Anti Racism Commission,

Democratic Socialists of America

Po Box 162394

Sacramento, Ca. 95816

If you want peace, work for justice.

We strongly repudiate and oppose terrorist actions such as the Sept. 11,2001, attack on New York City and the Pentagon. Those who planned and executed these horrific acts bear full responsibility for them, and should be held accountable. But innocent Muslims are not responsible for these acts. The Middle East is not responsible for these acts. The U.S. Muslim community did not organize these acts. They are innocent.

The assaults and the threats against MuslimsArab Americans, and Muslims, like all Americans, were injured and died in this tragedy. They too have family and friends who worked in the World Trade Center and for the Federal Government. They mourn with us for those who lost their liv

Terrorist actions undermine the moral, political and economic struggle for global justice. We oppose terrorism as a strategy, including terrorism when used by the U.S.A., such as in the Coup in Chile in 1973, the Contra War in Nicaragua, and others. We find it deeply troubling that the present administration has appointed John Negroponte as Ambassador to the United nations and Elliot Abrams to be Under Secretary for Human Rights and Democracy, since these individuals themselves organized and carried out terrorist activities in Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador leading to the deaths of over 20,000 innocent people.

We urge all to stand for our democratic values and against intolerance and hatred. We urge all to repudiate both the racist attacks on Muslims and international terrorism. Our position is that terrorism is a criminal matter, and those guilty should be brought before an International Court, as has been done with prior war criminals. In addition to opposing terrorism , the broad progressive and left movements need to join the struggle for social

We in the Anti Racism Commission unite with the effort to create a broad, effective Peace and Justice Movement. War and racism are combined in the current Administration war activities. We need to make the connection between war , economic justice

The world is experiencing a major restructuring of the global economy. This restructuring is directed by the transnational corporations to produce profits for the corporate owners. In many developing nations "neo liberal" economic restructuring plans imposed by the World Bank the IMF, and major corporations have produced unemployment rates of over 40%. The economic forces of global corporations are unrestrained. The impoverishment of the vast majority in pursuit of profits for the minority has pushed millions to migrant in search of food, jobs, and security. Refugees from poverty and refugees from war deserve our support. Immigration is changing U.S. politics and we, along with the AFL-CIO, take the side of the immigrants in opposing discrimination and hate crimes. We recognize that global capitalism produces global misery. Matters will only get worse as we are now entering a period of global recession.

Global corporate led development has made the rich richer, and millions poorer. Children are starving in Africa, Afghanistan, and Central America. Making the majority poorer has produced new forms of resistance. Some of the people will be organized into resistance, such as the Zapatistas resistance in southern Mexico. Unfortunately, lacking effective progressive social movements, some poor people will be organized into terrorism as a response to global injustices.

If we want peace, we must work for justice. We must feed the poor and the starving. We need to change the international economic and power relationships which produce sta

The brunt of this administration's war effort is aimed at and will be borne by innocent people of color, first in the Arab world and South Asia. Muslim's are being demonized in the media as "terrorists" and "fundamentalist

The current crisis challenges all progressive to understand the connections between war, the global economy, and racism. The U.S. left is deeply divided, politically endangered and ill-prepared for this campaign. The isolation of the left, and its lack of organizational strength, the gap between the left in communities of color and the White left all permits and encourages the growth and success of the Right Wing agenda such as the recently adopted anti terrorist legislation.

Hopefully this new context can awaken a new left, and orient progressives toward unity of struggle. A new left must be a multi racial left, for that is the only political force which can sustain itself and reach to a majority in this country. A new left will not be created by asking the diverse communities to submerge their issues into one anti war movement . A left can best be built by combining the works of progressives in the several communities