Statement by AJWS Senior Director of Civil and Political Rights and Advocacy, Tracey Gurd, on the attempts to dismantle an independent judicial system in Guatemala As U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris plans her visit to Guatemala in June, we encourage her to focus on the attacks on the country’s democracy, especially those aimed at Guatemala’s …Read More
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Hurricane Iota hurtles towards the same coastlines just battered by Tropical Storm Eta, as Central America braces for more catastrophic damage.
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Across the world, COVID-19 is ravaging low-income communities unprepared to take on a global pandemic and its economic effects. This crisis is compounded by authoritarian governments who are both refusing to lead with the public’s interest in mind and capitalizing on this global pandemic to assert and strengthen their power. To learn more about how …Read More
Read MoreHuman rights group calls on Morales government to end 30-day state of siege affecting indigenous communities American Jewish World Service (AJWS), the leading global Jewish human rights organization, strongly denounces Guatemala’s decision to impose a 30-day state of siege across 22 municipalities in five provinces in response to the killings of three Guatemalan military officers. …Read More
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In the hot, rural plains of Altaverapaz, Guatemala, there is a small agrarian community, 81 families strong. They’ve only just arrived at La Flecha in the last year, trickling in to this neglected farm after being displaced from different lands in the region. Life in La Flecha isn’t easy. Small cinderblock houses with tin roofs …Read More
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“We are telling the truth. We want to be heard, and we want justice,” said a petite, elderly woman to a room full of journalists and human rights activists in Guatemala City on February 13, 2016. A survivor of sexual slavery during Guatemala’s decades-long civil war, the woman’s face was obscured by a Mayan scarf to protect her identity.
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Seeking justice for bloodshed in the name of development
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Hundreds of Maya Achi people were murdered to make way for a dam in Guatemala. Decades later, their families finally find justice. Back in 1982, Carlos Chen Osorio was a young man with a family: his wife, Paulina, and their toddler children, Enriqueta and Antonio. Paulina carried their third child inside her, and expected to …Read More
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Indigenous communities work together to defend their land and way of life. In Guatemala, indigenous people whose families have lived and farmed in one place for generations are now facing rapid encroachment on their land and way of life. Many Mayan communities lack official land titles, despite obvious historic and cultural ties to their land. …Read More
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In Guatemala, AJWS focuses on ending violence and discrimination against women, youth and Indigenous people, and protecting the land and natural resources that farmers need to survive. AJWS grantees also protect human rights defenders seen as threats by the country’s deeply corrupt government.
Read MoreThis week, we are pleased to welcome guest writer Rabbi Brent Chaim Spodek. Everybody wants something. There are very few of us who have reached the level of equanimity that we are happy with what we have; the rest of us want things that are still out of our reach. For oppressed peoples, the most …Read More
Read MoreThis week, we are pleased to welcome guest writer, Dvar Tzedek alumnus Guy Austrian. Rock by rock, stone by stone, each one passed hand to hand along a human chain of young Jews and indigenous Guatemalans: our energy was high on this beautiful day during our AJWS delegation to rural Guatemala. We cleared a riverbed …Read More
Read MoreHundreds of young Mayan students gathered with their teachers and a small group of New York Jews, standing in a wide circle as we observed an astonishing spectacle. Rivulets of bubbling candle wax streamed onto the ground. Flowers withered and crumpled in smoke and flames. A priest of the Maya Achi tradition presided over the …Read More
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