The Makua Protestant Church was a historic Hawaiian sanctuary in Oahu’s Makua Valley. During World War II, the U.S. Army evicted residents, including the church’s minister, and bombed the site. The destruction of the church is tied to ongoing native rights protests seeking to heal and demilitarize the valley.
The historic Protestant church and community hall in Mākua Valley (Oahu, Hawaii) were destroyed during World War II when the U.S. military evicted local residents, marked the building with a white cross, and used it for target practice during bombing drills.
The U.S. military’s seizure of Mākua Valley in the 1940s—following the attack on Pearl Harbor—radically transformed the region into a live-fire training reservation. The local community, notably through environmental and cultural organizations like Earthjustice, engaged in a decades-long legal battle to protect the area from ongoing explosive training and to reclaim cultural access.
KAWAIOLA NEWS – EXPIRING ARMY LEASES
Expiring Military Leases: The Law is on Our Side
In 1964, the State of Hawaiʻi leased nearly 23,000 acres at Pōhakuloa to the U.S. Army for just one dollar. The state brokered a similar deal across Oʻahu at Mākua, Kahuku, and Kawailoa-Poamoho. These leases expire in August 2029 and renewal negotiations are underway.
The future of these ʻāina is not merely a policy question but a legal crisis. The law governs what the state can and cannot do with these lands, and the lāhui has a collective kuleana to demand that it be followed.
Since securing the leases, the military has had broad, largely unsupervised control over these lands. But these are not just any state lands – they are unrelinquished crown and government lands of the Hawaiian Kingdom, seized through the 1893 illegal overthrow without consent of the Native Hawaiian people…. (see link above)
MORNING PRAYERS TAP IN LINK BELOW
