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On Behalf of the Louisville Ceasefire Coalition
Fifteen people were arrested on the morning of Friday, February 2 at Raytheon/RTX and BAE Systems in Louisville, including several members of the Louisville Ceasefire Coalition. We were arrested in three locations blocking access and egress points to Raytheon/RTX and BAE Systems in South Louisville, which are companies that manufacture weapons sold and transferred to the Israeli government and that are used for the destruction and killings in Gaza and the West Bank. The Louisville Ceasefire Coalition was formed after October 7, 2023, to push for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza and an end to Israeli occupation. In addition to demanding a permanent ceasefire, our protest also emphasizes that continued and growing US military aid to Israel, and the profiteering of these companies, directly contributes to the genocide of the Palestinian people. We support what the International Court of Justice has recently determined: that the Israeli government is plausibly engaged in a genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza. We chose to protest at Raytheon/RTX and BAE Systems because they are arms manufacturers in our own backyard. And these companies are both fueling and profiting from Israel’s genocide of Palestinians. These companies have provided weapons that have directly caused the deaths of over 27,000 people, 40% of whom are children. Our intent in this action was to raise awareness of U.S. complicity in war crimes through the unlimited supply of weapons to Israel being used against a civilian population. Raytheon/RTX and BAE Systems are the world's second and seventh largest military companies, respectively, and manufacture missiles, bombs, components for fighter jets, naval guns, and other weapon systems used by the Israeli military against Palestinians. These technologies are also integrated into Israel's main weapon systems, including fighter jets, military drones, and warships. These weapons are often gifted to Israel through the U.S. government's Foreign Military Financing program. US military funding to Israel topped $3.8 billion in 2023, as part of a record $38 billion deal over 10 years signed under former US President Barack Obama in 2016. In the past 75 years the US has supported Israel with a total of $124 billion in the form of military and defense aid. Congress is also currently debating a $14.1 billion additional US military aid to Israel. Between 50% and 60% of buildings in Gaza have been demolished and the bombardment has displaced some 85 percent of Gaza's 2.3 million residents. Israel has cut off food, water, fuel, and medical supplies getting into Gaza and continually bomb areas they have designated as “safe zones.” Half of the population are at risk of starvation and 90 percent of Gazans regularly go without food for an entire day or longer. And it cannot be stressed enough: these companies are making weapons right here in our community and it impacts all of us. One of those arrested, Carla Wallace, emphasizes that, “We have needs here at home for affordable housing, jobs, healthcare and education. Funds used for weapons to kill people in Gaza could be used to care for people here in Kentucky and elsewhere.”
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 Photo ActiveStills Archives: Gaza under attack, Khan Yunis, south Gaza Strip. Photographer: Mohammed Zaanoun 19 Nov 2023 On Friday, December 1, when Israel resumed its bombing campaign in Gaza, Deanna Rushing began a hunger strike in protest and as part of the worldwide call for a permanent cease fire, negotiations, and humanitarian aid. “When I learned the bombing had begun again, I had to take more drastic action,” states Rushing. “I made the decision to begin a hunger strike. I am in day 4 of not eating. It is imperative to demand an end to the horrific genocide being perpetrated with the financial and leadership directives my government makes in the name of my country, in my name. My state, Kentucky, contributes $9 million dollars per year, largely in military weapons, in support of the occupation that has led to the suffering.” “We’ve been protesting for weeks and along with the majority of our country’s people and the people of the world we have been calling for an end to this genocide, but it has not stopped,” said Rushing “It must stop.” Rushing is urging more members of the Louisville community to speak up and make a deeper commitment to ending the US-backed Israeli attack that has cost the lives of over 16,000 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and children. This includes over 800 deaths since the bombing resumed. She is asking people to contact their US representative for the first time, or again, if they have already called. She is asking people from Louisville to write to Joe Biden asking him to call for a permanent cease fire. Rushing is part of the Louisville-based Coalition for a Cease Fire, and a member of Louisville Showing up for Racial Justice (LSURJ). She has been part of the protests for a cease fire since the US-supported assault on Gaza began. To follow Deanna in this journey or to contact her, see her blog here.
The Statue of John Castleman is a symbol of white supremacy and has no place in any community committed to equity and racial justice. Disproportionately impacting Louisville’s Black community, where the legacy of slavery continues to impact economic outcomes, housing, over policing, incarceration and a lower life expectancy——statues that salute the Confederacy are part of slavery’s continuing crimes.
Today's state Supreme Court decision pointing to process errors leading to the removal of the John Castleman statue from the Cherokee Triangle neighborhood does not change the position of Louisville Showing Up for Racial Justice. We agree with the findings of the Public Art and Movements Advisory Committee, which provided the research and foundation for the Fischer administration's decision to remove the statue. We urge Mayor Craig Greenberg and our entire community to be steadfast in the need to have public art reflect who we want to be as a community, and not retain the symbols of oppression in our past. The removal does not erase history but puts it into context. Specifically, the Castleman statues was installed at a time when hundreds of monuments celebrating Confederate generals and politicians were being erected -- as deliberate symbols intended to strengthen the illusion of nobility of the South's Lost Cause, to visibly bolster Jim Crow laws to prevent integration and true reconstruction. John Castleman was a convicted terrorist and leader of Confederate raiders planning to attack a prison near Chicago. He was a member of the slave-holding elite. He laid the basis for the segregation of Louisville’s parks. He should not have been pardoned and celebrated, then or now, as some kind of kindly and reformed Confederate. # # # # Members of LSURJ and other groups will hold a huge “End Police Violence” banner in front of the venue where Mayor Craig Greenberg’s first Mayor’s Night Out to call for an end to police violence, a pledge to oppose a new jail and open contract negotiations for the FOP They will then enter the venue to participate in the event, and hold signs.
With the release of the US Department of Justice report on Louisville policing, people across the community want to make sure that Mayor Craig Greenberg goes beyond lip service to address police violence. “We have been working on these issues of police accountability for decades,” said KA Owens, Co Chair of the KAARPR. “We do not wan this DOJ report ignored”. There is also growing public opposition to the up to half a billion dollar new jail some metro council members are pushing, and a call for the mayor to pledge to oppose it in favor of monies of mental health, affordable housing and other community investments that keep people out of jail. In addition, LSURJ joins the 490 Project and others calling for the mayor to open the negotiations on the police contract, to the public as part of his pledge to grow government transparency. “The mayor says he wants a new direction,” said Anice Chenault, a member of the Louisville SURJ Coordinating Team. “We support that. But so far the mayor seems to be repeating the patterns of past administrations that have not addressed police violence, have continued to arrest and jail people on nonviolent crimes, and have not allowed public access to police contract negotiations. We have good reason to expect more of the same unless there is public pressure.” The exhaustive report from the United States Department of Justice names a pattern of abuse from Louisville police, who disproportionately target and terrorize Black communities in Louisville. The report further documents LMPD’s abuse in its responses to behavioral health crises, sexual assault, and intimate partner violence.
The results of the DOJ’s investigation echo what Black, disabled, poor, and unhoused Louisvillians have been saying for years. If we had an administration committed to change, this report would land on fertile ground and we could reimagine public safety, divest from an inherently unjust and violent policing system, and invest in what people in Louisville need in order to thrive. Unfortunately, the announcements by the mayor last week about major investments in LMPD, his refusal to publicly oppose the half-billion dollar new jail being pushed by several Metro Council members, and the refusal to open the upcoming negotiation of the police contract to the public, already tell us that this is not a mayor who will make the changes we need without the continued, concerted public pressure that brought about an investigation by the DOJ in the first place. As an organization focused on moving white people into action for racial justice—the racial justice that will benefit every one of us and our community—we must raise our voices to demand change that goes deeper than window dressing. Mayor Craig Greenberg’s initial comments in response to the DOJ report underline the very legitimate concern that, without continued public intervention, nothing will actually be done to address the patterns of abuse and the unconstitutional practices that LMPD is well known for. Racially motivated over-policing, racial profiling, the systemic use of violence, and the arrests of poor or houseless people who pay for our failure to address poverty have been hallmarks of LMPD and mayoral leadership in Louisville for decades. An institution rooted in the capture of runaway enslaved people cannot be reformed with the “few bad apples'' approach the mayor is leading with. What if we got serious about the community safety the mayor says matters to him? What if we began addressing the root causes of crime, like poverty, racism, and lack of opportunity? What if we created community-based mental health services and ended the failed “war on drugs” which only fuels mass incarceration? What if social workers instead of police responded to nonviolent crime, and we instituted a restorative justice process instead of locking people in jail on low level charges? What if there was a REAL commitment to prioritizing affordable housing instead of going into hundreds of millions of dollars in debt for a new jail? Unless we as a community continue to demand that this mayor make changes, we will only keep getting lip service, and the racist abuse and deaths will continue. |
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