April 30-May 1st, Days of Mourning and Resistance

Call to action below

There also be a Direct Action to Stop the
War spokescouncil on Sunday, April 25th at 4 PM, St. Boniface, 133 Golden Gate, SF.

There will definitely be a “No one is illegal” solidarity vigil with immigrants
and a main street Burlingame anti-war march on Friday, April 30th. Previously
scheduled events for these days include Critical Mass on Friday, a United for
Peace & Justice Bay Area-led procession and visual for the dead on all sides on
Saturday afternoon, and Education Not Incarceration's Saturday teach-in and
speak out at Oakland Tech.

While a new e-mail address is being set up, you can contact the organizers care
of carwil [at] falseignorance.info.

Please distribute widely! Please distribute widely! Please distribute
widely!

A Call for Days Of Mourning And Resistance Against the U.S.
Occupation of Iraq

In remembrance of those being killed in Iraq, in solidarity with all
under attack in the war for empire and the war at home...

Sponsored by Direct Action to Stop the War (DASW)

April 30th and May 1st, 2004

Saddened and angered by recent events in Iraq, and convinced that
increased resistance from within the heart of empire can undermine
and eventually stop this cruel war, we are calling for all who oppose
it to join in two days of mass direct action, public mourning, and
the building of a culture of resistance.

The vision:

We're calling for two days of gatherings, mass direct actions, and
marches, each cascading into the next. This will be a time for the
majority against empire and war to remember and resist together. In
the city centers, streets will be alive with resistance and
individual institutions involved in the war will see their day
disrupted.

We are calling for affinity groups*, workplaces, organizations and
community groups, to help orchestrate a variety of actions: office
blockades, roaming "snake" marches, jumping on transit together to
confront an institution involved in the war, rallies throughout the
region that end with their participants joining others in the city
centers. During the day, there will be regularly convergence points
to bring people to support actions wherever they occur. And the
evening of April 30th we are seeking to organize a march out of the
city center to join a community-based memorial service for those
being killed in Iraq.

We're calling for artists of all types and in all media to join in
this event, to perform or exhibit in public during these days, and
continue the ongoing work of creative culture of resistance. We will
help distribute reproducible visual art promoting these days of
mourning and resistance--please contact us if your interested.

These are just two days out of an ongoing struggle on many, many
fronts. We urge events that build continuing efforts of resistance
to a society that creates war and empire. In particular, we encourage
people to participate in Education Not Incarceration's May 1st teach
in and speak out and Oakland Technical High School.

Making it happen:

These days are not, and cannot be, a set of events produced by the
few for the passive involvement of the many. Rather, if our
resistance is to be real, it must involve the vast numbers of us who
oppose the war. Organize your friends, your workplace, your
neighborhood, your community.

Direct Action to Stop the War will be providing spaces for training
(on issues from nonviolent action to your legal rights), art making
and coordination on the weekend of April 24th and 25th. Please
contact us to get involved in making that happen, or organize local
trainings and meeting spaces in your area.

A variety of critical tasks for these days need your help. Volunteers
and organizers are needed for reconvergence points, providing legal
support, documenting actions on the days, and providing food and
medical support.

Why now?

This month has seen a major escalation in counterinsurgency warfare
in Iraq. As of the time of this call, more than 1,000 Iraqis and over
50 Americans have died. Fallujah, an entire city has been surrounded
and subjected bombardment and attack. Freedom of the press has been
denied, unarmed demonstrators have been shot, and neighborhoods
attacked from Baghdad to Najaf. 24 million Iraqis are facing an
indefinite future of military occupation and corporate colonialism.

April 30th marks two months before the mythical "transfer of
sovereignty" in Iraq. On that day, the U.S. government proposes
to "give power" to a government it has appointed, that it will
control with behind-the-scenes, in a country will continue to occupy
indefinitely filled with permanent U.S. military bases. Instead of
this deception, we demand a real withdrawal and real democracy for
the Iraqi people.

April 30th also marks just another day in the administration of
empire. On that day, stock traders, corporate managers, politicians
and diplomats will be making everyday decisions that devastate our
future. Buy helicopters and ammunition; shutter a half-dozen
schools; recruit more of the poor to become killers; build another
jail for their cousins; turn a country into a sacrifice zone for
profit; build a factory for weapons rather than human needs; evict a
community. On this day, some of these cruelties will be interrupted
by our action.

May 1st is International Workers' Day, commemorating decades of
struggle for power at the workplace, from the eight hour day to the
ability to decide what you will make, how and why. It also saw the
beginning of the four-million-student strong national strike against
the U.S. invasion of Cambodia in 1970 and a massive anti-war direct
action effort in Washington, D.C. in 1971. We continue to resist.

On both these days, in this month, and this year, thousands upon
thousands have been killed in a war for empire and greed, in the
angry blowback to this war, in the communities forsaken so that
resources might be concentrated on colonizing another people. We
will remember them as siblings, as cousins, as friends, as those who
would have grown to respect have the lines of the empire not come
between us, as those we could have joined in peace had the
explosives not reached them first.

Form or Join an Affinity Group

Get your crew together to plan and organize...

Form an affinity/action group now to get prepared. Get a group of
five to 25 of your friends, family, neighbors, co-workers, or
schoolmates to prepare for and participate in the Days Of Mourning
And Resistance. Make a plan of how you will get together, join in and
act. Send one or two people from your group to the April 25th
spokescouncil to coordinate with other groups. Participate in a
nonviolent direct action training to get prepared. Several affinity
groups can join together as a "cluster."

Links...

Direct Action to Stop the War http://actagainstwar.org/

Download & Print Flyers http://fishe.home.igc.org/war/DaysInvite.pdf