Milwaukee, WI – On March 14, protesters rallied in front of Chancellor Mark Mone’s mansion demanding UW-Milwaukee cut ties with Israel. Despite the constant rain and cops tailing the caravan headed to the mansion, the protesters remained steadfast in their commitment to the campaign to cut ties with genocide.

The rally was hosted by Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) at UWM, the Milwaukee Anti-war Committee (MAC), and the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression.

UWM SDS’s campaign, which is sponsored by the Wisconsin Coalition for Justice in Palestine, aims to cut financial ties with Israel, end study abroad trips to Israel, change the name of the Golda Meir Library, and recently, drop the charges on the Milwaukee 5. There have been consistent militant actions in the spite of the repression.

Sara Onitsuka, chair of the Milwaukee Anti-war Committee and a UWM alumnus, brought attention to the connection between the ongoing SDS and MAC campaigns, stating, “I am so proud to stand here in solidarity with the student movement today, following the footsteps in the many decades-long solidarity between the student and anti-war movements.”

Astronautics, with its headquarters in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, and a subsidiary in Israel, frequents UWM career fairs, but they did not present themselves at the most recent club fair, knowing they are not welcome. Onitsuka finished with a resounding chant, “From Milwaukee to Falastin, end the U.S. war machine!’’

Patricia Fish, co-chair of UWM SDS and part of the Milwaukee 5, called out Chancellor Mone, stating, “Over 30,000 Palestinians are dead. Our school is complicit! How can you not have a sense of urgency to stop a fucking genocide! UWM and Chancellor Mone are standing on the wrong side of history, and we won’t forget. If you are complicit, if you are neutral, you are guilty!”

To end, Kayla Patterson, of UWM SDS said, “I can look back on the events February 9 and laugh. One of the pigs that day covered his ears because we were chanting so loud, prompting ‘prohibited noise’ charges. We had them scrambling, and it makes it clear that the police don’t anticipate us to fight back and use our first amendment rights on campus.”

Patterson finished by saying, “We give them power when we accept their fear tactics, so we need to keep up the same energy and make them fear us instead!”

The students and community made it clear that rain or shine, on or off campus, they will stay active in the struggle to cut ties with genocide.

#MilwaukeeWI #WI #StudentMovement #AntiWarMovement #International #Palestine #SDS #SDSUWM #MAC

Milwaukee, WI – Another visit to Milwaukee by President Biden resulted in a protest by the Wisconsin Coalition for Justice in Palestine (WCJP) to denounce him. On Wednesday, March 13, Biden made multiple stops across Milwaukee, issuing promises to improve the living conditions for Black residents and visit the new Democratic Party headquarters.

The WCJP called for an emergency rally at Dontre Hamilton (Red Arrow) Park and led a crowd of hundreds within sight and sound of the Democratic Party headquarters. Chants of “Free Palestine” and “Genocide Joe” reverberated throughout downtown Milwaukee while the crowd waited for Biden to arrive. The crowd, proudly lifting Palestinian flags and displaying signs demanding an end to the genocide, was met by dozens of cops and members of the Secret Service.

For over two hours, the crowd led chants and sent a clear message to Biden and the rest of the Democratic Party – end U.S. aid to Israel and end the genocide now. Khaled Abukhamireh of the US Palestinian Community Network stated, “Rafah stands as the final sanctuary for the people of Gaza. There is an imminent threat as the genocidal Israeli army prepares to advance, posing a great danger to this beautiful city.”

Channeling the unified energy of the crowd, Audari Tamayo of Students for a Democratic Society at UW-Milwaukee and Freedom Road Socialist Organization said, “Today we’re here to tell Genocide Joe that he’s not welcome here, that he’s not welcome anywhere, and that there’s people here with a conscience. Just as the revolutionary socialist leader Hugo Chavez said, ‘Fuera de aquí yanqui que aquí hay un pueblo unido!’”

The WCJP brought together multiple movements that have become increasingly angrier with the ineptitude of the Biden administration, including the immigrant rights movement. Executive director of Voces de la Frontera, Cristine Neumann-Ortiz, stated, “We’re calling on President Biden to support a ceasefire in Gaza and to use executive action to fulfill campaign promises he made to the Latinos and immigrants here in Wisconsin – to end 287g that makes our communities less safe by deputizing local law enforcement to act as immigration and to expand access to work visas for essential workers and their families and asylum seekers, including Palestinians.”

Biden’s team made it clear that Wednesday’s visit is the first of many he plans to make to Wisconsin in the coming months. As proven by the WCJP’s action, no matter where Biden goes in Wisconsin, there will be a crowd there to confront him.

#MilwaukeeWI #WI #AntiWarMovement #International #MiddleEast #Palestine #WCJP #SDS #SDSUWM #USPCN #VDF #Biden

Oak Creek, WI – On Friday, February 2, the Milwaukee Anti-war Committee (MAC) and around 30 supporters gathered at Drexel Town Square in the Milwaukee suburb of Oak Creek, and marched through the town center to the headquarters of Astronautics Corporation of America.

Astronautic, founded in Milwaukee in 1959, is a defense corporation contracted with the U.S. military and has direct ties to the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). Protesters’ voices ringing out in the street and echoing off of apartment buildings, the passionate crowd chanted, “Astronautics you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide!”

This was the third protest that MAC held against Astronautics, a corporation with a long history of war profiteering, specifically making computers and systems for weapons and fighter jets used all around the world. After stopping at Astronautics headquarters, the crowd heard speeches from MAC and two other local organizations, Students for a Democratic Society at UW-Milwaukee (SDS-UWM) and Freedom Road Socialist Organization – Wisconsin (FRSO-WI).

Each speaker highlighted the local ties of Astronautics and the U.S. war machine more broadly to people’s everyday lives in Milwaukee.

“Astronautics partners with other global defense industry giants such as: Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, The Israeli Aircraft Industries, and many more. But they are also heavily embedded in our own community,” said Sara Onitsuka, chair of MAC. “They sponsor the Milwaukee Air and Water Show every summer, which is marketed as a family-friendly event despite being a huge recruiting and propaganda fest for the U.S. military. They attend career fairs at colleges and offer internships to young people to entice them into joining the Astronautics team.”

Onitsuka continued, describing why the company’s involvement in the community is so problematic: “Kids and youth here, locally, are being taught the narrative that we need these kinds of corporations to stimulate the economy. That they’re beneficial and good and have our personal interests in mind – never mind the death and destruction they are dealing abroad. And never mind that at home many people also don’t have access to what we need – healthcare, safe and affordable housing, even a basic living wage.”

Audari Tamayo, member of SDS-UWM, drew connections between Astronautics and the names of buildings at the UW-Milwaukee campus, stating, “Just like this innocuous-looking building houses genocide abettors, our university houses the name of a genocide perpetrator, Golda Meir, and the last name of the co-founder of this shameless company, Nathaniel Zelazo. In an attempt to wash the blood off their hands, Nathaniel Zelazo funded the construction of the Helene Zelazo Center for Performing Arts,” he said, to boos from the crowd. Tamayo explained that Nathaniel Zelazo “named it after his wife, but who cares about the love story of a war criminal? Astronautics is shameless. UWM is shameless. We must call these executives what they are: war criminals.”

Finally, Lo Cross, a member of FRSO, described the connections across movements for liberation. “When Astronautics manufactures weapons to murder innocent Palestinians abroad, weapons manufacturers, under the same orders from the military here, manufacture weapons to massacre and bomb the oppressed here, in Tulsa, in Philly. In both instances the goal being to further dispossess and massacre Black, brown and Indigenous communities.”

Cross described how organizing in FRSO helps them continue to fight for the liberation of all people. “But being a part of a revolutionary organization means you realize that as long as freedom is a power that can be taken away it’s something that you will always have to fight for. And the struggle that will really create lasting change is the struggle for liberation – the struggle for the liberation of the nationally oppressed and the struggle for the liberation of the working class!”

Many cars and trucks passing by honked in support of the march. MAC will continue putting the pressure on the Milwaukee born-and-bred Astronautics, making it known city and metro wide that the corporation profits off of genocide and that the people will not stand for it.

#OakCreekWI #MilwaukeeWI #AntiWarMovement #International #MiddleEast #Palestine #FRSO #MKEAWC #SDS #SDSUWM #Aeronautics #MilitaryIndustrialComplex