Military Sacrifice Zones —

Pohakuloa, Red Hill, Pearl Harbor, etc.

Photo of Toxic Dust clouds from bombing at Pohakuloa (PTA) in the center of Hawaii Island

      The land, water, air, people, plants and animals surrounding the 133,000-acre Pohakuloa Toxic Area (PTA), including the troops who train at PTA, are all part of a Military Sacrifice Zone. That means everyone on Hawaii Island. Actually the Hawaiian islands are one of the most militarized places on the planet with more than 100 US military installations. On Oahu, 75 year old military multi-million gallon underground fuel tanks at Red Hill are leaking 100 feet above Honolulu’s main aquifer – the drinking water for more than 400,000 people. And military families are smelling fuel-like odor in their military housing tap water in the Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Red Hill areas and in water at nearby schools.

      On Veteran’s Day 2021 US President Biden finally recognized the great risk that soldiers face from airborne toxins including carcinogens when serving in overseas war zones. Joe Biden’s son, Beau, an Iraq war vet died at the age of 46 due to brain cancer. that may have been caused by exposure to war zone toxins. But what applies to overseas war zone toxins also applies to the training for war zone toxins.  Not only are troops exposed to military toxins but the communities surrounding military bases are exposed as well.  Here in Hawaii, we know that among the many military toxins, is Depleted Uranium (DU) Oxide toxic dust from DU weaponry used at Pohakuloa and other sites in Hawaii. DU is recognized by many countries as a weapon of mass destruction.  After more than a decade pursuing transparency and truthfulness of environmental and health studies, we see President Biden’s statement as the first step towards banning DU weaponry and other military toxins – followed by a clean-up of the contaminated lands. The silent killer of persistent, drifting toxins, including DUOxides will affect thousands/millions of generations to follow. DU has a half-life of 4.5 BILLION YEARS. See the following link (and more links within the article) on military toxic exposure https://www.nbcnews.com/news/military/biden-administration-increase-support-veterans-exposed-toxic-burn-pits-while-n1283689

      The well known writer, Arthur Koestler remarked that if he was to name the most important date in all history he would without hesitation choose August 6, 1945, the day when the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Koestler said that ”before then each person had to live with only his or her individual death in mind; after Hiroshima we have been forced to live with the prospect of the extinction of our entire species.” Dr. Rosalie Bertell, PhD, American scientist, author, epidemiologist,  cancer researcher, public health advocate, and Catholic nun said: “The last healthy generation belongs to people born before 1945.

Today, the entire planet is a Military Sacrifice Zone!

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject violence & war as solutions. 3. Defend civil liberties.
4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, anti-Hawaiian, anti-Black, anti-Asian, etc.
5. Seek peace through peaceful means and work for justice in Hawai`i and around the world.

Malu ‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 Ola’a (Kurtistown), Hawaii 96760

Phone (808) 966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org to receive our posts. For more information www.malu-aina.org

December 3, 2021 Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet – week 1053– Fridays 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

-- 
Jim Albertini Malu 'Aina Center For Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 Ola'a (Kurtistown) Hawai'i 96760
Phone 808-966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org Visit us on the web at www.malu-aina.org

Photos from the Nov. 26, 2021 Hilo Peace Vigil

Jim Albertini Malu 'Aina Center For Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 
Ola'a (Kurtistown) Hawai'i 96760
Phone 808-966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org Visit us on the web at www.malu-aina.org

Excellent insights and analysis by

Koohan Paik-Mander

Please share this 14 min video widely.  Mahalo.

An Indigenous Peoples’ Analysis of COP26 Decisions (UN Climate Conference)

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/states-fail-adequately-address-climate-change-indigenous-peoples-analysis-cop26-decisions

It starts with the following two paragraphs:

From October 31 to November 12, 2021, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Conference of Parties (COP 26) took place in Glasgow, Scotland. As Cultural Survival reflects on the outcomes of COP26, we can’t help but feel that despite the tremendous efforts brought forth by Indigenous Peoples and our delegations from across the world, global leaders failed to act on the urgency of the climate crisis. Global leaders failed to empathize with what we, as Indigenous Peoples, experience on a daily basis– the direct impacts and catastrophes of climate change. If the climate crisis is to be abated, and if we are to reach the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5֯°C, the global community must wake up and acknowledge climate change is an urgent matter that requires true commitment and changed behaviors now.

This year, Indigenous Peoples represented the second-largest civil society delegation in attendance at COP26, second only to oil and gas lobbyists which accounted for 500+ delegates. The general feeling towards COP26 is best captured by Cultural Survival’s Lead on Brazil and COP26 delegate, Edson Krenak (Krenak), “COP26 brought us many disappointments. As always, Indigenous Peoples, as guardians of the land did not sit at the table where negotiations and decisions were made. States continue, together with corporations, to try to save the economy, capital, the money machine that is capitalism or colonialism – in this context, it is only these terms that are interchangeable, and they are not working to save the planet!”

And another paragraph further down:

Graeme Reed (Anishinabee), Co-Chair of the IIPFCC spoke about the activities of the Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples Platform (LCIPP), which was established at COP24 in 2018 in Katowice, Poland, along with the creation of a newly constituted body, the Facilitated Working Group, which has seven Indigenous representatives that are self-selected from the seven UN socio-cultural regions and seven States, “At COP26, we had the first-ever annual Knowledge Keepers Gathering. Twenty-eight knowledge keepers from around the world organized within those seven UN socio-cultural regions and we were able to actually have our own meeting that allowed us to create our own space. This is the first time ever that we’ve had a meeting within the parameters of the Blue Zone, which is the UNFCCC-controlled framework that explicitly asked States to stay out. For me, that’s just an indication of our ability and our growing ability to create space for Indigenous Peoples within these systems.” 

Just to make sure, I do not think that the outcomes of COP26 are something to celebrate in the sense of: the world´s big destruction players finally woke up/admitted their on-going crimes and made the necessary U-turn. And the authors of the article see it similarly, as you´ll see reading it.

Yet, what is indeed a deep satisfaction to me personally is the fact that Indigenous People(s) finally took up a far more prominent role in advocating their and Mother Gaia´s rights “within these systems”.

After all, that´s the major objective I have been working and fighting for during the last two decades: to turn an almost exclusively defensive Indigenous positioning – since the age of invasion and destruction euphemistically called colonialism began – into an offensive one.  To have Indigenous wisdom and sense of all-beings-justice become a major teaching tool for the entire world.

And now, it has started to happen on a global scale!

Another excerpt from the respective article:

“Now, more than ever, Indigenous Peoples and other movements will continue to unify to pressure States to respect Indigenous rights, human rights, and FPIC.  Parallel to this process, it is important to reflect on the consumerism in our households, especially in developed countries as consumers are the final clients of what is produced from extractivism. Over and over, I heard Elders say at COP26: ‘take only what you need and use it wisely’,” says Avexnim Cojti, Cultural Survival Director of Programs and COP26 delegate.       

Mass People’s Movement Needed!

The fundamental change to prevent climate catastrophe and nuclear war needs to come from the bottom up. It won’t come from the top down that put us in this crisis position. The mass movement needs to be rooted in nonviolence – kapu aloha, to protect this sacred earth and the dignity of all life.

VFP Statement on Results of COP26 (UN Climate Conference)

      If COP26 is the “last best hope for the world” as Climate Envoy John Kerry stated, the USA is largely responsible for the failure to achieve that “hope.” President Biden says the USA is “… leading by the power of our example”. The Veterans For Peace Climate Crisis & Militarism Project (CCMP) believes that the USA’s poor “example” led to the half-measures achieved at COP26.

• Why should other nations, both USA’s friends and foes, prioritize action on climate when the USA spends more in one year on so-called “defense” than the total 10-year funding for climate action proposed in Biden’s Build Back Better plan?
• Biden’s promised doubling of funds “…by 2024 to $11.4 billion per year to help developing nations deal with climate change,” is less than the funds added by Congress ($25 BILLION) to an already bloated FY 2022 military budget, (now totaling more than $778 Billion.)

      In his address at COP26, President Biden stated the climate crisis poses “…the existential threat to human existence as we know it.” Unfortunately, the actions of the Biden administration are not just inadequate, they are counterproductive. How can other countries trust the intentions of the U.S. government to prioritize a meaningful response to climate change when the U.S. expends vast resources on maintaining its global military dominance? Without the trust of other nations, the USA cannot expect international cooperation in what should be a shared effort to meaningfully address the climate crisis. Read the entire statement

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As we offer prayers during this Holy Season, let us be grounded in our responsibilities to one another and the earth we share. Justice, peace, and the environment are the keys to human survival!

Read: Who is America’s God?

America’s Abyss of Weapons and Warmaking

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/56863.htm 

Save the Planet!  Starve the War Machine!  Feed the Hungry!

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject violence & war as solutions. 3. Defend civil liberties.
4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, anti-Hawaiian, anti-Black, anti-Asian, etc.
5. Seek peace through peaceful means and work for justice in Hawai`i and around the world.

Malu ‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 Ola’a (Kurtistown), Hawaii 96760

Phone (808) 966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org to receive our posts. For more information www.malu-aina.org

November 26, 2021 Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet – week 1052– Fridays 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

— Jim Albertini Malu ‘Aina Center For Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 Ola’a (Kurtistown) Hawai’i 96760 Phone 808-966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org Visit us on the web at www.malu-aina.org