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February 25, 2010
Contact Steve Miller
Day 419-242-7317
For Immediate Release
Catholic Sister Gives First Hand Account
from Palestine
On Sunday , February 28, at 2:00 P.M. in Corpus Christi University
Parish (2955 Dorr St.) a coalition of groups (Arab Student Union, Media
Decompression Collective, Northwest Ohio Peace Coalition) will sponsor
a talk given by Sr. Paulette Schroeder. Sister Paulette will be
speaking about her recent fact finding in Hebron, Palestine..
Sister Paulette, a Franciscan Nun and Member of the Christian
Peacemaker Team, has been to the Middle East several times reporting on
conditions in Palestine and the surrounding occupied territories. As a
member of the Christian Peacemaker Team, Sr. Paulette, in the Christian
tradition of bearing witness, will be reporting about the circumstances
of her visit through personal testimony and photographs of the daily
reality of living in Palestine. As opposed to those merely report about
Palestine, Sr. Paulette will share the unique perspective of one who
has lived with the people of Palestine.
Steve Miller, of the peace coalition, said, “Sr. Paulette’s compelling
account of the plight of the Palestinian people is something we all
need to hear.” Mr. Miller added,“ Sr. Paulette doesn’t just report the
news from Palestine, she is the news from Palestine.”
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December 31, 2001
Contact Steve Miller
Day 419-242-7317
For Immediate Release
Local Peace Group Sponsors Rally and March
Stop the Siege of Gaza
On Sunday, January 3, members and friends of the Northwest Ohio Peace
Coalition will be commemorating Israel’s attack on Gaza a year ago. A
rally, followed by a march, will begin at 2:00 pm at the intersection
of Talmadge and Sylvania. The march will begin with a few words from
representatives of the participating organizations. The assembled will
march around the boundaries the Westfield Shopping Mall staying on the
public sidewalk.
The action is in concert with others taking place around the United
States commemorating the Israeli bombardment of Gaza. In addition to
the commemoration the ongoing blockade and its effect on people of Gaza
will addressed.
Peace Coalition member, Steve Miller, said “Israel’s bombing of Gaza
left over 1,400 people dead and the infrastructure of the area
devastated. Since that time the ongoing blockade of Gaza has prevented
essential supplies from being delivered. The loss of life and
infrastructure and the ongoing blockade has created the worst kind of
alchemy, an angry and desperate population.“ Mr. Miller added “Israel’s
disproportionate attack on Gaza in retaliation for rocket launches
should remind us of Mahatma Gandhi’s admonition, ‘An eye for a eye and
a tooth for a tooth leaves the whole world blind and toothless.’” He
added “The United States must use its influence as Israel’s primary
provider of military assistance to demand an end to the blockade and
open the borders to much needed assistance”
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November 29, 2009
Contact Steve Miller
Day 419-242-7317
For Immediate Release
Peace Group Vigils to Send Obama Pre-Press
Conference Message
Withdraw, Don’t Deploy!
On
Tuesday, December 1, members and friends of the Northwest Ohio Peace
Coalition will hold a candle light vigil for peace in Afghanistan. The
vigil will be held at 5:30pm at the intersection of Talmadge and
Monroe. The observance is being held to send the Obama administration a
message to draw down, not build up, troops in Afghanistan.
In light of President Obama’s scheduled 8:00 pm press conference, local
peace activists will be joining others around the state and nation
saying no to a build up in Afghanistan.
Member of the Peace Coalition, Steve Miller, said “If reports of a
35,000 troop build up are meant as a trial balloon, I say deflate it,
it won’t float” the former army veteran added, “We should learn from
the Soviets. Victory, however defined, is illusory given the political
and tribal geography of Afghanistan. Let’s stop it now before more have
to die!”
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Northwest Ohio Coalition for Single Payer
September 13, 2009
Contact Steve Miller
Day 419-242-7317
For Immediate Release
Local Coalition Rallies for Single Payer
Healthcare
On Wednesday, September 16, the Northwest Ohio Coalition for Single
Payer will be holding a "Healthcare not Warfare" rally at the Lucas
County Courthouse at 5:00 pm. The rally will feature speakers
advocating national single payer healthcare. The rally is scheduled
from 5:00 pm to approximately 5:30 pm at which point a march is
scheduled from the courthouse to One Government Center. At the
Government Center, some brief closing remarks will end the event.
The featured speakers will be representing their respective
constituencies. The coalition consists of University of Toledo
Anti-War, Toledo International Socialist Organization, Northwest Ohio
Peace Coalition, Single Payer Action Network of Ohio, Northwest Ohio
Green Party and Physicians for a National Health Program.
Steve Miller of the Northwest Ohio Peace Coalition said, "With the
money we're spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan we could fund
a national healthcare program that would be of real and lasting benefit
for all Americans" the former army veteran added, "Dr King said 'A
nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military
defense than programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.'
At times like these Dr King's admonition seems disturbingly prophetic."
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For
Immediate Release
May 7, 2009
Contact Steve Miller
Day 419-242-7317
Local Peace Group Commemorates Mother's Day
Anti-War Message
On Sunday, May 10, members and friends of the Northwest Ohio Peace
Coalition will be displaying a large Mother's Day anti-war proclamation
at Heatherdowns and Reynolds from noon to 1:30 pm. A large display of
placards printed with Julia Ward Howe's Mother's Day anti-war
proclamation (included separately) will be the focus of the
demonstration.
In 1872, suffragist, pacifist and social activist Julia Ward Howe
penned a Mother's Day statement widely believed to be the origin of
the first Mother's Day. Those attending the event will be wearing black
in the tradition of the Women in Black peace network.
Peace group member Kelli Zenz and mother of three said "I'm a firm
believer in peace and wouldn't want my children to do anybody harm or
to be harmed".
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For
Immediate Release
April 29, 2009
Contact Steve Miller
Day 419-242-7317
Peace Group Decries U.S. Deaths During
Obama’s First 100 Days
On Friday, May 1, members and friends of the Northwest Ohio Peace
Coalition will be holding a picket at the corner of Secor and Central
Avenues from 4:30 to 6:00 pm. The purpose of the demonstration is to
express the disappointment of local peace activists to President
Obama’s first hundred days in office.
Steve Miller, a member of the peace group, said “President Obama ran on
a platform on of “bring the troops home” not bring them home from Iraq
in due time while increasing troop strength in Afghanistan.” The
Veterans for Peace member added “After the administration of George
Bush I thought we had an ally in the white house. His first hundred
days have been a profound disappointment”
Jeff Klein, a member of the peace group, constructed a number of large
signboards reading “Obama’s Watch:
Day 100 – U.S. Troop Deaths: Iraq ,
Afghanistan (followed by the current total)” as a visible
statement and
display.
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For immediate release May 8, 2008
Contact:
Like
the First Mother’s Day in
1870,
Women Today
Mourn War Dead, Plea for Peace
Mother’s Day Vigil,
Sunday May 11, corner of Reynolds and Heatherdowns from noon to
1:30pm.
We ask all
who attend to wear black and stand silently during this event.
The
following lines are among those from Howe’s statement that will be
displayed on large posters and held for passing motorists to see on
Reynolds Rd.
"Our
husbands shall not come to us reeking with carnage, for caresses and
applause."
"Our sons
shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to
teach them of charity, mercy, and patience."
"We women of
one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our
sons to be trained to injure theirs."
"From the
bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own. It says,
"Disarm, Disarm!”
Mother’s
Day wasn’t always about shopping for flowers or jewelry. On
the
first Mother’s Day in 1870, Julia Ward Howe -- reformer, writer, peace
activist, and suffragette -- called for mothers everywhere to raise
their voices and bring an end to all war. Her anguished
Proclamation (attached) remains timely to this day.
On
this Mother’s Day, the North West Ohio Peace Coalition invites all area
women – and men who support them – to join with us in mourning the tens
of thousands of lives lost in Iraq and Afghanistan. We invite
residents to stand silently in recognition of the thousands of mothers,
grandmothers, wives, daughters, and sisters who grieve the death of a
loved one – an American, an Iraqi, an Afghan – on this 138th annual
commemoration of what is one of history’s most eloquent pleas for peace.
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For
Immediate Release March 21, 2008
Sue Carter 419-729-7273
Peggy
Daly-Masternak 734-457-2394, Ext.
3
For
Iraq
War’s 5th
Anniversary Peace Groups Rally to Say: Not One More Death!!
At
11:00 am on Saturday, March 22, area citizens will gather at Toledo
Promenade Park on Summit Street in downtown Toledo (next to the COSI
building) to hear the remarks of Marine veteran, Wes Liggett, who
speaks out against the war and urges us to support the troops when they
return home. Liggett, from South
Bend, Indiana, was deployed to Iraq three times. From
Promenade Park the activists will walk to the site of the Arlington
Midwest display of 5,000 tombstones on the Lucas
County courthouse lawn. After a
solemn closing ceremony, participants will take down the tombstones.
“We
hope we will never need to add another one,” states Peggy
Daly-Masternak organizer from the NW Ohio Peace Coalition. “This
rally and march is the last in a series
of events to mark the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq but
people of peace will continue to protest until this war end and the
troops return.” For over 6 years,
the NW Ohio Peace Coalition holds an anti-war demonstration every
Sunday on a Toledo street corner.
The
week of peace activities is co-sponsored by 37 organizations including
communities of faith, campus groups and labor unions from Toledo,
Fostoria, Tiffin, and Adrian Detroit and Monroe Michigan.
######
Endorsing
organizations:
*UT
Anti-War - Tiffin Pax Christi - Pax Christi of Corpus Christi
University Parish - Fostoria Area Citizens for Peace - People for Peace
and Justice Sandusky County - Green Party of Northwest Ohio - Toledo
Area Jobs With Justice Coalition - Sylvania Sisters of St. Francis -
Pax Christi Wood County - NAACP Toledo Unit - Broadmead Monthly Meeting
(Quakers) - St. Paul's United Methodist Church - Interfaith Justice and
Peace Center - Toledo NOW - Flowing Waters Sangha - International
Socialist Organization - Ursuline Sisters - Military Families Speak Out
Ohio - Toledo Area Committee on Central America - Adrian Dominicans
Office of Global Missions - Lenawee Peacemakers - Servants of the
Immaculate Heart of Mary, Monroe - Sisters of St. Francis, Tiffin -
AFSCME Local 2415 University of Toledo Medical Center - St. Rose
Catholic Church Peace and Justice Committee - Farm Labor Organizing
Committee - Monroe for Peace and Justice - Media
Decompression
Collective - October 15 Anarchist Collective - St. Mark’s
Episcopal Church - Voices for Peace and Justice - Millions More
Movement Local Organizing Committee - St. Johns Jesuit Social Justice
Alliance - Detroit Province of the Society of Jesus - The Servant
Leadership Center
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For
Immediate Release
Sue Carter 419-729-7273
Peggy
Daly-Masternak 734-457-2394, Ext.
3 March 17, 2008
Peace
Groups Mark 5th Anniversary of the Iraq Invasion, March 19.
At
the display site of 5,000 tombstones, activists hold a 12 hour vigil to
read names of U.S. military and Iraqi citizens who have died.
At
8:00 AM on Wednesday, March 19, the fifth anniversary of the invasion
of Iraq, area citizens and activists will gather in a 12 hour vigil at
the Lucas County Courthouse on Adams Street in downtown Toledo to read
the names of U.S. military and Iraqi citizens who have died. The
courthouse is the site of Arlington
Midwest: The Human Cost of War
, a display of 5,000 tombstones of those who have died in the
wars in Iraq, in Afghanistan and when they return home by
suicide. A candle light reading will start at 6:30
P.M. Both at 8:00 AM and at 6:30 PM, after the bugler plays taps,
readers
will begin with the names of the Ohio fallen.
“The 5,000 tombstones of Arlington Midwest
try to depict the human cost of war and we read the names so we can
remember and grieve for each of them,” states Anna Colnar, member
of Military Families Speak Out, an organization of military families
opposed to the war in Iraq. “The devastation caused by this
war is beyond repair and yet after 5 years there is no end in
sight! We need to stop this madness now, bring our troops
home,
give the Iraqis back their country and use the $275 million dollars
(current according to National Priorities Project) we spend each day on
war and death to heal and rebuild both of our nations.”
Volunteers will be setting up the tombstones on Tuesday, March
18. Arlington Midwest
is the project of the NW Ohio Peace Coalition and Veterans for Peace
and is supported and co-sponsored by 35 organizations from Ohio and
Michigan including communities of faith, labor unions and campus
groups*.
######
*UT
Anti-War - Tiffin Pax Christi - Pax Christi of Corpus Christi
University Parish - Fostoria Area Citizens for Peace - People for Peace
and Justice Sandusky County - Green Party of Northwest Ohio - Toledo
Area Jobs With Justice Coalition - Sylvania Sisters of St. Francis -
Pax Christi Wood County - NAACP Toledo Unit - Broadmead Monthly Meeting
(Quakers) - St. Paul's United Methodist Church - Interfaith Justice and
Peace Center - Toledo NOW - Flowing Waters Sangha - International
Socialist Organization - Ursuline Sisters - Military Families Speak Out
Ohio - Toledo Area Committee on Central America - Adrian Dominicans
Office of Global Missions - Lenawee Peacemakers - Servants of the
Immaculate Heart of Mary, Monroe - Sisters of St. Francis, Tiffin -
AFSCME Local 2415 University of Toledo Medical Center - St. Rose
Catholic Church Peace and Justice Committee - Farm Labor Organizing
Committee - Monroe for Peace and Justice - Media
Decompression
Collective - October 15 Anarchist Collective - St. Mark’s
Episcopal Church - Voices for Peace and Justice - Millions More
Movement Local Organizing Committee - St. Johns Jesuit Social Justice
Alliance - Detroit Province of the Society of Jesus - The Servant
Leadership Center
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For
Immediate Release
Sue Carter
419-729-7273
Peggy
Daly-Masternak 734-457-2394, Ext.
3 February 28, 2008
Peace
Groups Mark 5th
Anniversary of the Iraq Invasion with Week of Activity
5,000
Tombstones Will
Stand on the Courthouse Lawn
See
complete program
below
From
March 18th
through March 22nd, co-sponsors will stage Arlington
Midwest:
the Human Cost of War at the
Lucas County Courthouse. 5,000 tombstones create this display,
including US service members
killed in Iraq and Afghanistan and those returning home and
committing suicide. Also included are the names of 3,000 Iraqis out
of over a million killed.
Complete
Program:
- March 18 at 11:30 a.m. at
Lucas County Courthouse: Dozens of volunteers will
spend the
day erecting 5,000 tombstones on the courthouse lawn.
- March 19 at 8:00 a.m. at
Courthouse: Opening ceremony of Arlington Midwest
and the
start of the reading the names of the fallen, beginning with Ohio.
- March 19 at 6:30 p.m. at
Courthouse: Candlelight vigil for the fallen and
the reading
of names continues.
- March 10 at 7:00 p.m. at UT
Law School: Colonel Ann Wright, former
State
Department official who resigned in protest to the plan to invade
Iraq. She will sign copies of her newly released book, Dissent:
Voices of Conscience.
- March 20 at 6:30:
documentary film: Sir!
No Sir! at
Sanger Library. “Sir! No Sir!”
documents for
the first time on film the underground GI movement against the war in
Vietnam.
- March 22, 11:00 a.m., peace
activists rally at Promenade Park and march to the
Lucas
County Courthouse for a rally and closing ceremony for Arlington
Midwest tombstone display. Speaker is South Bend USMC veteran, Wes
Liggett, deployed to Iraq three times.
Sponsored
by: Northwest Ohio Peace Coalition and University of Toledo Anti-War.
Co-sponsors include Tiffin Pax Christi; Pax Christi of Corpus Christi
University Parish; Fostoria Area Citizens for Peace; People for Peace
and Justice Sandusky County; Veterans for Peace; Green Party of
Northwest Ohio; Toledo Area Jobs With Justice Coalition; Sylvania
Sisters of St. Francis; Pax Christi Wood County; NAACP Toledo Unit;
Broadmead Monthly Meeting (Quakers); St. Paul’s United
Methodist
Church; Interfaith Justice and Peace Center; Toledo NOW; and
International Socialist Organization.
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