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[Nonviolenza] La biblioteca di Zorobabele. 483

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LA BIBLIOTECA DI ZOROBABELE
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Segnalazioni librarie e letture nonviolente
a cura del "Centro di ricerca per la pace, i diritti umani e la difesa della biosfera" di Viterbo
Supplemento a "La nonviolenza e' in cammino" (anno XXIII)
Direttore responsabile: Peppe Sini. Redazione: strada S. Barbara 9/E, 01100 Viterbo, tel. 0761353532, e-mail: centropacevt at gmail.com
Numero 483 del 21 giugno 2022

In questo numero:
1. Rileggendo "Custer e' morto per i vostri peccati" di Vine Deloria Jr. Un incontro di studio a Viterbo nell'ambito dell'iniziativa per la liberazione di Leonard Peltier
2. Carol Gokee: Rise Up For Peltier Call to Action Toolkit
3. Michele Bollinger: Leonard Peltier and the Indian struggle for freedom (2009) (parte seconda e conclusiva)

1. REPETITA IUVANT. RILEGGENDO "CUSTER E' MORTO PER I VOSTRI PECCATI" DI VINE DELORIA JR. UN INCONTRO DI STUDIO A VITERBO NELL'AMBITO DELL'INIZIATIVA PER LA LIBERAZIONE DI LEONARD PELTIER

La mattina di lunedi' 20 giugno 2022 si e' svolto a Viterbo per iniziativa del "Centro di ricerca per la pace, i diritti umani e la difesa della biosfera" un incontro di studio sul classico libro di Vine Deloria Jr, "Custer e' morto per i vostri peccati", pubblicato nel 1969 e tempestivamente tradotto in italiano dalla Jaca Book nel 1972, ed in seconda edizione nel 1977.
L'incontro si e' svolto nell'ambito dell'iniziativa per la liberazione di Leonard Peltier, l'illustre attivista nativo americano difensore dei diritti umani di tutti gli esseri umani e della Madre Terra, da 46 anni detenuto innocente nelle carceri statunitensi a seguito di un processo-farsa in cui fu assurdamente condannato per un crimine che non ha mai commesso sulla base di "prove" false e di "testimonianze" altrettante false, come successivamente ammisero i suoi stessi accusatori e giudici.
L'incontro si e' aperto, come di consueto, con un minuto di silenzio per le vittime della guerra in corso in Ucraina e di tutte le altre guerre.
Nel corso dell'incontro e' stato dettagliatamente illustrato il contenuto del libro, un vero e proprio classico della saggistica contemporanea.
L'autore (1933-2005) e' stato uno dei piu' grandi e influenti intellettuali nativi americani del XX secolo: docente universitario, teologo, storico, politologo, saggista, attivista, promotore di rilevantissime iniziative culturali e per i diritti umani, autore di molti libri che sono stati decisivi per la coscientizzazione sulla cultura e sulla resistenza delle popolazioni native americane e per contrastare il genocidio, l'etnocidio e l'ecocidio di cui sono tuttora vittime da parte del potere razzista, colonialista, rapinatore e imperialista bianco.
Tra le varie altre opere di Vine Deloria Jr., purtroppo tutte ancora non tradotte in italiano, segnaliamo particolarmente il classico "God is Red. A Native View of Religion" del 1973 (terza edizione del 2003), e per un accostamento insieme introduttivo e panoramico due rappresentative antologie di suoi scritti: "For this Land. Writing on Religion in America", 1999, 2011, e "Spirit & Reason", 1999 (quest'ultimo volume da' conto dei vari campi di ricerca in cui Deloria ha dato contributi assai significativi; il libro e' articolato in cinque parti dedicate rispettivamente a: Filosofia, Scienze umane, Educazione, Indiani, Religione).
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Le persone partecipanti all'incontro hanno condiviso la persuasione che sia assai opportuno che la traduzione italiana di questo classico libro sia finalmente ristampata, e che siano finalmente pubblicate anche nella nostra lingua le altre opere maggiori dell'illustre studioso.
Le persone partecipanti all'incontro hanno conclusivamente condiviso l'appello alla Presidente del Parlamento Europeo, on. Roberta Metsola, e l'analogo appello al Segretario generale dell'Onu, on. Antonio Guterres, affinche' chiedano al Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America un provvedimento di grazia che restituisca la liberta' a Leonard Peltier.
Le persone partecipanti all'incontro hanno altresi' promosso un invito a tutte le persone di volonta' buona, alle associazioni democratiche, alle istituzioni sollecite del bene comune dell'umanita', affinche' si adoperino per la liberazione di Leonard Peltier.
In calce si allega il testo dei due appelli alla Presidente Metsola e al Segretario generale Guterres, e l'invito erga omnes all'impegno comune affinche' sia restituita la liberta' all'illustre militante nativo americano da quasi mezzo secolo detenuto per delitti che non ha mai commesso, perseguitato per essere uno strenuo difensore dei popoli oppressi, dell'umanita' intera e della Madre Terra.
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Allegato primo: Appello alla Presidente del Parlamento Europeo, on. Roberta Metsola: president at ep.europa.eu
Gentilissima Presidente del Parlamento Europeo,
il suo indimenticabile predecessore, il Presidente David Sassoli, si impegno' affinche' il Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America compisse un atto di clemenza che restituisse la liberta' a Leonard Peltier, l'illustre attivista nativo americano difensore dei diritti umani di tutti gli esseri umani e della Madre Terra, da 46 anni detenuto innocente nelle carceri statunitensi a seguito di un processo-farsa in cui fu assurdamente condannato per un crimine che non ha mai commesso sulla base di "prove" false e di "testimonianze" altrettante false, come successivamente ammisero i suoi stessi accusatori e giudici. Nonostante la sua innocenza sia ormai da tutti riconosciuta, Leonard Peltier continua ad essere detenuto.
Con un intervento pubblicato su twitter e una dichiarazione alla stampa di cui e' disponibile la registrazione video il Presidente Sassoli il 23 agosto 2021 espresse pubblicamente la richiesta al Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America di concedere la grazia a Leonard Peltier.
Nel suo tweet del 23 agosto 2021 il Presidente Sassoli scriveva, in italiano e in inglese:
"Inviero' una lettera alle autorita' statunitensi chiedendo clemenza per Leonard Peltier, attivista per i diritti umani dell'American Indian Movement, in carcere da 45 anni.
Spero che le autorita' accolgano il mio invito. I diritti umani vanno difesi sempre, ovunque".
"I will send a letter to the US authorities asking for clemency for Leonard Peltier. A human rights activist of the American Indian Movement, he has been imprisoned for 45 years.
I hope the authorities will take up my invitation. Human rights must be defended always, everywhere".
Gentilissima Presidente del Parlamento Europeo,
gia' nel 1994 e poi ancora nel 1999 il Parlamento Europeo delibero' risoluzioni per la liberazione di Leonard Peltier.
Qui di seguito si trascrive integralmente la Risoluzione del Parlamento Europeo dell'11 febbraio 1999 (pubblicata sulla Gazzetta ufficiale n. C 150 del 28/05/1999 pag. 0384, B4-0169, 0175, 0179 e 0199/99):
"Risoluzione sul caso di Leonard Peltier
Il Parlamento europeo,
- vista la sua risoluzione del 15 dicembre 1994 sulla grazia per Leonard Peltier (GU C 18 del 23.1.1995, pag. 183),
A. considerando il ruolo svolto da Leonard Peltier nella difesa dei diritti dei popoli indigeni,
B. considerando che Leonard Peltier e' stato condannato nel 1977 a due ergastoli dopo essere stato estradato dal Canada, benche' non vi fosse alcuna prova della sua colpevolezza,
C. considerando che Amnesty International ha ripetutamente espresso le proprie preoccupazioni circa l'equita' del processo che ha condotto alla condanna di Leonard Peltier,
D. considerando che il governo degli Stati Uniti ha ormai ammesso che gli affidavit utilizzati per arrestare e estradare Leonard Peltier dal Canada erano falsi e che il Pubblico ministero statunitense Lynn Crooks ha affermato che il governo degli Stati Uniti non aveva alcuna prova di chi aveva ucciso gli agenti,
E. considerando che dopo 23 anni trascorsi nei penitenziari federali, le condizioni di salute di Leonard Peltier si sono seriamente aggravate e che secondo il giudizio di specialisti la sua vita potrebbe essere in pericolo se non ricevera' adeguate cure mediche,
F. considerando che le autorita' penitenziarie continuano a negargli adeguate cure mediche in violazione del diritto umanitario internazionale e i suoi diritti costituzionali,
G. rilevando che Leonard Peltier ha esaurito tutte le possibilita' di appello concessegli dal diritto statunitense,
1. insiste ancora una volta affinche' venga concessa a Leonard Peltier la grazia presidenziale;
2. insiste affinche' Leonard Peltier sia trasferito in una clinica dove possa ricevere le cure mediche del caso;
3. ribadisce la sua richiesta di un'indagine sulle irregolarita' giudiziarie che hanno portato alla reclusione di Leonard Peltier;
4. incarica la sua delegazione per le relazioni con gli Stati Uniti di sollevare il caso di Leonard Peltier iscrivendolo all'ordine del giorno del prossimo incontro con i parlamentari americani;
5. incarica il suo Presidente di trasmettere la presente risoluzione al Consiglio, alla Commissione, al Congresso statunitense e al Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America".
Gentilissima Presidente del Parlamento Europeo,
la liberazione di Leonard Peltier e' stata chiesta gia' da molti anni da prestigiose istituzioni, innumerevoli associazioni democratiche, milioni di persone di tutto il mondo tra cui illustri personalita' come Nelson Mandela, madre Teresa di Calcutta, Desmond Tutu e numerosi altri Premi Nobel.
Gentilissima Presidente del Parlamento Europeo,
dia seguito all'iniziativa del Parlamento Europeo e del Presidente Sassoli, e chieda al Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America di compiere finalmente l'atto di clemenza che restituisca la liberta' a Leonard Peltier.
Le persone partecipanti all'incontro di studio sul libro "Custer e' morto per i vostri peccati" di Vine Deloria Jr. svoltosi a Viterbo (Italia) il 20 giugno 2022
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Allegato secondo: Appello al Segretario Generale delle Nazioni Unite, on. Antonio Guterres: sgcentral at un.org
Egregio Segretario Generale delle Nazioni Unite, on. Antonio Guterres,
uniamo la nostra voce a quella di quanti hanno gia' chiesto un suo intervento presso il Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America affinche' compia un atto di clemenza restituendo la liberta' a Leonard Peltier attraverso lo strumento giuridico della grazia presidenziale.
Chiediamo questo suo intervento perche' la vicenda di Leonard Peltier riguarda l'umanita' intera.
Come Lei gia' sapra', Leonard Peltier e' un illustre attivista nativo americano, generoso e coraggioso difensore dei diritti umani di tutti gli esseri umani e della Madre Terra, da 46 anni detenuto per delitti che non ha commesso.
Gli stessi suoi accusatori che ne ottennero la condanna al termine di uno scandalosissimo processo-farsa basato su cosiddette "prove" dimostratesi assolutamente false e su cosiddette "testimonianze" dimostratesi anch'esse assolutamente false, hanno successivamente riconosciuto che la condanna e la conseguente detenzione di Leonard Peltier e' ingiusta e persecutoria, insensata e disumana, ed hanno chiesto loro stessi la sua liberazione.
Eppure, nonostante che la sua innocenza sia ormai certezza condivisa dall'umanita' intera, Leonard Peltier - ormai anziano e con gravi problemi di salute - continua ad essere detenuto per delitti che non ha mai commesso.
Sicuramente ricordera' che la liberazione di Leonard Peltier e' stata chiesta da milioni di persone di tutto il mondo, tra le quali figure luminose come Nelson Mandela, madre Teresa di Calcutta, Desmond Tutu.
Ricordera' sicuramente anche che la liberazione di Leonard Peltier e' stata chiesta da innumerevoli istituzioni, tra le quali il Parlamento Europeo con ben due risoluzioni fin dagli anni '90 del secolo scorso.
Ci e' particolarmente grato ricordare anche l'iniziativa del compianto Presidente del Parlamento Europeo, on. David Sassoli, recentemente deceduto, che il 23 agosto 2021 scriveva, in italiano e in inglese:
"Inviero' una lettera alle autorita' statunitensi chiedendo clemenza per Leonard Peltier, attivista per i diritti umani dell'American Indian Movement, in carcere da 45 anni. Spero che le autorita' accolgano il mio invito. I diritti umani vanno difesi sempre, ovunque".
"I will send a letter to the US authorities asking for clemency for Leonard Peltier. A human rights activist of the American Indian Movement, he has been imprisoned for 45 years. I hope the authorities will take up my invitation. Human rights must be defended always, everywhere".
Gli sforzi di milioni di esseri umani, l'impegno di innumerevoli associazioni - tra cui in primo luogo Amnesty International -, il voto di autorevolissime istituzioni, non hanno ottenuto fin qui che Leonard Peltier venisse liberato.
Occorre evidentemente un'iniziativa ulteriore.
Sia Lei, che rappresenta l'Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite, quindi l'istituzione rappresentativa di tutti i paesi e i popoli del mondo, a promuovere questa iniziativa.
Sia Lei a chiedere al Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America di restituire la liberta' a Leonard Peltier.
Le persone partecipanti all'incontro di studio sul libro "Custer e' morto per i vostri peccati" di Vine Deloria Jr. svoltosi a Viterbo (Italia) il 20 giugno 2022
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Allegato terzo: Un invito a tutte le persone di volonta' buona, alle associazioni democratiche, alle istituzioni sollecite del bene comune dell'umanita', affinche' si adoperino per la liberazione di Leonard Peltier
Fratelli e sorelle,
a tutte e tutti chiediamo un impegno, nelle forme che riterrete adeguate, affinche' sia restituita la liberta' a Leonard Peltier.
Vi proponiamo di scrivere lettere sia direttamente al Presidente degli Stati Uniti d'America, nelle cui mani e' il potere di concedere la grazia che restituisca finalmente la liberta' a Leonard Peltier, sia alle istituzioni, alle organizzazioni ed alle personalita' che riterrete possano trovare maggior ascolto da parte della Casa Bianca, sia ai mezzi d'informazione affinche' cessi il silenzio sulla vicenda e sulla testimonianza di Leonard Peltier e sulla lotta sua e dei popoli nativi in difesa dei diritti umani di tutti gli esseri umani e dell'intero mondo vivente.
Ma soprattutto vi chiediamo tre cose: di informare e coscientizzare le persone con cui siete in contatto, di voler voi stessi approfondire la conoscenza della vicenda di Leonard Peltier, di mettervi in contatto sia con lui che con il comitato internazionale di solidarieta' che lo sostiene.
L'indirizzo postale di Leonard Peltier e' nel sito dell'International Leonard Peltier Defense Committe (www.whoisleonardpeltier.info). Per contattare il comitato internazionale di solidarieta' inviare una e-mail a: contact at whoisleonardpeltier.info
Grazie di cuore per quanto vorrete fare.
Le persone partecipanti all'incontro di studio sul libro "Custer e' morto per i vostri peccati" di Vine Deloria Jr. svoltosi a Viterbo (Italia) il 20 giugno 2022

2. REPETITA IUVANT. CAROL GOKEE: RISE UP FOR PELTIER CALL TO ACTION TOOLKIT
[Dal comitato internazionale di difesa di Leonard Peltier ("International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee", 428-A8 Farnham St. Marshall, WI. 53559, 715.209.4453, sito: www.whoisleonardpeltier.info, e-mail: Contact at whoisleonardpeltier.info) riceviamo e diffondiamo]

Ask President Biden for the Immediate Release of Leonard Peltier!
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Call to Action Briefing
There is no doubt that our criminal justice system is imperfect, and Mr. Peltier knows firsthand just how imperfect it can be.
"I call on President Biden to commute Mr. Peltier's sentence expeditiously. It is the right thing to do." - Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt), longest serving member of the U.S. Senate
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Call to Action
Contact President Biden today!
202.456.1111
Ask for the immediate release of Leonard Peliter
Call President Biden Today! 202.456.1111
Please note: The White House comment line is open from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Eastern, Tuesday through Thursday.
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Important Links:
Change.org Petition: https://bit.ly/3refswl
Contact your local Representatives: https://bit.ly/housereplp
New York Times Article : Clemency for Peltier:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zpHhgTsR0cOQkqxlCJ-7fKoW2qJzTx9SbdoqaldBJlg/edit
Guardian Article Calling for Clemency:
https://amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/02/leonard-peltier-is-americas-longest-held-indigenous-prisoner-he-should-be-freed
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Graphics:
Click Here to Download Social Media Graphics
Please use these graphics to post on social media outlets.
RISEUpForPeltier Signs & Banner Art link here
Use images in this link above for signs and banners for art builds.
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Official Hashtags
#RiseUpForPeltier
#FreeLeonardPeltier
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Account to Tag
@POTUS
@whitehouse
@OfficialFBOP (Bureau of Prisons)
@PeltierHQ (International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee)
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Sample Facebook and Instagram Post (Copy and Paste)
Call-to-Action
Leonard Peltier, Anishinaabe and Dakota, has spent over 4 decades of his life behind bars, and recently, the prison system has failed to provide him adequate care and protection against COVID-19. His story is the epitome of the systemic abuse that continues to target Indigenous people and Movement Leaders.
We call upon President Biden to show proof of his efforts toward justice and equity by granting Executive Clemency to elder movement leader Leonard Peltier.
Call the White House and demand the release of Leonard Peltier. (202) 456-1111. Say
you support the commutation of #LeonardPeltier's sentence. He's held at USP-Coleman I in FL. Register number 89637-132
Sign the online petition: https://bit.ly/3refswl
Contact your reps. Find them here: https://bit.ly/35raR
#RiseUpForPeltier
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Here's what you need to know to #RiseUpForPeltier
On March 26, 2020 the Office of the Attorney General issued guidelines for the "Prioritization of Home Confinement as Appropriate in Response to COVID-19 Pandemic." A release to home confinement can be an immediate measure to ensure that Mr. Peltier gets the health care that he requires while the ILPDC continues to push for the commutation of his sentence.
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Mr. Peltier's home community on the Turtle Mountain Reservation in North Dakota continues to plead for his return, confirming that they do not see his release as a threat to his community. Read the full letter here.
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The International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee (ILPDC) is calling on the public to contact the White House and urge President Biden to take immediate action. Next, contact members of Congress and ask them to call upon the Warden at USP Coleman-1 and Bureau of Prisons Director Michael Carvajal, urging the immediate release of Leonard Peltier to home confinement.
It is time for Leonard Peltier to go home and be taken care of by his people. He has suffered for far too long and time is running out. Enough is enough!
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Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt), the longest serving member of the U.S. Senate issued a statement urging President Biden to commute Leonard Peltier's sentence stating that, "His trial was so riddled with flaws that even one of the prosecutors trying him has acknowledged that Peltier was wrongfully convicted... He is exactly the kind of individual who should be considered for clemency... I have long believed that pardons and commutations are vital tools to offer clemency and relief, particularly when our criminal justice system has been contorted to propagate injustices. I call on President Biden to commute Mr. Peltier.s sentence expeditiously. It is the right thing to do."
Read the full statement here:
https://www.leahy.senate.gov/press/comment-urging-president-biden-to-commute-leonard-peltiers-sentence
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Sample Tweets (Copy and Paste)
Mr. Peltier's home community on the Turtle Mountain Reservation in North Dakota continues to plead for his return, confirming that they do not see his release as a threat to his community. Read the full letter here:
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The IPLDC is calling on the public to contact the White House and urge President Biden to take immediate action. Next, contact members of Congress and ask them to call upon the Warden at USP Coleman-1 and Bureau of Prisons Director Michal Carvajal, urging the immediate release of Leonard Peltier to home confinement.
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It is time for Leonard Peltier to go home and be taken care of by his people. He has suffered for far too long and time is running out. Enough is enough.
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Graphics Sharing Instructions
1. Download a graphic from one of the visual asset folders below.
2. Log on to the social media platform of your choice. Assets for Facebook,
Instagram, and Twitter have been built for this toolkit.
3. Copy and paste one of the sample posts listed below or write your own post
and include one of our RISE UP FOR PELTIER hashtags.
4. Upload the image you’ve downloaded from the visual assets folder.
5. Tag or @mention @POTUS @WHITEHOUSE and post!
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For Media Inquiries, Please Contact:
Carol Gokee, International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, 715-209-4453
Jean Roach, International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, 605-415-3127
Kevin Sharp, former Federal District Court Judge & Peltier's lead attorney, 615-434-7001

3. DOCUMENTAZIONE. MICHELE BOLLINGER: LEONARD PELTIER AND THE INDIAN STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM (2009) (PARTE SECONDA E CONCLUSIVA)
[Dal sito della "International Socialist Review" (www.isreview.org), n. 67, riprendiamo questo articolo, preceduto dalla seguente nota: "This article is based on a presentation delivered Saturday, June 20, at Socialism 2009 in Chicago"]

Trail of Broken Treaties
AIM organized the Trail of Broken Treaties caravan in November 1972. Participants traveled from all over the country. The caravan stopped in cities and reservations along the way, and held political meetings and rallies. In St. Paul, the caravan converged and participants drafted a twenty-point proposal of social, economic, and political demands to present at the White House. But the portents were not good. An interior department memo - which the caravan's participants had gotten wind of before they arrived - instructed BIA officials to offer no assistance to the caravan.
By end of the first day in Washington, 400 Native Americans had arrived, including Leonard Peltier. They had been in touch with Vice President Agnew's office and had been assured they would be met seriously and respectfully. But the caravaners faced problems immediately. The Park Service refused to allow the Indians to perform a religious ceremony at the grave of Iwo Jima veteran Ira Hayes in Arlington Cemetery. The BIA had just spent $50,000 hosting tribal chairmen, yet refused to offer any financial support, even when the Trail's housing fell through. Angered and without adequate accommodations, the Trail participants decided to descend on the BIA building. Participants were told that they could stay in the BIA auditorium until proper accommodations could be found for them. Before arrangements were finalized, however, police in riot gear arrived and ordered the Indians to leave. After a fierce five-minute battle, the police found themselves outside the building, the entrance barricaded by the Indians, who by then numbered 1,000. According to historians Paul Chaat Smith and Robert Allen Warrior, "The Indians unfurled a banner reading NATIVE AMERICAN EMBASSY across the BIA building. A tepee rose on the front lawn of the liberated territory."
"If Alcatraz seemed fraught with potential disaster," writes Smith and Warrior, "this sudden rebellion in Washington, D.C. had catastrophic possibilities that bordered on the surreal. Five days before the presidential election, Indian revolutionaries held a government building six blocks from the White House, vowing to die rather than surrender. The casualties, if it came to that, would likely include the Trail's scores of children and old people."
Outside the building, there was much solidarity. Many stopped by to leave food and supplies. Some Indian BIA employees showed up to participate. Celebrities like Dr. Spock and Black leaders like Stokely Carmichael came to offer their support. "A circle of black, white and Chicano supporters had linked arms, forming a human barricade." But the more conservative National Tribal Chairman's Organization denounced the occupation.
The occupation began with great unity and energy. Toward the end, however, the hungry, frustrated, and exhausted occupiers exploded in a final rage of destruction against the BIA and its building, causing more than $2 million in damages. Agent provocateurs fanned the flames of destruction.
Finally, instead of attacking, as they had repeatedly threatened to do, the government was forced to negotiate. AIM leaders including Clyde Bellecourt, Russell Means, Dennis Banks, and Hank Adams and some elders met with Nixon administration officials. The agreement to end the occupation included three main points that would all soon be broken: no legal action against the occupiers; reform the U.S. government’s relationship with Indian people to be more responsive to Indian needs; and analyze and respond to the twenty-point proposal within thirty days.
The negotiations secured compensation for travel ($66,000) and a police escort out of town. But they also took with them a little more - namely, a couple tons of BIA files that verified everything from cases of government misconduct, conflict of interest within the BIA - like the assistant secretary of the interior who went to work for Peabody Coal a few years later - the identity FBI informants, including agents involved in the caravan, and documents verifying the forced sterilization of Native American women. It was described as the biggest document heist in history.
A House subcommittee said that the AIM action was "the most severe damage inflicted upon Washington, D.C. since the British burned the city in the War of 1812." But the federal government had a substantial number of agents among the protesters who had encouraged the destruction. It thus became apparent why the government was so willing to agree not to prosecute the Indians, in the words of Vine Deloria, it would have been "extremely difficult for the government to have proven an intent by the real Indian activists to destroy the building."
Out of this struggle the FBI and BIA escalated their war on AIM and Native Americans, turning its notorious counterintelligence program, or COINTELPRO, on AIM, and as well, in the 1972 Oglala Sioux tribal elections, throwing its weight behind strongman Dick Wilson for tribal president, hoping that a "strong Indian retaliation" against AIM and its supporters could quell the growing Indian militancy.
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Wounded Knee
Dick Wilson, a former bootlegger, was elected Oglala Sioux tribal council president in 1972. Wilson was deeply unpopular because of his mistreatment of the elderly and traditional people on the reservation, his undemocratic methods, and the rampant nepotism and corruption that infested his administration. He was infamous for embezzling Housing and Urban Development money and misusing funds, and for neglecting everything else on the reservation. Wilson used federal funds to start what some have called a paramilitary, and what became a virtual death squad. The cocky, crew-cutted Wilson only named his armed gang Guardians of the Oglala Nation (GOON) after angry Pine Ridge residents had been calling them the "goon squad" for awhile.
The GOONs went after anyone who spoke out against Wilson, using violence, harassment, and intimidation to uphold his dictatorship. At first, resistance to Wilson was organized through the Oglala Sioux Civil Rights Organization (OSCRO) which organized impeachment petitions (one of which had more signatures on it than the number of people who had voted for him) and filed for impeachment hearings multiple times, mobilizing hundreds of people for those hearings. These became a farce, however, when Wilson decided to preside over them himself.
It was at this point that a meeting of 200 members of the OSCRO and traditional elders, including the traditionalist chief Frank Fools Crow, decided to invite AIM to help them in their struggle. The speeches of women such as Ellen Moves Camp and Gladys Bissonette were decisive in the meeting. After delivering a speech in Lakota, she turned to the AIM leaders present at the meeting and appealed to them to bring their members to Pine Ridge. "For many years we have not fought any kind of war," she said, "and we have forgotten how to fight." AIM knew what they were getting into; there had been countless threats issued by Wilson in press releases that they were going to shoot and kill AIM members who came to Pine Ridge.
It was the decision at this meeting that led to the stunning seventy-one-day occupation of Wounded Knee in 1973. On February 27, 1973, a caravan of about 300 armed Oglala Sioux and AIM activists entered the town of Wounded Knee and declared it liberated territory. They took over the trading post, the church, blocked all the roads, and took several white hostages. The leading participants included Leonard Crow Dog, Carter Camp, Madonna Thunder Hawk, Russell Means, and Dennis Banks. "This was a rebirth of our dignity and our self pride," Russell Means said of the occupation. Dennis Banks said, "The message that went out is that a band of Indians could take on the U.S. government. Tecumseh had his day, Geronimo, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse. We had ours." Their demands were simple and included a call to investigate corruption in the reservation tribal government, and a demand that Congress hold hearings on broken treaties.
The response by the U.S. government was overwhelming: within hours, 200 FBI agents, federal marshals, and BIA police surrounded and blockaded the town, using two armored personnel carriers and a couple of fighter jets in their operation - later to be augmented by fifteen more armored personnel carriers, authorized by the U.S. Army. U.S. military personnel, disguising their presence by wearing civilian clothes, played a central role in the siege. South Dakota's two Senators, George McGovern and James Abourezk, came to negotiate getting the hostages released, only to discover that the hostages, sympathetic to the Indians, were free to come and go as they pleased. One eighty-two-year-old hostage told reporters that they had decided to stay in order to protect AIM activists, whom he feared the troops would kill if the hostages left.
The government immediately rejected the occupiers' demands, sending in mid-level officials who delivered an ultimatum for them to leave. AIM burned it in front of a bunch of TV cameras. By this point Wounded Knee was on the nightly news, and polls showed that 90 percent of Americans followed it very closely. A delegation led by Leonard Fools Crow went to the United Nations. Marlon Brando, who had participated in one of the fish-ins in the Pacific Northwest, refused to accept his Oscar for best actor in The Godfather, sending Apache actress Sacheen Littlefeather to decline the Oscar on his behalf.
With the Watergate scandal in progress, the federal government didn't want to look any worse, especially on the same site as the 1890 massacre. On March 8 it pulled back the roadblocks and hoped the occupation would peter out. Instead, hundreds of supporters and a great deal of supplies poured in and the occupiers declared themselves the Independent Oglala Nation. Some of the local Sioux departed to be replaced by Indians from other nations, as well as by white leftists, veterans, Chicano activists, and a small number of Asian and Black participants. Several thousand people joined in the occupation, either for a day or for many more.
The blockade was reestablished on an even stronger footing and Wounded Knee came under severe attack. The occupation met with repression from the FBI and U.S. marshals, and from Dick Wilson and his GOONs, who were furious that the feds didn't unleash an all-out assault from the start. In fact, they shot at both camps to try to start firefight.
It didn't take long for the feds to catch up, though. As Former FBI Chief Joseph Trimbach bragged in the years that followed: "The director said, tell Trimbach he can have anything he wants! Which was pretty neat, because it was like having a blank check. I had agents go up to Rapid City and buy every rifle they could find." (Earlier this year, Trimbach and his son, who have made careers for themselves by vilifying AIM, made a very public showing of sending a letter to Obama smearing Peltier and his supporters.)
The military response was overwhelming. Half a million rounds were fired into Wounded Knee, including some from a .50-caliber machine gun that fired two-inch diameter shells; fighter jets loomed overhead; and armored personnel carriers roamed the perimeter. The government cut power and water and forced the media out at gunpoint. In spite of the horrible conditions - food shortages and a late winter storm - people held their ground.
The occupation received support from Native Americans across the country, and from other Indian nations who were inspired by their example. A delegation of chiefs from the Six Nations of the Iroquois confederacy arrived on March 19 to convey their support. A statement by the Grand Council of the Iroquois asked the U.S. government, "You are concerned for the destruction of property at the BIA building and at Wounded Knee. Where is your concern for the destruction of our people, for human lives?"
The U.S. government was worried that Wounded Knee would become an example others would follow. A high-ranking BIA official expressed alarm over his view that Wounded Knee had "crystallized a revolutionary movement in the United States." Federal forces escalated their tactics, attempting to destabilized the occupation from the inside and attack it also from the outside. Two men, Frank Clearwater and Buddy Lamont, a Vietnam veteran, were shot and killed during separate firefights in which federal agents poured thousands of rounds into Wounded Knee. Frank Clearwater had just arrived in Wounded Knee with his wife to offer their support. He was hit by a stray bullet that pierced the local church where he had been resting; Buddy Lamont, an Oglala Sioux and Vietnam veteran well-liked on Pine Ridge, was struck down by a sniper. His great grandparents had been with Crazy Horse at the Little Bighorn battle, and his grandmother was one of the few to survive the 1890 Wounded Knee massacre.
With no electricity, no water, dwindling food supplies, and then a devastating fire that burned down the trading post - together with the coordinated arrests of several AIM leaders who were touring the country raising support - the occupation had reached its point of exhaustion by the end of April. After seventy-one days, on May 8, AIM agreed - at Fools Crow's request - to end it. The militants were disarmed and 120 were arrested. The night before, scores of people snuck out and evaded arrest, leaving toy guns for the feds to find. 
Gladys Bissonette, who had been in the occupation throughout, said on its last day: "This was one of the greatest things that every happened in my life. And although today is our last day here, I still feel like I'll always be here because this is part of my home... I hope that the Indians, at least throughout the Pine Ridge Reservation, unite and stand up together, hold hands, and never forget Wounded Knee. We didn't have anything here, we didn't have nothing to eat. But we had one thing—that was unity and friendship amongst 64 different tribes... I have never seen anything like this."
In the end, 1,200 people nationwide were arrested for Wounded Knee, and 500 traditionals were indicted. Almost all the defendants indicted for their direct involvement in the occupation were acquitted, and Leonard Crow Dog was the only one who served any prison time - a few months.
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Reign of terror
Leonard Peltier was not at Wounded Knee. But he would fall victim to its aftermath - as would hundreds of others. 
The FBI launched an attack on AIM as part of its COINTELPRO program, which had begun in the mid-1960s under J. Edgar Hoover and was used to destroy the Black Panther Party - the murder of BPP leader Fred Hampton, among many - while Dick Wilson and the BIA established an extreme reign of terror on Pine Ridge.
"The FBI set out to eliminate 'radical' political opposition inside the U.S. When traditional modes of repression (exposure, blatant harassment, and prosecution for political crimes) failed to counter the growing insurgency," commented one journalist, "and even helped to fuel it, the Bureau took the law into its own hands and secretly used fraud and force to sabotage constitutionally-protected political activity."
The FBI employed many dirty tricks against its targets including wiretapping, assassination, "bad-jacketing" (spreading rumors that certain activists were informants in order to discredit them), and the use of agents provocateurs - all in coordination with state and local officials, police forces, and district attorneys. Future South Dakota governor Bill Janklow declared at the time: "The only way to deal with the Indian problem in South Dakota is to put a gun to the AIM leaders' heads and pull the trigger." Many compare those years on Pine Ridge to a paramilitary invasion.
Dick Wilson and his GOONs went on a rampage of beatings and assassinations of AIM members, supporters, and the traditionals on Pine Ridge. Within three years, at least sixty-nine AIM members and supporters were violently murdered on or near the Pine Ridge Reservation, while hundreds more were physically assaulted.
Write Bruce Johansen and Roberto Maestas, "Using only the documented political deaths, the yearly murder rate on Pine Ridge Reservation between March 1, 1973, and March 1, 1976, was 170 per 100,000. By comparison, Detroit, the reputed 'murder capital of the United States,' had a rate of 20.2 per 100,000 in 1974... In a nation of 200 million persons, a murder rate comparable with that of Pine Ridge between 1973 and 1976 would have left 340,000 persons dead for political reasons in one year; 1.32 million in three... The political murder rate at Pine Ridge between March 1, 1973 and March 1, 1976 was almost equivalent to that in Chile during the three years after a military coup supported by the United States deposed and killed President Salvador Allende."
Among the victims were Pedro Bissonette, Philip Black Elk, Priscilla White Plume, Byron DeSersa, and Anna Mae Aquash. Most of the cases have never been solved, or even pursued - because the FBI and the BIA have blood on their hands in every single one of them and any decent investigation would point back to them.
Anna Mae Aquash, who was murdered in February 1976, was bad-jacketed by the FBI before her death. A BIA doctor, who also failed to notice that she had been shot in the head, removed her hands in a possible attempt to conceal her identity. It remains unclear if she was murdered by GOONs, the FBI, or AIM members who were convinced by FBI rumors that she was an informant. Many on the reservation believed that she was targeted by the FBI in retaliation for the deaths of the two FBI agents for which Peltier was prosecuted. Two former AIM members were eventually prosecuted for her murder. But there is so much deliberate disinformation and confusion surrounding the case, it is likely that the full truth will never be known.
It was the FBI-and-GOON driven reign of terror that led to - some would say provoked - the Incident at Oglala. Amid this terror and fear, traditional leaders on Pine Ridge once again called on AIM for protection, especially for older traditional people. That is why Peltier and dozens of others were camping on the Jumping Bull property on that fateful day in June 1975.
"The FBI had more than 50 agents swarming over the Pine Ridge Reservation (prior to 1973 they only had 2 or 3 agents in the area, if that)," wrote Peltier. "Seems like the more FBIs we had around, the more murders we had."
AIM members across the country faced constant harassment and frame-ups that drained the organization's resources and, eventually, broke its leadership. There were AIM - led actions through the end of the 1970s; a core of activists protested the Robideau and Butler trials as well as Peltier's; there was a protest outside the FBI building in 1979. But the Peltier conviction in 1977 was a severe blow from which AIM never recovered.
What explains the virulence of the offensive against AIM? Economic motives were clearly at work. Around the time of the Wounded Knee occupation, Wilson signed over a portion of the reservation known to be rich in uranium and molybdenum to the U.S. Forest Service. Early 1970s government estimates of potential profits from uranium mining in the Black Hills was in the range of a half billion dollars.
But the rationale extends beyond narrow economic reasons. The U.S. government was striving to smash the left, to break the back of political struggle, and the influence of revolutionary politics in particular. Indian militancy emerged on the scene just as many other struggles in this era begin to reach a political impasse; many struggles did not regain their footing after 1972, which is when AIM was ascending.
AIM was incredibly popular and well connected with the main radical currents in U.S. society that were influenced by national liberation struggles around the world. Furthermore, AIM symbolized armed struggle and militancy against oppression. The government feared that AIM could be a key factor in reviving struggle - one reason they became so desperate to end the occupation at Wounded Knee was so that it ended before campuses let out for the summer.
By 1973, the ruling class in this country was actively engaged in the process of breaking the back of revolutionary struggles here and abroad. The U.S. backed Augusto Pinochet's coup in Chile that year, for example.
Violent repression and divisive COINTELPRO tactics broke up and demoralized AIM, while the general decline of other social movements in this period sealed its fate. AIM continued to organize through end of the 1970s and maintains a presence in some areas of the U.S. today, but never recovered from the reign of terror and Peltier's conviction in particular.
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What the movement won
Despite this severe repression and the short time frame for AIM's influence, the Native American struggles won a great deal.
AIM essentially fought against the annihilation of Indian culture - and won. Traditions like the sacred Sun Dance could have been lost forever. The movement dealt a huge blow to racism, and changed people's consciousness in ways that we still see today. American Indian studies programs have thrived on campuses and the history curriculum taught in schools, while still highly problematic, is fundamentally different than what it was forty years ago. It is now commonly accepted that genocide was committed against Native Americans. And while we still have sports teams that use Indian mascots and the U.S. certainly hasn't gotten rid of Columbus Day, these things are commonly met with ridicule, disdain, and opposition. When people hear that a predominantly Native American community college in Colorado named their basketball team the "Fighting Whiteys," many cheer.
Important material gains were won. The policy of termination was ended. Nearly a dozen new policies and programs - in education, financing, and health - were instituted. Mount Adams was returned to the Yakama Nation in Washington State, and 48,000 acres of the Sacred Blue Lake lands were returned to Taos Pueblo in New Mexico. The Pacific Northwest Indians eventually won the right to 50 percent of harvestable fish.
The reforms won in the 1960s and 1970s made a number of material improvements in people's lives. The percentage of families on the Pine Ridge Reservation living below the poverty line fell 10 percent by the end of the 1970s and per capita income went up 7 percent. In fact, poverty overall fell for Native Americans more so than any other group. Unfortunately, these changes didn't last. During the Reagan years the number of Indians living in poverty went up 23 percent.
Given the severity of the poverty on reservations today, a massive investment in Native American communities is beyond urgent. Native Americans live in unspeakably horrid conditions in many places, especially the Rosebud and Pine Ridge Reservations. A chilling - and telling - 2007 Al-Jazeera broadcast showed footage of two Lakota people pushing their gasless car down a desolate road - they were taking their TV to the pawn shop for cash so they could eat. "A day in the life of a Lakota" remarked one.
Reservation life is characterized by 80 percent unemployment and a median income of $2,600 to $3,500 a year. The life expectancy on Pine Ridge is the lowest in the Western Hemisphere outside of Haiti.
Major illnesses strike Native Americans more severely than many other groups - diabetes and tuberculosis rates are eight times that of the rest of the population, cervical cancer rates are five times higher, rates of heart disease are twice as high. Suicide, depression, and alcoholism plague and paralyze entire communities. Most houses are substandard, with inadequate heat, water and sanitation, and on average each house is shared by a dozen people.
As Peltier rightly argues, "No one can bring the dead back. But we can do something for the living. Economic reparations to Native Americans are absolutely essential for a just future, as is the return of sacred sites and significant pieces of ancestral territory, as well as a fair share of natural resources on lands taken in violation of treaties."
The U.S. government has continually stalled in the face of a 1996 Native American Rights Fund class-action lawsuit against the United States on behalf of 500,000 plaintiffs over the mismanagement of billions of dollars in oil, gas, grazing, timber, and other royalties overseen by the Department of the Interior for Indian trustees since 1887. Countless reports have proven widespread fraud and mismanagement of these funds. Even the department's own commissioned 2002 report concluded that somewhere between $10 billion and $40 billion is owed to the plaintiffs. Yet Washington has refused to account for the lost funds owed but not paid to tribes and individuals - even after Congress ordered it in 1994 - on the grounds that such an investigation would cost too much.
It's safe to say that the U.S. government as well as countless U.S. corporations owe an enormous debt to American Indians, far beyond these billions in royalties. Activists need to ensure that they start by returning freedom to Leonard Peltier, and that they keep on paying.
The fight for Leonard Peltier's release from prison is about taking the first step toward rectifying the crimes done to Native Americans, but its also about challenging the U.S. gulag that incarcerates not just political prisoners like Leonard and Mumia Abu-Jamal, but also one in every hundred adults - disproportionately people of color, working-class, and poor people who have been victims of draconian "tough-on-crime" laws.
Former Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton played decisive roles on this front - and Peltier has languished in prison for over thirty-three years. But with the possibility of Peltier's parole in front of us, the time is now to rebuild the struggle against the criminal justice system and put Leonard Peltier's case back at the heart of it.
In the words of Peltier: "The destruction of our people must stop! We are not statistics. We are people from whom you took this land by force and blood and lies... You practice crimes against humanity at the same time that you piously speak to the rest of the world of human rights! America, when will you live up to your own principles?"

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LA BIBLIOTECA DI ZOROBABELE
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Segnalazioni librarie e letture nonviolente
a cura del "Centro di ricerca per la pace, i diritti umani e la difesa della biosfera" di Viterbo
Supplemento a "La nonviolenza e' in cammino" (anno XXIII)
Direttore responsabile: Peppe Sini. Redazione: strada S. Barbara 9/E, 01100 Viterbo, tel. 0761353532, e-mail: centropacevt at gmail.com
Numero 483 del 21 giugno 2022
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