Much has been taking place behind the scenes with regard to my call in a previous post for a rally designed to help support the cause of human rights and democracy activists in our unfortunate part of the world. Indeed, we are now ready to announce a tentative date for the rally, and to open the floodgate for any suggestions in this regard, suggestions that can help the organizers in making this event a success. The rally will focus in this initial phase on the situations in Syria, Lebanon and Egypt, which are very serious indeed, as we all know. But the invitation for participation is open to people from all over the region.
The proposed date for the rally is Thursday June 22nd, the proposed time is 9:30 am, and the proposed place is the delegation of the Arab League in Washington, DC. The event, then, will take place a week after the issuance of the Brammertz report, allowing us some time to evaluate ensuing developments and finalize our message accordingly. The choice of place is meant to allow Arab expatriates and their supporters and sympathizers from other communities to vent their frustration regarding the worsening conditions of human rights in their countries to a delegation representing all Arab governments, while avoiding giving the impression of instigating “foreign” intervention in Arab affairs, hence the decision not to demonstrate in front of the Congress.
Be that as it may, and in order to move forward from the point on and seeing that we have limited time, we need help in the following matters:
- We need volunteers who would organize participation from their local communities.
- We need suggestions for speakers from the various Arab communities, and from the halls of academia.
- We need student activists who would help advertise and garner the support of students, Arab and Americans, from all over the US.
- We need people to advertise this event throughout the Internet, their schools and their communities.
The more people we can put in the street the louder our message will be. This event will be orchestrated with the help of the HAMSA Initiative.
