The following action alert was sent by World Can’t Wait:

Protest! Tuesday, June 1
Federal Building, 3-6pm
Condemn the Killing of Unarmed Peace Activists!
End All U.S. Support for Israel!

As many as 19 activists in a flotilla carrying 700 activists and tons of emergency supplies to Gaza have been murdered by Israeli commandos! (ABC and US news reports 9; Al Jazeera reports “as many as 19”.) The flotilla was in international waters. Netenyahu as announced he supports Israel’s action; he says he’ s spoken with Obama since it happened. Protests are happening around the world.

As many of you know, Ann Wright was on the flotilla. It has been reported that she was not on the ship that was boarded, and where people were killed. All communication with people on the flotilla has been cut off. The satellite beaming Al-Jazeera news (which was on board) has been blocked. Activists have been taken into Israeli custody; some are being deported and others are remaining in Israeli prisons. News is breaking fast.

There will be a protest in front of the Federal Building tomorrow afternoon from 3-6pm. We urge everyone to be there! Spread the word and organize your friends. If you can’t make it at 3pm, come as soon as you can. We’ll have some signs, along with blank cardboard and pens, but bring your own if you can.

Because it is a holiday, the Federal Building will be shut down today. However, there’s lots you can do. Send letters to the editors. Send message to politicians (Djou is an outspoken Israel supporter!).

Following is a national press release from World Can’t Wait. It provides news links for the latest information.

We condemn the Israeli military attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla in international waters last evening. Al Jazeera’s most recent report says 19 international solidarity activists were killed, and dozens injured on 6 ships attempting to deliver humanitarian aid, and to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza. There were 700 activists in the six ship flotilla, withmany journalists and Arab and European members of parliaments on board. All were unarmed, part of a non-violent effort to awaken world public opinion to the desperate state of the people of Gaza.

Find reports at witness. Adam Shapiro of the Free Gaza Movement, speaking at 3:30 am EST, told Democracy Now from New York what he had learned. The FGM supporters rep orted live to Adam during the attack that the IDF forces came about the ship firing. CNN and the Israeli government are reporting that activists came after the heavily armed IDF commandos with “axes.”

Our friend, and advisor to War Criminals Watch, Ann Wright had been on the largest ship attacked, but moved to another ship in the flotilla before 1,000 Israeli commandos boarded the ships, and began shooting, according to news sources. The AP reports that 9 were killed in the IDF’s “botched raid” and that Israel had taken all 700 activists — presumbly including the injured — into custody, jailing some and preparing to deport others from Beersheba.

The attack has already brought protests and condemnation in Turkey and across the globe. The world condemns the killing of unarmed peace activists, and knows that the number one supporter, financially and politically, of Israel is the United States.

World Can’t Wait calls on you to join protests wh erever you are!”

PAN-PACIFIC RALLY TO DEMILITARIZE THE PACIFIC:

SOLIDARITY WITH OKINAWA, GUAM, TOKUNO ISLAND, KOREA & HAWAI`I

END THE OCCUPATION OF FUTENMA!

PRINCE KUHIO FEDERAL BUILDING, HONOLULU (300 ALA MOANA BLVD & PUNCHBOWL)

FRIDAY, MAY 14, 2010 4:30-6:30

On May 16, 2010, Okinawans will be encircling Futenma Marine Corps Air Station in Ginowan City, Okinawa, forming a human chain around the enormous military base as a vote of mass opposition and solidarity against further base expansion in Okinawa, particularly Henoko in northern rural Okinawa, the proposed site of Futenma’s relocation.   On May 14, diverse people of O`ahu will gather in solidarity with the Futenma rally and other people’s movements throughout the Pacific.

However, this isn’t just about Okinawa.  This is an international problem.  US military forces are deployed in 130 countries around the world, with permanent bases in 50 nations and growing.  Because of local resistance in Okinawa, alternative sites have been proposed, such as in Guam and Tokuno Island in the Ryukyu Archipelago (north of Okinawa).  From the illegal overthrow and military occupation of Hawai`i in 1893, the US, along with other colonizers, have occupied nations throughout the Pacific with military forces and agendas.  We stand with our Pasifika sisters & brothers united against further military occupation and expansion, including localities not mentioned in this appeal.

We demand the clean-up and return of lands back to civil societies to restore true human security and self-determination throughout our island homes.  Recent proposals to relocate forces from Okinawa to Guam, the Marianas, and Tokuno Island are just spreading this problem.  This is not a “not in my backyard” movement, but a “no militarism anywhere” unity rally.  To date, policy makers have not listened to island residents, so we unite as an ohana (family), defending our rights, our homes, our human security and our legacies.   Similarly, we want occupation armed forces to return to their home fronts, to help rebuild their communities and ultimately our collective human security.

US Armed Forces invaded Lu Chu (b.k.a. Okinawa) in 1945, and have never left.  Taking over and expanding Imperial Japanese airfields built by conscripted Okinawans, US military continued to occupy almost 20% of the island of Okinawa, including Futenma Marine Corps Air Station.  Called “the most dangerous airfield” by former Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, the Japanese and US governments agreed to Okinawan demands for the reduction of military occupation, including Futenma MCAS, which sits in the middle of urban Ginowan City, surrounded by neighborhoods, schools, hospitals and local business that must live with overhead jets and constant fear of accidents, such as the helicopter crash into Okinawa International University in 2004.  In addition to inevitable accidents and the social problems resulting from foreign military occupation, communities around Futenma must endure up to 200 decibel-shrieking flights a day over their neighborhoods and studies have found disproportionate low-weight births and lower academic outcomes in surrounding schools attributed to the noise pollution.  Slated for closure by 2014, Japanese Prime Minister Hatoyama recently announced that complete closure of Futenma is now somehow “impossible.”

Among the tired excuses for continued military occupation of Okinawa is the Cold War relic North Korea.  For 60 years, militarist strategies have failed to end the war between the Koreas.  It is clear that these militant policies don’t resolve conflict, but acerbate tensions, suffering and militarism on all fronts.  We call for peaceful resolution to such conflicts through diplomatic, cultural and economic exchange towards our collective security, as militaristic approaches have failed.  We link our struggles for peace with the people of the Koreas, sisters and brothers divided by failed, archaic politics.

Guahan, better known as the US colony of Guam, has shown widespread opposition to the resettlement of occupational forces from Okinawa to Guam that will overwhelm the fragile ecology of this even smaller island and reef system.  Meanwhile, other Micronesian and Mariana islands have been considered for relocation, while islanders disproportionately serve and die as fodder for a foreign commander-in-chief they could never vote for as non-citizens, nor serve as officers in this military poverty draft.

As island cousins, we sound the call to unite for our common defense against all forms of militarism and colonization, and our collective aspirations for international peace through social justice, sustainability, self-determination and mutual support.  After WWII, Okinawans in Hawai`i came together to help war-torn Okinawa; it is time we come support again.  Supporters include: DMZ-Hawai`i Aloha Aina, AFSC-Hawai`i, Ohana Koa NFIP and Buddhist Peace Fellowship-O`ahu; contact us to add your associations.

Parking is limited to streets, so consider carpooling and bus.  Feel free to bring signs, banners, instruments, friends and family to this unity rally committed to non-violence and popular sovereignty.

Yuimaaru/Laulima/Solidarity,

HOA (Hawai`i Okinawa Alliance)

Pete Shimazaki Doktor dok@riseup.net

Jamie Oshiro 808-728-0062

Impacted Sites

http://hoa.seesaa.net/

ANTHROPOLOGY COLLOQUIUM SERIES

U.S. Military Bases and Funshi (Feng Shui): The Anti-Base Movement and Community Development in Yomitan, Okinawa

Tomoaki Hara

Associate Professor of Anthropology, Shizuoka University, Japan

Thursday, April 22nd at 3:00 pm, in Crawford Hall 115

The 1997 city master plan of Yomitan Village, Okinawa, is unique in all of Japan in that it uses funshi (“feng shui”) as one of its key concepts. In the Ryukyu Kingdom prior to the 1879 annexation, feng shui was mainly used by the noble classes and played an important role in governmental public works projects. After the Meiji period, feng shui was introduced into the daily lives of the former commoner people in Okinawa and transformed into funshi. This paper considers the use of funshi by these Okinawan city planners as an example of the cultural identities forged by Yomitan’s community development in its struggle against U.S. military bases established during and after World War II. To properly contextualize the evolution of this unique anti-base movement and community development from the 1970s to the present day, this paper also traces the history of Yomitan before, during, and after the war. Special consideration is given to this movement’s value of bunka (“culture”), its unprecedented construction of public facilities on U.S. military bases, and villagers’ memory of their pre-war land.

Tomoaki Hara is currently a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at UH Mānoa and the East-West Center. He has been conducting ethnographic and historical research in Okinawa and Hawai’i which focuses on the intersections of memory, media, community, and identity of the Okinawan people both within and outside Okinawa. His Japanese publications include Domesticating Electronic Media: A New Perspective of Cross-Cultural Field Studies (co-edited with T. Iida, Serika Shobo 2005) and The Dynamics of Folk Culture: The Interweaving of Folk, Official, Popular, and Academic Culture in Yonaguni, Okinawa (Doseisha 2000). He has also published one of the most extensive English-language review articles on the history of Okinawan studies in Japan, available at: http://office-hara.travel-way.net/contents/okinawanstudies.pdf.

Co-sponsored with the Center for Okinawan Studies.

For further information, please contact Anthropology at anthprog@hawaii.edu.