Let’s give peace a chance

On the International Day of Peace, you can give a voice to the war victims who need food and peace so they can return home

 Sep. 21, 2026  

by William Lambers in The Patriot News 

William Lambers is the author of the Road to Peace and has partnered with the UN World Food Program on the book Ending World Hunger.

In the movie “The Wizard of Oz,” Dorothy famously says “There’s no place like home.” On International Day of Peace , Sept. 21, there are millions of war refugees who just want to go home and live there again. Peace is precious to them because it can lead them home.

Asha is a mother from war-devastated Sudan who was forced to flee with her daughters to South Sudan. She told the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) that she worries her daughters may have to grow up away from home.

Asha and her family wish every day could bring peace. War refugees may be thousands of miles away from you, but you can actually help them get home. The theme of this year’s International Day of Peace is “‘everyday architects of peace’—people driving local action, laying the groundwork for stability, and building a lasting peace from the ground up.”

As the UN reminds us, “Peace isn’t just built in conference rooms—it is shaped by everyone, everywhere, every day.” You have the power to make a difference in building peace.

First, pay attention to conflicts, even those that aren’t in the headlines. You can ask your elected officials to make global peacemaking a priority. Ask them to fund peacemaking initiatives rather than fuel arms races.

You can... READ MORE  https://www.pennlive.com/opinion/2026/09/lets-give-peace-a-chance-opinion.html?gift=707a9de1-ed48-4171-ac4a-3ca02af7116b

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Aunt Jameela's Bread. A Story of Food, Family, and Love..... A beautiful new book by Palestinian-American Mike Odetalla about childhood and baking bread in his homeland.

A beautiful new book by Palestinian-American Mike Odetalla about childhood, family, and homemade bread in his homeland  

Auntie Jameela's Bread

by Mike Odetalla (Author), Jaber Yassein (Illustrator) Format: Paperback

See all formats and editions

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In a small village nestled among golden fields and olive trees, Aunt Jameela baked bread that fills more than just hungry tummies...it fills hearts with joy, stories, and love.

From the wheat grown in the fields to the warm loaves shared with family and friends, every step is a reminder of what truly matters.

A heartwarming tale of tradition, togetherness, and the special memories made around the table.   https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0GXRFK11T/ref=sw_img_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

Buy a copy, enjoy, savor it... then pass it on to your local library or a child that you know and love 

Growing Gardens for Palestine

Sunday, May 10, 2026

Aunt Jameela's Bread. A Story of Food, Family, and Love..... A beautiful new book by Palestinian-American Mike Odetalla about childhood and baking bread in his homeland.

"My suffering, though severe, was never compounded by denial. The world around me was structured to keep me alive. That distinction matters. Because elsewhere, at this very moment, there are people whose hunger is not the byproduct of illness—but the result of policy. Of decision. Of design. In Gaza, and within the walls of Israeli prisons, hunger is not incidental. It is imposed..." Hunger, By Design By Mike Odetalla

Mike Hanini Odetalla

Hunger, By Design
By Mike Odetalla

At the height of my cancer treatment, I lost 60 pounds in less than two months.
Not by choice. Not by neglect. But because I simply could not eat.

Every swallow felt like fire. Every attempt at nourishment became a negotiation with pain. My body, once familiar, began to disappear before my own eyes—reduced not by lack of food, but by my inability to take it in. I didn't recognize the person looking back at me in the mirror.

And yet, even in that darkest stretch, one truth remained constant:

Food was there.

It sat within reach. Prepared. Available. Waiting for me, even when I could not accept it. Doctors urged me. Nurses monitored me. My suffering, though severe, was never compounded by denial. The world around me was structured to keep me alive.

That distinction matters.

Because elsewhere, at this very moment, there are people whose hunger is not the byproduct of illness—but the result of policy. Of decision. Of design.

In Gaza, and within the walls of Israeli prisons, hunger is not incidental. It is imposed.

There, food is not something a patient struggles to swallow—it is something withheld. Rations are restricted. Access is controlled. Malnutrition spreads not because bodies fail, but because systems ensure they do.

I know what it feels like to weaken. To feel your strength slip quietly away. To measure your days not in hours, but in ounces lost and energy drained.

But I also know this: My suffering existed within a system trying—however imperfectly—to save me.

Theirs exists within a system that does not. 

That is the difference between illness and injustice.

Between misfortune and intention.

Between hunger… and hunger used as a weapon.

And once you understand that distinction, you cannot unsee it.

 https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10165923688376977&set=a.10150390714236977

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Trump wants $1.5tn for the Pentagon – and cuts to healthcare and housing. The president’s proposed $445bn increase in military spending would batter popular domestic programs as millions struggle

In seeking a mammoth increase in military spending while cutting social programs, Trump is again showing how hollow his promises were about making life better for typical Americans.’ Photograph: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

Steven Greenhouse

 

 

 

 

 Tue 21 Apr 2026 

With Americans focused on Donald Trump’s deeply unpopular war against Iran, far too few Americans are focusing on another disastrous Trump idea: increasing the Pentagon’s budget to a colossal $1.5tn. Just as Trump’s Iran war has hurt millions of Americans by sending gas prices skyward, Trump’s supersized Pentagon budget will hurt millions of Americans because Trump, to help finance that budget, is pushing for painful cuts in health, education, and housing programs.

By proposing a record-breaking $445bn increase in military spending, Trump is showing he’s gung-ho for guns, but not for butter, even though millions of Americans are struggling financially and are eager for more butter – social spending – to make their lives easier. Trump’s proposed military budget would mean a spectacular jump – it would be 42% above this year’s budget and two-thirds bigger than Joe Biden’s last Pentagon budget. Asserting that human needs are woefully underfunded, a coalition of 289 groups denounced Trump’s “gigantic” increase as “grossly irresponsible”, especially since the US already spends more on its military than the next nine biggest defense-spending countries combined.

Trump evidently wants this $445bn increase so he can thump his chest even more about the US’s military might and brag about all the shiny, new hardware he is building, especially the new Trump-class “Golden Fleet” battleships named after you-know-who. (Those battleships will cost an astonishing $9bn to $13bn each.) Beyond that $445bn jump in military spending, let’s not forget that Trump wants Congress to approve a separate $200bn for his not-so-successful war against Iran.

 Trump’s Pentagon spending spree could prove disastrous in several ways. To help fund his increase, Trump is seeking a 10% cut in discretionary domestic spending, chopping such popular programs as medical research, job training, home heating assistance, environmental protection and disaster relief after hurricanes. After all the grievous damage that Trump has already done to government programs, the public doesn’t want more cuts – it wants increased spending on healthcare and other social programs.... READ MORE https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/apr/21/trump-military-pentagon-budget  

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"We're talking about a federal administration that has spent close to $30 billion dollars killing thousands of people at a time when working class people across this country cannot afford the bare minimum," he said. "And to be told that a city-run grocery store is implausible, but spending more than $500 million a day to kill people in Iran and Lebanon is not only plausible but necessary, it speaks to a broken kind of politics." Zohran Mamdani April 17, 2026 NPR interview

The war in Iran speaks to a "broken kind of politics"

That chasm is most clear in his deep opposition to the U.S. war on Iran, he said.

"We're talking about a federal administration that has spent close to $30 billion dollars killing thousands of people at a time when working class people across this country cannot afford the bare minimum," he said. "And to be told that a city-run grocery store is implausible, but spending more than $500 million a day to kill people in Iran and Lebanon is not only plausible but necessary, it speaks to a broken kind of politics."

He said that New Yorkers feel the effects of that war beyond their pocketbook.

"At the core of any war is a dehumanization that takes place, and that dehumanization is not limited to any battlefield," he said. "It extends into the lives of people across this country."

He shared the story of a young Muslim woman he called after seeing the news that she had been thrown to the ground at a New York City subway stop.

"She told me that the first thing her attacker said to her before he attacked her was, 'I wonder how many Iranians we killed today,'" he said. "That is what we are allowing to take hold in our politics."

Zohran Mamdani says Iran war speaks to a 'broken kind of politics'

https://www.npr.org/2026/04/16/nx-s1-5785163/zohran-mamdani-interview-first-100-days 

 

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