Fresh on the heels of last weekend’s massive demonstration in Washington, DC, where almost 100,000 people protested a potential US war with Iraq, local activists aim to build on the antiwar momentum with a November 3 rally at Boston Common. This Sunday afternoon, peaceniks and other like-minded folks will publicly voice opposition to what they see as an open-ended, expensive, and, as of now, unwarranted military strike against Iraq.

" We don’t accept the Bush administration’s reasons for going to war, " says Jennifer Horan, of United for Justice with Peace, the coalition of 27 local human-rights and progressive groups sponsoring the rally. Instead, activists believe that George W. and company are, in Horan’s words, " power-tripping. " She adds: " They think Americans’ fears about terror give them free license to wreak havoc and mayhem on a country that, despite their rhetoric, does not present an imminent threat to us. "

Organizers expect the November 3 rally to draw up to 10,000 people from Boston, Western Massachusetts, Vermont, and even Maine. It’s a crowd that organizers hope will rival the last large-scale peace protest in Boston, held in December 1990, during the Gulf War. While many die-hard peace activists are sure to show up on Sunday, when the rally kicks off at 1 p.m., many more will be political novices who have grown disgruntled by the Bush administration’s militarized foreign policies in the post-9/11 era. Says Horan, " Many of these people are new to activism, new to the concept of vigils, demonstrations, and tabling. They’re not the usual suspects. "

More than anything, organizers aim to send a strong message to Massachusetts senator John Kerry, who infuriated many of his liberal constituents earlier this month when he voted for a congressional resolution authorizing the use of force, if necessary, to ensure inspections of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Outrage over Kerry’s decision has even fueled a last-minute write-in campaign to replace him with veteran peace activist and Cambridge resident Randall Forsberg, who’s among the featured speakers at the rally. Other speakers include Green Party gubernatorial candidate Jill Stein, Boston city councilor Chuck Turner, and prominent progressive Howard Zinn.

But organizers also hope the event will help to sway the Bushies, even though conventional wisdom has it that war with Iraq is already a done deal. As Horan puts it, " If there is real street heat, if Bush sees that normal Americans oppose this war, then maybe we do have a chance " at stopping the seemingly inevitable.

The End the War on Iraq Rally takes place on Sunday, November 3, from 1 to 5 p.m., on the Boston Common. For more information, check out the United for Justice with Peace Web site at www.unitedforjusticewithpeace.org