News Releases

  • * Americans Just Out of Baghdad * Iraqi Dead * War Profits * U.S. Safety * Taxpayers

    MICHAEL BIRMINGHAM, STEWART VRIESINGA JEFF GUNTZEL, STEPHANIE SCHAUDEL While information has become more difficult to get from Baghdad, 15 members of the Iraq Peace Team have left the Iraqi capital and just arrived in Amman, Jordan. They are available for interviews. About half the Iraq Peace Team, composed of Americans and other Westerners, remains in Baghdad. Other members of the group have returned to the U.S. recently and are reachable through the Chicago office. MARC HEROLD Author of the recent article “When ‘Precision’ Bombing Isn’t,” Herold is a professor at the University of New Hampshire and a consultant to the…


  • * Supporting Troops * Rumsfeld: Lightning Rod * City Teach-in * U.S. Credibility * ‘Unavoidable’ Deaths

    NANCY LESSIN and CHARLEY RICHARDSON Lessin and Richardson are founding members of Military Families Speak Out. They have a son who has been deployed in the Gulf and just learned that he will be going into Iraq. They are in touch with over 300 other families of people from every branch of the military currently deployed in the Gulf and can help arrange interviews. Lessin said today: “The most supportive thing that anyone can do for our troops right now is to halt this invasion and protect their lives as well as the people in Iraq. We need to end…


  • U.N. — Accessory After the Fact?

    DENIS HALLIDAY Former head of the U.N. oil-for-food program, Halliday said today: “The people of Iraq are being crushed brutally everyday as we watch our TV. The U.N. and international law are being set aside by the U.N. Security Council member states. The Secretary General provides a weak voice reminding us all of Charter provisions, but too late and too little….” PHYLLIS BENNIS Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, Bennis is author of the book Before and After: U.S. Foreign Policy and the September 11th Crisis. She said today: “International law, specifically the Geneva Conventions, requires the belligerent occupying…


  • Humanitarian Impact: Image and Reality

    Dr. APRIL HURLEY, MARTIN EDWARDS, Ret. U.S. Army Captain CHARLES LITEKY, KATHY KELLY, DANNY MULLER, Hurley and Edwards (al-Dar Hotel), Liteky and Kelly (al-Fanar Hotel) are in Baghdad with 20 other members of the Iraq Peace Team. Phone lines are intermittent. Team members are assessing damage, visiting hospitals and placing articles and photos on the web. Several additional team members have recently crossed into Iraq from Jordan. Muller, in Chicago, is in regular touch with team members. More Information JOY GORDON Gordon, a Fairfield University professor, wrote “Cool War: Economic Sanctions as Weapons of Mass Destruction,” which appeared in Harper’s…


  • Propaganda and War: Interviews Available

    JOEL CAMPAGNA Yesterday evening, the U.S. military intentionally bombed Iraq TV. Program coordinator on the Middle East and North Africa for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Campagna said: “Broadcast media is a civilian object under the Geneva Conventions and cannot be targeted unless it is used for military purposes (e.g. military communication).” CPJ also objected to the New York Stock Exchange pulling Al-Jazeera’s press credentials yesterday. More Information LAMIS ANDONI An independent journalist and analyst who has covered the Middle East for over two decades, including the Iran-Iraq war in the south of Iraq, Andoni is monitoring the Arab-language media.…


  • * Geneva Conventions * Water Supply * Following Orders * ‘Fragging’

    MARJORIE COHN A professor of law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, Cohn said today: “While the U.S. government has objected to Iraq broadcasting photos of U.S. POWs, the U.S. government has allowed the very same thing…. Photos of Taliban prisoners of war and John Walker Lindh were continually broadcast on U.S. media outlets. The Pentagon is refusing to abide by the Geneva Convention with regards to the prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay.” DENIS HALLIDAY, Former head of the U.N. oil-for-food program in Iraq and former U.N. Assistant Secretary General, Halliday today criticized plans for the…


  • Crossing the Border

    DANIEL ELLSBERG Ellsberg, currently in Washington, D.C., authored the recent book Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers. More Information DENIS HALLIDAY Former head of the U.N. oil-for-food program and former U.N. Assistant Secretary General of the U.N. BRIAN WILLSON Was in Vietnam as an Air Force officer, now active in Veterans for Peace. More Information ZAINEB ISTRABADI Associate director of the Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies Program at Indiana University at Bloomington, an Iraqi-American. NORMAN SOLOMON Coauthor of the new book Target Iraq and executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. JOHN QUIGLEY Professor of international…


  • Bombing Baghdad

    The following analysts can comment on the bombing of Baghdad and will be available for interviews in the coming days and weeks as events develop. CHARLIE CLEMENTS, M.D, Clements is a Vietnam war veteran and recipient of the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of Physicians for Human Rights. He has just returned from a 10-day emergency mission to Iraq with other public health experts to assess the vulnerability of the civilian population. More Information More Information Ret. U.S. Army Captain CHARLES LITEKY, KATHY KELLY, MICHAEL BIRMINGHAM, Members of the Iraq Peace Team — Liteky, Kelly and Birmingham — are…


  • Americans Intervening for Peace in the Middle East

    DANNY MULLER Muller is a coordinator with the Iraq Peace Team. He was in Iraq recently, and more than 20 members of the group are still there. Muller is in contact with them and information is regularly posted on the above web page. While phone lines are intermittent, after several attempts many callers are able to get through. Among the team members in Iraq: Ret. U.S. Army Captain Charles Liteky; Kathy Kelly; Michael Birmingham. HUWAIDA ARRAF Arraf is a member of the International Solidarity Movement. Another member of the group, Rachel Corrie, 23, was killed on March 16 when she…


  • White House Claims: A Pattern of Deceit

    President George Bush, March 17: “Under Resolutions 678 and 687 — both still in effect — the U.S. and our allies are authorized to use force in ridding Iraq of weapons of mass destruction…. Last September, I went to the U.N. General Assembly and urged the nations of the world to unite and bring an end to this danger. On November 8th, the Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1441, finding Iraq in material breach of its obligations, and vowing serious consequences if Iraq did not fully and immediately disarm.” John Negroponte, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., urging support for Resolution…


  • First DNC Executive Committee Meeting in Five Months; Livestream Available

    Their petition urges the DNC to “convene an emergency meeting of all its members—fully open to the public—as soon as possible.” The petition adds that “the predatory, extreme and dictatorial actions of the Trump administration call for an all-out commensurate response, which so far has been terribly lacking from the Democratic Party.” Among the 7,000 signers are…

  • “Gaza’s Aid System Isn’t Broken. It’s Working Exactly as Designed”

    “The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation had promised something revolutionary with this initiative. … What it delivered instead was the purest distillation of colonial humanitarianism — aid as an instrument of control, dehumanisation, and humiliation, dispensed by armed contractors under the watchful eye of the occupying military.”

  • Day 600: Palestine … and Poetry

    “And she is too weak to stand, too weak to withstand not being able to make her hill, and she starts crying now for her father who was killed, her three brothers killed, her infant sister who died of hunger, for the sky that used to be clear of warplanes, for the hill she is…

  • Focusing on Children

    As Congress votes on President Trump’s budget bill, experts warn that cuts severely impact children in the U.S. in particular. Trump’s first 100 days in office were also detrimental to children. 

  • “Guns and Bombs Will Not End this Genocide”

    “Why did he do this? He did it because he lost hope. The rightwingers are saying that the protests are fomenting violence. It’s the opposite: Meaningful protests give people hope.”

  • Saving Medicaid

    Last week, House Republicans passed the Trump administration’s budget bill, which includes over $800 billion in cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act. The fight is not over, however. Caring Across Generations put out a National Protect Medicaid 2025 Toolkit. 

  • Vets Fasting for Peace in Gaza

    “We don’t have to walk and stand in line for hours to see if it’s available. We sleep securely at night without fearing a missile will incinerate us. In comparison, the pain and tension blanketing every soul in Gaza must be paralyzing. And then … it’s unimaginable to have children, whose lives depend on you,…

  • As Israel Attempts “Final Solution” in Gaza, It Targets Nonviolent Activist in West Bank

    “Israeli settlers attacked my house with stones, they came at 4 am to throw stones and [set fire to] my family land, chanting about the death of my brother, and wishing that I will die too or [be] killed.”

  • 23andMe Data Sold to Regeneron

    Regeneron, a pharmaceutical giant, is gaining access to one of the largest consumer genetic  bases through the bankruptcy sale of 23andMe. Regeneron will gain control of more than 15 million users’ DNA information. 

  • Veterans and Allies Conduct 40-Day “Fast for Gaza”

    On Thursday, a coalition of military veterans, religious and humanitarian organizations will begin a 40-day “Veterans & Allies Fast for Gaza,” with a news conference at 10:00 am ET, at the “Isaiah Wall” near the United Nations headquarters in New York City, moving to the U.S. Mission to the UN, where the fast will be…

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