April 5—Helga Zepp-LaRouche offered this example of the “top-down” policy formulation-process that the International Peace Coalition, which held its 44th consecutive weekly meeting today, must engage in. Today’s featured speakers were:

• Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Founder of the Schiller Institute;
• Prof. Richard Anderson Falk, professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor’s Chairman of the Board of Trustees, former United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories from 2008 to 2014;
• Jens Jørgen Nielsen, historian, author, former Moscow correspondent of the Danish newspaper Politiken, representative of the Russian-Danish Dialogue, Denmark;
• Francis Anthony Boyle, American human rights lawyer and professor of international law at University of Illinois, counsel to Bosnia and Herzegovina and to the Provisional Government of the Palestinian Authority;
• Prof. Fernando Garzón, architect, urban planner and leader of the Ecuadorian-Palestinian Union, adviser to various UN agencies, the Inter-American Development Bank, and others.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche opened the proceedings with an update on the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine. She asserted that with all that has transpired in Gaza, the fact that leading nations are still sending weapons to Israel is indicative of “the collapse of the moral order of the world.” She said of the devastation there, that “the only way to stop it would be that the United States puts its foot down, which they could, but they’re not doing it.”

Noting the recent observances of the 75th anniversary of NATO, Zepp-LaRouche remarked, “If you look at the actual history of NATO, it was not a defensive alliance.” She reviewed the history of its illegitimate actions, and said that in particular, the Libyan war was the beginning of the destruction of the UN, noting that her husband, Lyndon LaRouche, said at the time that this was the beginning of the war against Russia and China. Since that time, Zepp-LaRouche concluded, “NATO wars have killed 4 1/2 million people.”

She asserted that the UN Security Council is effectively defunct due to the abuse of the veto, followed by the statement of White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby that UNSC resolutions are not binding. “We are in a lawless situation,” she said. “We have entered the world of jungle already.”

Zepp-LaRouche concluded by encouraging all to participate in the Schiller Institute’s [[Oasis Plan conference]] [[https://schillerinstitute.nationbuilder.com/oasis_conference_20240413]] next week.

Former UN special rapporteur, Prof. Richard Falk, presented an impassioned defense of his colleague, special rapporteur for occupied Palestine Francesca Albanese, who recently issued a formal report titled, “Anatomy of a Genocide.” Falk described her report as being ”… in my judgment, the most objective and meticulously researched and analyzed assessment of the genocidal dimensions of what Israel has been doing in Gaza.” Falk recalled his own prior experience as Special Rapporteur for Occupied Palestine, during which he also endured “a series of smears, death threats and unpleasantness… and in my case, additionally compounded by being called a ‘self-hating Jew.’”

Falk called what is happening in Gaza “the most original, transparent genocide in all of history…. This is a case where the perceptions of people around the world are taking place in real time, with overwhelming evidence that is supplied by the imagery shown nightly on TV and by the self-justifying language used by Israeli leadership to dehumanize the Palestinian people.”

Jens Jørgen Nielsen offered his assessment of the strategic crisis, saying that leading politicians “regard the present situation as a sort of computer game.” “People wind up hating their counterparts so much that they are willing to hurt themselves to inflict harm on the other….We are trapped in our own toxic narratives and psychological distortions.” Nielsen called for a return to diplomacy, like that which saved the world at the time of the Cuban missile crisis. Instead, he lamented, “it seems that Western politicians have a race to see who can use the most derogatory terms about Putin.”

Prof. Francis Boyle proposed five measures that can be taken to resolve the crisis in Gaza:

• Suspend Israel’s participation in the activities of the UN General Assembly, along the lines of what the General Assembly did in response to apartheid in South Africa;
• Convene a war crimes tribunal against Israel, similar to the one against Yugoslavia to which he was a party;
• Sever diplomatic relations with Israel;
• Issue economic sanctions against Israel;
• Have the UN general assembly admit Palestine as a full-fledged member.

This was followed by a dialogue with Helga Zepp-LaRouche, who endorsed Boyle’s proposal to give Palestine full membership in the UN. She asked him to comment about her statement that the UN is defunct if the United States says resolutions are non-binding, to which he responded, “The statement that UN Security Council resolutions are non-binding is a bald-faced lie…under article 25 of the UN charter, all Security Council resolutions are binding.”

Professor Fernando Garzon described the conflict in Palestine as “…consequences of a scorched Earth strategy… to destroy any vestige of infrastructure,” following “75 years of continuous expulsion and elimination of its original population.” He emphasized the importance of creating a viable economy: “The Oslo agreements included a special chapter on development…. There never was implementation of this component.”

During the discussion period, a German participant proposed a “friendship concert” in Kaliningrad; preceded by a motorcade through European countries. Jack Gilroy of Veterans for Peace and Pax Christi, U.S.A. presented reports of anti-war actions around the country, including protests at weapons plants. Another participant described peace marches and related activity being held in Ibero-America.

To a question on how to avoid war with Russia, Zepp-LaRouche said, “You have to make the effort to understand the complexity of the whole world and put the one humanity first…. Treat other cultures as if they were your sons and daughters and grandparents.”

A video was shown of Kynan Thistlethwaite’s intervention against reporters and editors from the New York Times, Politico and the Guardian. Moderator Dennis Speed reported that “they basically froze and took an adjournment for five minutes.”

A final question was posed: “What does it mean to be optimistic under today’s circumstances?” Zepp-LaRouche turned to great thinkers, including astronomer Johannes Kepler, who said that the more you study the laws of the universe, the more you recognize the beauty of the plan of the Creator, and Gottfried Leibniz, who said that every evil will cause an even greater good to emerge. She concluded, “You must create within yourself a vision of how you want the world to be… If you do it, you will be happy.”