Our Bodies, Ourselves’ speech: “Hold our legislators’ feet to the fire”
Note: Judy Norsigian delivered this speech on behalf of Our Bodies, Ourselves at “Action for Artsakh” in front of the JFK Federal Building in Boston, Massachusetts on 18 November 2023.
My organization [Our Bodies, Ourselves] is in collaboration with dozens of groups of women around the world who’ve created translated adaptations of our book and who have worked for the health and human rights of women and girls and others around the world. In Armenia, we’ve had colleagues for more than twenty years who have produced several editions of the book, adapted it, and created projects on the ground that would improve the health of women and girls. And just recently in October, my partner Craig, who’s here with me, and I were in Armenia to witness the amazing projects that organizations like the Women’s Resource Center, the Women’s Support Center have launched to support the folks from Artsakh who are in great need at the moment. I was so impressed with the hands-on approach, the practical approach.
What we in the United States can do to help sisters and brothers and others in Armenia is to reach out to our legislators, as you’ve already heard, and make sure Section 907 is enforced, that we do not give any more arms to Azerbaijan, but moreover, as a very close Jewish friend just told me the other day, 85% of the military weapons that Azerbaijan got anew to attack Artsakh were from Israel. And it’s really important that we also ask our legislators to do what they can to apply pressure upon Netanyahu not to provide such weapons to Azerbaijan as it now seeks to take over southern parts of Armenia proper. They will not stop, they will continue to do whatever they can. And our job is to hold our legislators’ feet to the fire as best we can. Yes there are many competing geopolitical interests, but as we all know, the squeaky wheel sometimes gets the grease. So we all have not only earned marching orders, we have to ask our friends and our allies in other states to do all the things you just heard so far.
