Dear friends--
This week, Yousef Aljamal flew back to Turkey after a busy month of speaking events and meetings here in the United States, that Just World Ed was proud to organize. A big thanks to everyone around the country who worked with us on this "Palestine in Crisis" project, that brought Yousef's distinctive Gaza-Palestinian voice, expertise, personal stories, and huge human warmth to so many audiences here!
There were numerous highlights along the way. We hope you've been enjoying the photo album we put onto Facebook.
 I would classify the main "products" of tour in two main categories. The first is the numerous individuals-- from Members of Congress to high school students to church congregations to participants in Native Hawai'an gatherings-- with whom he was able to share in person his important witness about the dire situations of the Palestinians in Gaza and of the Palestinian youth terrorized by the detention system the Israeli military runs in East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank.
The second kind of "product" of the tour is the extremely useful and instructive videos that were made at no fewer than three of Yousef's speaking events.
 Of these, I think that this one, which was made and posted by Dan Shea of Veterans for Peace, in Portland OR, maybe has the most utility as a continuing teaching tool. Yousef was not using his Powerpoint slides at the event, so the lighting was great for videotaping-- and the videography was clear and smart. Dan's video lasts 33 minutes.
There was also an intriguing hour-long video made at the October 27 event in Madison WI. If you watch that one, you can catch the fab, 7-minute introduction that Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI), the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, gave to Yousef there. (It was also featured in this article on Mondoweiss.)
Then, there was the good 67-minute video made of the event Yousef had done along with Miko Peled at the Palestine Center a few days earlier. Miko comes in at around 26:40. He was really smoking!
 We were extremely happy that, in addition to meeting with Rep. Pocan in Madison, Yousef was also able to meet in Washington DC with Reps. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Betty McCollum (D-MN), Hank Johnson (D-GA), shown in the photo here, and Andre Carson (D-IN)... and also with staffers in an additional 17 congressional offices! We are very appreciative of all those folks on Capitol Hill who took time out from their currently very fraught schedules to sit down and listen to Yousef's important witness.
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On the tour, Yousef spoke at multiple events in six metropolitan areas within the Continental U.S., before continuing to Hawai'i. As I'm sure you'll appreciate, organizing a speaking tour like this takes a huge amount of work and resources. If you can make a donation to help support Just World Ed's continuing programs, that would be hugely appreciated! You can use this link to do so:
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In other news, I want to tell you about a new book of Quaker testimonies to which I've contributed. It is Passing the Torch: When Quaker Lives Speak, edited by Chuck Fager, who has an amazing record of publications and of spirit-led activism, dating back to his work with Dr. King.
 The book can be accessed in print ($10) or Kindle ($4) format here. I am deeply honored to have been invited to contribute to this book and thereby to join an amazing cohort of activists with far deeper records of Quaker engagement and thought than mine!
Chuck recently published a couple of teaser-excerpts from my contribution to the book, in this post on his "Friendly Letter" blog. But if you want to read the whole of my (much longer!) essay-- and the many other great contributions to the book, including Chuck's own-- then the book is is right there for you, very affordably, on Amazon...
I also want to tell you about some changes in my own plans. For four years now, I've been working pro-bono as JWE's Executive President, and prior to that, I was building and running the publishing company Just World Books...I feel proud of what both organizations have achieved thus far! But for some time now, I've become eager to resume my own writing career, something that also requires time, commitment, and energy.
I dipped my toe back into the water of doing my own writing earlier this year, with the 13-part series I wrote for Mondoweiss as part of a joint multimedia project between Mondo and JWE. Since then, I've published some pieces on Lobelog and Medium. But I came to feel increasingly strongly that I wanted to revive my old "Just World News" blog, which was the ur-platform of the whole "Just World empire." (This, for someone who's a dedicated anti-imperialist... )
 So now, I'm delighted to tell you that, with help from the great web designer Luke Finsaas, I have now done that. Check out the new version of JWN here!
We put all the older (2003-2018) content that was still in the JWN archives into a special container called vintage.justworldnews.org, where you can still access it, and all the content from the beginning of this year is now in the new, revamped Just World News. You can read a bit more about the history of the blog, here.
As for my engagement with the other two parts of the Just World empire, my plans and commitments are as follows:
- Regarding Just World Educational, the non-profit, my fellow board members and I are engaged in some in-depth discussions of the directions we want JWE to take over the coming months and years. But we know we have a strong record of achievements to build on! Stay tuned. (Of course, if we can receive your support for our end-of-year giving campaign, that would certainly help boost for our efforts!)
- Regarding Just World Books, the publishing company, I am deeply committed to continuing to nurture and promote the 38 distinctive titles we published between 2010 and 2018. That means keeping them in print and well distributed, selling as many foreign-language and other subsidiary rights as possible, and producing new editions of the works as appropriate. I have a couple of big reprintings underway now, and plans for two new editions in 2020. What we cannot do for the foreseeable future is publish any new titles. Book publishing is an expensive business!
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... I feel really great about what I've been able to do, through both JWB and JWE, to boost the voices of numerous other amazing thinkers and activists over the past 9-10 years. But now, I am really excited about getting my own public voice back.
If you read the whole of the essay I contributed to Chuck Fager's book, you'll see that one of the big "leadings" I currently have (as we Quakers say) is to explore, unveil, and chronicle the nature of the globe-circling "empire" the United States has constructed, especially since 1989; to look at the process of this empire's crumbling that is already underway; and to explore the kinds of arrangements that may emerge from this crumbling... with my standpoint always being that of the equality of all human persons, regardless of ethnicity, citizenship, religion, skin color, gender, or whatever.
As I engage in these gripping (and in my view, absolutely necessary!) intellectual endeavors, I am delighted to have taken up a position as Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy, a small progressive think-tank here in Washington DC that has some amazing colleagues and programs I am happy to connect with.
I'd love to hear any feedback you have on any of the above. And please, don't forget to include Just World Ed in your your-end giving. We are just about tapped out of funds right now and need the strongest financial base we can get for our programs for 2020! You can use the link below, to give directly online, or to learn how to send us a check.
Thanks and stay well--
Helena.
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