AFSC Midwest Digest

Highlights of Recent Work from Around the Region — July 6, 2016

Shared commitment propels justice work “A shared commitment to equality, freedom, and justice united us,” writes Jennifer Bing of AFSC Chicago in this blog about the recent Presbyterian General Assembly’s adoption of resolutions/overtures related to church divestment from the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. Chicago staff and volunteers also delivered a petition on ending the blockade of Gaza to Sen. Dick Durbin’s office. In this radio interview, Nawal talks about a Congressional letter regarding Israeli detention of Palestinian children and her work with the No Way to Treat a Child campaign Speaking of unity... Growing out of AFSC’s Social Change Institute in Kansas City, young people there recently held a Unity Fest to call for an end to scape-goating marginalized groups in our society. Click for photos and for a radio report. Planned before the Orlando tragedy, the event “celebrated our diverse community and our ability to work together for the common good,” according to Ira Harritt. AFSC KC encourages everone to endorse our “Statement of Solidarity With People of Syria, Refugees and People of Faith.” Dayton celebrates ethnic and cultural diversity The “marketplace” was the theme of this year’s World A’Fair in Dayton. Migwe Kimemia of AFSC was there, sharing information about African refugees and Congo conflict minerals in the global marketplace. In this article, he writes about the recent visit to Dayton of a German delegation seeking to learn more about how to welcome refugees. In August, Migwe will present at the 2016 Quaker College Leadership Gathering at Earlham. Recommended interviews from Northeast Ohio Can a single-payer health care system work in Ohio and across the nation? In this interview with AFSC’s Greg Coleridge, Debbie Silver-stein of the Single Payer Action Network (SPAN) explains how. A member of the AFSC Northeast Ohio Committee, Genevieve Mitchell talks with Greg in this interview about the July 15-17 People’s Justice and Peace Convention in Cleve-land, which will take place just prior to the Republican National Convention (RNC). She discusses the purpose of the event, who will be speaking, some of the issues that will be addressed and how participants will help develop a “People’s Platform” of alternative principles and policies promoting justice, peace, democracy and sustainability that will be delivered to the RNC and Democratic National Convention (DNC) a week later in Philadelphia.

Jennifer Bing gathers with Palestinian and Jewish

friends at the Presbyterian General Assembly in

Portland.

Soloman performs a spoken word poem at the

Unity Fest in Kansas City.

Njeri Migwe, above left, and Migwe

Kimemia march in the closing parade

of the World A’Fair in Dayton.

Genevieve Mitchell

Confronting militarization, sharing stories Interns in AFSC’s Chicago office will be spending six weeks this summer “learning about how militarism and violence culture spread through the cultural consciousness and how we can use our art to uplift the voices of the oppressed and educate others,” writes Alexandra in this post. Interns will be working with staffers Debbie Southorn and Mary Zerkel, who recently wrote this blog about the power of sharing stories to create new narratives around war. Taking on power in the Twin Cities “I’m tired of throwing small reforms at huge, structural issues,” Dominque Diaddigo-Cash of AFSC says in this interview. “I’m tired of working with deficit-based models. I want to undo the ability of institutions to take power from my community.” Dominque and Sharon Goens-Bradley of AFSC’s Twin Cities Healing Justice Program are planning the next AFSC Freedom School in the Twin Cities on August 2-6; the sign-up form is here. More on Palestine/Israel Israeli detention of Palestinian children was one focus of a recent Interfaith Peacebuilders delegation, joined by AFSC Midwest staff Nawal of Chicago, Jody Mashek of Des Moines and Katie Huerter of Omaha. Read more about their powerful experiences here…. Paul Ricketts, a Friend from Ft. Wayne and a Midwest Executive Committee member, writes about his experience with the Quaker Palestine Israel Network (QPIN)…. Midwest Regional Director Brant Rosen is profiled in this piece and writes about his support for the Palestinian Right of Return in this post. Michigan welcomes new intern Katie Wright is the new Michigan Criminal Justice Program Intern in the Ypsilanti office. She recently joined AFSC, as well as working full-time at an Ann Arbor coffee shop and applying for graduate programs in Public Health and Policy and for a Masters in Fine Arts with focus on poetry. She is a graduate of Kalamazoo College Class of 2012, where she studied Psychology and participated in a student organization called H.Y.P.E. (Helping Youth through Positive Empowerment), a social justice organization that sought to build meaningful relationships with youth in the Kalamazoo County Juvenile Home. (With thanks to Caitlin Ozga.) Training the next generation of immigrant organizers Darlene Graminga in Chicago is working with 28 students from the Chicago Public Schools this month on an immigrant activist training program. The students include Dreamers from Mexico, Central America, the Middle East, Myanmar and various countries in Africa.

A surveillance camera found during a recent

“militarization scavenger hunt” in Chicago.

At the first AFSC Minnesota Freedom School in

2014 (photo: Nancy Wong)

From left, Katie, Nawal and Jody travel to

Palestine-Israel with Interfaith Peacebuilders.

Katie Wright is a new

intern in Michigan

and, presumably, a

Tigers fan.

Humanize Not Militarize update Mary Zerkel and Erin Polley said AFSC has received all the entries for its Humanize Not Militarize film festival, with 90% of the films focused on policing. One entry is from a Chicago organization opposing “Countering Violent Extremism” programs in their community. There are great groups involved from Los Angeles, San Francisco, St. Louis, Greensboro, Indy and youth trainers from Chicago. Later this month, young people will be meeting with Washington, DC human rights groups and AFSC’s Peace by Piece staff in Baltimore. Standing with immigrants in Iowa Sandra Sanchez, with the Immigrants Voice Program in the Des Moines office, wrote this recent blog post about the program’s two decades of fighting immigration raids in Iowa….Kenia Calderron, who serves as the bilingual administrative assistant for the IVP Legal Services Program, wrote this opinion piece in the Des Moines Register just before the US Supreme Court dead-locked on President Obama’s executive orders on immigra-tion….The IVP Legal Services Program, directed by Jody Mashek, is very pleased to welcome Jessica Ceballos as a summer intern organizing weekly renewal clinics for recipients of DACA—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. She’s a recent graduate of American Institute of Business. Bits and peaces Directed by Kathleen McQuillen, the Iowa Peacebuilding Program is again helping organize one of the longest-running annual Hiroshima-Nagasaki observances in the country, set for August 9 in Des Moines. Iowans are looking forward to a return visit this Fall by retired Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson….Long-time AFSC sup-porter and former committee member Hedy Epstein passed away recently in St. Louis after a long life of peace and justice advocacy….AFSC is ramping up its resources on countering Islamophobia. Check out this list of five things your congregation can do, and learn more in this Quaker Speak video…. AFSC’s statement on the Orlando tragedy is here. Thank you We can’t say it enough. Your support is the reason AFSC has been working for peace and justice for nearly a century. If you would like to make a gift to support the AFSC Midwest Region or a spe-cific program, please click here. Your donation will support AFSC’s work for peace with justice in the region and around the world.

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From left, Jon Krieg of AFSC reconnects with

former AFSC Central Regional Executive Committee

clerks Loring Henderson and Dean Young at the

2016 Great Plains Yearly Meeting in Wichita.

A poster from the Humanize Not Militarize project.

Colonel Larry Wilkerson, right, with Iowa staff after

an event at Drake University in 2015.

Jessica Ceballos is a summer intern in Des Moines.