Baltimore Activists convicted for speaking out against genocide

 Baltimore Activists convicted for speaking out against genocide 

Friends,

   Let’s cut to the chase. On January 23, 2025 at 1:30 PM in Courtroom 310 in D.C. Superior Court, defendants Janice Sevre-Duszynska and Max Obuszewski were found guilty by Judge Risa Berkower of violating D.C. Code 22-1307[a]: Crowding, obstructing, or incommoding. We were arrested on April 9, 2024 in the Dirksen Senate Office Building cafeteria with 51 other members of Christians for a Free Palestine highlighting the fact that Palestinians were starving in the Gaza Strip.   Despite the tough on crime nature of the prosecutor John Roberts, the judge sentenced Janice to five days in jail, suspended, ninety days of unsupervised probation and $50 for the Victims of Violent Crime Act.  I got a similar sentence, but my jail time, suspended, was thirty days.  It should be noted that Judge Berkower did not issue a stay away order from the Capitol reservation, or request payment of a fine.  That was a bit of victory for the defense.

 Something that will never be answered is this question.  Why did the government expend its resources on a case which began in April 2024? Nevertheless, there is much more to report at a later date.

 Prior to sentencing, the defendants are allowed to address the court.  Janice identified herself as a Roman Catholic Womanpriest and a former teacher of English as a Second Language at Henry Clay High School in Lexington, Kentucky.  Her students were from 61 countries, and they included children from Palestine.  She vividly remembered how they told her of the trauma they suffered under occupation.  Any day the children feared that harm could come to them.

Following the continued assault on non-combatants in Gaza, she informed the court that she had to be part of the prayer service in the Dirksen cafeteria on April 9. As a priest, she has been involved in engagements of liturgy. Starvation in Gaza is criminal. For her the Eucharist is food, and food is the Eucharist.

I had this to say.  Judge Berkower, you found me guilty for speaking out against my government’s complicity with genocide.  Regardless of the verdict, I stand before you to honor Larry Hebert, who started a hunger strike on March 31, 2024.  He was a Senior Airman in the U.S. Air Force who began a hunger strike during an authorized leave from his post in Spain. Please note that Hebert's leave was terminated on April 9, the day of my arrest. He was there that day in the Dirksen cafeteria on the tenth day of his fast, and was moved to begin a fast after U.S. airman Aaron Bushnell immolated himself outside the Israeli embassy.

I would be remiss if I did not recognize members of the US government, including officials who worked closely on the arms trade and human rights policy, who resigned over the Biden administration's continued arms transfers to Israel for its operations in Gaza. In a joint statement entitled "Service in Dissent," the resigned officials wrote that "America's diplomatic cover for, and continuous flow of arms to Israel has ensured our undeniable complicity in the killings and forced starvation of a besieged Palestinian population in Gaza. This is not only morally reprehensible and in clear violation of international humanitarian law and U.S. laws, but it has also put a target on America’s back." Resigned officials who spoke to CNN stated that unnamed and non-confirmed former colleagues felt the same way but could not afford to resign. The officials included Lily Greenberg Call, Harrison Mann, Hala Rharrit, Maryam Hassanein, Mohammed Abu Hashem, Riley Livermore, Alexander Smith, Stacy Gilbert, Anna Del Castillo, Annelle Sheline, Tariq Habash, Josh Paul, and Andrew Miller.

I want to express my thanks to you and Mr. Roberts for allowing me to speak frankly about our government’s complicity with an ongoing genocide. Unfortunately, while Janice Serve-Duszynska and I were prosecuted while trying to attract attention to the war crimes ongoing against Palestinian noncombatants, I recognize that the president, the secretary of state, other Biden officials and legislators will never be prosecuted.

We all must make a decision, and Janice and I knew we had to go to the center of power with our concerns.  In this case, we went to the Dirksen Senate Office Building cafeteria to seek out ears of those who might listen to our pleas. Many legislators know that US law and international law prohibit arm sales to countries violating human rights. But a vast majority of these legislators lacked any semblance of courage and voted to send 5,000 pound bombs to a military willing and able to use them in residential areas.

During the trial, I testified that I was an organizer with the Ad-Hoc Coalition to Stop U.S. Arms to Israel. On May 7, 2024, some fifty concerned citizens went to the State Department to deliver a letter signed by several hundred people to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.  President Biden issued NSM 40 in February, and Mr. Blinken was to investigate arms sales to Israel.  I am not naïve, and was not surprised that the secretary of state made the ridiculous argument that Israel was not violating US law. 

I stand before you with a clear conscience that on April 9 and on other occasions I spoke out against genocide.  How could I not as the Israeli military with US weapons repeatedly attacks civilians and civilian infrastructure, refuses to investigate or punish those responsible for atrocities, and kills humanitarian workers and journalists at an unprecedented rate. Israel is also engaged in arbitrary rejection of humanitarian aid trucks, which has fueled famine in the Gaza Strip. Human rights groups have been documenting Israel’s atrocities and systematic obstruction of aid for months by submitting reports to the Department of State, but the Biden administration has continued approving weapons sales for the Netanyahu government in contravention of U.S. law.

And now we have a fascist president in the White House.  What he has already done is unprecedented and will continue.  Now all of us must decide what we will do in the face of a plan Project 2025 which is designed to bring down democracy in the USA.  I extend my heartfelt thanks to Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, an American prelate of the Episcopal Church who has served as Bishop of Washington since November 2011.  She had the courage to speak truth to power. 

I urge you and Mr. Roberts to reflect on the issues brought out during this legal proceeding.  Both of you are in a much more prominent position than Janice and I.  We will continue our work against U.S. complicity with genocide.  Possibly either of you may be able to also make your voice heard as well. Now is the time to speak truth to power. I will accept whatever sentence I receive.

Donations can be sent to Max Obuszewski, Baltimore Nonviolence Center, and 431 Notre Dame Lane, Apt. 206, Baltimore, MD 21212.  Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski2001 [at] comcast.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/.

“One is called to live nonviolently, even if the change one works for seems impossible. It may or may not be possible to turn the US around through nonviolent revolution. But one thing favors such an attempt: the total inability of violence to change anything for the better" - Daniel Berrigan