November 18, 2014 Dear Friends,

Thank you for welcoming me so warmly to the Muste Institute! Your responses to my August letter have been truly gratify- NewsMUSTE from the A.J. Muste Memorial Institute ing. (It’s still up on our website in case you missed it!) When I explain to people that our mission is to sustain nonviolent action for social justice, a common response is: “But what does the Muste Institute actually DO?” VOL. 22, NUMBER 1 NOTESFALL 2014 This issue of Muste Notes will give you an idea of the answer. We’re putting your contributions into action, and that means Palestinians and Israelis working together for peace, circus artists facilitating dialogue on race, indigenous people fighting back against nuclear waste, public exhibitions on prisoners’ rights organizing, and small HEIDI BOGHOSIAN PHOTO: farmers in Africa resisting land theft. NO NUKES! These are just a few of the things the September 2014: As the People’s Climate March brought some 400,000 people together Muste Institute “actually does” with your in City, the Muste Institute and Times Up!, a local environmental action group, contributions. By giving generously, now collaborated to hang a banner on the Muste building demanding the closure of the Indian and into the future, you can help us put Point nuclear plant. even more resources into the hands of activ- ists and organizers on the front lines of today’s global nonviolent movements. Palestine-Israel Journal: A Ray of Hope By Hillel Schenker Cygielman and Ziad AbuZayyad, With appreciation, Given the crisis-filled headlines today its office in East Jerusalem is one coming out of the Middle East, the very of the few places where Israelis and existence of the Palestine-Israel Journal Palestinians come together in the same (www.pij.org) provides a unique ray of space to seek a nonviolent end to the light and hope. Founded in 1994 as an occupation and a peaceful resolution of Heidi Boghosian independent quarterly by prominent the conflict. Executive Director Israeli and Palestinian journalists Victor With Israeli and Palestinian co-editors, and a 32-member editorial board with an equal number from both peoples, PIJ devotes every issue to one of the central Strengthening Nonviolence in Latin America questions on the joint Israeli-Palestinian March 2014: Activists from across Latin America gathered at a five-day agenda, and it becomes a major resource training for trainers in Quito, Ecuador, practicing exercises like “turn the for students, scholars, activists, opinion blanket,” in which they must turn over a blanket without anyone stepping and decision makers in the region and off it or using their hands; they then analyze the strategies and tactics used around the world. to accomplish the goal. Organized by War Resisters’ International with support The theme of our October 2014 issue from the Muste is “Natural Resources and the Arab- Institute’s Israeli Conflict,” a key cause of conflict International in the Middle East, but also a potential Nonviolence basis for cooperation and sustainability. Training Fund, Given the terrible violence and loss the event helped of lives this past summer, we added PHOTO: JAVIER GÁRATE JAVIER PHOTO: 25 participants a section on “The Israel-Gaza Crisis: develop their What comes next?”—a roundtable nonviolence discussion between four Israelis and training skills four Palestinians about the war and while laying the prospects for the future. We also held groundwork a very successful public conference in for a regional Jerusalem on both topics. network of Previous issues included “Two-State trainers. Solution at the Crossroads: Obstacles continued on page 2 2 • Muste Notes Fall 2014 Defending the Earth

Western Shoshone activists and leaders approached the entrance to the Nevada Test Site and spoke with guards there in an annual walk-run event drawing attention to the nuclear

PHOTO: JEREMIAH JONES PHOTO: tests carried out on Western Shoshone land at the test site and adjacent Yucca Mountain. The Muste Institute supported the Western Shoshone Cradle-to-Grave Radioactive Waste Awareness Project with a Social Justice Fund grant in February 2014. The Corporation of Newe Sogobia said the grant “provided us with the opportunity to reach out across the country, to build a network, and to tell the story of how nuclear waste from nuclear reactors and military installations eventu- ally impacts the culture and lifeways of our Native people.”

Marj Swann: A Lifetime of Inspiration

Marjorie “Marj” Swann Edwin, who worked with many of the nonviolence movements in the U.S. over nearly eight decades, died in March 2014 at age 93. Marj was deeply engaged in social justice work throughout her life, including in the 1940s when she got involved in anti-war efforts; in civil rights struggles, start- ED HEDEMANN PHOTO: ing with CORE in Chicago; and in the labor movement, as a volunteer organizer for the first inter-racial white-collar union in Washington, DC, representing department store workers. Marj was sentenced to six months in federal prison for civil disobedi- ence in 1958 at the Omaha, Nebraska nuclear missile site protests, where A.J. Muste was also famously arrested. In 1960 Marj founded the New England Committee for Nonviolent Action with her then-husband, Robert Swann. (The Swann Fund at the Muste Institute was named in their honor.) Her many accomplishments don’t fit in this space—they are worthy of a book, which she had in fact been working on in recent years. Marj will continue to inspire us.

Palestine-Israel Journal (continued from page 1) A.J. Muste Memorial Institute and Challenges Facing Negotiations,” “A and Israeli Brig. Gen. (Ret.) Shlomo 339 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10012 Middle East Without Weapons of Mass Brom, a senior analyst at the Institute Destruction,” “The Younger Generation,” for National Strategic Studies (INSS), phone (212) 533-4335 fax (212) 228-6193 “Civil Society Challenges,” “Women and who during the conference pointed email: [email protected] Power” and “The Arab Spring.” to the cover of our issue and quoted website: www.ajmuste.org In April 2014 I came to New York the slogan “Don’t Bomb – Talk!” In Board of Directors and Washington, together with Washington we had a marathon meet- Susan Kent Cakars Matt Meyer Palestinian Co-Editor Ziad AbuZayyad, ing with congressional staffers, and James A. Cole, Chair Peter Muste to carry out a series of activities around in both cities we gave public talks Bruce Cronin (on leave) “Advancing a Weapons of Mass sponsored by important civil soci- Rodolfo Díaz-Reyes Jill Sternberg Brian Drolet Nina Streich Destruction Free Zone in the Middle ety groups. Our presentations—each Carol Kalafatic Robert T. Taylor, East.” We believe that the U.S. govern- from our own perspective, but with Bernice Lanning Secretary ment and civil society have key roles to a common agenda of promoting a Ellen Luo Martha Thomases, play in advancing a nuclear free zone Weapons of Mass Destruction Free David McReynolds Vice Chair in our region, but that the topic is not Zone—clearly had a major impact on Staff on their agenda. So we organized an the people we met. Heidi Boghosian, Executive Director all-day conference in New York where Since 2012 we are proud to partner Jane Guskin, Program Manager Sky Hall, Administrative Assistant 50 civil society activists, think tank with the A.J. Muste Memorial Institute, Salvador Suazo, Superintendent experts, and UN diplomats had the rare enabling us to receive tax-exempt Eric Bachman, Program Associate, INTF opportunity to engage with Assistant contributions from U.S.-based donors, Secretary for International Security and without whom we could not maintain We are grateful to former co-director Nonproliferation Tom Countryman. and continue our activities. Jeanne Strole for her many years of dedication and hard work for the Our delegation included Egyptian You can read the Palestine-Israel Muste Institute, and we wish her all the Prof. Sameh Aboul-Enein, an expert on Journal online at http://www.pij.org/. best in her new endeavors. arms control and proliferation issues, Or better yet, subscribe. Fall 2014 Muste Notes • 3 Highlighting Prison Resistance

Participants engaged with an exhibition of cultural mate- rials produced by incarcerated people and their allies at the September 2014 opening of “Self Determination Inside/

Out” at Interference Archive in . A Social Justice SARAH COWAN PHOTO: Fund grant supported the exhibit and related film screen- ings, panel discussions, community dialogues and other public programs, all designed to spark dialogue about the history and future of grassroots resistance to the prison- industrial complex.

Building Pan-African Nonviolence

Representatives of grassroots social movements from 24 African countries came together for the Pan African Nonviolence and Peacebuilding Network meetings in Cape Town, South Africa, in early July 2014. The meetings were held in conjunction with the War Resisters’ International (WRI) conference “Small

PHOTO: CHRISTINE SCHWEITZER PHOTO: Actions, Big Movements: The Continuum of Nonviolence.” With help from a Social Justice Fund grant and Muste Institute spon- sorship of WRI, the Network was able to greatly expand its ranks, strengthen its structure, and plan new actions and trainings.

Organizing Against Land Theft in Africa

In June 2014, Ogoni small-scale farmers gathered for a training organized by Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) in Rivers State, Nigeria. Their goal? To build effective nonviolent resistance to government land grabbing policies, so they can continue to provide for them- selves and their families. Meanwhile, in Uganda, residents of rural Amuru District learned how to successfully use nonviolent tactics to protect their land rights, thanks to trainings coor- dinated by Solidarity Uganda. Grants from the Muste Institute’s International Nonviolence Training Fund (INTF) Above: MOSOP training in Nigeria. provided crucial support. Left: Solidarity Uganda training. Engaging on Celebrate 40 years Racism of support for The Race Circus Project nonviolence and creates spaces for group PHOTO: PATTY GREGORY PATTY PHOTO: dialogue about racism, segrega- social justice. tion and current relationships Please give among Atlanta’s white, Black, Latino, and Asian residents. The generously makeShift Circus Collective today to the used its first-ever grant, from the Social Justice Fund, to A.J. Muste develop this project. Memorial Institute. A.J. Muste Memorial Institute NON-PROFIT 339 Lafayette Street ORG. U.S. POSTAGE New York, NY 10012 PAID NEW YORK, NY PERMIT NO. 02030

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