Here’s a Dot Earth postcard from Kieran Suckling, the executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, who has been traveling with a group of protestors from the San Carlos Apache tribe in southeastern Arizona. The protestors, from a group called Apache Stronghold, oppose a land swap between the federal government and a subsidiary of the giant Rio Tinto mining company that they say threatens Oak Flat, a part of Tonto National Forest that they consider sacred.

[Update, July 28, 11:58 p.m. | A former tribal historian disputes this below.]

A recent Op-Ed article by Lydia Millet*, “Selling Off Apache Holy Land,” conveys their argument, which centers on dicey politics:

The swap — which will trade 5,300 acres of private parcels owned by the company to the Forest Service and give 2,400 acres including Oak Flat to Resolution so that it can mine the land without oversight — had been attempted multiple times by Arizona members of Congress on behalf of the company…. This time, the giveaway language was slipped onto the defense bill by Senators John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona at the 11th hour. The tactic was successful only because, like most last-minute riders, it bypassed public scrutiny.

(Here’s the argument of Resolution Copper Mining, the Rio Tinto subsidiary.) [Resolution Copper sent an expanded response, which is in the comment thread.]

Heres Suckling’s missive, filed from Times Square on Friday:

Times Square. I’m in a flash mob organized by Apache Stronghold, a group of San Carlos Apaches trying to save Oak Flat, a sacred religious site in Arizona stolen from them by a disgraceful John McCain rider on the Department of Defense budget bill last year. Between “repent now!” signs, nearly nude showgirls and nonchalant cops, 50 Apaches are drumming, singing, dancing, and working the crowd. Even in Times Square this is a thing.

I’ve been on and off the road with them for a couple of weeks, mostly with a small group on tour with Neil Young, opening up his Rebel Content/Monsanto Years concerts [Facebook video].

The larger group is traveling from reservation to reservation drumming up anger and support to stop the desecration of Oak Flat. Wendsler Nosie, Sr., an elder and former tribal chairman, flies in and out, meeting with Baptist leaders and congressmen. Next Tuesday a traditional spiritual run will cut through Rock Creek to Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C. Wednesday, there’ll be a big rally on the West Lawn. Having fired up Indian Country, the Apache Stronghold should turn out 500 Native Americans from more than 100 tribes and at least that many non-white supporters. Today it’s on to the United Nations.

The chaotic, seat-of-the-pants, insanely energizing caravan is a snapshot of the hyper-integrated, relentlessly hybrid, never-quite-modern NOW we all live in one way or another.

Native Americans from one the poorest reservations in the country are using cell phones, Twitter and Facebook to throw a flash mob in Times Square to save a sacred site in Arizona stolen by a multi-national mining company in Australia. It’s their land, but it’s public land, and John McCain is bent on privatizing it.

Cell phones abound, but there’s no credit card and money is very, very tight. The large group is out of range much of the time, performing ceremonies and sharing stories with other tribes. But you can follow their progress on Facebook.

The convoy is a run from tribe to tribe. They have been given hand-carved, carefully painted wooden arrows by the tribes they met to bring to Washington, D.C. Except one that is purple and metal because that’s all that a man could offer from the life and history America dealt to his tribe. It, too, is placed in the quiver.

The defenders of Oak Flat are traditionalists. Some leave the reservation rarely, but Standing Fox is a hip-hop artist and Rudy just traveled to London to shame Rio Tinto, which is partly British-owned. Last night in Camden, N.J., Neil Young asked 50 Apache drummers, singers and dancers to open his show.

I, who can barely muster the white man shuffle and don’t know what the sacred songs mean, find myself choreographing the performance in the parking lot an hour before show time because I’m the only one who knows what the stage looks like. It’s fraught with cables, amps, mikes, speakers and buttony things we’re told to never, ever step on.

Neil Young must be crazy. What international rock star risks his reputation to help desperate people he’s never met, and who, save Standing Fox, have no professional music experience? The man is heart and soul. As medicine man Anthony Logan, the eldest of the elders, sings a hunched over prayer with drums pounding, one of the teen Apache dancers takes selfies from the stage. This is how we live. This is how we fight. This is how we win.