Islamophobia and the Media
1.Yvonne
Ridley Speaking 2. Hazera Begum Speaking
On Friday October 8th 2010 a varied
audience of around 80
students and people from the community attended a public meeting on
Islamophobia and the Media jointly organised by
Tyneside Stop the War
Coalition and hosted by the Politics, Militarism, Space Research
Cluster of
Newcastle University's school of Geography, Politics and Sociology 4
speakers
addressed the meeting. Chaired by Tony Dowling the speakers were Dr
Nick
Megoran Lecturer in Human Geography, Hazera Begum former head sister
for Muslim
students at Northumbria University and supporter of Stop the War
Coalition,
Zeinab Raza, from InspireMe Islam, Newcastle and Yvonne Ridley, writer,
campaigner and broadcaster.
Listen to the speeches (MP3):
Nick Megoran
Hazera Begum.
Zeinab Raza
Yvonne Ridley
Tyneside Stop the War Coalition Reads the
Names of the Dead at Newcastle Monument
On Saturday June 26 Tyneside Stop the war War
Coalition held a reading of the names of the dead at Newcastle Monument at
1pm. A number of activists from the Coalition on Tyneside and South
Tyneside and the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign took part.
That 66 British soldiers have been killed this year and
unaccounted numbers of Afghans. The tragic occasion was marked by the
reading of the names of all 307 (now 308) names of British soldiers
and 300 Afghan names of those killed by the NATO
occupation as representative of the over 30,000s murdered by
the unjust occupation of Afghanistan.
June 26th marked asArmed Forces Day by the ruling
elite in Britain was manipulated by the monopoly media to bolster their unjust
war and justify the deaths. The Stop the War Coalition, in
opposition to this cynical manipulation, supported the soldiers and the
people of Britain in the best possible way by calling for the troops
home now, to end this slaughter, cut the war and its massive cost and end the
militarisation of the economy and the billions being spent on the war and
Trident and oppose massive cuts being imposed on the people here. Many
people came up and signed the contact list of the Tyneside Stop the War
Coalition.
Grey's Monument Protest in
Newcastle Against the Criminal
Israeli Attack on Gaza Freedom Flottilla
After days in which the terrible
news that 20 peace activists have been killed by the Israeli navy with
others
injured when they were part of the Freedom Flotilla taking aid to the
beseiged
people of Gaza, several hundred people gathered at the Monument
Newcastle on
Tuesday June 1st, 2010 to condemn the Israel's brutal killing of
activists and
show solidarity with the Freedom Flotilla Mission. The emergency
protest
organised by Tyneside Palestine Solidarity Campaign (TPS) and Tyneside
Stop the
War Coalition (TSWC) was chaired by Alex Snowden of the TPS. The
Protest lasted
an hour with speaker after speaker condemning the attack and also
calling on
the British government to condemn Israel and end its continued support
for this
criminal regime. Mahmoud Kurdi who had recently returned from the Viva
Palestina convoy last year said that this was a desperate act by Israel
because
their criminal blockade was being broken and condemned world wide.
The protest ended with slogans in support of the Palestinan people and
condemning Israel and its Anglo US backers. A beautiful and moving
Palestinian
poem was read out which had been written to condemn Israeli attack.
A Coach is now being organised for a
National Emergency
Protest in London on Saturday June 5th at 2pm.
Contact Tony for details: 07719946814
Newcastle Meeting Discusses
Afghanistan, Iraq, and Palestine
Tyneside Stop the War Coalition organised a
public meeting
of the coalition on Wednesday evening, February 10th 2010, at Newcastle
University. Chaired by Tony Dowling, who introduced the two
speakers
Lindsay German, national convenor, Stop the War and Mahmoud Kurdi,
president, Newcastle Muslim Association of Britain,
recently
returned from the Viva Palestina convoy. The speakers brought the three
topics
to life emphasing the importance of the activities and actions of the
stop the
war movement and of the viva Palestina convoy in focusing the support
of the
people and stengthening their unity against the war in Afghanistan and
to end
the blockade of Gaza. There followed a number of questions and
contributions to
the discussion.
Photos:
Rachel
Protest Vigil Against Tony
Blair
On Friday January 29th, a vigil took place
at 5pm at
Newcastle Monument as part of protests in London and other cities to
mark the
attendence of Tony Blair at the Chilcot enquiry. The convenor of TSWC
gave and
introduction in which he pointed out that the people had given their
verdict on
the Iraq war when 2 million demonstrated against the war in 2003. He
said that
the only just conclusion of this enquiry can be that never again should
a
government of Britain commit such war crimes against the people of the
world,
that the troops should be brought home from Afghanistan and all foreign
soil.
There should be an end to Britain's involvement in alliances with the
US and
NATO and that Britain should have an anti-war government that respects
the
sovereignty of other countries and resolves conflicts peacefully. He
spoke of
the consequense of the decisions of Tony Blair and his cabinet which
had not
been discussed as a crime against the peace in the enquiry. The
convenor then
called on those present to put theirquestions to Tony Blair and
the
protest vigil finished with the naming of the dead symbolic of the
anti-war
movement.
Photos:
Rachel
