On August 23rd, Cynthia McKinney, former US Congresswoman and member of the Free Gaza movement, gave a talk at the San Francisco Lunacy Theater. The event was part of a Bay Area benefit tour for the San Francisco Bay View Newspaper, an independent monthly that covers a variety of local and international stories. She also spoke in Oakland at the Grand Lake Theater and the Black Dot Cafe, Sonoma, and El Cerrito. Her speaking tour follows her recent expedition on a boat delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza under siege.

“Gaza lives,” McKinney said. “The people are vibrant and alive despite F-16 bombings, deformed children, depleted uranium. I didn’t think about what could happen to me before going. I’ve been involved in life-threatening political activity for some time, so when I got the call I didn’t think about my safety. Operation Cast Lead sickened me. I just went, and I’m so happy I did, even when my boat was rammed and I was kidnapped by the Israelis. They took us to Israel and then charged us with illegal entry! I spent seven days in prison with Ethiopian immigrants facing similar charges. Meanwhile, the Congress and White House said nothing. We had a boatload of $500,000 worth of trucks, cars, medical supplies for Gaza, but Egypt denied entry. They’re still sitting in the port right now.”

She spoke of the “two Americas” --one inhabited by the wealthy elite and the other the impoverished majority, and urged Americans to cultivate a stronger resistance movement in order to respond to political corruption and election fraud. She cited the Haitian uprising against the kidnapping of democratically elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide as well as the social unrest in Mexico City following 2006 election as model examples of mobilization for the United States. Read more

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