By electronicintifada.net via John Walsh
A group of Palestine solidarity activists in Los Angeles, including human rights defenders and members of the clergy, were arrested yesterday after being forcibly removed from a peaceful sit-in at the local offices of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Ca).
Estee Chandler of Jewish Voice for Peace was among four of 12 activists who were arrested just after 2:20 p.m.
The Electronic Intifada spoke with Ms. Chandler at 1 o’clock as she was continuing to sit in Sen. Feinstein’s office. At 1:45, Ms. Chandler said that Los Angeles police were threatening the activists with arrest and she was being told to give up her cell phone.
The activists have been demanding a meeting with Ms. Feinstein and her colleague, U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer, to protest their support for a bill that would send more weaponry to Israel. Those demands were repeatedly ignored or rejected.
Shakeel Syed of American Muslims for Palestine, who participated in the action, tweeted at 2:10 “CD [civil disobedience] in progress” just as the police began arresting the activists.
A broad coalition of Palestine solidarity groups and faith-based organizations are urging supporters of human rights to call the offices of Ms. Feinstein and Ms. Boxer, demanding they end their support for Senate Resolution 498, “which means sending further arms to Israel” and to “demand that the senators support a full, independent investigation into Operation Protective Edge” — the name Israel has given to its assault on Gaza that has killed almost two thousand people since July 7.
The activists also sat in at Ms. Boxer’s office. But as Ms. Chandler said, the action had ended earlier on Monday.
War Crimes Inquiry
Activists have drafted letters to Ms. Feinstein and Ms. Boxer, calling on them to support an international inquiry into “possible human rights violations and war crimes committed during Israel’s military offensive,” amongst other demands.
Taher Herzallah, national campus coordinator with American Muslims for Palestine, and a member of the Irvine 11 — a group of university students convicted after they disrupted a speech given by an Israeli official in 2010 — is part of the team of activists and clergy who sat in at Ms. Feinstein’s office. A selection of his tweets is below:
[img]2712|exact|A sit-in at Sen. Feinstein's office.||no_popup[/img]
An action alert sent out by Jewish Voice for Peace urges supporters to call the offices of Sen. Boxer at 213.894.5000, and Sen. Feinstein’s at 310.914.7300.
One Protestor’s View
Estee Chandler: I’m an organizer of the Los Angeles chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, and I’m here with friends, clergy, people from American Muslims for Palestine, CodePink, we have Christian Peacemaker Teams, we have Quaker clergy, we have a rabbi with us, and we are 12 of us, sitting in, feeling very strongly about communicating with Sen. Feinstein. We are hearing from our elected officials that they are working very hard for a cease-fire agreement, and yet we see what they actually are doing down to the Senate floor, voting to send more weaponry to the region.
We think that the time has come when the status quo has to end. We decided, the 12 of us, to stop the status quo in our lives, of going out in the street and demonstrating, gathering hundreds and thousands of people every weekend — because our elected officials don’t seem to be listening to our call.
Today we came to tell them in person, and to deliver a letter demanding that they actually take action and not just revert back to the status quo, which of course will end in continued occupation, continued siege on Gaza, continuing disproportionate deaths of Palestinians. We want to break that status quo.
Mr. Walsh may be contacted at hollywooddems@gmail.com
