Listen, Ring, Scream - 100,000 Bells Will Toll

Wednesday, October 26th is the fourth anniversary of the Listening Project, a weekly event, where questions have been raised about September 11th, the government’s response, how to defuse terrorism, and how to create a safer, better world for all children; the questions remain the same, but the answers have changed over time. This Wednesday, in Palo Alto’s Lytton Plaza, in addition to listening, from 10 am until 2:20 pm, a bell will be rung every minute, in memory of the 100,000 Iraqi victims of the current war. There will also be a microphone, and the opportunity to scream or speak loudly, on behalf of the Pakistani victims of the most deadly earthquake in modern times.

Voices for Creative Nonviolence and Justice Not Vengeance have called for bell-ringing ceremonies to grieve and protest the deaths of Iraqis in the war and occupation. Bells will be rung in the US, the U.K. and Switzerland. Locally, bells will also be rung in Oakland, October 25th, in San Francisco on October 27th, and on October 28th in Marin. As people opposed to war, we act to end the silence about the suffering and death in Iraq and to publicly unlock the grief that it has caused in our communities. 100 communities, each ringing a bell 1,000 times, would equal 100,000 rings, the estimated death toll of Iraqi civilians in the Lancet study.

Scream for those in Pakistan. 100,000 people may perish, if they do not receive help soon, before the winter sets in. The death toll continues to rise between 75,000 and 80,000 officially, with over 3 million people facing the winter homeless. The international community has been slow to respond to the crisis.

Umair Khan wrote: “Scream.”

“Spare a scream for the 100,000 dead and 3 million homeless, muted out of world media.

“Unmourned by the news media, unmarked by the world, Saturday October 22 was the two week anniversary of the 7.6 magnitude earthquake in Pakistan, India, and Kashmir. An estimated 100,000 have been killed and, of the 3 million made homeless, at least another 100,000 are in high peril as winter rolls down from nearby K-2. If they perish, they would surely have been suffocated by the silent air waves.

“For the 3 million homeless the bell tolls noiselessly. Beyond Pakistan's national news media, their coverage is a silent movie playing out on inside pages (if at all). Four more weeks of radio (and print and TV) silence and the region will become as quiet and stone cold as the news media. The news folks whose attention to the tragedy has declined as swiftly as the deaths have mounted, may finally get to report a "frozen" death toll. In four weeks, winter too will white-out the survivors.

“Intense and swift and whole-hearted as the response has been among the compassionate and the aware, it has been far too noiseless. For Pakistanis, for Kashmiris, for South Asians, for Asians, for humans and for humanity everywhere, this is not the time for whispered tears, silent if ardent prayers, mumbled grumblings, and soundless emails.

“This is the time to scream.

“Not in despair, or panic, or anger. But in recognition and in resonance. This is the time to broadcast the unbroadcasted. And this time expires in 4 weeks. There will be little point to being heard after that.

“There have been No vigils to mark the disaster... No minute of silence at 8:51am. No protest march (silent or loud) against NATO's refusal to airlift the injured. No sit-ins to demand of governments the desperately needed helicopters, tents, medicine, monetary aid. And no demonstrations in front of the oblivious offices of world media.”

Sponsors- WILPF, American Muslim Voice (http://www.amuslimvoice.org), Voices for Creative Nonviolence (http://vcnv.org/)
To Help Earthquake Victims go to- http://www.saquake.org and http://www.opensiliconvalley.com