Dahlia Wasfi

Overview

Dahlia Wasfi born New York, NY December 6, 1971. American physician and peace activist. As daughter of Iraqi father and American Jew, she demanded US immediate unconditional withdrawal from Iraq.

Quotations

“Since World War II 90% of the casualties of war are unarmed civilians, a third of them children. Our victims have done nothing to us, from Palestine to Afghanistan, to Iraq, to Somalia, to wherever our next target may be, their murders are not collateral damage they are the nature of modern warfare.
They don’t hate us because of our freedoms, they hate us because every day we are funding and committing crimes against humanity.
The so-called war on terror is a cover for our military aggression to gain control of the resources of Western Asia. This is sending the poor of this country to kill the poor of those Muslim countries.
This is trading blood for oil. This is genocide, and to most of the world, we are the terrorists. In these times, remaining silent on our responsibility to the world and its future is criminal, and in light of our complicity in the supreme crimes against humanity in Iraq and Afghanistan and ongoing violations of the UN Charter and international law, how dare any American criticize the actions of legitimate resistance to illegal occupation?
Our so-called enemies in Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine, our other colonies around the world, and our inner cites here at home are struggling against the oppressive hand of empire demanding respect for their humanity.” (to Congressional Progressive Caucus, Apr. 27, 2006; photo youtube.com)

Vera Baker Williams

Overview

Vera Baker Williams born Hollywood, CA January 28, 1927 (d. 2015). Prize-winning children's author and illustrator. Antiwar poster for May Day, 1971. Executive Committee, War Resisters League, 1980-84. Imprisoned one month for women’s blockade of Pentagon, 1981; Amnesty International prisoner of conscience.

Quotations

“I was also taking part in feminist actions and in protests against this country’s wasteful pouring of our resources into military might. After all, creating a nonviolent world in books will not suffice to bring down the military budget.” (Horn Book, Nov. 20, 2001; photo nytimes.com)

Shailene Woodley

Overview

Shailene Woodley born Simi Valley, CA November 15, 1991. Actress. Arrested for support of native women’s protest against Dakota pipeline, 2016.

Quotations

“Will you choose money, or will you choose children? Will you choose ignorance, or will you choose love? Will you choose blindness, or will you choose freedom? . . . I am not scared. I am not afraid. I am grateful, and I am amazed to be standing by the sides of so many peaceful warriors. Standing Rock ‘protests’ are rooted in ceremony and in prayer. I’ve been there.” (Time, Oct. 20, 2016; photo marieclaire.com)

Gertrude Weil

Overview

Gertrude Weil born Goldsboro, NC December 11, 1879 (d. 1971). American Jewish progressive civic reformer and suffragist. Led League of Women Voters in lobbying the World Court for disarmament; promoted good relations with Latin America.

Quotations

“The abolition of war is humanity’s supreme need today. . . Thus in working toward this end, woman takes her place in world progress.” (“Thoughts on Armistice Day” c. 1928, in Melissa Klapper, Ballots, Babies and Banners of Peace)

“As women are the producers of the race, they would be naturally the conservers of the race. . . Viewed from any standpoint, we cannot see no justification for war. . . We find that war abrogates the teachings of all religions. The is nothing in war compatible with the doctrine of human brotherhood and the universal law of love.” (Leonard Rogoff, Gertrude Weil, p. 164; photo Jewish Women’s Archive)

Yoko Kawashima Watkins

Overview

Yoko Kawashima Watkins born Harbin, Manchuria, Japanese-occupied China October 5, 1933. Japanese-American children’s writer; antiwar pacifist. Author of controversial semi-autobiographical story of war in Korea So Far From the Bamboo Grove, 1986. Received Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award.

Quotations

“Now myself and other Japanese people who see themselves as peacemakers and who lived in North Korea are in small ways trying to mend the Japanese government’s mistakes. I have been shouting all along, 'Forgive us!' 'No more fighting!' 'No more nuclear!' And who suffers most during any war? It’s innocent, unknown civilians!. . .  I say that peace must start from each one of us. To do that, first, we must be kind to each other. If we all carry hatred and revenge inside us, then we will never achieve peace in the world.” (quote and photo, Korea JoongAng Daily, Feb. 2, 2007)

Margaret Murray Washington

Overview

Margaret Murray Washington born Macon, MI March 9, 1877 (d. 1925). African-American educator; international activist. Co-founder and first president, International Council of Women of the Darker Races, 1922. Led petition to Congress denouncing Belgian atrocities in Congo, 1910; opposed US occupation of Haiti.

Quotations

“If we wish to help each other let us not only praise ourselves, but also criticize. Plain talk will not hurt us.” (wiki; photo firstthoughtco.com)

Delia Webster

Overview

Delia Webster born Vergennes, VT December 17, 1817 (d. 1904). “Petticoat Abolitionist” jailed for aiding slaves escape; teacher, author, and suffragist. Conductor on Underground Railroad, Lexington, KY. Tried for helping slaves escape on her 27th birthday, 1844; sentenced to two years hard labor, but pardoned after two months. Second arrest 1854, escaped and rearrested, tried, and acquitted. Nurse during Civil War; founded school for African-American children.

Quotations

“From my earliest knowledge of the existence and nature of American slavery, I have had an utter abhorrence of it, as a system of uncompounded wickedness, alike opposed to Christianity, and the principles of republican government.” (“Thoughts on Slavery”, Kentucky Jurisprudence, pp. 83-84, Frances Eisan, Saint or Demon, p. 10; photo vermonthistory.org)

Lillian Wald

Overview

Lillian D. Wald born Cincinnati, OH March 10, 1897 (d. 1940). Nurse and community activist. “Militant pacifist” and “practical idealist.” Founder and first president of American Union Against Militarism, 1914. Co-founded League of Free Nations Association, forerunner of Foreign Policy Association, 1918. Active in feminist Women’s Peace Party and WILPF.

Quotations

“Women are here to reaffirm their protest against war, to restate their unalterable faith in the righteousness of Peace.” (Better World Heroes; photo Wikipedia)

Patricia M. Wald

Overview

Patricia McGowan Wald born Torrington, CT September 16, 1928. American Judge of International Court for Yugoslavia 2002; opposed execution of Rosenbergs; only woman on 2004 commission to assess intelligence leading to Iraq War.

Quotations

"The Intelligence Community’s performance in assessing Iraq’s pre-war weapons of mass destruction programs was a major intelligence failure." (Iraq Intelligence Commission Report, p. 46, 2004; photo ICTY)

Julia Grace Wales

Overview

Julia Grace Wales born Bury, Quebec July 14, 1881 (d. 1957). Originated idea of continuous peace mediation 1915, which led to League of Nations; co-founded WILPF.

Quotations

"I ask myself, is it just a wild flight of imagination to conceive of a world without war. . . but someone must try. . . " (March 20, 1917)

"The time to make a resolute effort to save our world is now, before the destruction has gone any further." (Wisconsin Plan, Feb. 27, 1917; photo collectionscanada.gc.ca)

Alice Walker

Overview

Alice Walker born Eatonton, GA February 9, 1944. Author; essayist; poet; activist. Inspired by Martin Luther King, Jr., Howard Zinn, Rosa Parks, and Fannie Lou Hamer, registered Mississippi voters, 1965; with husband Melvyn Leventhal, first legally married interracial couple in Mississippi, 1967. Awarded Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, 1983; recipient National Book Award, 1983.

Quotations

"The quietly pacifist peaceful always die to make room for men who shout. . . I do not believe in war at all; although I am as capable of anger as anyone. To me war is something to be outgrown, recognized as immature, wasteful and so destructive to life that human beings should shun it as they shun swine flu, or HIV/AIDS or as they once shunned Bubonic Plague." (March 22, 2010, The Root Blog; 2007 photo Wikipedia)

Madam C. J. Walker

Overview

Madam C.J. Walker (née Sarah Breedlove) born Delta, LA December 23, 1867 (d. 1919). African-American tycoon; benefactor of NAACP Anti-lynching campaign.

Quotations

"We must not let our love of country, our patriotic loyalty cause us to abate one whit in our protest against wrong and injustice. We should protest until the American sense of justice is so aroused that such affairs as the East St. Louis riot be forever impossible." (speech during World War I, Philadelphia, 1917; photo wikicommons pd)

Margaret Walker

Overview

Margaret Walker Alexander born Birmingham, AL July 7, 1915 (d. 1998). Black novelist and poet, SNCC leader.

Quotations

"World War I was fought for control of land, people, and money. Telling the folk that it was a war fought for the benefit of democracy was a slogan." (interview, African American Review, Summer 1993; photo Wikipedia)

Naomi Wallace

Overview

Naomi Wallace born Prospect, KY August 17, 1960. American playwright, poet and professor; peace activist; “The Fever Chart: Three Versions of the Middle East” (2008) exposes the cruelty of Palestine’s occupation and Iraq War; Women’s Boat for Gaza 2016.

Quotations

“I believe the job of mainstream culture and mainstream theatre is to keep the peace. Our job, as teachers, is to encourage new writers to break it, to disrupt the lie, to speak truth to power.” (“On Writing as Transgression”, Oct. 2007 Palatine workshop; photo americantheatre.org)

Sarah Wambaugh

Overview

Sarah Wambaugh born Cincinnati, OH March 6, 1882 (d. 1958). Internationalist; political scientist; professor at Wellesley College and Radcliffe College. Expert on plebiscites; chosen by League of Nations to oversee Saar plebiscite, 1935; UN Observer of Greek elections, 1946, and Kashmir plebiscite, 1949.

Quotations

“To [stop war itself ] we must join with the rest of the world, through the League of Nations, in a system of collective security based on mutual assistance to prevent aggression.” (Harvard Crimson, Dec. 3, 1935; 1920s photo Wikipedia)

Dionne Warwick

Overview

Dionne Warwick born East Orange, NJ December 12, 1950. Pop singer; US envoy for health, UN Global Ambassador for FAO, 2002; active in AIDS campaign; resident of Brazil.

Quotations

"What the world needs now is love sweet love
no, not just for some but for everyone."
("What the World Needs Now is Love")

"The windows of the world are covered with rain,
What is the whole world coming to?
Everybody knows when men cannot be friends
Their quarrel often ends where some have to die.
Let the sun shine through."
("The Windows of the World"; photo 2003 wikicommons)

Ingrid Washinawatok

Overview

Ingrid Washinawatok El-Issa born Menominee, WI July 31, 1957 (d. 1999). UN indigenous rights leader murdered in Colombia civil war.

Quotations

"The human family needs all its peoples to come together if it is to survive." (1992 speech; photo Wikipedia)

Maxine Waters

Overview

Maxine Waters born St. Louis, MO August 15, 1938. US Congresswoman for Los Angeles 1990; opposed Iraq War; founder and chair of Out of Iraq Caucus; urged impeachment of president; arrested for nonviolent protests against Apartheid and Haiti.

Quotations

"I have a right to my anger, and I don't want anybody telling me I shouldn't be." (Brian Lanker, I Dream a World, 1989; photo Wikipedia)

Lilian Watford

Overview

Lilian Watford born Chicago, IL April 27, 1908 (d. 2004). Quaker peace activist and lobbyist. Opposed arms race and McCarthyism; supported immigrant rights and nonviolence.

Quotations

"We seek a world free of war and the threat of war.
We seek a society with equity and justice for all.
We seek a community where every person’s potential may be fulfilled.
We seek an earth restored."
(Friends Committee on National Legislation motto)

Diane Watson

Overview

Rep. Diane Watson born Los Angeles, CA November 12, 1933. Opposed Iraq War; US Ambassador to Micronesia, 1998-2001.

Quotations

"How can you win a war against terrorism when terrorism is a concept? You must change hearts and minds. . . So let’s work together to bring our courageous troops home, and put an end to this devastating war of choice." (June 17, 2006; photo Freedom Speaks)