40 Days and Escalate: Veterans & Allies Fast For Gaza

Hello from your new FOSNA National Field Organizer! My name is Addie, and I was delighted to join the staff of FOSNA on May 1. It is good to be in the movement with you.

May 23, 2025

Hello from your new FOSNA National Field Organizer! My name is Addie, and I was delighted to join the staff of FOSNA on May 1. It is good to be in the movement with you.

I'm a longtime friend of FOSNA and Sabeel, a Presbyterian clergy member, and a mother. My friend Omar Haramy, during his award speech for the Berrigan-McAlister Award for non-violence this week, told us, “All Palestinian women are mothers” because of their commitment to mothering all children toward a free Palestine. This week I celebrated my third Mother’s Day with a renewed commitment to parent my kid toward a free Palestine. May it be so. Mothering is an important movement metaphor because no one can be a good mother without acting on what they believe should be possible for their children. Mothering can’t only be about saying the right thing, but has to also be about doing the right thing.

Last week Jonathan wrote about apartheid Israel’s hunger plan. As we commemorate Nakba Day, we commit – with our bodies – to interrupt that evil plan to starve our Palestinian kin in Gaza. As your new National Organizer, I hope to offer you options for embodying your liberation work. Costly discipleship looks like showing up with our bodies just as much as tending to our theologies, our policies, and our strategy. With other organizers around the country, and supporting the leadership of Veterans For Peace, we’re excited to be a co-sponsor on a nationwide 40-day fast. We will begin our fasting across the country on May 22. Our demands are clear to the colonial states of the U.S. and Israel: 1) resume humanitarian aid to Gaza, under UN authority 2) stop arming Israel NOW!

Join the fast

We envision this fast as both centralized and dispersed:

Our centralized fasters commit to living in community in our provided housing close to the UN building in NY for 40 days. They commit to fasting by limiting their caloric intake to just 250 per day, in line with the general caloric intake of Gazans under the famine inflicted by the Israeli apartheid regime.
Our dispersed fasters commit to fasting for 40 days** from their local context. Dispersed fasters can select any meaningful method of fasting. Some examples include water-only, a time-based fast (like Ramadan), or the 250 calories/day option. You decide the method of fasting in line with what is most meaningful for your participation in this action from your local positionality.
ALL fasters commit to: elevating their fast activity online and in person and to escalating at the end of the 40 days if our demands are not met within the timeframe of the fast.

**Can't do all 40 days? Commit to building a chain of fasters that last the 40 day action length. (For example, four people commit to 10 days spread across the action. This is a great opportunity to self-organize in your local context!)

We believe we can get to 250 individual fasters committed to this action across the country. Will you help us spread the word about this action?

Join the fast

If the demands are not met, we'll keep mothering our way toward justice.

If the demands are not met, this action asks participants to join in an escalation to end their fast: in NYC with our centralized fasters, at a larger action we’re supporting in DC, or through a smaller, local escalation in your community. (Want support escalating? Contact your new favorite National Organizer! Email me for local escalation ideas at addiedomske@fosna.org.)

As a mother, I am responsible for feeding my child. I also believe, as a mother, I must be responsive when other children are starving. I’m committed to fasting for 40 days, starting May 22, because I want to remind my body that starvation of any person is unnatural; will you join me?