Tag: Spirit of Humanity

Recently, I had an opportunity to speak with Cynthia McKinney, and I asked her about leadership. She replied that at the local level in the Black communities, there is leadership. It no longer gets media coverage, but it is there. Real leaders are those with the courage to dissent and to resist. It is the act of resistance that transforms an elected person into a leader.

Knowing what we do about Israel, we find it insulting to see the Israeli flag flying above the Belize flag. This is offensive to Belize and Belizeans; in Israel it is illegal for Palestinians to fly their flag. We seriously doubt that anyone could fly any flag above the Israeli flag in Israel.

On the first night of her Aug. 20-24 Triumph Tour, our sister Cynthia McKinney put a face on Gaza, Palestine, I don’t think many in the audience had seen before – I’m speaking of African Americans who are not usually the target population of such media focus. McKinney was speaking at Oakland’s landmark Grand Lake Theater, kicking off her Gaza Solidarity Triumph Tour, a series of fundraisers for the struggling SF Bay View newspaper.

Welcome former Congresswoman and presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney, the people's advocate, to your Bay Area city Thursday-Monday, Aug. 20-24. She'll discuss her stay in an Israeli prison, her triumphant trip to Gaza and the importance of independent media. Click the picture for her schedule. Check back often for updates. Cynthia is our Paul Robeson. Show her your love!

Black British filmmaker Ishmahil Blagrove was aboard Free Gaza's Spirit of Humanity, abducted by the Israeli Navy and, like Cynthia McKinney, one of the Free Gaza 21 imprisoned in an Israeli jail. He reports: "The prison population in Israel is 90 percent Black, which is why I was so welcomed by fellow inmates. There are thousands upon thousands of Africans inside the Israeli prisons."

Jubilant at finally breaking the blockade to bring aid to the people of Gaza, three Black heroes - former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, fresh out of an Israeli prison, New York City Councilman Charles Barron and M-1 of dead prez - and Viva Palestina organizer British Member of Parliament George Galloway's are interviewed by the world press. Yet U.S. media are silent. Read all about it right here.

On the 30th of June 2009, in international waters, 60 miles off the coast of Israel, Israeli Naval gunships surrounded the Free Gaza movement boat, "Spirit of Humanity," which was carrying 21 activists from 11 countries, including former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire and a cargo of medical aid, toys and building supplies for the besieged people of Gaza.

Minister of Information JR caught up with former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, the Green Party’s 2008 presidential candidate, upon her return to the U.S. from a week’s incarceration in an Israeli jail. She and the Free Gaza 21 – the crew and passengers, including political leaders, human rights workers, Nobel Peace laureate Mairead Maguire among them, and journalists, of the boat “Spirit of Humanity” – had been boarded, assaulted and kidnapped while sailing in international waters by a fleet of Israeli warships.

The world saw Israel’s despicable violence, thanks to al-Jazeera Arabic and Press TV that broadcast in English. I saw those broadcasts live and around the clock, not from the USA but from Lebanon, where my first attempt to get into Gaza had ended because the Israeli military rammed the boat I was on in international waters … It’s a miracle that I’m even here to write about my second encounter with the Israeli military, again a humanitarian mission aborted by the Israeli military.