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December 19, 2007, JVP E-Newsletter
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For printable online version, go here.)
- Thank you for your support
- Philly chapter launches Trees Campaign
- Madison chapter joins JVP!
- Muzzling in Sacramento, Bay Area AIPAC, Minnesota and Tutu, and more
Thank you to all of our supporters
We know we can never thank all of you enough for having the courage to
speak out about what you know to be right, for taking the time to sign
a letter or stand outside with a sign, for choosing to donate to Jewish
Voice for Peace. Please know that we are, all of us at JVP, deeply
grateful to each of you who is working to bring true justice and
compassion to this world in all ways, big and small. We are honored to
count you as friends, supporters and activists.
Save the Date! Tu B'Shevat Seders Across the Country
Elliott
bat Tzedek and Hannah Schwarzschild of JVP's Philadelphia chapter are 2
of the leaders behind the "Trees of Reconciliation" project which aims
to replant 3,000 olive trees throughout the West Bank through the
Palestinian Fair Trade Association. The project will launch on Tu
B'Shevat on January 21, 2008.
Elliott and Hannah are developing a beautiful anti-occupation seder,
grounded in the values of social and economic justice, that explores
the meaning of trees though Jewish history, especially as they relate
to Israel and Palestine. Email Trees-at-jewishvoiceforpeace.org to join the campaign and hold your own seder. (Pictured
above, top row from left: Philly-JVP members Rebecca Subar, Sue Rouda,
Jerry Silberman. Bottom row from left: Hannah Schwarzschild, Susan
Landau, Rachael Kamel )
Madison, WI launches JVP chapter.
It is with tremendous excitement that we announce that JVP-Madison has
joined our family as our tenth chapter. Congrats to Tsela Barr, Judith
Laitman, Haley Pollack, (Sydney, Judith and Tsela pictured above)
and the rest of our friends in snowy Wisconsin! We know we are in good
hands. Check out what they had to say in this important op-ed in the
Capital Times: "Jews need to speak out on abuse of Palestinians"

Chapters and campaigns director Sydney Levy is on a whirlwind tour of chapters in Seattle, Detroit, Chicago, Madison, Philly and Boston.
Photo: Sydney Levy with Detroit-JVP members Barbara Harvey, Barbara Barefield and Barbara Stahler-Sholk.
COlor of Jews, No Light in Gaza, Muzzling in Sacramento, HaHRP back, AIPAC in the Bay Area, Tutu in Minnesota and more
JVP Advisory Board member MelanieKaye/Kantrowitz's new book,The Colors of Jews: Racial Politics and Radical Diasporism is available now.
Tony Kushner says:"This is a big and important book...Melanie
Kaye/Kantrowitz throws open to questioning every assumption about the
meaning of race, identity and justice . . ."
For the second year in a row, during Hanukkah, many chapters distributed thousands of "There is no Light in Gaza" postcards to Condi Rice about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Fresh back from the largest delegatio n yet to Israel and Palestine, JVP co-chair Howard Lenow (pictured at right with 2 young friends in the West Bank, photo by Juliette Shimkin) and fellow JVP Boston member Jeff Klein were interviewed on the Arabic Hour about the Health and Human Rights Project delegation. Check out the group's blog here. Richard Colbeth-Hess, also on the HaHRP delegation, participated in this nonviolent protest with 100 Palestinians, Israelis and internationals who marched to Route 443 to protest Israel's denia l of the Palestinian right to free movement within their own territory.(Photo below: HaHRP delegate Juliette Shimkin on right with 2 young girls at the Jenin Freedom Theater.)
Dr. Alice Rothchild, author of "Broken Promises, Broken Dreams", who was also part of the HaHRP trip, continues to travel across the country, and write op-eds like this one, the The Judaization of East Jerusalem, in the Salt Lake City Tribune. When the Sacramento chapter asked the local Jewish Federation Jewish paper to print her speaking schedule, they were muzzled. Sacramento News and Review wrote Muzzle Off!, an extended profile of the Sacramento JVP chapter, Alice, and the incident.

Meanwhile, San Francisco Bay Area chapter members sold 3 cases of
Palestinian olive oil at Kehillah Community Synagogue Hanukkah events.
Many chapter members also gathered outside of various AIPAC meetings to
say AIPAC does not speak for them. (Pictured above from left, selling olive oil: Jackie Brookman, Zoe Goorman and Phylece Snyder.)
JVP Chair Henri Picciotto has a letter about McCarthyism in the Jewish community in The Nation this week.
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency's managing editor suggested JVP Communications Director Cecilie Surasky be named one of the Forward's 50 most influential Jews of the year for her work on Muzzlewatch. She will be speaking on December 27 in St Paul, MN on "Silencing the Peacemakers" and JVP's successful campaign to get the Univ. of St Thomas to overturn their ban on Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
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