Gaza, genocide, Targeting Muslims, U.S. Militarism, Violations of U.S. and International Law, War Resister
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World Court: South Africa Presents Plausible Case That Israel Committed Genocide
On January 26, the International Court of Justice (ICJ, or World Court) handed down a historic, near unanimous ruling in South Africa’s case against Israel for its genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza. At least 26,422 Palestinians have been killed and 65,087 injured by the Israeli Occupying Forces since Hamas’ October 7 attacks. More than 85% of the Palestinians in Gaza have been displaced.
The World Court concluded that South Africa presented a “plausible” case that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. The court held that the right of the Palestinians to be free from genocidal acts, and South Africa’s right (as a party to the Genocide Convention) to ensure Israel’s compliance with the convention, could be protected by six provisional measures (an injunction), which the court ordered Israel to take.
South Africa’s ministry of foreign affairs described the court’s decision as “a decisive victory for the international rule of law and a significant milestone in the search for justice for the Palestinian people.” The Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights called the ICJ’s decision “a much-needed light in the darkness,” adding, “It is a historic day for clearly recognizing the fundamental human rights of Palestinians, including their fundamental right to life, and an important vindication of the vital resort to law to uphold fundamental rights.”
Richard Falk, former UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said the ICJ’s ruling “marks the greatest moment in the history of the [court]” because “it strengthens the claims of international law to be respected by all sovereign states?—?not just some.” This is particularly significant in light of the recent ruling here in the United States in which the federal district court on January 31 dismissed a lawsuit against Joe Biden, Antony Blinken and Lloyd Austin for their failure to prevent genocide and complicity in genocide by Israel.
Guest – Marjorie Cohn is Dean of the People’s Academy of International Law and a member of the Bureau of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers. Marjorie is also professor of law emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and former president of the National Lawyers Guild. She has written several articles about Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza for Truthout.
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Judge Dismisses Genocide Case On Behalf Of Palestinian Human Rights Groups
On January 26, just hours after the International Court of Justice found a plausible case that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, a historic 4-1/2 hour hearing took place in a federal courtroom in Oakland, California. Palestinians who are suing President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin for failure to prevent genocide and complicity in genocide testified before district court Judge Jeffrey White in a live-streamed session. 1,000 people watched the hearing via Zoom. There were also hundreds of people outside the courthouse during the hearing, standing in solidarity with the Palestinian plaintiffs.
The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed the lawsuit on behalf of Palestinian human rights organizations Defense for Children International – Palestine and Al-Haq, three Palestinian individuals who live in Gaza, and five Palestinian Americans who have family in Gaza.
The plaintiffs petitioned U.S. District Court Judge Jeffrey White to declare that the United States has violated international law and to issue a preliminary injunction to immediately force Biden, Blinken and Austin to stop providing additional money, weapons, and military and diplomatic support to Israel for its genocide in Gaza.
The defendants have asked Congress to appropriate $14.1 billion in military assistance to Israel — in addition to the $3.8 billion the U.S. already provides to Israel each year. Blinken authorized a $320 million transfer of military equipment to an Israeli manufacturer of precision bomb kits.
On January 31, Judge White dismissed the case because it involved a “political question” which is reserved to the executive and legislative branches. He wrote that “the ongoing military siege in Gaza is intended to eradicate a whole people and therefore plausibly falls within the international prohibition against genocide.” But he concluded this case was a “rare” instance where “the preferred outcome is inaccessible to the court.” He also wrote that the “Court implores Defendants to examine the results of their unflagging support of the military siege against the Palestinians in Gaza.”
Guest – Maria LaHood, one of the attorneys who presented the case for the Palestinian plaintiffs, Maria is Deputy Legal Director at CCR, with expertise in constitutional rights and international human rights. Maria works closely with Palestine Legal to support students and others whose speech is being suppressed for their Palestine advocacy around the country. She graduated from the University of Michigan Law School and was named a 2010 Public Justice Trial Lawyer of the Year Finalist.
Hosted by attorneys Heidi Boghosian, Marjorie Cohn and Julie Hurwitz
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Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, Gaza, genocide, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, Violations of U.S. and International Law
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South Africa Brings Israel To World Court
On January 11 and 12, South Africa and Israel appeared in a historic case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, in The Hague. South Africa’s legal team made a strong and persuasive argument that Israel is engaging in genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza. South Africa asked the court to impose nine emergency “provisional measures” aimed at putting an end to the slaughter.
South Africa’s application to the ICJ places Israel’s genocidal acts and omissions in the broader context of Israel’s 75-year apartheid policy, 56-year occupation, and 16-year blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip. This siege was described by the Director of UNRWA Affairs in Gaza as “a silent killer of people.”
South Africa told the court that it “unequivocally condemned the targeting of civilians by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups and the taking of hostages on 7 October.” But, it continued, “no armed attack on a State’s territory no matter how serious — even an attack involving atrocity crimes — can provide any justification for, or defence to” genocide. Israel “has crossed this line.”
Israel responded by placing responsibility on Hamas for the situation in Gaza. It accused South Africa of an “attempt to weaponize the term genocide.” Israel argued that international humanitarian law is the relevant framework — that Hamas committed war crimes. In Israel’s view, this is not a genocide case; if anyone was the victim of genocide, Israel claims IT was on October 7 when Palestinian resistance forces killed what Israel claims were 1,200 people. However, Hamas is not part of this case, because it is not a state party to the Genocide Convention.
Guest – co-host Marjorie Cohn is Dean of the People’s Academy of International Law and a member of the Bureau of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers. Marjorie is also professor of law emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and former president of the National Lawyers Guild. She writes prolifically about Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory and Israel’s violations of the human rights of the Palestinian people.
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Honoring the Legacy Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
We hear part of an hour long program honoring the life and legacy of the Rev. Dr.Martin Luther King. Our listeners know all too well that the Nobel Peace Prize laureate was shot on April 4, 1968. Not so well known is the radical Dr. King, who said in the last months of his life that:
“Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world, declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo.”
Joining us are special guests Ruby Sales, a colleague of Dr. King’s and co-founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee; and Rev. Dr. Emma Jordan-Simpson, Executive Director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation (F.O.R.). We’re also joined by author and activist Matt Meyer, a board member of the AJMI.
Dr. King began close ties with A.J. Muste and with the F.O.R. during the Montgomery bus boycott, when FOR staff members Bayard Rustin and Glenn Smiley came to Alabama to support local efforts nonviolently challenging racial segregation. Dr. King developed a special relationship with former FOR chairman A.J. Muste, whose absolute pacifism King had, as a theological seminary student, questioned.
Before heading F.O.R., Muste was a prominent labor leader, helping to found the militant Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). And Dr. King, of course, was killed exactly one year after taking a staunch anti-Vietnam war position and in the midst of supporting a significant strike of sanitation workers, linking—as he had been—issues of race, class, and violence as King deepened his critique of the roots of oppressive U.S. society.
Guest – Ruby Sales is the founder and director of the “SpiritHouse Project”, a national organization that uses the arts, research, education, action and spirituality to bring diverse peoples together to work for racial, economic and social justice as well as for spiritual maturity. A life-long organizer, scholar and public theologian in the areas of civil, gender and other human rights, she was a member of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee and served as national convener of the Make Every Church A Peace Church movement.
Guest – Rev. Dr. Emma Jordan-Simpson is the Executive Pastor of The Concord Baptist Church of Christ, Brooklyn, NY. She has combined pastoral ministry with the social justice community. The former Executive Director of the Children’s Defense Fund she is now the Executive Director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation.
Guest – Matt Meyer is Secretary-General of the International Peace Research Association, Chair of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation’s Financial Advisory Committee, Africa Support Network Coordinator of the War Resisters International, and Senior Research Scholar at U-Mass Amherst. As current National co-chair of FOR and former Chair of the War Resisters League, he is second only to AJ Muste in holding the top post of those two historic US peace organizations. He is author of the recently published White Lives Matter Most And Other “Little” White Lies.
Hosted by attorneys Heidi Boghosian and Marjorie Cohn (also as guest)
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Civil Liberties, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, Violations of U.S. and International Law, War Resister
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Human Rights Lawyer Says UN Failed To Protect Palestinians
The Israeli air and ground war against 2.3 million Palestinians imprisoned in the Gaza Strip is in its is 98th day. Ralph Nader stated on Democracy Now that the reported 23,000 deaths of Palestinians is vastly understated. He estimated a true count to be around 100,000. Moreover, he projected, that because of disease and starvation 500,000 people in Gaza will likely die this year.
International human rights lawyer Craig Mokhiber resigned from the United Nations on October 28, 2023.
He had worked for the UN for more than three decades, and was the director of its human rights agency in New York. In his resignation letter he wrote that the UN had failed in its duty to protect Palestinians. Mokhiber accused the US, the UK, and much of Europe, of being “wholly complicit in the horrific assault” in Gaza.
Last week South Africa filed a lawsuit against the government of Israel in the International Court of Justice for the crime of genocide. The ICJ is the court of the United Nations. John Kirby, a spokesperson for the United States, called the lawsuit “counterproductive, without any basis in fact, whatsoever“.
Guest – Attorney Craig Mokhiber, graduated from the University of Buffalo Law School and has lived in the Gaza Strip. Mr. Craig Mokhiber is a Director in the New York Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). A lawyer and specialist in international human rights law, policy and methodology, he has served the UN since 1992. As chief of the Human Rights and Development Team in the 1990s, he led the development of OHCHR’s original work on human rights-based approaches to development and human rights-sensitive definitions of poverty.
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CIA Operations Subject To Discovery In Assange Attorneys’ Spying Case
On December 19th, a federal court in New York rendered a decision of profound importance, having to do with claims of illegal actions by the CIA, and others, brought by attorneys representing the world-renowned journalist and founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange. Assange is currently imprisoned in London awaiting a final ruling in the U.S. government’s efforts to extradite him back to the United States and stand trial for violations of the Espionage Act of 1917, for having published documents exposing U.S. war crimes in connection with America’s wars in the Middle East. In their lawsuit against the CIA, former CIA head Mike Pompeo, and others, Assange’s attorneys alleged that the CIA violated the attorneys’ constitutional rights by subjecting them to illegal surveillance during their visits with Assange while he was staying in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he had been granted asylum.
While the other claims of the attorneys were dismissed by the court, the CIA was not dismissed from the lawsuit. And so, the plaintiffs have won a rare opportunity for the clandestine operations of the CIA, which prides itself on secrecy, to now be subjected to public scrutiny and accountability through discovery actions in connection with the plaintiff’s claims.
The importance, the significance of this victory against the CIA cannot be overstated. And to help us understand how this victory came to pass, what the alleged abuses of the CIA were that led the judge to deny the attempt of the CIA to be dismissed from the lawsuit.
Guest – Vincent de Stefano, the chief organizer for the National Defense Committee for Julian Assange. Mr. De Stefano is a life-long social justice activist and a founding member of the Southern California Assange Defense Committee, as well as an Executive Board member of the national Assange defense committee. He is the former President of the Pasadena/Foothills Chapter of the ACLU and a board member of the Southern California ACLU Affiliate. Vince De Stefano has worked with Amnesty International for over 4 decades, and in 2019 was recognized by Amnesty as their Urgent Letter Writer of the Year.
Hosted by Attorneys Michael Smith, Maria Hall and Jim Lafferty
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Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, Human Rights, U.S. Militarism, Violations of U.S. and International Law, War Resister, Whistleblowers
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Israel Is Terrified The World Court Will Decide Its Committing Genocide
Since Hamas killed 1,200 Israelis on October 7, Israel has launched a full-scale genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza. As of this broadcast, Israeli forces have killed at least 22,100 Gazans, about 9,100 of whom are children. At least 57,000 persons have been wounded and at least 7,000 are reported missing. Untold numbers of people are trapped beneath the rubble. Israel has expelled and forcibly displaced more than 85% of Gaza’s population from their homes, and has cut off their access to food, water, fuel and electricity.
Although the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been investigating what it refers to as the “Situation in the State of Palestine” for nearly three years, calls for prosecution of Israeli officials have been ignored. This blind eye comes as the chief prosecutor of the ICC demonstrates blatant bias in favor of Israel.
The ICC’s Rome Statute provides for the prosecution of individuals who commit, or aid and abet the commission of genocide. By contrast, the International Court of Justice (ICJ or “World Court”) — the judicial arm of the UN system — resolves disputes between countries.All the 153 countries that have ratified the 1948 Genocide Convention have a duty to prevent and punish genocide and they can submit the issue of Israel’s genocide to the ICJ.
On December 29, South Africa launched a well-documented case at the ICJ, alleging that Israel’s military campaign in Gaza amounts to genocide. South Africa is asking the court to order provisional measures to “protect against further, severe and irreparable harm to the rights of the Palestinian people under the Genocide Convention.” It also asks the court “to ensure Israel’s compliance with its obligations under the Genocide Convention not to engage in genocide, and to prevent and to punish genocide.”
A hearing in the ICJ on South Africa’s application is scheduled for January 11 and 12. Other parties to the Genocide Convention are being approached to join South Africa’s petition.
Marjorie’s recent article : Israel Is Terrified The World Court Will Decide Its Committing Genocide
Guest – Marjorie Cohn – Law and Disorder co-host Marjorie Cohn, who is Dean of the People’s Academy of International Law and a member of the Bureau of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers. She is Professor of Law Emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and former president of the National Lawyers Guild and she has written extensively about the Israeli genocide in Gaza for Truthout.
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Remembering Australian Journalist John Pilger
Today we re-broadcast a recent interview we did with the great Australian journalist John Pilger about his film titled The Coming War On China. With the exception of a short break at the conclusion in 1975 of the Vietnamese war, the United States has been at war continually. The momentum of what President Eisenhower warned us against and described as being led by, “the military industrial complex” has been going on with successive wars against Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and now the American proxy war in Ukraine. The military industrial complex has been augmented by support from the CIA, Congress, and the corporate media.
As Pilger demonstrates, the United States, is building up for a war against China. This build up is both military and ideological and shaped by hostile propaganda. In this respect, an alarming full page New York Times article, 11 weeks in the making, and written by seven reporters, appeared on August 5, 2023. The article targeted the American peace organization CODEPINK as well as one of its financial backers. It is a hit piece that has alarmed many of us in the movement. John Pilger gives us the background to it.
Guest – John Pilger covered that war as a young reporter and understood that it was based on the lie that Lyndon Johnson told falsely stating that the North Vietnamese had attacked an American ship in the Gulf of Tonkin. Another 1 million people died in the Iraq war That war was based on the now well known lie that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that he was going to use against us and that he was responsible for 911. A similar campaign of fear mongering is going on now about China. The major news media parrot the government’s fact free line that China is our enemy. In his article “The Coming War With China” John Pilger wrote “a US war against China beckons and we have a responsibility to speak out. We know what is coming. Silence must be broken.”
Hosted by attorneys Michael Smith, Maria Hall, Heidi Boghosian and Marjorie Cohn
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CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Rights, Human Rights, Prison Industry, Truth to Power, U.S. Militarism, Violations of U.S. and International Law, War Resister
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What Kind Of Nation?
What kind of nation cuts off of food, water, medicine, electricity, and fuel to 2 1/3 million Palestinians and then bombs them as they sit trapped in the open air prison which is the Gaza Strip? What kind of national leader in his capacity as Israeli Minister of Defense, says “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.“ Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu promised that “We will turn Gaza into a deserted island.”
What kind of a nation vetoes a cease-fire as the US did in a 13 to 1 vote when it was proposed at the United Nations Security Council? The Israeli and American nations finds themselves morally isolated on the world stage.
The American government supplies the weapons of war to a nation that has so far annihilated at least 20,000 people, including 8000 children. The Israelis use weapons made in the US and paid for by our tax dollars.
American foreign policy is driven by the military industrial complex. It’s a country whose weapons industry is closely allied with the weapons industry of Israel and a country whose government is heavily influenced by the Israeli lobby, a lobby that should be forced to register as an agent of a foreign country.
Guest – Aaron Maté about the continuing genocide in Gaza, which is now approaching 100 days. He is a journalist with The Gray Zone where he hosts “Pushback“. He is the co-host of Useful Idiots. In 2019 Aaron Maté won the Izzy award for outstanding achievement in independent media for his Russiagate coverage in The Nation.
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Unilateral Sanity Could Save The World: Nothing Can Be Changed Until Its Faced
As we begin 2024, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists just reset its nuclear doomsday clock for the 24th time in its 76-year history. They created the doomsday clock just after WW2 to visually represent the threat of global nuclear annihilation. Although the precise time won’t be announced until later this month, the most recent change was just one year ago: in January 2023, when the clock was moved forward to 90 seconds til midnight – the closest to midnight ever.
What will 2024 bring? Will we get swept up in momentum and fervor toward global catastrophe? Or can we muster the will and courage to act … and try to save one another – other animals, the earth, and ourselves?
In his article, Unilateral Sanity Could Save the World, our guest: author and political analyst Norman Solomon, invokes Antonio Gramsci’s philosophy of keeping a “pessimism of the intellect,” but “an optimism of the will.”
Guest – Norman Solomon is a long-time associate of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, the national director of RootsAction.org, and the Executive Director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. His books include War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death; and his latest book, War Made Invisible: How American Hides the Human Toll of its Military Machine which was published by the New Press in June 2023.
Hosted by attorneys Michael Smith and Maria Hall
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Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, Gaza, genocide, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, U.S. Militarism, Violations of U.S. and International Law, War Resister
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Unwavering U.S. Support Of Israeli War Atrocity
Israel, with indispensable American support, is destroying the people of Gaza. They are being bombed by American planes dropping American bombs and shot at by Israeli soldiers, using American weapons and ammunition. Israel has prevented them from getting food and water, medical supplies and fuel. They are sick and starving. 85% of the population of 2.3 million have had their homes destroyed and are living outside in the cold without food, fuel medicine or clean water
Already some 20,000 Palestinians have been murdered, the majority, women and children. At least 800 children have had their limbs amputated. It is a one-sided war. The American equipped Israeli Air Force and Army is the fourth largest military force in the world. The Palestinians are essentially defenseless against this. They have been herded to the south tip of tiny Gaza, their homes, schools, hospitals pulverized. They are living in the streets, in the cold, with no sanitation, awaiting their certain destruction by starvation, dehydration, and cholera.
The American government has fully supported this genocidal operation with military supplies, diplomatic, cover, and propaganda. Last week, the United States voted to block a cease-fire resolution at the UN Security council – 13 to 1. The US and Israel are looked upon as moral outlaws by the rest of the world.
Why has the American government supported Israel? What is the history of this support for the Israeli colony which was set up in 1948 in the heart of the Arab world and has been expanding and displacing Palestinians ever since?
Professor Khalidi OpEd LA Times
Guest – Columbia University Professor Rashid Khalidi is a Palestinian American historian of the Middle East, the Edward Said professor of Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University, and Director of the Middle East Institute of Columbia School of International and Public Affairs. He was educated at Yale and Oxford universities and is the author of many books on the Middle East. He is also the author of Under Siege: PLO Decision Making During the 1982 War, Brokers of Deceit: How the US Has Undermined Peace in the Middle East and recently The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017.
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Anti-Semitic or Pro Palestine, Quick Silencing Of Student Protests
Unless you’ve been living in a cave for the past week or so, you know about the firings and attempted firing of university heads at M.I.T, Harvard, and Penn in the wake of the new Israeli-Palestinian war. At M.I.T. and Penn, their top bosses were, in fact, fired. So far, Claudine Gay at Harvard has held on to her job, but many still think her days there are numbered. The moves to get rid of these university bosses flowed from the claim that they were not strong enough in their condemnation of the October 7th Hamas attack, and of the way their students sloganized in the course of their boisterous on-campus protests against Israel, because of the humanitarian crisis resulting from what Israel is doing in Gaza.
In short, they were deemed to be, if not out and out anti-Semantic themselves, clearly insufficiently pro-Israel in their over-all statements and actions since this latest Israeli/Palestinian war began. Of course, there have been conflicts at many, many other U.S. colleges and university arising from the war, often resulting in the outlawing on campus of campus groups like Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace.
Put simply, despite the fact that a very significant pro-Palestine bias may exist among students on our nation’s campuses of higher learning, these students’ grownups know what’s best…and that means unwavering support for Israel and the supportive role played by the U.S. in that war. And it means trying to silence criticism of Israel and bold support for Palestine. Shout our certain slogans, such as “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”, or “down with Zionism, down with Israeli apartheid”, or “Israel, Israel you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide”, and the censors won’t be long in attacking you, or simply silencing you.
Aside for my grief and anger over what is happening to the Palestinian people in this war, there are a couple of other aspects of all of this that have me particularly disturbed, have me angry and greatly worried. One is the simplistic, quick to condemn, efforts to shut down the actions and slogans of the pro-Palestinian demonstrators. The other is how reminiscent this is of how the ruling elite in this country went after the leadership, and rank-and-filers, in the anti-Vietnam war movement of the 60’s and early 70’s. Then, the charges were that the slogans and the demonstrations were “anti-American” and, in fact, down right “communistic.” I, along with a handful of other anti-Vietnam War leaders, was then called before the new House Un-American Activities Committee, to testify about the supposed, and I quote, “Soviet money and leadership that was supporting U.S. antiwar groups and coalitions.”
Are today’s pro-Palestinian leaders now to be called to account and asked by the authorities, “are you now or have you ever been, an anti-Zionist”? “Are you getting money from the Islamists?” Yes, the growing danger to free speech in our country, and the right to defend those who the government may disfavor, or claim to be the enemies of our people, is to be greatly feared. It often grows slowly, at first, like some cancerous viruses, but once it gathers strength…well, remember our history.
Guest – Stephen Rohde is a noted constitutional scholar, retired civil rights lawyer and activist. He is the past Chair of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California; the founder and current chair of Interfaith communities United for Justice and Peace; the author of Freedom of Assembly and American Words of Freedom. Steve Rohde is also a regular contributor to the Los Angeles Times Review of Books, TruthDig, and a leader in the national campaign to free imprisoned investigative reporter, Julian Assange.
Hosted by attorneys Michael Smith, Maria Hall and Jim Lafferty
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