“Hey-hey, ho-ho, endless war has got to go.”
That was just one of the chants shouted by more than 60 demonstrators following an anti-war rally on the Columbus City Hall steps Thursday night.
Many in attendance said they were calling for Americans to voice their dissent against what they perceive as President Donald Trump’s efforts to ignite a war with Iran. Many of the demonstrators advocated for greater diplomatic efforts with Iran.
Tensions began to escalate when a rocket attack by Iran-backed militia group Kataeb Hezbollah, or Hezbollah brigades, caused the death of an American contractor.
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The next incident was an U.S.-led attack ordered by President Donald Trump on a convoy near Baghdad International Airport that killed one of Iran’s most powerful military leaders, Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
Iran responded by firing more than a dozen missiles at two Iraqi military bases that house American troops. On Friday, President Donald Trump responded by ordering additional sanctions against Iran.
Rally co-organizer Michelle Carr told the crowd that Trump has “repeatedly turned down opportunities for diplomacy, and has instead taken steps to make war more likely, including filling his administration with war-hungry neoconservatives.”
The actions taken by White House officials make wider-scale violence more likely, have placed lives throughout the world at risk and has created a real risk of all-out war, Carr said.
The Rev. Felipe Martinez told the participants he agreed with the phrase that “freedom isn’t free.” But the pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Columbus said the price for peace is not measured in violence and conflict, but rather in diplomacy, communication and enacting multilateral solutions.
“It is cowardly to make our armed forces, their families and innocent civilians located both abroad and at home the only ones to pay the price (of violence and conflict),” Martinez said. “We have a stake in this because the line is ‘We, The People’ — not ‘wake me up when it’s over’.”
Too many in our region are unwilling to raise objections to “those waving the flag and claiming they love the troops” because they don’t want to rock the boat, Columbus attorney Ross Thomas said.
But Thomas, a Democrat who waged unsuccessful election campaigns for state senator and Columbus City Council in recent years, says it’s time for local residents to stand up and declare they are not in favor of unnecessary and perpetual wars.
The lawyer said Trump’s claim that Article II of the U.S. Constitution allows him to do whatever he wants is a lie.
Referring to the Jan. 3 assassination of Soleimani near the Baghdad airport, Thomas told the crowd a targeted assassination of an official from another country is against U.S. and international law.
“Yes, Soleimani was a bad guy,” Thomas said. “The problem is that if an American president can start killing people on the sole basis that he says they are bad guys, it becomes both dangerous and ridiculous,” Thomas said. “Does this incident mean the Chinese can decide the Mexican ambassador to the United States is a bad guy, so they can start launching missiles toward our country?”
As Americans consider another war, they should pause to recognize the lives that have already been lost in Middle East conflicts, saod the Rev. Nic Cable of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbus.
“Those who will die in the weeks and months to come cannot be brought back, and their families will never be the same,” Cable said. “Many Middle Eastern countries, including Iran and Iraq, will never be the same because of this violence that has broken our world once more. We must recognize our despair and grief (from past losses) in order to understand that healing is needed.”
Many of those who attended the rally appeared to be old enough to either remember or have participated in anti-war rallies against the Vietnam War. That includes David Kadlec of Columbus, who held a sign that stated” “Peace gets kids fed. War gets kids dead.”
The sign was a reminder that the U.S. can choose to invest its money and resources as either a flexible force for kindness, or as a punishing force that goes in fists-first, Kadlec said.
What is most difficult for families with a military member serving in the Middle East are “senseless, bravo tactics” that frighten them, participant Steve Schoettmer said. The Elizabethtown resident, who unsuccessfully challenged Rep. Jim Lucas, R-Seymour, said he has a son who is a major in the National Guard now serving a third tour in Kuwait.
“We don’t know what’s going to happen, what (Trump) is going to do, what might provoke him — or what poll numbers might be guiding his actions,” Schoettmer said. “It terrifies us.”
However, the rally did attract a number of young adults such as Mikala Lomax of Columbus. The 25-year-old held a protest sign that stated: “No more killing and dying for profit. End U.S. Imperialism now. Evil will triumph when good people do nothing.”
When asked to elaborate, Lomax said she believes America has allowed its priorities to be twisted for too long.
“We shouldn’t go into other countries for the wrong reasons — and a lot of times, we shouldn’t go in at all,” Lomax said. “We shouldn’t force our policies on to other countries. nstead, we need to lead by example, rather than by force, and by peace, not by killing.”
The rally, which included a march around the Bartholomew County Courthouse, was co-organized by Bartholomew County Indivisible and the Bartholomew County Democratic Party.
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For more photos of the event, visit therepublic.com.
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