January/February 2020 Events: Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice

Thank you so much for your support of our work on immigration justice. Our December 17 event with Brooklyn immigration justice activist Josh Rubin was a huge success, getting about 100 attenders on a snowy, icy night and raising hundreds of dollars for Josh’s work on the border and our own February trip (going directly into relief work, such as food for the meal for 1200 refugees we’ve signed up to cook–we are all paying our own travel and lodging).
Here’s what we’ve got coming up in January and February–we welcome your participation:

  • January 12: benefit concert with children’s choruses Local Chorus and Focus Chorus, both led by Nerissa Nields, 3:00 p.m. at Edwards Church in Northampton (snow date: 1/26)
  • January 18: First day to view the exhibit, “Uncaged Art,” pictures done by teens imprisoned in the Tornillo Detention Center, at R. Michelson Gallery, 132 Main Street, Northampton (in the vault)
  • February 2, 3:00 p.m., Visual Images from the Border: Trauma and Children’s Art, Gallery Talk by Dr. Simone Alter Muri, Director of Art Therapy/Counseling Graduate Programs and Art Education  at Springfield College–and send-off for the local delegation to the border, also at R. Michelson.
  • February 8: 10-member Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice delegation leaves for eight day relief and observation mission to Brownsville, Texas and Matamoros, Mexico
  • February 14, 6-8 p.m. Michelson will be open during Northampton Arts Night Out, including the Uncaged Art exhibit
  • February 21: Final day to see the Uncaged Art exhibit
  • Late February through April, report-backs from our border witness, dates and locations TBA

How You Can Help: We especially welcome you to share these events with your contacts and on your social media feeds (they all have Facebook events pages accessible in the events section of our Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/JAIJWM/
Contributions to bring the art show here and/or directly fund food/clothing supplies for our relief work on the border are also appreciated. Please encourage your supporters to mail checks to Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice c/o Annique Boomsma, 66 Harkness Rd., Pelham, MA 01002 or donate online at https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-us-help-migrants-at-the-border

Immigration Justice Activist Josh Rubin Comes to Northampton

Immigration Activist Josh Rubin, Who Helped Close Two Migrant Teen Prisons, to Speak/Show Film in Northampton, December 17; Press Conference that Morning

For Release: December 1, 2019

Contact: Joan Epstein, 413-896-2301, joanepstein at aol.com

NORTHAMPTON: Activist Josh Rubin sparked a national movement around immigration justice for teen migrants imprisoned by the US. Inspired by Rubin, hundreds of people have come to the border, to witness and to help. The subject of the new film, “Witness at Tornillo,”Brooklyn-based Rubin will visit the Valley Tuesday, December 17 for a showing of the film and discussion, 7 PM, Northampton Center for the Arts at 33 Hawley Street, supported in part by a grant from the Harold Grinspoon Foundation.

Rubin, 67, lived in an RV for two months as a solitary witness in the desert, reporting daily on Facebook about first the privately-run detention center for migrant teens in Tornillo, Texas, then its replacement in Homestead, Florida. His posts went viral and sparked the national movement that shut down these two prisons holding up to 3,000 kids each who are not accused of any crime but were torn from their family members.

Rubin and immigration justice activists nationwide continue to press for information on where these children have been sent after the closure of the Homestead center. He is now focusing on organizing a presence on the US-Mexico border for early 2020.

The public is invited at no charge (voluntary donations are welcome). Journalists can also meet Rubin at a press conference that morning, Pioneer Valley Workers Center, 20 Hampton Avenue #200, Northampton 11 a.m..

The event is organized by Western Massachusetts Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice, a local group that formed in June 2018 and sent a delegation this summer to witness at the detention center for migrant teens in Homestead, Florida, now closed thanks in part to Rubin’s kindling of nationwide movement. The group will be sending a delegation to the US-Mexico border early next year.

Event Summary:

Event: Film showing and talkback with Josh Rubin, immigration activist

Date: Tuesday, December 17, 2019

Times/Locations:
7 PM public event, Northampton Center for the Arts at 33 Hawley Street;
11 AM press conference,Pioneer Valley Workers Center, 20 Hampton Avenue #200, Northampton

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/998735250490819/ 

Admission: Public event is open as space permits at no charge but with a voluntary donation requested; seating is limited. Any money raised over costs will be used to assist the thousands of people currently detained in tent camps in Mexico and to witness the situation on both sides of the border.

Organized by: Western Massachusetts Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice

Sponsors: See list below, or view the latest update on the Facebook event page

CO-SPONSORS so far include (in alphabetical order) Beit Ahavah Reform Synagogue of Greater Northampton (Florence); Congregation B’nai Israel Tikkun Olam Committee (Northampton); Critical Connections; Hampshire Mosque; Indivisible Northampton; Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action (JALSA) West; Jewish Community of Amherst Tikkun Olam Committee; Karuna Center for Peacebuilding; Northampton Friends Meeting; Pioneer Valley Interfaith Refugee Action Group; Pioneer Valley Workers Center; Refugee Support Project of Temple Israel, Greenfield, Western Mass Asylum Support Network, Unitarian Society of Northampton and Florence. This event is also supported in part by a grant from the Harold Grinspoon Foundation. We thank all the funders and sponsors.

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Letter: How “praying with our feet” turned out

This letter summarizing the October 6 Immigration Justice Taschlich in Northampton, MA was published in the Daily Hampshire Gazette (Northampton’s newspaper) on October 19, 2019.

We were very grateful for Bera Dunau’s article, “Praying with Their Feet,” which previewed our October 6th March and Tashlich ritual. And we think Gazette readers will want to know how it turned out.

More than 300 people showed up at the Connecticut River Greenway State Park boat dock, many marching from downtown Northampton and from Hadley. Members of at least 5 synagogue congregations stretching from Holyoke to Greenfield attended, as did at least four rabbis. That is especially remarkable, because the time from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur is a rabbi’s busiest time of the year. But they took time away from their urgent duties to participate.

One of them, Rabbi Riqi Kosovske of Beit Ahavah in Northampton, was an active member of the planning committee and led the ritual.Equally important–before the ritual, attenders heard several deeply moving speeches on surviving the Holocaust, working with immigrants on the border, being an immigrant, and making the connections between the oppression of Jews and others during the Holocaust with the heartless behavior of the American government today.

Our planning committee received several heartfelt thank-you notes. And we also have some thank-yous: to the two police departments, the elected officials, and the many Jewish and other community organizations that co-sponsored and publicized the event.

For Western Massachusetts Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice,

Joyce Duncan

Joan Epstein

Dina Friedman

Ellen Kaufmann

Shel Horowitz

Alice Levine

Betty Lynne Wolfson

Press Release for October 6, 2019 Immigration Justice Tashlich

This press release was sent around the Valley to media and organizations. You are welcome to share it.

“Praying With Our Feet”: Jews and Allies Around the Valley to Converge for Immigration Justice Ceremony October 6, Northampton

For Release: Thursday, September 26, 2019
Contact: Shel Horowitz, 413-586-2388, shel at greenandprofitable.com
Event Summary: Valley-wide Rally and Tashlich Service for Immigration Justice, Sunday, October 6: March from Northampton and Hadley feeder sites to the boat launch below the Coolidge Bridge for Tashlich ritual and rally. Gathering at 4 p.m. Rally begins at 5 p.m. with Tashlich ritual immediately following.
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/376902869899683/ or https://bit.ly/2kYDGvh

NORTHAMPTON: Background: Why have Jews been so out front and visible protesting the treatment of asylum-seekers and other immigrants under the current administration? Jews have a special connection with immigrant justice issues. From the time of Pharaoh to the present day, Jews have been seen as outsiders, and often abused. The Torah repeats several times the command to treat immigrants well, because “you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”

As recently as the 1940s, Jews faced deliberate mass murder: an ethnic cleansing attempt to kill all of Europe’s millions of Jews. After the Holocaust, the Jewish community said “Never Again.

In today’s climate of family separations, caged children, borders closed to asylum seekers, and race-based detention camps, we do not have the luxury of pretending we didn’t know. Thus, Jews have come together to say “Never Again is Now!”

Event Details: Jews from at least four congregations, plus unaffiliated Jews and non-Jewish allies including members of the immigrant community, will converge at the Coolidge Bridge Sunday, October 6, in the holy time of year between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, to do a modern variation of the cleansing ritual of Tashlich (“Casting Off”). Instead of throwing breadcrumbs to represent our own sins, traditionally done on Rosh Hashana, we will cast pebbles into the Connecticut River to represent the sins against immigrants done by the federal government in our name.

At the boat launch at 5 pm (downstairs from the bikeway parking lot), we will perform the Tashlich ritual and then hear Jewish and immigrant activists demand the defunding of government-sponsored hate. Confirmed speakers and performers will include teenage activist Maya Luhr (who recently volunteered with immigrants at the US/Mexico border), Holocaust survivor Henia Lewis, and ACLU Massachusetts Immigrant Protection Project Coordinator and musician Javier Luengo-Garrido. Dina Friedman of Western Massachusetts Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice will share her experience at the Homestead Detention Center in Florida. Alice Levine, WMJIJ co-founder and also part of the Homestead delegation, will moderate. Several rabbis will attend, including Rabbi Riqi Kosovke of Beit Ahavah: The Reform Synagogue of Greater Northampton, who will lead the Tashlich service.

Bring: Signs, shofars, pebbles for the Tashlich ceremony, and positive, respectful energy. Participants are welcome but not required to wear Jewish ceremonial garb. Preregistrations are encouraged at the event’s Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/events/376902869899683/ or https://bit.ly/2kYDGvh

Gathering Points: Northampton and Greenfield marchers will meet at 4 pm at Pulaski Park; those wanting a shorter walk can join at 4:30 pm at Sheldon Field. Amherst and Hadley participants will meet at 4 pm at the corner of Railroad St. and West St. in Hadley, at the intersection of the Common and the Bike Path (park at either Paragus or Most Holy Redeemer Church across Railroad Street from the Bikeway). Parking for people with walking disabilities is in the State Park lot on Damon Road facing the river, immediately after the Coolidge Bridge.

Organizers/Sponsors: Organized by Western Massachusetts Jewish Activists for Immigration Justice and part of a national day of events coordinated by Bend the Arc Jewish Action, the event is co-sponsored by Beit Ahavah: The Reform Synagogue of Greater Northampton (Northampton) and its Tzedek Tzedek (Justice Justice) Committee, Jewish Community of Amherst Tikkun Olam (Repairing the World) Committee, Temple Israel (Greenfield) Refugee Support Project, Congregation B’nai Israel Tikkun Olam committee (Northampton), Prayground Minyan (Congregation), Indivisible Noho, and Pioneer Valley Workers Center.
Media inquiries: Shel Horowitz, 413-586-2388, shel at greenandprofitable.com
Co-sponsorship/general public inquiries: Alice Levine, 617-921-3512, alicelevine12 at gmail.com

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Who Can I Send Money To?

Here’s a short list of national and western Mass. based organizations who are working on this issue. The Homestead Witness Group also has a longer, more comprehensive list that includes organizations in other regions, which you can find here.

Legal Support  

  • ACLU 
  • RAICES

  Political Support

  • United We Dream
  • Movimiento Cosecho

 Jewish Political Action Support

  • Never Again—Jewish Activism (neveragainaction.com) 
  • HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society
  • T’ruah (Rabbinic Call for Human Rights)
  • Bend the Arc

 Bail/Bond Funds and Support

  • National Bail Fund Network
  • Massachusetts Bail Fund

Humanitarian Support 

Local Support   

  • Pioneer Valley Workers Center

More on What You Can Do to Help

There’s so much information out there, it’s hard to keep track without getting overwhelmed. This list is culled from a much longer list, which we will be publishing piece-meal over the next several days. It contains some of the key actions. Organizations accepting donations will be published in a separate post.

Legislative Advocacy

Call your members of Congress (find them at https://whoismyrepresentative.com) at 202-224-3121 with specific demands:

  • Vote NO on funding for deportation (Note: Congressman Richie Neal recently voted FOR the Senate bill for “humanitarian” assistance that took away many of the protections for children in the HOUSE bill. Now the fight for funding will be continued through budget appropriations process in September.)
  • Cancel raids and improve detention conditions
  • Demand insepctions of detention centers.
  • Release detained children and families
  • Demand hearings on immigrant detention
  • Support Merkley’s Shut Down Child Prison Camps Act (S.397)
  • Support Harris’s Families NOT Facilities Act (S. 388)

Local Initiatives (Western Mass.): Pioneer Valley Workers Center: https://pvworkerscenter.org

  • MA Driver’s License Campaign—pass legislation that would allow undocumented people to obtain drivers’ licenses.
  • Safe Communities Act
  • Ride Shares and Court Accompaniment
  • Sponsor Immigrant Families

Boycott

Protest/Visibility

Powerful Spirit: Father’s Day Rally at Homestead Detention Center

What an amazing day at the mass rally to shut down Homestead Detention Center! Hundreds of people, both locals and out-of-towners like us, showed up for a spirited, passionate rally and march, despite drenching rain and some logistical issues (like the extra porta-potties that were ordered never showing up, leaving exactly one–and a need to change the designated parking at the last minute because the lot owners had announced they’d tow any car).

I felt really glad that we’d already spent two mornings at the site. Because we were knowledgeable, we were able to engage with several local people who are looking for ways to get involved, and tell them exactly how they could participate and who they could contact. And we also knew a lot of people outside of our own group of eight.

David Nurenberg from our affinity group was interviewed by both a local TV station (Channel 4, which also interviewed Betty Lynne Wolfson and used both in its story) and the Miami Herald. He’s a journalist and teacher who has three assignments to cover the march. And Alice Levine and Dina Friedman did a pre-arranged wrap-up interview (by phone from the restaurant where we Western Massachusetts folks all went out to dinner with Scott Merzbach from our local paper, The Daily Hampshire Gazette in Northampton. We also have a number of presentations and media interviews set up already at home. And the very first words in the Herald article were “David Nurenberg,” talking about how he is spending this Father’s Day away from his own kids to do this crucial work.

Speaking of continuing the work—there are plenty of ways YOU can get involved. For specific, easy action steps you can take to end this nightmare, please read Dina Friedman’s post, “Key Reasons to Shut Down the Child Detention Center in Homestead, FL and What You Can Do”, just below this one.

Here are some pictures

Charlie Fromby of Homes Instead (right, female, holding sign) relocated from five hours away in Pompano Beach and has made the witness project her everyday occupation.
Speaker from Florida Immigrant Coalition-2
Speaker from the Farmworkers