Los Angeles: 35 Clergy Members and others Arrested in Civil Disobedience vs. ICE Raids
April 16, 2017 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
From a reader:
On April 13, at least 200 clergy members and civil rights activists from a number of organizations marched in downtown LA to call attention to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids, detentions, and deportations of immigrants by the Trump/Pence regime. In an act of civil disobedience, 35 were arrested when they blocked the entry to the Metropolitan Detention Center—a refusal to accept the inhumane treatment of immigrants by ICE and Homeland Security. This protest was an “Interfaith Day of Prophetic Action.” Rabbi-in-Residence Aryeh Cohen of Bend-the-Arc, a Jewish Partnership for Justice, explained that the action “says to ICE, the institution, that we are intending to put our bodies in between them and ... deportations and detentions of people who have been in this country for a long time.”
As the protest started Jewish, Muslim, and Christian faith leaders chanted “Exodus from detention!” as they marched toward the Metropolitan Detention Center, which houses ICE jail cells and where ICE vans leave to round up immigrants, take them to detention centers, or deport them south of the border. Rabbi Sarah Bassin of Temple Emanuel of Beverly Hills said, “I’m standing with my brothers and sisters in faith ... on behalf of the undocumented and the refugee and immigrant communities that are being targeted now.” Rabbi Jonathan Klein, Executive Director of CLUE (Clergy United for Economic Justice), held up bitter herbs “to call out the bitterness of ICE sweeps, of fathers detained in front of their children, of the bitterness of imprisonment for no crime.” Shakeel Syed, an imam associated with the Shura Council of Southern California, said, “Today, I am a full human being standing in solidarity with all my Jewish brothers and sisters.”
This civil disobedience is righteous and right on time and should spread to ICE headquarters throughout the country! And let’s connect these actions with the urgent need to drive out the fascist Trump/Pence regime!
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