The Green Party Stance on Palestine and Israel
Conflicts in the Middle-East are a strong part of many political agendas, but they tend to focus on the conflicts where the U.S. is directly involved. One situation that is often disregarded to too great of a degree is the conflict between Israel and Palestine. The violent clash between the two sees much bloodshed, and the Green Party saw a need to create a full statement in November of 2005.
The following points were struck on in the official statement:
1. A demand that Israel be boycotted and non-recognized until such a time that they fully restore the rights to the Palestinian people, both as individuals and as a group.
2. That all Green Party groups, associated groups, or supporting entities join in boycotting Israel entirely.
3. That governments around the globe needed to boycott Israel in a similar manner, and that individual states within the U.S. should join in this cause.
4. That all Campus Greens (a student organization of Green Party members) should work alongside other groups within their campus, as well as their campus administration, in order to make sure their entire institution was effectively boycotting Israel.
5. That all groups affiliated with the anti-war efforts of the Green Party (most notably the Green Peace Action Committee) should both a) boycott Israel as an institution and b) encourage all others they are associated with to do likewise.
6. That the international committee of the Green Party was to work with all other Green organizations and other associated groups across the globe in order to achieve international support of this boycott.
While the boycott itself didn’t see a strong amount of support on a high echelon of the political spectrum, numerous institutions, online degree programs and some regions sponsored the boycott. Other political action groups with a similar outlook on the conflict used the GP boycott as the foundation for their own action.
Iraqi War and Peace
- Image by Getty Images via @daylife
War and Peace. Not only a title of a famous book but it is also an issue that the Green Party strongly stands by. There isn’t one person that loves war, but many who feel that war is the answer to settle disputes between nations. Not only are many lives lost of those that fight the wars but there are many lives of innocent people indirectly involved in the war that are lost. Many men, women, and children are killed by bombs and enemy fire.
As of September 7, 2010 the total number of deaths in the Iraqi War was 4,418, with 3,495 of those deaths in combat. With that, there have been approximately between 97,000 to 106,000 documented civilian deaths in Iraq. Those are innocent victims that did not have a choice and unfortunately had to pay the price.
The cost of the Iraqi War is over $150 billion a year, yes “billion”. It costs approximately $390,000 to deploy a soldier to Iraq for just one year. That is an absurd amount money for a war and it certainly doesn’t compensate for the life lost of even one of the soldiers.
Many families are losing a son or daughter, niece or nephew, brother or sister? Think of the little children that have to see their Mom or Dad leave for a long period of time or never come back. When reading articles on both sides there are good points brought to our attention. But, the bottom line is, no human life is worth losing over a war, American or not.
There have been many wars, and with that, many people who oppose war. The Green Party stands by their position that war is not effective or justifiable to settle disputes among nations and strongly urges the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq with the assistance of the UN Coalition.