Yes, the world. Did you know that over 50 countries, virtually the entire global population, participated in some manner in the invasion of Afghanistan? Did you know the Taliban booted the invaders out with virtually no help from anyone else. Did you know that not one single state recognizes the Taliban? I'm sure Hamas looks at the Taliban and thinks, we can do that too. Rolla Peace News is distributed by email once a week on Tuesdays (except on rare occasions) and is posted on the web at http://tomsager.org (click on Rollaites for Peace: near the top of rightmost column).Wage peace, Tom yushasager (at) yahoo.com |