Filipino activists call for "hands off" Syria

by Don Tagala, ABS-CBN North America Bureau

September 9, 2013

Dozens of protesters made sure their opposition to President Obama’s call
to unleash military strikes in Syria were heard loud and clear in Times
Square, in New York over the weekend.

Obama said the planned US cruise missile bombing in Syria is a humanitarian
act in response to the chemical weapons attack which killed hundreds of
Syrians, and that it is America’s moral obligation to launch such an attack
to deter further future chemical weapons attack.

Protesters like Bayan USA’s Bernadette Ellorin say she believes
otherwise…

“Why would this war be called humanitarian?” Ellorin said, “People in the
US don’t have jobs, are hungry, hospitals are closing, education is being
cut back, the people here in the US is in Crisis this is not the time to
launch any type of humanitarian effort that cost the people here so much
money.”

“We have learned that Presidents of this country do not go to war for
humanitarian reasons — they lie about their reasons,” Larry Holmes of the
Workers World Party said, “They make it sound like humanitarian because
they have to convince the people…. They’re always political, economic and
cold blooded… and more about Wall Street than about savinganybody from
weapons of mass destruction.”

Protesters say that bombing Syria would kill more civilians, polarize the
situation even further and is considered a war crime — without the United
Nation’s Security Council’s blessings.

In an interview with CBS News, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, warned
that if the US strikes Syria… there will be retaliation.

Pro-Assad Ayrian-Americans say they know too well that such a US attack
would only bring more hardship for people back home.

Syrian-American, Goerge Talliseh said, “I hope not, we will have big
trouble, big problem, we don’t want war, won’t don’t it…”

As Obama presses his case for the airstrike with rounds of media interviews
today,the President is said to be going against a growing national anti-war
sentiment…

A new CNN/ORC international survey released today showed that even though 8
in 10 Americans believe that the Syrian President gassed its own people,
more than 70 percent of those surveyed do not want congress to authorize an
airstrike – saying it would not achieve significant goals for the US.

Holmes said, “It has more to do with oil, US domination of the Middle East
and they fooled us once, and now we’re smart, and we’re not gonna get
fooled again.”

The US senate returned today from its month long recess to take up a
resolution that would authorize the planned airstrike butorganizers here
say that protests will continue to demand “No to US war on Syria.”

You may reach Don Tagala at don_tagala@abs-cbn.com for more information.