Activism Through the Artist’s Lens: Maize, Seed of Life
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Transformed by grief: A mother searches for Mexico’s disappeared
María Herrera did not expect to be quoted in international newspapers, meet with the Pope or see her name on Time‘s list of the 2023 world’s 100 Most Influential People. Fifteen years ago, she was busy caring for her family and running a jewelry and clothing business. Her life forever changed when two of her sons …
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When Indigenous Activists Are Unjustly Jailed, Frayba Fights Back
For generations, Indigenous communities within Chiapas — the southernmost region of Mexico — have enjoyed a symbiotic relationship with the land they inhabit. The people nurture and support their ancestral lands, and in return, the land provides them food, shelter and clean water. But in recent decades, mining companies have descended upon the region, poisoning …
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Activists Up Close: Meet Misael, a Water Defender in Mexico
Misael was born into a family of Indigenous farmers in Oaxaca, Mexico — his connection to the land goes back generations. Today, he works for Flor y Canto, an AJWS grantee organization that mobilizes local communities to fight for their rights to land, water and other natural resources. In 2005, the Mexican government restricted farmers’ …
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From Sex Workers to Chicken Farmers: Trust Based Philanthropy at Work in a Pandemic
When COVID-19, AJWS realized right away that the moment called for a largescale pandemic response strategy. We pivoted and it paid dividends: all 502 of our grantees remained operational over the last two turbulent years. It is now clear that this pivot not only helped during a moment of crisis but remains crucial in supporting …
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Bernardo Vasquez Sanchez
Defending the land with his life
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Alejandra Ancheita
Prosecuting powerful adversaries of indigenous rights
Read More The Movement and the Mine
In 2012, Bernardo was shot and killed. Locals allege that he was assassinated by supporters of the mining project in an attempt to silence the opposition. While his murderers remain at large, the people he left behind have refused to give in to fear and intimidation. With support from Colectivo Oaxaqueño and other AJWS grantees …
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Protecting Indigenous Communities from Mining
The rapid growth of mineral mining across Mexico has ravaged local communities. Poverty and disease have soared for workers and people who live near mines and other development projects. The digging has stripped local land—ruining it for farming—and polluted sources of drinking water, multiplying health problems and miscarriages.
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Mending the “Open Wounds” of Mexico
When 43 college students disappeared from Iguala, Mexico in late September 2014, the incident was just one in a long series of tragic stories. As the country’s epidemic of government corruption and gang violence has escalated over the past decade, more than 26,000 people have simply disappeared.
Read MoreWhere We Work
Dvar Tzedek
Vayakhel
When I visited some of the poorest neighborhoods in Cancun with AJWS in 2010, my greatest fear was not what I would see, but what I might feel. I worried that I would feel—as so many people do—that I needed to fight for justice so that I could save the people I met there, providing for them what they could not provide themselves. This sentiment is common, but dangerous and demeaning, because a belief that the privileged must save the poor assumes that people in need lack the ability to shape their own destinies; that it is a lack of aptitude or ability that lies at the core of their misfortune.
Read MoreShlach
The Jewish people are approaching the culmination of the Exodus experience—the long-awaited fulfillment of the promise to the Patriarchs that their children would one day inherit the Land of Canaan. They are camped right at the border when the now-ominous words that open Parshat Shlach appear—“Send for yourself men to spy out the land of …
Read MoreMishpatim
Amidst the myriad commandments in Parshat Mishpatim, we find a curious law: You shall be holy to Me; therefore, you shall not eat any ‘tereifah’ in the field; you shall throw it to the dogs.[1] This mitzvah is puzzling, both in its content and context. The first question raised is, of course, what does the …
Read MoreChukat-Balak
The strange story of Bilam, his talking donkey and the blessings he bestowed on Israel is recounted in Parshat Balak.[1] After the Israelites successfully defended themselves against the attacking Amorites, the Moabite king, Balak, asked Bilam to curse the Israelites in order to weaken them. Following several rounds of negotiations with Balak’s representatives and with …
Read MoreChukat-Balak
The strange story of Bilam, his talking donkey and the blessings he bestowed on Israel is recounted in Parshat Balak.[1] After the Israelites successfully defended themselves against the attacking Amorites, the Moabite king, Balak, asked Bilam to curse the Israelites in order to weaken them. Following several rounds of negotiations with Balak’s representatives and with …
Read More