Tikkun Daily Blog Archive (https://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/author/guest/page/46/)
The rights of immigrants, LGBT communities, and women are intrinsically connected. And for all groups there has been a recent uprise in the amount of laws and resolutions being passed on a State level, with local communities taking the lead and making their own example of what they want to see happening in Washington.
Is Syria simply ‘stage 2’ in a neoconservative plan to bring about regime change, with Iraq as stage one and Iran as stage three? William Beeman discusses how a war on Syria would exacerbate violence rather than bring the world closer to peaceful resolution of the tensions in the region.
Perhaps the biggest challenge for activists to overcome is to remain truly hopeful, but that is not to say it is impossible. Sam Daley-Harris shares the stories of those who have faced their fears and transformed their lives in order to better the world, and shows why a little grassroots empowerment can help create movements that will change the world.
Gandhi was once given a seemingly impossible scenario: what would he do if a plane were flying over his ashram to bomb him? He gave an equally challenging answer: he would pray for the pilot. Gandhi’s call to prayer was consistent with his vision of nonviolent strategy, and we have much to learn from his teaching as we seek to address the potential U.S. bombing of Syria.
A year after a deportation reprieve became available to undocumented youth, analysts are noticing a trend: Very few Chinese immigrants are applying for it.
Jewish law requires that all synagogues have windows. We’re not supposed to pray in separation from the world; we’re supposed to pray with the world, conscious of its cycles, in a space that invites connection with them. Unfortunately, most authorities interpret this rule as permitting synagogues to have windows that never open.
It is the mark of a dysfunctional family to insist on secrecy, hide truths, not be willing to discuss problems openly. When it comes to race, the U.S. is a dysfunctional family. We know racism persists, but we won’t speak about it openly, fund organizations to tackle it, or allow our president to refer to it.
Obama is spot on in saying that “the presence of economic opportunity” is central to the pursuit of social justice. In focusing so much on the economy, however, Obama neglected to substantially take on some of the most acute ongoing manifestations of racism today, such as stop and frisk, mass incarceration, or the racism behind the killing of unarmed black men like Trayvon Martin.
There are firm legal foundations for the International Criminal Court to intervene in Syria. Although Syria is not a party to the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention, prohibiting the use of chemical weapons, that does not matter. Customary international law prohibits the use of such weapons of indiscriminate effect generally and Syria would be responsible, especially if they were used against civilian populations regardless of whether they are party to the Treaty.
Across the West Bank, Israel’s occupation has given rise in recent years to a nonviolent “popular resistance” movement that should be an inspiration to people across the globe. On my trip to the West Bank, Leaders of the Palestinian popular resistance – from intellectuals to grassroots villagers who’d been repeatedly jailed – spoke to us about universal human rights, about a human family in which all deserve equal rights regardless of religion or nationality.