Tell Your Political Representative:

Just Don't Go!

Urge Them Not to Attend AIPAC events.

The "No Thanks AIPAC" Campaign.

Every year, AIPAC lobby invites politicians to join one or more of  their various celebrations of US funding for Israel’s occupation of Palestine. AIPAC hosts dozens of these events in cities around the country. Our goal is to inform our political representatives that we consider support for AIPAC's extremist agenda is unacceptable.

We urge you to contact your local, state and congressional representatives whenever AIPAC has an event in your area. They need to hear from you so that they know that pandering to this lobby is controversial and unacceptable to people who care about peace. We even have handy postcards you can send to your representatives.

If you know of an upcoming aipac event in your area, contact all your representatives to find out if they are planning to attend. Most offices will be responsive to this request for information, since this is contact with a political lobby. Consider expressing these talking points as you urge them to just say "No Thanks" to AIPAC.

•   We can support every representative listening to all points of view, and we expect them to meet in their office with anyone who wishes to speak with them on these issues. However we oppose public displays of support for war and occupation. Attending an AIPAC event  gives AIPAC respectability and credibility it does not deserve.

•   We should be building up our cities here, not supporting the destruction of homes and farms in Occupied Palestine. AIPAC's unconditional support for even the very worst of Israel's policies is directly contradictory to the values of peace and fairness that is best for our city, our country, and our world.

•   AIPAC continues to work with extremists like fundamentalist John Hagee, war-supporter John Bolton, and rabid anti-Muslim campaigner Daniel Pipes. Supporting AIPAC in any way is offensive to those who support rational policies of justice, peace and reconciliation.

•   AIPAC continues to support confrontation with Iran and opposes real diplomacy.  We should be actively supporting global nuclear disarmament (for all countries, including the US and Israel), not threatening others with military action. Attending an AIPAC event implies support for this militaristic perspective.

Our over-riding objective is to lessen AIPAC's influence so that we can create a just foreign policy based on respect for human rights, international law, and making peace possible. We believe that politicians, by attending AIPAC events, helps build support for AIPAC's agenda, and does nothing to advance actual dialog. However, we also believe that the bottom-line is not the choice of attendance at such events, but the actual policies politicians actively support.  With that in mind, we encourage you to be positive in your communication to all your representatives, even the ones who have chosen to attend such public events in the past.  Ask each of them to support policies of fairness and justice for all in the Middle East.

Go Here to see some Politicians to contact if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, to ask them not to attend upcoming AIPAC events.

Postcards

A postcard to send to your political representatives will be available by December 6th. Please contact us if you wish to have some for your group.

Here is the text:

Side One:

The AIPAC lobby invites politicians to join their celebrations of US funding for Israel’s occupation of Palestine.  Will they respond like this?

No Thanks AIPAC, my schedule is full, won’t make it to your fancy gala.   

While I am supporting the building of homes here, I will not support Israeli demolition of homes in Palestine. I will not support the US sending yet another shipment of deadly weapons to Israel for endless military occupation while our cities go broke. I have no time to listen to your drumbeat for war with Iran, I’m busy calling for global nuclear disarmament.  

Most of all, I’m supporting peace and justice for all the people of the Middle East. So I won’t make it to your party. Doing so would harm my reputation and help you look more respectable than you deserve. 

No Thanks AIPAC, I have no time to support your agenda for war and occupation.

Side Two:

Dear ____________________

As my political representative, I hope your response to AIPAC’s invitation to their events is to refuse to support their agenda for war and occupation. It’s time for a new approach to the Middle East. Yet AIPAC lobbies Congress for $3 billion in US military aid to Israel every year. We need to build peace, not fund war. Don’t support AIPAC.  Please don’t go.