Portside

Massachusetts Peace Action sent the following letter to Sen. Elizabeth Warren on September 12, 2014. We also raised questions about her justification of Israel's war crimes in Gaza at her Tufts lecture on September 15 and distributed flyers to the attendees.

Reader Comments- People's Climate March - climate change, environmental activism, labor unions; Syria, Iraq, ISIS; public education; labor organizing; Zephyr Teachout - Working Families Party, Democratic Party, 2016 elections; Spain, Scotland, Cuba, Gaza, El Salvador; racial bias; worker cooperatives; Announcements - Film Screening African Americans in Spanish Civil War; Mobilizing Against Inequality Book Launch; Southern Tenant Farmers Union celebrates 80th anniversary

ISIS is something quite new. It wants to destroy all states, especially the Muslim states carved out by Western imperialists from Islamic land. With horrible savagery, elevated to a religious symbol, it sets out on its way to conquer the Muslim world, and then the globe. It expresses the Muslim longing for restoring ancient glory, their hatred of all those who have humiliated Islam, a thirst for spiritual values.

Reader Comments - Remembering September 11 and The Other 9/11; Fast Food Strikes; Retail Workers Find Better Deals With Unions; Justice Dept. to Probe Ferguson Police; Working Families Party; Death Row; Israel Confiscates More Palestinian Land; One-Third of Israelis Consider Emigrating; Wal-Mart-ization of Education; Wages for Housework; Gluten-free; Eugene Debs and Debs Museum; Charlie Haden; New resource - International Human Rights Law: Violations by Israel; more..

Like other states, Israel pleads "security" as justification for its aggressive and violent actions. But knowledgeable Israelis know better. As historically has often been the case, massive bombings and other assaults do not destroy the support of populations for movements or governments, but tend to solidify it. Israeli policy is reducing civilized life for Palestinians in a major way and yet increasing the urge both to fight on and the desire for revenge.

The truth is that a huge number of young, well-educated, professional Israelis have already decamped, or are making plans to do so, to more hospitable climes in Europe or elsewhere. They do so for many reasons: some are economic, seeking greater financial, professional or educational opportunities. Some are security-related. And some find the climate in Israel to be stifling either culturally or politically.

Reader Comments - Fast Food Workers; Ralph Fasanella; US-Africa Leaders Summit; School's Back and Growing Inequality; Twin Plagues of ISIS and Ebola; Diablo Canyon Nuke Plant; Brazil's Elections; Argentina; Victory for Market Basket Workers and Consumers; Fed-Ex Workers Can Organize; New Culture on the Left; Call for papers on Harry Braverman's Labor and Monopoly Capital; Today in History - Paul Robeson Returns to Peekskill; Jewish Woman Among the Interned Japanese

Rubble Bucket Challenge; Kids' artist hits profiling; White Ferguson betrays itself; Race/class in Silicon Valley; Cooper Union - Cooper vs. $; Klein's latest

Reader Comments - "I Question America" -- Remembering Fannie Lou Hamer; The Coming Race War Won't Be About Race; Ferguson - Politicians and AFL-CIO - Both Missing; Israelis in US: An Open Letter to American Jews on Gaza; Minnesota Home Health Care Workers Unionize; Ukraine and Neo-Nazis; Sanctions & the Dollar; Economic Democracy Project's first event: Economic Democracy And The Struggle For Black Independence - Sept. 3 - New York

This open-ended cease-fire is fragile. Some of the goals of the two sides will be very hard to attain. And, at root, the Israel-Gaza war won’t really be over until there is a comprehensive peace settlement with either a two-state or a one-state solution to Palestinian statelessness.