April Actions Planned

As the Department of State prepared for February publication of its second consecutive annual report of serious violations of the human rights of Palestinians living both in Israel and in Israeli-occupied territories, two people in Washington, DC were working night and day to prepare a nationwide response to the report's conclusions.

They were Hilda Silverman, former Washington representative of the America Israel Council for Israeli-Palestinian Peace (headquartered in Downer's Grove, IL), and Rick McDowell, former coordinator of Ohioans for Middle East Peace (of Akron, Ohio). In cooperation with Anan Ameri, president of the Palestine Aid Society of America, they pooled personal resources, rented a Washington, DC post office box and went into action.

They secured permission to use the telephone number of an existing publishing organization. That organization's conference room then became the national headquarters of Act on Conscience for Israel/Palestine, incorporated the second week of January and open for business from early morning to late at night ever since.

Even the conference table comes with strings attached. When it is needed for a meeting by the host organization, Act on Conscience either takes a lunch break or, more often, hauls sacks of mail to the post office. The stream of letters that emerges calls upon recipients to support three actions.

It asks concerned Americans in cities across the United States to call for congressional and other public hearings to investigate US government compliance with sections 502B and 116(a) of the Foreign Assistance Act, which prohibit military and economic assistance "to any country the government of which is engaged in a consistent pattern of gross violations of internationally recognized human rights." Act on Conscience calls upon President Bush and Congress to implement those provisions.

It also calls upon Americans all over the United States to join in demonstrations, lobbying efforts, educational forums, and acts of moral and religious witness on April 14, 15 and 16 (tax filing day) to heighten public awareness of US complicity in Israel's violations of human rights, and to urge the administration and Congress to comply with US and international law.

The State Department report, when it was issued, confirmed Israel's violations, despite reported efforts to tone down the charges by the Department's director for human rights, Richard Schifter.

With the April 14 to 16 protest period almost upon diem, Silverman and McDowell are working night and day to handle calls from persons wishing introductions to others planning action in their local areas. Their 21-member advisory council, which includes prominent Catholic, Jewish, and Protestant clergy and theologians, scholars, retired US ambassadors and political activists such as William Sloane Coffin, president of Sane/Freeze, and Jack O'Dell, director of International Affairs of the Rainbow Coalition, is outgrowing the space provided for it on Act on Conscience stationery.

By mid-March, they had generated responses from 25 states, with the hope that the April actions will be the springboard for similar undertakings in the future.

Washington Report readers interested in contributing money or time, either in their own communities or in Washington, DC, can do so by calling (202) 939-6050.