by War Resisters’ International

Editor’s Preface: These two articles are from The War Resister: Quarterly News Sheet of the War Resisters’ International, issue XXVII, Winter 1930-1931. As we have noted in the preface of the Gandhi statement also posted under this date, the European peace movements were divided over the influence of Gandhian nonviolence. Even by the early 1930s some European intellectuals such as Bart de Ligt were convinced of the possibility of another world war. It is against this dramatic background that the debates about Gandhian nonviolence must be seen. Please also see the archive reference information and acknowledgments at the end, and also consult our WRI project category to access de Ligt’s and other articles on the debate with Gandhi. JG

Article One: A Message to Gandhi

The first message to reach Mahatma Gandhi from British shores after the Civil Disobedience Campaign commenced [1929-30] was from the Executive of the War Resisters’ International. It read: “(We) are watching with intense interest the progress of your campaign in India. In accordance with the principles of the W.R.I, we believe in the possibility of overthrowing imperialism by pacifist means, and we rejoice that you are relying upon the method of nonviolence. We send you our love and sympathy in the hardships and difficulties which you will undoubtedly have to face and assure you that we will do our best by propaganda in whatever circles will be open to us, to assist you in your fight for truth and justice.”

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by Geoffrey Ostergaard

“Gandhi’s Salt March”; color woodblock print, 1931 by Kanu Desai; courtesy Golden Vista Press

Editor’s Preface: This previously unpublished essay is the text of a speech delivered by Geoffrey Ostergaard (1926-1990) 25 October, 1974 to the Muirhead Society, University of Birmingham (UK), and is another in our ongoing series of rediscoveries of important historical interpretations of Gandhian nonviolence. Ostergaard was one of Gandhi’s most intelligent critics, and we have posted other articles by him. Please see the notes at the end for further information about this text, biographical information about Ostergaard, links, etc. JG

Discussions of nonviolence tend, not unnaturally, to focus on the issue of the supposed merits, efficacy and justification of nonviolence when contrasted with violence. In this paper, however, I propose to pursue a different tack and I shall have little to say directly about the main issue. My object is to explicate the Gandhian concept of nonviolence and I think that this can best be done, not by contrasting nonviolence with violence but by distinguishing two kinds of nonviolence. My thesis, in short, is that nonviolence presents to the world two faces which are often confused with each other but which need to be distinguished if we are to appraise correctly Gandhi’s contribution to the subject.

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by Douglas Kerr

Ayad Burnat speaking to Israeli soldiers in Bil’in; courtesy ifpb.org

Interfaith Peace Builders Preface: Bil’in is a small, peaceful Palestinian village 7 miles west of Ramallah. It has continued its struggle to maintain its existence by fighting to protect its land, olive trees, resources, water and liberty. Its population of 1900 live in an area of approximately 1000 acres or 4000 dunams. The residents of Bil’in depend on agriculture as their main source of income, but close to 60% of Bil’in’s land has been annexed to build Israeli settlements and Israel’s Separation Barrier, destroying more than 1,000 olive trees in the process. Israel began construction of the illegal Separation Barrier in April 2004 by appropriating 570 acres (2300 dunams) of Bil’in land. Residents resisted these injustices despite the increase in night raids by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF), arrests and injuries of its residents and activists, and two fatalities. Indeed, Bil’in’s residents, joined by Israeli and international activists, have peacefully demonstrated every Friday in front of the Separation Barrier and the IDF have responded with both physical and psychological violence. Working side-by-side with international and Israeli activists, the people of Bil’in managed to achieve recognition by the Israeli Supreme Court in 2007, when it ruled that the route of the Separation Barrier was illegal and must be changed. The Israeli Defense Force, however, toughened its oppression by systematically arresting members of Bil’in’s Popular Committee, namely, those in charge of organizing the nonviolent demonstrations. In 2009, Abdullah Abu Ramah, coordinator of the Popular Committee Against the Wall in Bil’in, was arrested in his Ramallah home. Despite his recognition by the EU as a “human rights defender,” he was found guilty of “incitement” and “illegal protest,” and imprisoned for 16 months. In June of 2011, in accordance with the 2007 Israeli Supreme Court decision, the Separation Barrier was re-routed and 300 acres (1200 dunams) returned to the village. The Wall and settlement projects to date (2015) still occupy 270 acres (1100 dunams) of Bil’in land. Bil’in’s residents continue steadfastly to demonstrate each Friday. They are the subject of the film 5 Broken Cameras, the 2013 Academy Award Nominee for Best Documentary film, directed and narrated by Emad Burnat, brother of Ayad Burnat. R.H. Tracy

Douglas Kerr: How did the nonviolent popular resistance to the Occupation first start in Bil’in?

Ayad Burnat: It is now nine years, in December 2004, since we started nonviolent resistance, when the Israeli bulldozers started to destroy the land, the olive trees of the farmers. All of the people went outside, without prompting, to try to stop the bulldozers from destroying their land. Bil’in is a small village with a population of around 1900 and about 4000 dunams [c. 1000 acres] of land. The Israeli government confiscated 2,300 dunams. This land is full of olive trees. It is the life of the farmers in the village, and most of the people in the village are farmers. This land is their life. We started our nonviolent struggle in Bil’in when we saw these bulldozers destroying the olive trees, and we continued. Between December and February 2005, there was a demonstration every day.

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by Claire Gorfinkel and Howard Frederick

Editor’s Preface: This previously unpublished article details the 1974 visit by the authors to the Palestinian villages of Kafr Bir’im and Iqrit, in Israel 4 kilometres south of the Lebanese border. Most of the inhabitants had been expelled in 1948 during an Israeli military campaign against the Arab Liberation Army and Syrian forces, Operation Hiram. A few stalwart villagers remained to protect their ancestral homes, and the article vividly details their struggle. A small Malkite Greek Catholic church was also kept open in Iqrit and crops planted in both villages, every year uprooted by Israeli settlers or army. The authors met with the Malkite Archbishop Joseph Raya (1916-2005), who was one of the leaders of a joint Palestinian-Israeli nonviolent peace effort. In 1965 he had also been made Grand Archimandrite of Jerusalem. Further textual and biographical notes appear at the end of the article. JG

Ruins of Kafr Bir’im; courtesy wikipedia.org

Kafr Bir’im and Iqrit are Arab Christian villages, located in Israel just south of the Lebanese border. The villagers’ story is a simple one. Israeli Jews and Arabs have verified its authenticity. Prior to the 1948 war the inhabitants of Kafr Bir’im and Iqrit had good relations with their Jewish neighbours. (1) They had helped illegal Jewish immigrants cross the Lebanese border, and they welcomed the new Jewish state. The fighting never directly involved the villages, and when the Israeli army arrived at the end of October 1948, the villagers, unlike many Arab Palestinians, did not resist or flee. Based on their long friendship with Jews, they welcomed the Army with traditional bread and salt.

Two weeks later, the army asked the villagers to leave their homes for a short time. Chroniclers have disputed the reasons for this request. Some say that an Arab counter-offensive from Lebanon was anticipated, but others say that was only a pretext to get them off their land. In any case, the villagers were assured that they would be allowed to return in a fortnight. Today, twenty-six years later, these loyal citizens of Israel are still denied permission to live in their ancestral homes. Their campaign to regain their land has been a classic nonviolent struggle.

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by Tadd Graham Fernée

Cover art courtesy sagepub.in

The sea changes in 20th century experience provide the ground for dismantling the often tacit colonial paradigm which erased non-Western viewpoints, and for incorporating the wider human experiences of modernity, development, progress, scientific achievement, secularism, the nation, justice, ethics and aesthetics. A case is made in my book, Enlightenment and Violence: Modernity and Nation-Making, for an Enlightenment ideal grounded in identifiable values committed to nonviolent conflict resolution, rather than a single cognitive worldview claiming a ‘new’ monopoly on ‘truth’. Modern science, in itself, yields no fixed picture of things, nor provides the comfort of a single fixed worldview. It follows that the Enlightenment heritage should shift from totalizing epistemic claims to the ethical core of Enlightenment in nonviolence. Where claims to total truth or moral certitude justify mass murder – even on grounds of modern secular ideologies – the Enlightenment has been fundamentally betrayed. From this perspective, the book is an auto-critique of the many-sided universal Enlightenment heritage. It comparatively studies nation-making patterns, experiments and revolutions in terms of the criterion of non-violence as an ideal normative value.

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by William J. Jackson

19th century print of the Enlightenment, courtesy adambaumgoldgallery.com

Tadd Graham Fernée’s new book, Enlightenment and Violence: Modernity and Nation-Making, causes readers to consider some timely issues. I will begin by mentioning some of the issues it has caused me to mull over and explore, questions the book raises both directly and indirectly.

Chronologically, the European Enlightenement ran from 1650-1800. It was a period of remarkable advances in rationality, science and technology, and also a time of new social theories and revolutionary acts of violence ushering in the modern age. Typical dictionary definitions describe the Enlightenment as an eighteenth century movement of philosophical thought which explored the potential of the empirical method in science, questioned authority, and developed new political theories. While many people think of the Enlightenment as dead and gone, it is possible, and reasonable, to see it in another way. It can be seen as a time of blossoming advances which are still bearing fruit, of ongoing intellectual probes and experiments still giving birth to new sets of viewpoints and refinements which are capable of being informed by non-Europeans now, long after the chronological period of the original phase of the Enlightenment has passed.

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by Dr. Abhay Bang 

Sevagram Ashram, c. 1960s; courtesy mkgandhi.org

As a child growing up in the 1960s I went to an amazing school. Today, I feel helpless and sad because I’m unable to offer such an education to my son, Anand. “Our childhood was so different. Things have changed beyond recognition,” old timers often moan and groan about the past. Still, my heart is heavy. You may ask what was so different about my school?

From grades four to nine I studied in a school which followed Gandhi’s Basic Education tenets (Nai Taleem), located at Sevagram ashram in Wardha, founded by Gandhi in the 1930s. Education should not be confined within the four walls of the classroom mugging up boring subjects away from Mother Nature. Gandhiji’s Nai Taleem strongly believed that children learnt best by doing socially useful work in the lap of nature. This is how children’s minds would develop and they would imbibe a variety of useful skills. To implement such a system of education, the great poet and Nobel Prize winner, Rabindranath Tagore, at the behest of Gandhiji sent two brilliant teachers to Sevagram. Mr. Aryanakam came all the way from Sri Lanka and Mrs. Asha Devi from Bengal. This duo combined Gandhi’s educational methodology with Tagore’s love for nature and the arts. My parents, followers and friends of Gandhi, were involved with this educational experiment right from the start. The school tried out many novel experiments in education. Here, I will attempt to recall some of these.

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by Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb

Peace mural Shomer Shalom; courtesy shomershalom.org

Author’s Preface: Sami Awad is a Palestinian Christian from Bethlehem, and the nephew of Mubarak Awad, one of the founders of the Palestinian nonviolent movement. [See the interviews we have posted with Mubarak Awad.] When still a boy his uncle gave him the writings of Gandhi, which led to a lifelong commitment to Gandhian nonviolence. Upon finishing his studies in the U.S. he returned to the Palestinian Territories and in 1998 founded The Holy Land Trust, the mission of which is “to create an environment that fosters understanding, healing, transformation, and empowerment of individuals and communities . . . in the Holy Land.” Awad is one of thousands of people in Palestine who resist occupation every day through nonviolent popular resistance. Holy Land Trust works with the Palestinian community at the grassroots and leadership levels in developing nonviolent approaches to Israeli-Palestinian conflict transformation and a future founded on the principles of nonviolence, equality, justice, and peaceful coexistence. Awad has also established the Travel and Encounter Program, which aims to provide tourists and pilgrims with unique religious and political experiences in Palestine, and the Palestine News Network, the first independent press agency in Palestine and a major source of news on life in Palestine today. RLG

Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb: Ahlan wa sahlan, Sami. Nonviolent civilian resistance to foreign occupation has been a way of life in Palestinian society. The words sumud (steadfast) and intifada (shaking off) describe the nature of Palestinian nonviolence. Can you give us a thumbnail sketch of the history of Palestinian nonviolent civilian resistance and the popular struggle?

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by Barbara E. Addison

Editor’s Preface: We previously posted Reynolds’ article, “The Practical Application of Nonviolence,” as part of our War Resisters’ International project, found at this link. Both that article and this are additions to our ongoing series on Gandhi’s influence on pacifist and nonviolent movements in Europe and the U.S. Please consult the note at the end of the article for further information about the author. JG

“Gandhi: Man of the Year”; Time, Jan. 5, 1931; courtesy www.kamat.com

Reginald Reynolds, a young British Quaker, corresponded with Mohandas K. Gandhi during one of the most crucial periods in Gandhi’s life and in modern Indian history: the Salt March (Salt Satyagraha) and the beginning of the 1930 Indian civil disobedience campaign against the British Raj. Reynolds was a resident in Gandhi’s ashram (spiritual retreat) at Sabarmati from 1929 to 1930. In March 1930, Gandhi appointed him to deliver a lengthy statement (generally known as “Gandhi’s Ultimatum”) to the British viceroy explaining the reasons for Gandhi’s revolt against British authority. The Gandhi-Reynolds correspondence, written primarily between 1929 and 1932, reveals Gandhi as an indefatigable political strategist, spiritual leader, and warm, attentive friend.

In 1931, Reynolds sold three of his Gandhi letters to Charles F. Jenkins, a prominent Philadelphia businessman and manuscript collector. He was parting with the correspondence in order to raise funds for his British-based organization, “The Friends of India.” He told Jenkins: “I find myself able to help them by surrendering some of my most valued possessions,” adding that he had many other letters, but had selected these as the ones with which he felt he could best part. “The rest are far too personal and precious to part with at all, and a fortune would not purchase them!” (1) The letters apparently were left to the Swarthmore College Peace Collection in Jenkins’s will, and were added to the collection in 1952. Reynolds himself donated sixteen of his “personal and precious” letters to the Peace Collection some time between 1952 and his death in 1958. Barbara Addison’s article, including scans of all the original documents, may be accessed at this link, “Gandhi Letters in the Swarthmore College Peace Collection.” (2)

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by Terry Messman

Martin Luther King, Jr.; courtesy thestreetspirit.org

Two of the most inspiring currents in modern American history came together when Muddy Waters and his electrifying Chicago blues band traveled to Resurrection City in Washington, D.C., on May 18, 1968, to play a benefit concert for the poor people and civil rights activists camped out in a shantytown in the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial.

Both of the mighty rivers that converged on that fateful day in the nation’s capital — the river of song and the river of justice — had their headwaters in the state of Mississippi, in two of the nation’s most poverty-stricken areas.

The river of song had its source at the ramshackle wooden shack where Muddy Waters lived and labored and first played the blues; while the river of justice had its headwaters in Marks, Mississippi, the small town in Quitman County where Martin Luther King, Jr. first saw the full extent of childhood poverty and hunger.

“Justice is like a Mighty Stream”

The two rivers had joined together in Resurrection City, the encampment created by the Poor People’s Campaign in May 1968. One of Dr. King’s most oft-cited passages from the prophet Amos likens justice to a “mighty stream.” Five years earlier, Dr. King had delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech at the massive March on Washington in August 1963 while standing at the same location where Resurrection City now stood. He had quoted Amos in his speech: “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

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