Inauguration Resistance and Petition to Report Deaths in Custody

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

Dear Friends,
We wanted to send out a recap of our witness at the Inauguration Resistance and the Women’s March in D.C. You may view more photos at the following links:
Inauguration protest
Women’s March on Washington
We direct you again to WAT’s statement opposing Trump’s agenda on torture and detention, and to the new video that Justin made to break down what needs to happen to close Guantanamo, now that Trump is president. Our friends, the Peace Poets created a new spoken word video to encourage us in these difficult times – view it here.
Lastly, we have included an ask from our partners the Coalition of Concerned Mothers – please sign their petition here and read about their work.

WAT Witnesses at Trump’s Inauguration, Attends Women’s March

O crisis, intensify!  The morning is about to break forth.

Even though the bands tighten and seem unbreakable,
They will shatter.

Those who persist will attain their goal;
Those who keep knocking shall gain entry.

O crisis, intensify!
The morning is about to break forth.

–from the poem O Prison Darkness by Abdulaziz in Poems from Guantanamo

We reflected on this poetry as thirty WAT members circled up at First Trinity’s Church Hostel on January 20 before we went into the pre-dawn darkness at 6:30 am to demonstrate at the Inauguration.  We processed to a nearby security checkpoint close to the Mall.  We had a long row of folks in orange jumpsuits and black hoods; a robust team of guides, given the darkness; a security team, given the potential for hostile Trump supporters; as well as a choreographer, a medic, and people assigned to media and leafletting.  We were ready.

We joined a huge crowd of Palestinian human rights supporters and antiwar protesters at D St. and First St. NW.  Our banner holders silently faced the police amid a raucous sea of chanting.  As dawn broke, we extracted ourselves from the crush and moved a half block away.  There we faced the line of people waiting to enter the inauguration.  Back at the intersection, riot police moved in, but we stayed safely out of the fray.

Our hooded detainees holding anti-torture banners provided a dramatic tableau that drew hundreds upon hundreds of people snapping photos or recording videos.  The steady flow of humanity, which included Trump supporters and protesters, was, for the most part, respectful and peaceful.  Whenever a person seemed hostile, a member of the security team was right there beside the WAT member being confronted in order to provide a united, nonviolent front.  We received some derisive comments that echoed words we’ve heard from Trump concerning torture and Gitmo.  We understood the challenge that faces us as we go forward from this day.

We stayed at our post until 10:00 am, having committed to occupy that space while other protest groups went to another check point where Black Lives Matter had completely blocked entrance to the inauguration.  We later heard from one BLM member who told us how wonderful it had been to look up from their protest and see all the white faces surrounding and supporting them.

Many of our activists stayed another night, so we could attend the Women’s March on Washington on Jan. 21st.  This time we carried our own personal messaging as women and as men supporting women.  All 25 of us stepped off together, but we split into smaller groups, intentionally and unintentionally, as the day progressed and we moved through an incredible sea of humankind.  One group actually heard and saw some speeches on a jumbotron.  Many of us, however, had no idea there were any speeches, but we found the crowd itself to be fabulous.  A couple of first timers kept asking when we were going to get to the march, and we told them they were in it! The throng was so big that the march had to self-assemble on at least 5 parallel streets.  The big hits of the day were the creative signs and the sense of love and community that enveloped us all.

 

But how shall we educate men to goodness, to a sense of one another, to a love of the truth? And more urgently, how shall we do this in a bad time?—Daniel Berrigan, S.J.

Coalition of Concerned Mothers Banner a Big Hit at the Women’s March

Sign Their Petition to Demand Reporting of All Deaths in Police Custody 

The Coalition of Concerned Mothers is a dynamic group of women who are trying to make sure no other mothers suffer what they have: the killing of their children by police or by senseless community gun violence.  During this January’s fast, WAT met with members of the Coalition, as we have in years past. Hearing the stories of how their children were killed and their struggles for justice, was heartbreaking, but strengthened our resolve to support their efforts to stop the senseless killing.

Please sign their petition demanding the Department of Justice begin enforcing laws requiring the reporting of all deaths in police custody:

http://petitions.signforgood.com/DeathsinCustodyReportingAct?code=CofCM

According to President Marion Gray Hopkins and Vice-President Cynthia deShola Dawkins, “Because of the Death in Custody Reporting Act and Arrest Related Death Act the Department of Justice has the legal responsibility to require law enforcement agencies to report any and all deaths of people while in custody. To date, although this law has been in place for several years, the financial penalties on law enforcement agencies for not complying have not been enforced.”

We need this information. The victims of police brutality are not just hashtags. They are brothers, daughters, mothers and fathers, many of whom we never hear about. Police brutality, especially against people of color, is systemic and in order to address this national crisis legislatively our elected officials need these reports.

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Recap and Celebrating 10 Men Released

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

Dear friends,

We celebrate the release of ten more men from Guantanamo Bay Prison: Ghaleb Nassar Al Bihani, Mustafa Abd al-Qawi Abd al-Aziz Al-Shamiri, Karim Bostam, Abdul Sahir, Musab Omar Ali Al-Mudwani, Hail Aziz Ahmed Al-Maythali, Salman Yahya Hassan Mohammad Rabei’i, Mohammed Al-Ansi, Muhammad Ahmad Said Haider, and Walid Said bin Said Zaid. They were released to Oman over the weekend. We were privileged to spend time in D.C. with Ghaleb’s wonderful drawings when we visited the Tea Project’s Exhibit (It is open until Friday at GWU’s Gallery 102).

Thank you for all of your support during Part 1 of our witness in D.C. We had 10 days filled with engaging street theater, liquids only fasting, group discussions and reflections, as well as lots of meetings to shape our daily actions. Please visit our website to see photos and videos of the week, as well as our daily updates and notes from the white supremacy workshop Jerica led. We gathered a few links to articles about our J11 actions here: The Guardian, USNews, UPI, CommonDreams and Fox and Frida wrote a Little Insurrection. Her article really nails our time together during the fast and how we are moving toward Part 2: Inauguration Resistance.

If you are planning on joining WAT for our Inauguration Resistance on January 18-21st, RSVP is required to witnesstorture@gmail.com ASAP – we will have limited space so it is specifically reserved for those joining our witness during that time.

Thank you for your continued support. Please keep sharing your local events and news stories with us. We hope to see you in D.C. this weekend!

Witness Against Torture on Social Media
We will be using #CloseGitmo and #guantanamo
Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work and Fast for Justice.
We are asking our supporters to donate $45 to Witness Against Torture to symbolize the 45 men remaining in Guantanamo.
Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate.

 

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White Supremacy Workshop Notes – WAT Fast for Justice 01.07.17

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

Below are some more detailed notes from the workshop that Jerica led based on the class she teaches on Whiteness.  There are questions at the end which we considered together as we planned our witness in DC on January 11 and during the inauguration resistance. We invite you to read through these resources and consider these questions with us.

“Hope is a discipline.” Mariame Kaba

White guilt is not helpful.
(Smith, “The Problem with Privilege”) – public confessions from white folks will not absolve supremacist thinking.

Peggy McIntosh – “White Privilege and Male Privilege”; “Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack
late 80s
first white academic publicly questioning the intricacies of whiteness
like male privilege, white privilege is an unearned asset
through no virtue of one’s own, white folks possess key to accessing institutions, structures, systems of our society

Racism is not merely individual acts, thoughts, behavior that is prejudiced, but
“invisible systems conferring dominance on my group” – a system

Racism = race-based prejudice PLUS power

“Psychologies of Dominance” – whites are taught (conditioned/socialized) into the infrastructure of racism early on; we should assume complicity with white supremacy
no training to “see” advantage

Whiteness = individual, morally neutral, normative, average, benign, universal, good

Robin DiAngelo – “White Fragility”
we are taught that racism is individual acts/thoughts/behavior
racists = bad; I am good; therefore I cannot be/am not racist
racism is “a multidimensional and highly adaptive system” in which “whites have systemic and institutional control”
this system PROTECTS and INSULATES whites from race-based stress; therefore we can move through a highly racialized world with an unracialized identity
i.e. whites not identifying as “white” until they take a diversity class

Challenges/confrontations become highly stressful and whites get triggered, DEFENSIVENESS
whites are socialized into superiority and entitlement. When this is challenged, we become highly fragile (“white fragility”)
a challenge to our racial worldview = a challenge to our very identity as “good” (white = good)
whites tend to withdraw, cry, minimize, ignore, defend, disengage, and leave

Patterns that reinforce white fragility:
Segregation: most white people grow up, live in, and are accustomed to all white neighborhoods, schools, and communities. We are taught this is not a loss.
Good/Bad Binary: if we commit no individual racist acts, we are not racist.
Individualism: whites are not a racialized, homogenized group like other racial categories. This belief erases our collective history of domination, control, and wealth accumulation.
Entitlement to Racial Comfort: white folks have no tolerance for racial stress because we have no practice in dealing with racialized confrontation. When we are confronted, whites tend to blame the person of color bringing up the incidence of racism, and accuse them of wrongdoing as source of discomfort. When in a position of power (in a hierarchy, i.e. job situation), the whites tend to consolidate power, recruit other white people to their side, and isolate the POC.
Racial Arrogance: because whites have no training in dealing with racial stress, we also tend not to practice humility when listening to the experiences of POC. Instead, we largely dismiss their experience (which is different from our own).
Racial Belonging: whites enjoy a deeply internalized, largely unconscious sense of belonging to our society/culture. In every valuable situation or image capturing life, whites belong. (When this doesn’t happen – when white folks are de-centered from the scene – this becomes very destabilizing and frightening.)
Psychic Freedom: whites don’t bear the social burden of institutionalized racism. POC are seen as responsible for the “racism problem”; therefore, whites don’t need to use their psychic/mental energy on it.
Messages of Value: whites are characterized as better and more important in all major forms of shared story, including textbooks, history, media, teachers, heroes. “Good” neighborhoods are really white neighborhoods (coded language); religious iconography; the internalization of value and belonging in mainstream media.

Myth of meritocracy: the American Dream; the belief that the system is based on merit and each individual has the same access/ability to make it to the top.

Whiteness = power = the ability to craft and repeat a societal narrative or story until it is true. Monolithic representations of POC groups and marginalized identities are created by white supremacy.

Lipsitz, “The Possessive Investment in Whiteness”

Smith, “Heteropatriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy”
White Supremacy impacts communities in different ways, therefore the strategies for liberation must be different.
white supremacy is constituted by three separate but interrelated LOGICS

SLAVERY/ CAPITALISM:
black folks = slaveable/property
anchor of capitalism
commodification; pillar is about exploiting LABOR
hierarchy is racialized; “as long as you’re not black, you can stay off the bottom and escape commodification”
Prison Industrial Complex = rooted in anti-black racism; slavery was reinstated through the prison system; black folks overrepresented; PIC as modern-day slavery

GENOCIDE/COLONIALISM
indigenous folks = must always be disappearing (manifest destiny)
this gives non-indigenous rightful claim of land; pillar is about exploiting LAND
settler colonialism
indigenous as “present absence” in white mainstream imagination
appropriation of custom, spirituality, culture

ORIENTALISM/WAR
West as superior; always against the “exotic”, “inferior”, “anti-progress” East
U.S. exceptionalism
pillar is about XENOPHOBIA, ISLAMOPHOBIA, JUSTIFICATION for war
there is always a constant threat to the well-being of Empire
immigrants = foreign threats inside and outside the Empire
anchor for war; U.S. can justify constant war to protect itself from constant threat
Racial profiling of Arab World is widespread, “necessary”
“the U.S. IS war”, white supremacy = must always be at war
culture of fear
myth of “security”

Questions to consider:
The term “white supremacist” has been used to describe Trump’s campaign in the mainstream. Why? How might this connect to the Bannon appointment and the rise of white nationalism and the alt-right? How is Trump consolidating power? Trump was endorsed by David Duke and, even though widespread calls were made for Trump to distance himself, he did not. How might this impact our work?

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Day 6 Update: “You Can Have a Heart and You Can Stop This Torture Now”

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

Day 6 of the fast was “Pentagon Monday” and brought an early morning and cold temperatures. The lights turned on at 5:30am to allow our 30 plus people to wake up, get dressed, and travel to join the Dorothy Day House weekly vigil at the Pentagon. We brought the men in Guantanamo with us as we held vigil in the bitter cold. We spoke their words as the police stood watch and employees rushed pass. It is hard to judge the impact of our presence but there is something important about witnessing at the center of U.S. war making.

We opened the vigil with these words from Art Laflin, “We greet all Pentagon workers and police in a spirit of peace. We, members of the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker and Witness Against Torture, come to the Pentagon, the center of war making on our planet, to say YES to love and justice, and NO to the death-dealing policies of a war making empire. Mindful that God calls us to love and never to kill and mistreat our neighbor, we seek to eradicate what Dr. King called ‘the triple evils of poverty, racism and militarism.’ We remember and pray for all victims of the U.S. empire, including the nine men who have died at Guantanamo since its opening.”

Building on our workshop with the War Resisters League, we took our presence to the Department of Justice. During the rally, the War Resisters League presented 14,000 signatures to a representative of the Attorney General demanding the ban of tear gas in prison and we read these words of those affected by tear gas in prison:

“One woman imprisoned by the Colorado Department of Corrections describes the experience: They didn’t hit me with the gas until the fight was over and I was already in handcuffs and shackles. The captain sprayed me directly in the face. I immediately began to choke, snot, tears, and saliva spewing from my face. It felt like I was breathing fire. A couple minutes later I began to vomit…. I was not allowed to wash the chemical off until three days later. So for those three days the chemicals continued to burn my flesh.”.

Together, we sang:

You can have a heart // You can stop this torture now
You can ban this tear gas // and make your children proud

In the evening, we came together to remember the the cloud of witnesses that came before us. We remember those who our community has lost this year. We called upon the spirits of Joe Morton, George Homanich, Dan Berrigan, Michael Ratner, Larry Egbert, Tim Chadwick, and Sister Liz Proefridt to be with us. Finally, Beth Brockman led us in a ritual that asked us to reflect on someone that brought us to the circle. Each one spoke the name of that person or persons as we lit a candle.

Check out our photos from the week!

In DC? Join us for these events.

Tonight, January 10th @ 7pm: Words From the Grassroots: Strengthening Our Resistance to State Violence

Location: 801 22nd Street NW Gallery 102, Smith Hall of Art, Washington, DC 20052

Join the Center for Constitutional Rights, Witness Against Torture, and the Tea Project for a night of tea, art, poetry, music, and words by artists, activists, and leaders in the movements to end state violence from indefinite detention at Guantánamo, police murders, and institutionalized Islamophobia. Speakers will share stories of hope and lessons from the front lines of their work, while speaking to the ways we need to change our resistance to confront the incoming Trump administration.

Doors open at 6:30 PM and the program will begin at 7:00 PM. The event is free and open to the public. Tea will be served throughout the evening.

January 11th Rally:  No More Guantánamo. No Torture Presidency.  No Indefinite Detention

Join Witness Against Torture and our coalition partners on January 11th in Washington DC. for our annual rally to close Guantanamo!

Location: Supreme Court
11:30: Rally
12:15: March around Senate Buildings.

Torture, discrimination, and indefinite detention are wrong.  There are no exceptions.  Any attempt to bring back torture or to send new people to Guantánamo will be strongly opposed in the United States and throughout the world. Any effort to persecute Muslims – or any other religious, racial, or ethnic group – through special immigration or surveillance measures is unacceptable.

Mr. Trump must:
*make clear the absolute rejection of torture, as banned by US and international law
*continue handling domestic terrorism suspects within the civilian criminal justice system and in accord with the US Constitution
*continue the policy of transferring men from Guantánamo and work toward the closure of the prison, with its steep moral and financial cost to the United States

Click Here to read the Call to Action:

Witness Against Torture on Social Media.
We will be using #CloseGitmo and #guantanamo
Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work and Fast for Justice.
We are asking our supporters to donate $55 to Witness Against Torture to symbolize the 55 men remaining in Guantanamo.

Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate:

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Day 5 Update: Hope in a Time Like Ours

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

“Hope in a Time Like Ours.”

“If we are not nearly in despair there is something the matter. The only thing that is to be regretted without qualification is for one to adopt perfectly to totalitarian society. Then one is indeed beyond hope. Hence we should all be sick in some way. We should all feel near to despair in some sense because this semi-despair is the normal form taken by hope in a time like ours.”

Brian Terrell opened our morning reflection with these words taken from a letter that Thomas Merton wrote to Czselaw Milosz in September of 1959. In a time like ours despair is reality for many of us in the movement. Yet Merton reminds us that this despair is the most human and normal response from us when realizing that Guantanamo will survive into the Trump administration, the prison industrial complex continues to expand, and Islamophobia and racism determines public policy. These policies we can never accept. And so we protest, “not to establish our own innocence but to acknowledge and claim our part of the collective responsibility for the world as it is.”

In the afternoon, we attended The Tea Project where Aaron Hughes and Amber Ginsburg welcomed us into their gallery, which will be held from January 8th to January 20th at George Washington University. Aaron and Amber created 779 porcelain cups, each dedicated to a man detained at Guantanamo. On the base of each cup is the name of a Guantanamo prisoner, with the sides decorated with flowers indigenous to the prisoner’s country.

The project originated from a story told by Guantanamo guard, Chris Arendt.  In an interview in Esquire magazine, he said, “I liked working night shifts, because whenever they were awake, I wanted to apologize to them. When they were sleeping, I didn’t have to worry about that. I could just walk up and down the blocks all night long.”  In the evenings, detainees were given tea in styrofoam cups. The prisoners would decorate their cups, sometimes using their fingernails. Often they etched floral drawings onto the cups. Every night, Chris would collect the cups and turn them over for a security analysis, and then the cups would be destroyed.

Furthermore, this exhibit also includes artwork created by two men imprisoned in Guantanamo. Fifty-eight works of art from Ghaleb Al-Bihani, who is still detained, are on display there. The other artist featured, Djamel Ameziane, was detained from 2002 to 2013.

We joined Aaron and Amber’s efforts to unpack and display the cups — with songs, stories, and tearfulness interspersed. First, we unpacked nine cups dedicated to the nine people who have died in Guantanamo. Matt Daloisio was first to place a cup and shared about one of the prisoners, Yasser Talal Al Zahrani. He recounted how authorities said that Zahrani, along with Mana Al Tabi and Ali Ahmed, died on the night of June 10th, 2006, because they committed suicide. However, that has been called into question by a subsequent investigation by Scott Horton, reporting for Harper’s Magazine, who raised the possibility that they died of asphyxiation at the hands of Guantanamo authorities.

Later,  we placed cups on the racks to represent the 55 detainees still imprisoned in Guantanamo. Luke Nephew led us in singing: “We hear a beautiful song. It is the breaking of chains. We see a path full of hope. We have found the way. Let them go home. Let them go home. Let them go home. Let them go today.”

Witness Against Torture will continue to build with the Tea Project. We are partnering with them for their opening reception and program entitled, “Words from the Grassroots” on Tuesday, January 10, at 7 p.m. They are also hosting us to break our fast on the morning of January 11.

In the evening, four members of the War Resisters League (WRL) joined us. Ali Issa, Tara Tabassi, Emma Burke and Raul Ramos presented a teach-in which helped us understand the extent of tear gas usage in prisons in the U.S. and also raised issues about the ways that military forces, internationally, have used tear gas to attack peaceful protesters. The 1925 Geneva Convention and the Chemical Weapons Convention prohibits the use of tear gas in international warfare. Yet, used domestically, tear gas is allowed as a “riot control agent.”

Younous Chekkouri, a detainee who was held in Guantanamo for 13 years, called his lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith and told him about an April 13, 2013 attack in which Guantanamo prison guards used tear gas and shotguns with small rubber bullets to subdue a peaceful protest after detainees covered cameras inside their cells.

The War Resisters League received over a hundred letters from people facing the brutality of tear gas while locked up in 21 states. “Tear gas is one front of violence that those locked in the mass incarceration system face; it is a part of militarism in action against an already vulnerable and captive community.”

To connect with WRL’s campaign to ban tear gas, Click Here.  

Learn more about our activities this week by checking out our Daily Schedule, and January 11th: Call to Action,

Witness Against Torture on Social Media.
We will be using #CloseGitmo and #guantanamo
Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work and Fast for Justice. 
We are asking our supporters to donate $55 to Witness Against Torture to symbolize the 55 men remaining in Guantanamo.
Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate:

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Day 4 Update: Hope Is a Discipline

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

“Hope is a discipline.”– Mariame Kaba

The question, “what brings you hope?” opened our work for the day.  Together, we shared our ideas on how hope is cultivated and sustained. For our community hope is found by sharing and celebrating successes and the long hard work of our elders and mentors. Even simple acts such as planting garlic remind us that our work is for the future. One person reflected on the image of a tree growing through a crack in the sidewalk whose roots will eventually break it’s concrete prison. This image draws us to consider all the acts of resistance that are needed to break the chains that bind us.  Hope, while found in all manner of vision and action, must be sought out, seeded, and cultivated.

The community participated in a workshop to help us understand and dismantle white supremacy. The collective discussed the writings of Peggy McIntosh, Robin D’Angelo, George Lipsitz, and Andrea Smith. In particular, we considered Smith’s Three Pillars of White Supremacy – Slavery/Capitalism, Genocide/Colonialism, and  Orientalism/War.  Over the past few years while WAT has been working to address the unjust imprisonment and brutal torture of innocents in Guantanamo, we have also been going deeper into our analysis to address the root cause of power and understand the racism inherent in the system. This helps us see the connections from Guantanamo to mass incarceration, police murder, and immigrant detention. Finally, we talked about the importance of understanding the hatred and racism that fueled the campaign strategy of Donald Trump, and the subsequent process that elected these policies into the highest office in the United States. Given the rise of the Trump administration, the “alt-right”, and white nationalists in mainstream politics, such work is paramount and necessary.  

After an afternoon free for small group meetings and self-care, we were joined in the circle by members of the Coalition for Concerned Mothers. Marion Gray-Hopkins, DeShola Dawkins, Burnette McFadden, Greta Willis, Beverly Smith, and Rhanda Dormeus graciously and generously shared the stories of their children who were murdered by police and horizontal community violence. The room was heavy from the pain and loss endured by these women. In their sharing, the mothers focused on the humanity of their children, the specifics of each story, and the reality that justice is impossible for the lives lost.
These courageous women remain vigilant and courageous in their cause, seeking to ensure that other mothers never have to endure the loss of a child. In the sharing of stories and the communal holding of the pain, we built community and together are reminded that “hope is a discipline.” 

Check out our actions in this recently published video:  Why Trump Should Close Guantánamo

Learn more about our activities this week by checking out our  Daily Schedule, and January 11th: Call to Action,

Witness Against Torture on Social Media.
We will be using #CloseGitmo and #guantanamo
Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work and Fast for Justice.
We are asking our supporters to donate $55 to Witness Against Torture to symbolize the 55 men remaining in Guantanamo.

Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate:

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Day 3 Update: Loving Persistent Resistance

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

This morning’s reflection led by Matt Bereza focused on the unseen laws that govern energy and the transfer of energy. In the 1600s a scientist named Leibniz developed a mathematical formula that came to be known as the Law of Conservation. Essentially, this law states that what is taken will be filled—this thought later gave rise to the laws thermodynamics.  While mathematical in nature, these theories can also be seen as philosophical. This morning we meditated on those things we have lost—food, our own space, time, and control over the thermostat. After contemplation, several members of the group responded with what has been conserving their energy.  Most notably, members of the circle spoke about community and the presence of others as nourishing.

The volatile and hostile political atmosphere in the country and here in the capital city prompts us to consider how we can take care of each other and our personal and communal safety and wellbeing. Protocols, contingencies and the roles of a security team were discussed. Especially in these coming days leading to the Trump inauguration, we recognize the need for more deliberate care.

The dramatic witness voicing the words of the men in Guantanamo was repeated near the White House as we joined the weekly vigil there that members of the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker House has held there every Monday noon for many years.

We opened the space with words from Art Laffin. “If a member of our own blood family was imprisoned at Guantanamo, what would we want people to do to help them? We would certainly want a speedy and just resolution to their case. Yet 55 men have languished at Guantanamo, most for 14 years, not knowing their fate. We need to see the men at Guantanamo as members of our own blood family and act on their behalf. And so we come to the White House today, in the name of the detainees unjustly held at GITMO, to call on President Obama in his last days in office to fulfill his campaign promise of eight years ago and issue an executive order to Close GITMO Immediately!”

We continued to be creative and  amend our presentation. We have added these words inspired by Ghaleb al Bihani, as shared with us by the Center for Constitutional Rights, who while enduring his own unjust incarceration recognized his solidarity with the oppressed in the United States: I have been at Guantanamo for 15 years and I am a ‘forever prisoner’. I saw the news of people protesting the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson and the stories of policies that use racial profiling and mass incarceration. These people are being treated like non humans, like us. We are trapped in Guantanamo in the same way that black people are on US soil. That is mass incarceration.

 

We could not approach the usual “free speech zone” on Pennsylvania Avenue due to the setup of the reviewing stands for the inauguration of Donald Trump as president on January 20. Our plea at the White House is to President Obama to keep his promise to close Guantanamo as the window of his opportunity to do the right thing closes. We rejoice in the recent releases of some of those unjustly bound, but we know that any vestige of the horrible prison that remains when Trump takes office will set the stage for more heinous violations of human rights in the coming years. Today, The New York Times, published an article entitled, “Trump Said ‘Torture Works.’ An Echo Is Feared Worldwide” explaining the effects of another pro-torture  U.S. president in the Global community.

Whatever comes, we pledge ourselves to continue our loving persistent resistance.

Learn more about our activities this week by checking out our  Daily Schedule, and January 11th: Call to Action,

Witness Against Torture on Social Media.
We will be using #CloseGitmo and #guantanamo
Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work and Fast for Justice.
We are asking our supporters to donate $55 to Witness Against Torture to symbolize the 55 men remaining in Guantanamo.
Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate.

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Day 2 Update : An Invitation to Witness

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

At our morning gathering, we reflected on terrors experienced by people bearing the brunt of militarism, racism, and materialism. We reminded ourselves of Dr. Martin Luther King’s warning of these three giant triplets of evil. Kathy Kelly shared the moving story of a young man who escaped the bombing of a hospital in Afghanistan, which helped illustrate these words of caution made by Dr. King so many years ago.

We did our first public witness at Union Station inviting people to hear directly from Guantanamo detainees. This year, we had more positive feedback from our action than in previous years and people applauded and thanked us for our witness. We started by counting out the numbers of each of the men still imprisoned.  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9  human beings 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 human beings and so on until we reached 59 human beings. Again, like years past, we brought the words of the detainees into the space. People formed a line, dressed in jumpsuits and hoods and one at a time, a person would step forward, identify the detainee being represented, and deliver a quote from them.

“My name is Tariq Ba Odah. I was detained at Guantanamo for 14 years.  “I tell them again and again that I don’t want any food from them….I just don’t want it. All I want is for them leave us alone, lingering in these cells. They want me to eat, but first I have to be subjected to humiliation.” I was force fed but my hunger strike will never end. “My method of delivering my message is through hunger strike. I weighed 121 upon my arrival to Guantanamo, and when I left, I weighed 94 pounds.”

The words reminded the audience not only of the torture of imprisonment in Guantanamo, such as waterboarding, solitary confinement, indefinite detention and death but also the men’s deep hope for freedom. The Peace Poets tied it together by leading the group in song:

If you want freedom, if you want justice, if you believe in the common good. Now is the time for you to witness, to the face under that hood.

Click here to see pictures of our action.

In the evening, we gathered  to reflect on our fast. Matt Daloisio told the story of Witness Against Torture’s beginning. He reminded us that we started fasting 10 years ago when the men in Guantanamo first began hunger striking. We understand that fasting is not a hunger strike, but it connects us in a powerful way to the men. When we fast our senses are challenged. It takes more energy to listen to one another. We see and hear differently. We believe that when we fast together a spirit arises in this community that connects us and keeps us moving forward in order to bring the message of the men in Guantanamo to the world.

Today we don’t know how many men are on a hunger strike but we DO know that our spirit is with them as long as they remain stuck in a cage.  

At the end of the day, we learned that four men were released to Saudi Arabia. One of those men, Mohammad Bwazir, was supposed to leave the prison a year ago to be resettled in Montenegro which is not his home country. When the guards came to retrieve him and take him to the plane, he chose not to leave, saying he did not want to return to a place where he could not see his family.  He was released today and 21 members of his family greeted his return in Saudi Arabia. His successful resistance inspires us all to remain steadfast in our work.

Tomorrow, we will count off 55 numbers. There are 55 men still waiting to see their families and gain their freedom.  We will keep counting until all the men are resettled and Guantanamo is closed.

Learn more about our activities this week by checking out our  Daily Schedule, and January 11th: Call to Action,

Witness Against Torture on Social Media.

We will be using #CloseGitmo and #guantanamo
Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work

Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate.

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Fast for Justice Day 1: Forgiveness Demands Accountability

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

 

Mohamed Ould Slahi left Guantanamo on October 17, 2016 after fourteen years of imprisonment there. He was held without charge and tortured.

Speaking of the torture, isolation, and loss he endured, he nevertheless forgives his captors. He says forgiveness is his inexhaustible resource. He maintains belief in the potential goodness of U.S. people.

Witness Against Torture began our first full day of fasting this morning by listening to Slahi’s words and then hearing an op-ed that appeared in the morning’s New York Times. The op-ed quotes President-elect Donald Trump who says that Guantanamo should be kept open. In February, 2016, while campaigning in Nevada he promised that “we’re gonna load it up with some bad dudes.”

Slahi, in this video, says: “I have no doubt that the good U.S. people will realize that holding innocent people in prison is not the way to go and will work for their release until every last innocent detainee has joined his family. I wholeheartedly forgive everyone who wronged me during my detention and I forgive because forgiveness is my inexhaustible resource.”

Forgiveness demands accountability from U.S. people. Slahi’s forgiveness places responsibility on our shoulders to carry on our activities until torture is decisively ended, its victims are fully acknowledged, Guantánamo and similar facilities are closed, and those who ordered and committed torture are held to account. Slahi hasn’t said: forgive and forget

Today we began planning dramatic actions to remember the men who have died, those who are still detained and those who have been released and continue suffering from the trauma of their detention.

Through large and small group reflections, we are getting to know our neighbors and build community.


Four Men will be released from Guantanamo Bay to Saudi Arabia

We celebrate the news that The United States will transfer four men to Saudi Arabia in the next 24 hours. We have heard that President Barack Obama will make a final push to shrink the inmate population before Trump takes office. Click here to read the story.

Witness Against Torture on Social Media

Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work

Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate:

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Witness Against Torture’s Fast for Justice Begins

Fast for Justice 2017 // Film

 

Dear Friends,

Witness Against Torture is once again gathering in Washington D.C to Fast for Justice. The first car loads of people have arrived. The first actions are being crafted and our last meal has been consumed.  Every year, we come from around the country to reflect and take action. We center our work together by remembering the muslim men that remain in Guantanamo. Most of them have never been charged with any crime. For the next 8 days, our lives are intertwined together in this basement hostel, where we will create a resistance community, we will build a shared analysis, and we will fast.

We will fast in solidarity with the 59 muslim men that remain in Guantanamo.    

We will fast to resist white supremacy, racism, islamophobia, and fear of our neighbor.

We will fast to denounce state violence.

We will fast to remain human in a culture that dehumanizes our communities.

We know that human rights face a new danger: Donald Trump. His racist and islamophobic rhetoric threatens us all. He has said he wants to torture. He has vowed to keep Guantanamo open. Just yesterday, Donald Trump reminded the world he will not release anyone.

This year, we are fasting and building together to strengthen our resistance for the years to come. We  invite you to join us in this work.  

We are fasting until January 11th. We are engaging in creative direct action. You can come to DC or you can participate from home. Just send us an email and let us know your plans: witnesstorture@gmail.com

If you want to receive the daily fasting updates, please let us know by emailing witnesstorture@gmail.com

Schedule for January 8th to the 12th:

Click here to see Full Fast Schedule

Join us next week for these larger events in DC:

Breathing Fire: A Teach-In on Teargas in Prison

Sunday, January 8th, 6 to 8pm:

Location: First Trinity Lutheran Church
501 4th St NW, (entrance on 4th Street)
Washington DC 20001 (4th and E Sts. NW)
(Judiciary Square Metro)

This Teach-In will include:
1. What is tear gas? Who makes it? Who uses it? Why is it banned?
2. Who does teargas impact? Activity with testimonies of being gassed in prison, in protest and around the world?
3. Facing Teargas in Prison: The letters from the inside, the petition of 13K, what we are gonna do at the Department of Justice the next day
4. Prison Militarization: what does that even mean?

Words From the Grassroots: Strengthening Our Resistance to State Violence

Tuesday, January 10, 2017, 7:00pm to 9:00pm

Location  801 22nd Street NW
Gallery 102, Smith Hall of Art
Washington, DC 20052

Join the Center for Constitutional Rights, Witness Against Torture, and the Tea Project for a night of tea, art, poetry, music, and words by artists, activists, and leaders in the movements to end state violence from indefinite detention at Guantánamo, police murders, and institutionalized Islamophobia. Speakers will share stories of hope and lessons from the front lines of their work, while speaking to the ways we need to change our resistance to confront the incoming Trump administration.

January 11th Rally:

No More Guantanamo. No Torture Presidency.  No Indefinite Detention

Join Witness Against Torture and our coalition partners on January 11th in Washington DC. for our annual rally to close Guantanamo!

Location: White House Ellipse
12 noon: Music
12:30: Rally
1:30: March to Department of Justice.

Witness Against Torture on Social Media

Please “like” us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter & Instagram.
Check out our latest news and updates on Tumblr.
Post any pictures of your local activities to our flickr account and we will help spread the word.

Donate to support our work

Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. We need your financial support. We are fiscally sponsored by the Washington Peace Center. The Washington Peace Center is a verified US-registered non profit.If you are able, click here to donate:

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