Peace Island Conference Report

JAY KVALE wrote:

The last two days I attended the Peace Island Conference at Concordia College in St. Paul. The purpose of the conference was to bring together peace activists, environmentalists, and citizens to discuss ways to turn away from the war, militarism, corporate greed, and environmental destruction that is damaging the world and find ways to build a peaceful, sustainable world for future generations. Experts from around the country including Jim Harkness, Terry Gips, Kathy Kelly, Mel Duncan, Anne Hastings, Ann Wright, Lisa Ledwige, Ami Voeltz, Coleen Rowley, and Starhawk gave presentations on their specialties.

Three of the top speakers were:

-- Antonia Juhasz (expert on the oil business . . . her new book is "The Tyranny of Oil"). Despite their ads, the oil companies have only one goal -- PROFIT (the top 4 companies made more than $100 billion in profits last year). They will continue to go after as much oil as they can (until it finally runs out) for as long as they can since they hold the whole world hostage. There is still plenty of oil out there but there could be panic in about 15 years when the World Gas Tank gets down to one-third if we don't get off our addiction (3 billion gallons used every day). Substantial reductions in oil consumption can be achieved fairly quickly if people work together to develop alternatives . . . a good first step is to break up the oil companies and their lobbyists.

-- Bruce Gagnon (expert on militarism and leader in stopping weapons in space). He described the new space weapons systems, electronic warfare, and military empire-building of the neocons and Pentagon. The cost of these schemes is prohibitive (hundreds of billions) and is already bankrupting the country. Two freight trains are on a collision course . . . military empire and basic human needs such as education, health care, Social Security etc. We will have to choose between guns and butter. Cutting missile defense (at more than $100 billion it's the biggest scam in history because it will never work), the mostly useless F-22 fighter (more than $200 million per plane), and thousands of useless nuclear weapons could save at least $250 billion. The rest of the world laughs at our hypocrisy . . . bullying and threatening smaller countries while maintaining the largest military arsenal in world history, which now costs us more than a trillion dollars a year.

-- Sami Rasouli (Iraqi-American with dual citizenship, he travels from Minneapolis to his home city of Najaf several times a year building relationships and overseeing humanitarian aid with Christian and Muslim peacekeeper teams). He said don't believe the media spin that Iraq is "much improved." It is improved for American troops because our casualties are way down but life is still terrible for Iraqis. Baghdad is the most violent city in the world . . . most attacks and killings aren't covered by the media. More than 2 million people have left the city and there are blast walls and checkpoints everywhere. Sunni insurgents are mostly quiet for now because they get millions in bribes from the Americans. Thousands of widows and orphans (there are several million in Iraq) scrounge in garbage dumps every day to survive and many thousands of Sadr City residents have hepatitis from dirty water. Sami works with Americans to provide water filtration systems at $500 and $1,000 each for schools and towns.

Sami was highly critical of Obama's choice of Biden for VP. Biden was a strong supporter of the invasion and is also a strong Zionist. Most Americans don't know the Mossad (Israeli intelligence) has murdered 650 Iraqi scientists, including 350 nuclear physicists. Biden has proposed dividing Iraq into three parts, which would drive millions more out of their homes. Why do arrogant American politicians think they can move Iraqis around like chess pieces? The only candidate Sami can support is Ron Paul, who advocates an immediate pullout of all American troops from Iraq and an end to American military interventions in the Middle East.

Sami said most Iraqis don't hate Americans (many want to come here) but of course they oppose our current government. They don't like the way so many American soldiers regard them as "insurgents" or "terrorists." Last month a good friend of Sami's, a well-known and liked government official, was killed by American troops, who have killed more than 300,000 Iraqis since 2003. When he tells Iraqis that 70% of Americans oppose the occupation they don't believe him . . . why did we re-elect Bush?

Sami said the cities in Iraq are highly militarized because the army is almost the only job available for young men. Thousands of young farmers have come to cities and joined the army because the soil has been poisoned by depleted uranium munitions. Toxic for millions of years, DU will probably cause hundreds of thousands of cancers in Iraq for the rest of human history. Several hundred severely deformed babies have been born in Fallujah, site of the most vicious battle of the war in 2004.

Sami is a warm-hearted, animated, outgoing man with hundreds of friends in both countries but often you can perceive the anger rising within as he discusses what has happened to his country.