News Releases

  • Israel “Denying Water to Millions”

    “MECA has worked for 14 years to build water purification units throughout the Gaza Strip that provide safe, clean water to more than 100,000 children through our Maia Project. But with Israel’s attacks on water infrastructure and cutting off electricity, many of these units can’t operate.”


  • Is Israel Killing U.S. Citizens by Refusing a Cease-fire?

    “More signs, then, point to the possibility that a cease-fire could expedite the release of these civilian hostages. The more complex task is a prisoner swap — exchanging captured IDF soldiers for Palestinians in Israeli jails. Hamas has indicated it wants to use the Israeli soldiers it is holding in a deal to free the thousands of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, of whom 1,123 are political prisoners held under Israel’s laws of ‘administrative detention’ without charge or trial.”


  • Israel and the “Systematic Destruction of People’s Ability to Survive”

    “As Rachel wrote to us shortly before she was killed, ‘This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop. I don’t think it’s an extremist thing to do anymore. I still really want to dance around to Pat Benatar and have boyfriends and make comics for my coworkers. But I also want this to stop.’”


  • Reports: Israel Bombs Hospital, Killing Hundreds as Biden Vetoes Ceasefire at UN and Goes to Support Israel

    “An Israeli airstrike” hit Al-Ahli Arabi Baptist hospital in Gaza City, which “was packed with the wounded and other Palestinians seeking shelter. At least 500 dead, according to health ministry.”


  • ADL’s Aims are “Genocide” and “War”

    “The ADL is historically and presently a Cold War organization, it views the world in terms of the West and the Rest. Its attacks on critics of Israel often, without irony, target Jewish peace organizations who are doing real work with Palestinians and communities of color. Echoing the language of right-wing panic about ‘socialism,’ the ADL’s Greenblatt has taken to labeling efforts to stop Israeli violence as ‘Soviet propaganda.’”


  • Medicare Advantage Overpayment Tops $100 Billion

    Medicare Advantage results in a “$100 billion annual payoff for attracting inexpensive enrollees, upcoding disease severity, and biased price-setting procedures.”


  • Censoring Pro-Palestinian Speech; Attacks on Muslims

    “The contradiction at the heart of Israel has been that a state founded by victims of racism was itself a racist state. For some time, that meant Israel had to carry out a difficult balancing act: an apartheid system with the rhetoric of liberal values, tolerance, and antiracism. And it became necessary to distort the concept of antisemitism to include criticism of Israeli apartheid.”


  • Hezbollah Expert: Hamas Trying to Follow in Hezbollah’s Footsteps, Israel Pursuing Exodus of Palestinians

    “How good is Israel at ‘defending itself’? We’re not seeing it significantly inflicting damage on Hamas’ infrastructure, only deliberate large-scale targeting of civilian areas. Those brandishing this ‘right’ must be fully aware that all Israel does is punish a population? In reality, all Israel seems to be doing is taking this opportunity to pursue a long-standing dream: force a large-scale exodus out of Gaza, the home of 2 million or so Palestinians, many of whom in the first place escaped other areas of Palestine to be trapped there. Hamas is first and foremost attempting to break the prevailing military-security status-quo…


  • Noted Nonviolent Activist Deported by Israel on the Way Forward

    “I have spent my life advocating for Palestinians and Israelis to use nonviolent means to resolve their conflicts. Because Israel feared Palestinian unity and mass nonviolent action, I was expelled by the government in 1988. Since then, I have, on several occasions, personally advocated with Hamas leaders to abandon armed struggle and embrace nonviolent campaigns. Yet, today, Palestinians and Israelis are once again killing each other.”


  • Israeli “Intent to Kill in the Thousands”: * International Law * Ethnic Cleansing

    “Israel plans to flatten Gaza. This is beyond comprehension. There’s no irony that in the name of battling ‘barbarism,’ Israel with the backing of the U.S. and most European capitals, will unleash a genocidal campaign.”


  • * Military Tribunals * Ashcroft’s “Voluntary” Interviews

    MARJORIE COHN An associate professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, Cohn said today: “The new rules for military tribunals violate due process by allowing the admission of hearsay evidence that hasn’t been authenticated and providing no guidelines for sentencing. They raise serious separation of powers problems because the appellate panels are…

  • Campaign Finance: Reform or Scam?

    STEPHANIE WILSON Executive director of the Fannie Lou Hamer Project, Wilson said today: “We were supporters of McCain-Feingold until the limit for individual contributions was raised from $1,000 to $2,000…. This is now actually deform, not reform…. Less than 1 percent of the population contributes 80 percent of the money that funds political campaigns. This…

  • What’s Driving the Military Budget?

    FRIDA BERRIGAN Senior research associate with the Arms Trade Resource Center at the World Policy Institute, Berrigan said today: “If President Bush has his way, total military spending for 2003 will reach $396 billion, an $87 billion increase from January 2001. It would be the largest increase since the Reagan administration. But this spending spree…

  • Interviews Available: Andersen Indictment

    RUSSELL MOKHIBER Editor of Corporate Crime Reporter, Mokhiber said today: “Much of the history of corporate crime and violence in this country has never seen the light of day because corporate executives follow closely the advice of corporate counsel — when in doubt, shred it. Corporate lawyers have become so cavalier about the subject that…

  • Nuclear Posturing: Interviews Available

    In his news conference on Wednesday afternoon, President Bush responded to several questions about nuclear policies. The following analysts are available for interviews: JOHN BURROUGHS Executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee on Nuclear Policy, Burroughs said: “Contrary to what Bush said today, the Nuclear Posture Review [NPR] expands the circumstances in which nuclear weapons could…

  • Israel-Palestine: What Paths to Peace?

    KHADER SHKIRAT A visiting fellow at Harvard Law School and director of the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment based in Jerusalem, Shkirat said today: “This is not ‘a war by two sides’ — two armies poised against each other. Israel is occupying and oppressing Palestinians. The Israeli military forces…

  • * Shadow Government * “Bunker Busters”

    CHRISTOPHER SIMPSON Professor of communication at American University and author of National Security Directives of the Reagan and Bush Administrations, Simpson is available for limited interviews. He said today: “Senate Majority Leader Daschle knew or certainly should have known that there are contingency plans for a shadow government. But he apparently did not know that…

  • Interviews Available on Domestic Policy Issues

    WENONAH HAUTER Hauter is director of Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy Project. She said today: “It is outrageous that the Department of Energy had to be taken to court to be forced to release the documents relating to Vice President Cheney’s energy task force. We will look forward to the documents becoming public and seeing…

  • Back from Afghanistan: Interviews Available

    KELLY CAMPBELL DAVID POTORTI Family members of Sept. 11 victims have formed a non-profit organization seeking effective alternatives to war as a response to the terrorist attacks. Peaceful Tomorrows favors the creation of an Afghan victims fund to match the outpouring of support for U.S. victims. Four family members have recently traveled to Afghanistan to…

  • War in Colombia

    A fierce assault by thousands of U.S.-backed Colombian government troops — launched on Friday to retake a large safe-haven region controlled by rebels for three years — has already resulted in confirmed reports of civilian deaths. The Bush administration is now seeking more than $500 million in additional aid to the Bogota regime, which would…

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