Where are anti-war women?

During the Vietnam War, there was Mothers for Peace and a long list
of other organizations of mostly feminists opposing U.S. involvement. To
date, only two feminist organizations, MADRE and a dissident chapter of
the National Organization for Women, have taken a stand against the war
in the Balkans calling for an immediate end to the bombing of
Yugoslavia.

Marie-Jose Ragab, president of the Dulles Area chapter of the
Virginia NOW, said that although a number of her organization’s members
at first opted to remain silent about the war, new information changed
their minds. The displacement of almost two million Kosovars, the
increasing use of cluster bombs against defenseless populations, the
systematic destruction of the civilian infrastructure in Serbia, the
eradication of targeted historic and cultural sites and the attack upon
the Chinese Embassy have unified the small NOW chapter, making it the
first to oppose the war openly.

“(Some members) were really fixated on the humanitarian aspects and
fixated on the fact that we had done nothing,” said Ragab referring to
the mounting atrocities taking place in the Balkans before the NATO
attack. “But once information started to come out and they were able to
see that the Clinton administration’s actions were a bit more
complicated, they started to look at other aspects of what the so-called
war was all about.”

The other feminist organization joining Ragab and her NOW chapter in
the war protest is MADRE, an international women’s human rights
organization. MADRE strongly condemns the war against Serbia and is
calling for a halt of the NATO bombing. The organization believes that
bombing has never achieved a reduction in violence and the current war
is no exception.

“We’re totally opposed to the bombing,” said Vivian Stromberg,
executive director of MADRE. “Bombing cannot make it better, and the
United States can’t go around saying that every time they hit a civilian
target, it’s an accident. When you load bombs into a plane and send
them over cities to unload and they explode, you cannot say that is an
accident.”

Speaking about NOW’s silence in regards to the war, Ragab told
WorldNetDaily she was somewhat surprised because the group had always
been anti-war. She also pointed out, though, that it was probably the
organization’s dedication to the Clinton administration that has “once
again” clouded its thinking.

Explaining what she meant by “once again,” Ragab said that NOW looked
the other way during the investigations into the alleged rapes of
Juanita Broaddrick and didn’t condemn him during the Paula Jones suit.

Ragab said that she wasn’t quite sure why so few women’s
organizations have taken a stance against the war, but that in any case,
there has been an ever-growing weakness in the women’s movement as a
whole.

WorldNetDaily called many women’s organizations in an effort to learn
their position, but none of those contacted had an official statement.
The organizations contacted include Concerned Women for America,
Independent Women’s Forum, League of Women Voters, Feminist Majority,
National Partnership for Women and Families and the Center for Policy
Alternatives. NOW’s national headquarters was called as well, but the
phone call wasn’t returned.

Although Ragab views her peers in the feminist movement as having
become weak, Ragab herself vows to remain strong. Last August, Dulles
NOW supported the drive to impeach Clinton and called for his
resignation, and the organization will continue to call for Clinton’s
resignation until his last day in office.

A recent event in Belgrade that concerns Ragab as well as her members
is the bombing of the Chinese Embassy. Ragab believes the United
States’ explanation for the accidental bombing was weak and that many of
her members believe that it could have been intentional.

“This story about the pilots using an old map is not credible at
all,” Ragab said. “Actually, it makes the United States not look very
good.”

Another aspect of the war that doesn’t make the United States look
good, according to Stromberg, is the idea that the NATO action concerns
itself with stopping the ethnic cleansing of Kosovars.

“I don’t believe it at all,” Stromberg said. “I think they’re trying
to figure out some good way to prove that they need more arms contracts
and that they can fight these ‘testosterone wars’ on more than one front
at the same time.”

Besides speaking out against the war, Stromberg said that her
organization is in the process of sending support to community-based
women’s organizations that are responding to the refugee crisis. MADRE
is also sending support to a Yugoslavia-based group called Women in
Black in Belgrade. According to Stromberg, the group is still standing
up against President Slobodan Milosevic’s policies.

Summarizing the two organization’s beliefs about the war, Ragab said,
“Far from defending human rights and liberties as touted, the record of
the Clinton Administration with regards to Belgrade and elsewhere
demonstrates how profoundly contemptuous of those rights and of
international laws it really is, just as it demonstrated how
contemptuous it was of women, their rights and our own laws. The
recorded fiasco the bombing operations have become is now threatening
world peace. They must stop.”