“Flashpoints” on KPFA-FM and affiliated stations
(20-minute interview begins at the 13:15 mark):
Dr. Zunes contrasts blatant censorship and violent police suppression of Gaza War campus protests with anti-apartheid protests of the 1980s.
The Progressive, May 1, 2024: Unlike apartheid-era South Africa, many universities aren’t even recognizing Israel’s human rights abuses. A wave of sit-ins and encampments have swept college and university campuses… led—as in past anti-war campus protests in 1968—by Columbia University. [source]
Truthout May 5, 2024: This phrase was never about killing Jews. It emerged in the 1960s as a call for equal rights within a democratic state. The wave of pro-Palestinian protests sweeping American campuses was triggered by Columbia University President Minouche Shafik’s order to forcibly clear a peaceful encampment [after] her grilling the previous day before a House committee… A major focus of the interrogation was the slogan…” [source]
Professor Zunes shared his nuanced understanding of the Israel-Palestine conflict with RCNV’s Executive Director, Silvia Morales. Zunes said. “Jews feel attachment to Israel, often rationalizing war crimes it commits.” RCNV and Zunes emphasize human rights and international law over ideology.
Stephen Zunes’ April 2021 report* reviews the chronology of the resistance struggle in Sudan, the critical role of nonviolent discipline, other factors contributing to the movement’s success, and the current political situation. It seeks to explain how the movement was able to succeed despite enormous odds against it, and what lessons could be learned by those facing similarly difficult circumstances. Given the serious challenges facing the new civilian-led government, there is a real possibility that—as was the case following successful pro-democracy struggles decades earlier—the military could again seize power. However, there are also reasons for hope… Download the PDF here or at *The International Center on Nonviolent Conflict (ICNC).
Sojourners Magazine: The war between Armenia and Azerbaijan was an avoidable tragedy. The disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region has been populated since at least the second century B.C.E. by Armenians, one of the world’s oldest Christian civilizations. The Muslim Azeris and others have lived there and in neighboring areas for centuries as well, and the region was ethnically mixed (albeit majority Armenian) when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991…
The Progressive October 26, 2020: President Donald Trump’s refusal to agree to a peaceful transfer of power has raised concerns that the Republicans may try to steal the 2020 Presidential Election… a growing network of organizations is already preparing to launch a large-scale civil resistance movement to defend American democracy.
ICNC October 23, 2020: Recent precedents we can learn from about how to stop attempts to overturn election results include… one in Southeast Asia, one in Africa and two in Eastern Europe… through large-scale nonviolent direct action. This article looks at these cases, and identifies key lessons.
Reposted April 2020 from Inside Arabia by ICNC,
Nonviolence International and The Conversation
Conditions under Sudan’s oppressive autocratic regime did not fit into what Western analysts see as the right ones for a successful pro-democracy civil resistance movement and yet they have emerged victorious—for now. Among other things, its success points to perhaps the single most important factor: nonviolent discipline…
International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, April 22, 2019: A powerful pro-democracy civil insurrection in Sudan which has ousted a longstanding dictator and his successor is still in progress, but Sudanese are hopeful for a full democratic transition…
The Progressive, April 10, 2019: There is little question that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is bad news. Some of its units have engaged in severe repression of nonviolent dissidents, supported Assad’s brutal counter-insurgency operations in Syria, backed hardline Islamist militia in several foreign countries, and more…
