#He’s taken down government official websites including ones on women’s rights and ones related to healthcare

[kwpw-vent]

This type of shit makes me want to kill myself man

[helen-magpies]

On social media the USA population are asking anyone from outside countries to properly document what is happening to them right now as they can't or are not able to.

As of the 20th of January 2025 up to the 24th January 2025 the following has happened:

Trump has signed several executive orders including:

Ruling that the United states will only recognise two genders, woman and man, and ones gender is determined by the sex they were conceived as. (his words not mine. By the way, this makes everyone effectively female) despite his stupidity, we know what he means, if one is born female, they are a woman. This effectively erases non-binary folk and forcibly de-transitions trans folk. This order claims to be defending woman from harmful gender ideology. The misogyny and outright bigotry within this order is genuinely terrifying and frustrating.

Fact sheet: Trump protects civil rights and merit-based opportunities by ending illegal DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion)

The death penalty. Trump is pushing for capital punishment to be used as often as possible for a certain list of crimes. Murder being one of them. Abortion and miscarriage has been described as murder. Woman are going to be imprisoned and slaughtered because they had a miscarriage or an abortion. This would also put those born outside of the US at greater risk of murder as the laws will be stricter towards them. Reading through the official documents, if a foreigner commits a federal crime (from as little as speeding 50miles over the limit to committing murder) they will be sentanced to death.

An alarming amount of executive orders are related to foreigners and foreign affairs such as:

Guardenteeing the states protection against invasion.

Protecting the United states from foreign terrorists and other national security and public safety threats.

Fact sheet: Trump protects the United states and American citizens by closing the borders to illegals via proclamation.

Trump has also stated in an executive order that there will be armed forces at the borders to prevent "aliens" from entering the country.

Source: WhiteHouse.com. (the constitution was replaced by Trumps executive orders and the White House Legislative Branch can not be found on the official website as it has been taken down.

____________________________________________

Books are continuing to be banned and religion is re-entering the schools, indoctrinating the children.

They want to take womens right to vote. They are starting with pregnant women and women on maturity leave. If they can't keep you pregnant (if you get an abortion) you would have your right to vote stripped from you as abortion is now classified as murder which is a felony. Felons can't vote.

Jim crow laws will be reinstated. The native children will be taken. You are the people, you don't work for the government, they work for you. Get the gelatine, take back your power as the people.

When Hitler first got control, he told the jews to leave germany. When Trump got control, he told the immigrants to leave the US.

When Hitler got control, he came for the Queers first. Trump went for the queers.

When Hitler got control, he came for the disabled. Trump went for the women.

There were people who came before the jews. There are going to be people who come before those of colour. Trump is a racist, a sexist and a rapist. There will be people who come before you. Stand up for them so they will stand for you, lest you stand alone.

"When they came for the Queers, i didn't say anything because i was not Queer. When they came for the jews, i didn't say anything because i was not a jew. When they came for the women, i didnt say anything because i was not a woman. When they came for the disabled, i didnt say anything because i am not disabled. But then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me."

There is an Australian song about inclusively, and how when we are together we are stronger.

"We are one, but we are many. And from all acorss the lands we come, to share our dreams, and sing with one voice. I am, you are, we are Australian." Honestly, the US need this song right now.

[antoine-roquentin]

Myanmar: Vast arsenal and notorious troops deployed during nationwide ‘killing spree’ protest crackdown – new research

The Myanmar military is using increasingly lethal tactics and weapons normally seen on the battlefield against peaceful protesters and bystanders across the country, new research by Amnesty International has revealed.

By verifying more than 50 videos from the ongoing crackdown, Amnesty International’s Crisis Evidence Lab can confirm that security forces appear to be implementing planned, systematic strategies including the ramped-up use of lethal force. Many of the killings documented amount to extrajudicial executions.

Footage clearly shows that Myanmar military troops - also known as the Tatmadaw - are increasingly armed with weapons that are only appropriate for the battlefield, not for policing actions. Officers are frequently seen engaging in reckless behavior, including the indiscriminate spraying of live ammunition in urban areas.

‘We are frontliners’: Youth brave bullets and arrest to keep protests alive 

While the early street protests against the February 1 military takeover remained largely peaceful, attracting people from all strata of society, the police and army have violently broken up more recent demonstrations, killing more than 70 so far. This has whittled down protests to younger, more daring groups engaging in cat-and-mouse games with security forces: making tactical retreats and reassembling the moment forces move on. To avoid death, injury or arrest, they have had to quickly adopt new methods and tools.

Mayangone Township resident Ko Phyo Tin, 25, who joins the Kyun Taw protest group every day, uses a shield improvised from a piece of steel as protection against rubber bullets and live rounds, and dons a Chinese-made combat helmet.

“Most of us are using protective equipment made in China. We don’t trust its quality but we have no alternative,” he said, adding that the group would gladly accept donations of quality gas masks, hard hats and body armour.

Women have also taken up positions as “frontliners”, the protesters bearing the brunt of the police and army assaults and shielding those behind them. They include Ma Thu Thu, 23, a founder of a team of frontliners that operates in Hlaing and Kamaryut townships, where such groups proliferate.

Thu Thu said her team comprises a core group of more than 10 people that is supported by about another 50 volunteers, who have learned from the street tactics used in dissident movements overseas.

“I saw the protests in Hong Kong and they gave me ideas about how we could defend ourselves,” said Thu Thu, whose small frame belies a capacity to endure gruelling confrontations with security forces.

She has been protesting against military rule since February 6 and is increasingly convinced that the people need protection from the lethal force police and soldiers used against striking dockworkers in Mandalay on February 20, when security forces fired live rounds on a crowd of more than 1,000 demonstrators at a shipyard, killing two and injuring dozens.

On February 26, Thu Thu watched a violent crackdown by police on big crowds of protesters at the Myanigone and Hledan junctions in Yangon.

“Police opened fire to disperse protesters, who fled in chaos. Some were arrested. When I saw that, I thought we needed to be able to protect protesters during demonstrations planned for February 28, Milk Tea Alliance Day,” she said, referring to a loose alliance of pro-democracy movements in Thailand, Hong Kong, Taiwan and now Myanmar.

“I posted [these thoughts] on Facebook and one of my friends said she would donate 30 shields. I talked with some of my male friends and we decided to volunteer as frontliners,” she added.

“When we first started posting [about our plan], about a hundred people contacted us [wanting to join]. Members of our group are from many different townships in Yangon.”

Myanmar junta hires Israeli intelligence veteran for international lobbying campaign 

Defense Minister Mya Tun Oo retained Ari Ben-Menashe and his Montreal-based Dickens & Madson Canada to “assist in explaining the real situation in the country,” according to a consultancy agreement dated Thursday. The firm is tasked with lobbying Congress and the Joe Biden administration as well as the governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Israel and Russia in addition to the United Nations, the African Union and other international organizations and NGOs.

The firm is expected to file a formal lobbying contract with the US Department of Justice early next week, Ben-Menashe said in a telephone interview Friday morning from Myanmar, where he’s wrapping up his second trip in the past few weeks. He said the contract was for a “big amount” but declined to get into specifics.

(Update: Dickens & Madson said the contract with Mya Tun Oo was for $2 million in a Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) disclosure filed Monday, March 8 with the US Department of Justice. The amount is to be paid  “when legally permissible by controlling jurisdictions” since the minister and other military leaders are under US sanctions.

“Within the United States, Registrant will provide advice and counsel to the foreign principal and advocate before the executive and/or legislative branches of the government of the United States to seek support and humanitarian aid for the benefit of the citizens of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and to strive for the removal or modification of current sanctions,” the lobbying disclosure states. “Additionally, Registrant proposes to provide media and public relations services to further the country’s goals and activities. Registrant also provides lobbying services to the foreign principal in other countries.”)

Ben-Menashe indicated that he plans to present the country’s military rulers as a counterweight to alleged growing Chinese influence in the country under Aung San Suu Kyi, the government leader whose National League for Democracy swept legislative elections in November. The Burmese military declared the elections to be illegitimate on Feb. 1 and deposed Suu Kyi and President Win Myint, sparking international condemnation.

“Aung San Suu Kyi moved toward China while she was in power,” Ben-Menashe said. “And these guys [in the military] don’t like it.”

He added that officials in Saudi Arabia and the UAE had offered to assist with the return of Rohingya Muslims, almost a million of whom have fled to neighboring Bangladesh in recent years amid what the United Nations have labeled a campaign of genocide. Ben-Menashe said he had advised the country’s rulers in the 1990s and warned at the time against having Suu Kyi in the government, claiming she had shown anti-Muslim animus.

“Aung San Suu Kyi as leader was the one who did in the Rohingyas, not the army,” he insisted.

Democratic shadow government taking form in Myanmar 

Myanmar’s banking system, always feeble, looks close to collapse. With banking havens for the junta’s finances, namely the US and Singapore, restricting capital flows, the Biden administration’s freeze on $1 billion of Myanmar’s US-held assets and an ongoing national boycott of military-affiliated businesses, the junta’s finances are being squeezed.

All this definitely means the junta’s strategy of carrying on with business as usual has gone out the window and makes large-scale violent escalation likely.

The writers disagree with the view that the disparate Civil Disobedience Movement can win by sheer power of will and personal sacrifice. Look at the numbers: In some ministries, such as health and education, participation in the movement is substantial, with estimates that a third of staff are actively involved. In others, it is much smaller.

Some 600 policemen are said to have defected so far. Overall, the number of Civil Disobedience Movement participants is likely in the tens of thousands, out of a million or so civil servants across the country.

The junta is cracking down hard. Participating civil servants have been suspended by the junta, with some losing their pay and benefits and others potentially charged with treason.

One senior civil servant told us: “I really want to participate in the civil disobedience campaign but I have to take care of my family – we rely on my salary [and] the housing provided by the department.”

One month on, the story of Myanmar’s coup has become a tale of two governments, the junta and the acting administration of the Committee Representing the National Parliament (CRPH), a group of MPs mostly from Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) party.

With many of its members including Suu Kyi detained and least one who has died in the junta’s custody, the democratically-elected NLD has been hit hard by the coup.

“We cannot operate as a political party right now. [The junta] seized our leaders… Our party headquarter is closed. But we are trying to connect with our party members,” Phyo Zeya Thaw, NLD Central Committee Member, told the writers.

The CRPH has sought to challenge the junta while running and hiding. It has already announced a public administration program that established local councils led by MPs and loyal local officials to run affairs in Myanmar’s 360 townships in competition with the junta.

Preliminary data from a survey we are conducting on this parallel governance bid suggest that early success is mixed: In parts of the country, the NLD’s grassroots networks have been able to set up structures, in particular in Yangon, Mandalay and Sagaing regions, all part of the NLD’s heartland. In other townships, the junta has the upper hand.

Significantly, the CRPH is now putting itself firmly at the head of the disparate civil disobedience movement. On its website, the CRPH is registering civil servants participating in CDM who it will provide support.

It has also formed an ”acting administration” of acting ministers. They will cover all portfolios of the toppled NLD government until a new unity resistance government is formed.

To form this unity government, the CRPH is competing with the junta in reaching out to both civil society leaders and to ethnic political parties and ethnic armed groups. The success of these overtures may decide the ultimate fate of Myanmar’s coup.

Two other resistance organizations, a General Strike Committee and a General Strike Committee of Nationalities, that sprung up to organize a general strike in February are still organizing protests and strikes independently.

Business revolt brewing in coup-crippled Myanmar 

Western business groups, namely European, American, British, Italian and French chambers of commerce, rejected the regime’s invitation to meet on March 4. At the same time, major Asian business groups such as the Thai, Hong Kong, Japanese and Chinese have not released any statements of concern since the coup and lethal crackdown on protesters.

The Western chambers’ refusal comes at a time of widespread and rising condemnation against the regime’s brutal crackdown on unarmed protesting civilians, with more than 50 killed as of March 3, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), an independent monitoring group.

Australian business group AustCham Myanmar said on Wednesday it has “serious concern over the increasing use of violence against the people campaigning for a return to democratic Government in Myanmar.”

[infinitywizard1207]

Our President And The Issue Of EJKs In The Philippines by Santino Fernandez

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely-Lord Acton”  

These words to me are important as they reflect a huge societal issue happening right now in The Philippines. This issue has to deal with the police and how they abuse their power towards the people of my country.  It is no secret that Police Brutality is running rampant in some countries right now. Just last May, America experienced a great tragedy with the murder of George Floyd.  The cop killings in the US are rampant but in the Philippines they are as bad if not worse.

Ever since 2016 our president Rodrigo Duterte has been on the so called “War on Drugs.”    In this campaign he promised to rid the country of dangerous substances by the end of his  six year term. However all it has done is create more damage  as this so called “Drug War” targets the poor and less fortunate.  In the years since Duterte has taken office he has implemented Extra Judicial Killings also known as EJKs in the country.   An EJK is when the government sanctions the killing of people or drug addicts  in the country as long as there is evidence.  There is no due process any more and these addicts are not taken to a court of law. These addicts are shot in the streets in cold blood without any hesitation or remorse.

Since the implementation of EJK in our country there have been up to 5000 deaths caused by the EJKs. However human rights groups say it is way beyond 12,000 already.  Human rights groups have been siding with the people because it is a violation of democracy. According to our democratic law everyone deserves their day in court but Duterte prefers to not do that and instead kill the offenders.  In a direct quote from the man himself he says that he will protect the cops who commit the EJKs. Duterte says- “That’s our deal. When I said that you go and destroy the drug industry, destroying means destroying, including human life.” He said police officers who have faced difficulties in carrying out their duties should never stress over it as he says  "I'll take care of you.”  

This has caused many corrupt cops to abuse the power and protection given by the president. Because of this protection the deaths caused by the EJKs have risen rapidly claiming the lives of men, women, and children alike.  One of the many victims was Kian De Los Santos a 17 year old boy in high school who was gunned down by cops.   The official statement by the police was that allegedly Kian drew a firearm on the cops and it prompted them to fire back.  Witness reports and a closed-circuit TV, though, showed two men pulling Kian around a basketball court in civilian wear. At the site of the confrontation, two small sachets of alleged shabu, a .45 calibre firearm and four shot cartridge cases were found. Witnesses have reported that they ordered Kian to run and handed him a gun. The Caloocan policemen believed Kian was a drug runner, but the accusation was vehemently refuted by the teenager's parents.  

However it is not just physical damage and the loss of life that these EJKs cause but mental damage as well.  Human Rights watcher  Carlos H. Conde has investigated the trauma caused by the EJKs. One of Carlos’s subjects was a girl whose father was gunned down by the police which has created massive trauma.  In a direct quote from Carlos-“What struck me deeply was the level of trauma that these kids have, When I talked to her about that, she was very articulate and forthright, but you could sense the deep psychological trauma that she suffered in witnessing the violence and also being reminded every day of what happened to her father”

These children paint a harrowing picture of the long-lasting consequences of the murders. Another harrowing example of  how EJK effects children are three anonymous brothers. These three brothers, who were 15, 13 and 10 when their father was killed over two years ago, now live on the streets, after being essentially deserted by their mother, do not attend school and work menial jobs for rent. A 5-year-old boy's mother said he threatened to kill one of his friends and cover him in packing tape. "It's the same way the boy's father was discovered 19 times after being stabbed, his head wrapped in tape and a sign placed near him reading, "I'm a drug pusher. Don’t emulate me.”

From July 1, 2016 to June 30, 2019, the Philippine National Police announced that 5,526 criminals were killed during police operations. However, according to reports by domestic human rights organizations, this figure does not include the thousands of suspected gunmen killed in incidents that are not seriously investigated by the authorities, raising the death toll to as high as 27,000. Human Rights Watch reports and reputable media sources such as Rappler and Reuters say that these vigilante-style shootings were committed either by police officers themselves or by police-related killers.  This has resulted in many cases with regards to the violation of human rights but only one case was brought to justice and it was the case of Kian.

Even today there are victims of this abuse in power. On Dec 20 2020 a mother and her son were killed by a policeman in Pampanga.  This policeman by the name of Jonel Nuezca shot a middle aged woman by the name of Sonya Gregorio and her son by the name of Frank Gregorio.  This whole incident was recorded on video and shows Nuezca take out a gun and shoot Sonya in the head, then shoots her son while they clutch each other, then shoots each of them a second time. The video soon went viral, prompting an internal investigation of the police officer and murder charges. He has handed himself in to the police but this is again a harsh reminder of how rampant this abuse of power is.

The presidents reach of power also extends over to the media and government. The United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a resolution in July 2019 urging the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to send a briefing on the human rights situation in the Philippines in June 2020, putting international pressure for transparency to bear. The Duterte administration reacted by demanding the termination of all financial aid talks from the 18 countries adopting the resolution.

Journalists are also being silenced as well.  This is the case with the company of ABS-CBN  news network and the famous journalist Maria Ressa.  In the case of ABS-CBN the company was accused of political bias.  Duterte accused ABS-CBN of not being impartial or fair during the 2016 elections. These accusations go even further when the President accused ABS-CBN of aiding Duterte’s political competition.  During the hearing for the franchise’s renewal the house of representatives voted on closing ABS-CBN after 25 years of news. Critics of the president say he's gone after media outlets who have closely reported his drug war, which since he took office in 2016 has left thousands of people dead. By government order, ABS-CBN ceased operations of its free TV and radio channels after its 25-year franchise expired in May.

This has caused massive repercussions amongst the Philippine society as 11,000 workers were left without a job and let go.

However there are massive long term effects as well.  ABS-CBN was the number one news network in the country and their network reached across the various provinces. With no news network most of the country is not informed on the various events in the country.  This was the case in November 2020 when Typhoon Ulysses hit the Cagayan Valley. Since there was no news of the upcoming Typhoon the residents of that province were unprepared and not ready. The result was a staggering amount of deaths in the Cagayan valley as well as a massive amount of damage.  All this is the result of Duterte wanting to silence his critics because of his actions in the drug war.

Another example of Journalism being silenced is the case of Maria Ressa. Maria Ressa was the CEO of the news website Rappler.  This news website vehemently criticized and watched  Duterte’s movements and approached towards the drug war.  Ever since the 2016 election  Rappler has been a harsh critic for Duterte but in 2020 Maria Ressa was jailed. The allegations according to the court were “cyberlibel” which is equivalent to 200,000 pesos in damages plus a few years in jail. Ressa’s arrest sparked anger in millions including famous journalist Amal Clooney.  Many have stated that this is an act that takes away the freedom of speech. A right that we Filipinos have because of our democratic government.  Amal has said her self that “the court had become complicit in a sinister action to silence a journalist for exposing corruption and abuse”.  

Rappler scrutinized Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's government, revealed bot armies and corruption, and reported his ruthless anti-drug campaign, which, by some reports, has resulted in tens of thousands of extrajudicial killings. In exchange, Rappler was criticized as trading "fake news" by the president, and his administration launched multiple lawsuits against him. In addition to the cyber-libel allegations, Ressa is also facing further prosecution for libel, two court proceedings alleging unlawful foreign ownership of her enterprises, and inquiries into her old tax returns. The numerous allegations made against Ressa could lead to prison sentences of about 100 years.

Various journalists have also been  victims to Duterte’s silencing.  In November, one journalist had been killed: news anchor Eduardo Dizon of Mindanao's Kidapawan City, who was shot dead on July 10. At least one of them, Brandon Lee, was seriously wounded in an assault by a gunman in the northern Philippines in August.   But it doesn't stop there as Duterte has passed an Anti Terror Bill which at close examination controls our freedom of speech.  Under the statute, a criminal suspect can be arrested without trial for 14 days, a duration which may be extended to 24 days. Human rights lawyers argue that it breaks a constitutional requirement that after three days of arrest, an individual must be convicted. The anti terror law also will  monitor any social media discourse related to offending the president or his administration.

Even today the ruthless reign of Duterte continues as the police are given more power while the masses suffer. During the lockdown the president has stated that he will kill anyone who violates it. “My orders to the police and the military, if anyone creates trouble, and their lives are in danger: shoot them dead.”   This has created  fear amongst the masses as well as a new view on how the people see our government.

In my personal opinion this is not what a leader is supposed to be. Before I started on this essay I put a quote about power and I feel this is more relevant now than ever. Duterte’s absolute power has corrupted the government absolutely.  It has made the police think they are untouchable and has caused the poor people to suffer.  Our president is waging a war on drugs that is not effective at all and the Filipino people are paying the price.  A good leader in my opinion is one who puts the people first and not his agendas.  A good leader is someone who takes the Filipino people’s lives into consideration and does not murder them in cold blood. So with this current societal issue happening in our country I ask that you spread the awareness of how bad our president is.  Hopefully this country will change for the better and it will see a brighter tomorrow. In the end it is really up to the Filipino people and if they want their country to change.

“People should not be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their people.”

V from V for Vendetta

Sources-

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/philippines

https://humanrightsmeasurement.org/extrajudicial-killings-in-the-philippines/

https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/961396/duterte-to-cops-kill-criminals-if-you-have-to-ill-protect-you

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/what-happens-to-the-families-left-behind-in-dutertes-deadly-campaign-against-drugs/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/philippines-police-brutality-mother-shot/2020/12/21/0a5f9762-4358-11eb-ac2a-3ac0f2b8ceeb_story.html

https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/

https://www.hrw.org/tag/philippines-war-drugs

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46381697

https://cnnphilippines.com/news/2018/11/29/Kian-delos-Santos-murder-Caloocan-police-guilty.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/4/2/shoot-them-dead-duterte-warns-against-violating-lockdown

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/10/world/asia/philippines-congress-media-duterte-abs-cbn.html

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/15/maria-ressa-rappler-editor-found-guilty-of-cyber-libel-charges-in-philippines

https://reliefweb.int/report/philippines/philippines-typhoon-vamco-ulysses-cagayan-valley-region-impact-and-response-24

https://www.npr.org/2020/07/21/893019057/why-rights-groups-worry-about-the-philippines-new-anti-terrorism-law

[a-room-of-my-own]

By Julian Vigo

Hans Christian Andersen’s The Emperor's New Clothes tells the tale of a ruler who is unconcerned with the reigning of his kingdom—he did not care much about attending the theatre nor making any public appearances unless, of course, he was able to flaunt his latest clothes. That is until one day when two swindlers came to town and tricked the emperor successfully convincing him that they were weavers who could spin him the most beautiful cloth he had ever before seen in his life. These swindlers claimed, “Not only were the colours and the patterns of their material extraordinarily beautiful, but the cloth had the strange quality of being invisible to anyone who was unfit for his office or unforgivably stupid.” It was perfect, of course, for the emperor whose intelligence would not only allow him to see quite perfectly the beauty of the cloth before him but which would also allow him to choose his councillors wisely as he would discard any of them who were unable to perceive the magnificent beauty before their eyes. 

The emperor then bought these fraudsters the most expensive materials of silk and gold and a loom with which to make the clothes. The swindlers kept the materials for themselves and pretended to make the garments from the empty loom. First, the emperor sent his faithful prime minister to check up on the “weavers” who doubted his eyesight as he found an empty loom. He thought to himself, “Am I stupid?” wondering if he was fit for his office. In a choice between his trust of his eyesight or his desire to keep his position, the prime minister quickly came around stating, “It is beautiful. It is very lovely...What patterns! What colours! I shall tell the emperor that I am greatly pleased.” And each of the councillors the emperor sent thereafter had a similar reaction—at first doubting their sanity and then realising that if they did not concede the beauty of the cloth being spun that they risked losing their position. Soon, all those close to the emperor had announced their sighting of a magnificent cloth that in fact was non-existent.

When it finally came time for the emperor to view the completed cloth, the fraudsters and everyone around the emperor informed him how beautiful the cloth was. The prime minister exclaims, “Isn't it magnifique?” However, the emperor had a similar crisis to that of all those he had sent before to check up on the cloth: he saw nothing. He thought to himself, “I can't see a thing! Why this is a disaster! Am I stupid? Am I unfit to be emperor? Oh, it is too horrible!” However, like his officials who realised that their credibility and good-judgment lay in the balance, the emperor capitulates to his officials’ claims and announced the glorious artistry of a cloth that did not, in fact, exist at all. “It is lovely,” exclaims the emperor. After paying the thieves handsomely for their good work, the emperor decides to have the cloth cut and sewn and, in celebration of his new clothes, he has a parade. As he marches down the streets in sheer nudity, everyone in the kingdom is awed by the beauty of his clothes and shares in his delight and belief of the lie. That is until a young child sees that the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes at all and the rest of the kingdom slowly begins to realise the same.

This well-known fairy tale serves as an allegory for political ideology that a government can impose upon its citizens, that a well-funded interest group can as well—that of false consciousness. In his essay,The Power of the Powerless (1978), Václav Havel explores what he calls the post-totalitarian regime in Czechoslovakia wherein he reveals an ideology of false consciousness that is strikingly similar to the political consciousness of Andersen’s fairy tale. Havel uses the analogy of a greengrocer who displays in his storefront window the party slogan which reads “Workers of the World, Unite!” Just as the emperor's clothes are a production of artistic sleight of hand and cunning trickery, for Havel so too is the party literature, the slogan of the green grocer. The manoeuvre of an invisible cloth or a state-mandated slogan in both cases becomes the vehicle through which ideology surfaces and inscribes itself upon the masses whereby, as Havel writes, the citizens “confirm the system, fulfil the system, make the system, are the system.”

Havel’s essay is quite critical of political ideology calling it an “almost secularised religion” which maintains its force by offering the wandering masses a “home” that immediately grants the believer a life full of new meaning:

Ideology is a specious way of relating to the world. It offers human beings the illusion of an identity, of dignity, and of morality while making it easier for them to part with them. As the repository of something suprapersonal and objective, it enables people to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position and their inglorious modus vivendi, both from the world and from themselves. It is a very pragmatic but, at the same time, an apparently dignified way of legitimising what is above, below, and on either side. 

Havel goes on to assert that ideology feeds a systemic drive that creates a “world of appearances trying to pass for reality” where the post-totalitarian system “touches people at every step, but it does so with its ideological gloves on.” 

Havel’s essay is not only a damning summation of the ideological rituals common within Czechoslovakia, Poland and other Communist regimes of the era, but it eerily portrays much of what is happening in the west today fifty years later. With samizdat, a form of dissident activity across the former Eastern bloc nations long ago retired, we have laid witness in recent years to its unofficial rebirth among many critics of gender ideology. For those who have pushed back against the onslaught of gender ideology that has permeated the neoliberal left over the past twenty years, many critics of this era’s embrace of identity politics who refuse to be silenced have either taken to social media or they have published blog posts under assumed names. Due to the mounting authoritarianism from the left on this subject whereby individuals have faced losing income, being fired from their positions entirely, or being socially and politically ostracised, the protest to the official narratives of gender ideology has been emanating from unofficial spaces. 

Twitter and Facebook have been the two primary social media spaces where feminists and trans ideologues alike have created secret groups in an attempt to strategise, dialogue, and establish actions. It would be an understatement to state that the wave has not only turned in the favour of these feminists, but COVID-19 has assisted the many who previously doubted the importance of material reality, to understand the difference between identity as feeling and the somatic reality of male versus female, a virus versus a unicorn. I have been in many of the gender-critical groups that are composed of only women, only radical feminists, only leftists, and myriad other variations on a theme. Where women and men from the left have joined forces to fight what they perceive as an ideological backwater of men’s rights activism, this fourth wave of feminism has teeth and it is speaking clearly to what resoundingly appears to be a religious ideology of gender.

Now that the NHS and the BBC have radically transformed their websites in recent weeks to update the information on gender dysphoria to include mentioning childhood desistance and ROGD (rapid-onset gender dysphoria), there is now a mass wiping of servers of these and other institutions of all references to Mermaids, a UK-based lobby group and NGO that has long identified its constituency as “transgender children” and their parents. And Mermaids is no outlier in the industry that seeks the expansion of childhood medical “gender transition” as it has consistently encouraged policy changes within the British government and its agencies to effect the quickest possible transition times of the highest number of children with the fewest safeguards in place. In 2018, Mermaids received £500,000 in lottery funding to this end.

So how is it that in less than two years, Mermaids has gone from being the star charity ostensibly championing the rights of children to now being silently removed from the BBC and NHS websites in their information and support sections as all the claims that puberty blockers such as Lupron are “reversible” have also disappeared? More importantly, why is it now commonplace in recent weeks that the media and public figures as well as private and public institutions have in stealth removed mention of Mermaids and the cheerleading of “childhood transition” from their accounts or servers as if a damnatio memoriae rivalling China’s removal of Zhao Ziyang from most every public record available in China?

Last year British actor, Jameela Jamil, participated in a video in support of both sic “trans kids” and Mermaids. Yet, in the same time frame that the NHS and BBC servers were wiped clean of any reference to Mermaids with data amended that exaggerated suicide information or that omitted childhood desistance, Jamil has curiously wiped clean her many Twitter posts referring to Mermaids. While Jamil claims she deleted her history to “become a more activism focused account that I can lend to other activists and charities,” many activists have answered Jamil on Twitter noting the non-coincidence of her and British comedian Josie Long having both dumped their Twitter feed within hours of one another, to include the many tweets in support of both Mermaids and the lifetime medicalisation of mostly gay and lesbian children’s bodies. 

On the other side of this debate, you have trans activists like Katy Montgomerie who are soliciting screenshots of gender-critical people who have “bought this latest Mermaids conspiracy theory” as he calls it. One of the tweets sent to Montgomerie as “proof” of wrong-think was that of fellow-writer, Suzanne Moore, who tweeted this past week: “I see all you celebs deleting your tweets that supported the charity Mermaids? Wonder why you are doing that.” Now that Montgomerie is invested in collecting evidence of women’s words on social media (as if their clearly visible tweets were not enough), the pushback to gender-critical voices has become patently absurd, especially since feminists have been pointing out the sexism and homophobia inherent within transgender ideology for years. Next up, Montgomerie or another trans-identified male will claim that gender critics are right-wing, religious bigots because they questioned the sexism and homophobia of Mermaids which in turn made it impossible for them to question the sexism and homophobia of Mermaids. This is pretty much the cycle these online debates take in the vein of “on the wrong side of history” debates that pervade social media.

Content aside, what should trouble us all is that media of public and private institutions and individuals on social media is being scrubbed of history. As Havel’s essay shows us that the greengrocer’s shop slogan is divorced from what the slogan actually says, the true meaning of the social act of proclaiming allegiance to an ideology is quite clear and comprehensible because the code is so familiar: 

The greengrocer declares his loyalty (and he can do no other if his declaration is to be accepted) in the only way the regime is capable of hearing; that is, by accepting the prescribed ritual, by accepting appearances as reality, by accepting the given rules of the game. In doing so, however, he has himself become a player in the game, thus making it possible for the game to go on, for it to exist in the first place.

Today, here we are in the midst of a tide-turning moment where transgender ideology is being rejected en masse by gay and straight people, men and women alike. Meanwhile, the public institutions which have for years codified the social signs, sponsored the "gender identity" training, crafted the woke lessons transmitted by the BBC and the NHS permeating all arenas of media and public health, in addition to the cast of Harry Potter chiming in with their endless support for “trans people” through Twitter and other media outlets, and we have been handed the perfect storm exemplifying exactly how we got here in the first place. Of course, political ideology is a powerful tool when it leaves no oxygen in the room for anything else. Such an authoritarian narrative creates the subterfuge to the very ideology all these bodies and individuals espouse. 

For those like British journalist Owen Jones who declared in 2015 that all critics of transgender ideology were on “the wrong side of history,” we must be more circumspect in how we approach ideologues who ought to be covering the news instead of participating in it. While gender has wider implications beyond its very narrow media representation, the political backwater of how the media influences public policy, politics and even law is unparalleled today. We need to learn from Havel’s historical example of what happens when we allow ourselves to become the greengrocer who unthinkingly parrots slogans that have neither any base in reason nor any resonance within our society. The repression of artists, poets, thinkers and politicians in the former Eastern bloc countries has been well documented. So too have the attempts to purge antagonistic articulations about gender from the “party line” been noted in recent years across various anglophone countries.

Now that the gender narrative is falling apart quickly, many of its proponents are running for cover skipping over to the very side they previously denounced as “wrong.” Of course, these individuals will happily prefer their slogans be forgotten, to have their tweets removed and their websites altered from public record. “All traces of totalitarian influence, dissidents confirm, define, adopt, and integrate the methods of totalitarianism within their own structure building their 'truth' on its negation,” Havel reminds us.

Let’s now remind these political actors of the dangers that occur when espousing ideological hogwash as human rights. More importantly, let us now learn from this lesson of this dangerous era of public tyranny and return to the drawing board to continue that discussion about historical materialism and its significance today

[techcrunchappcom]

New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/the-latest-china-toughens-travel-rules-for-xinjiang-capital-national-news/

The Latest: China toughens travel rules for Xinjiang capital | National News

A government employee disinfects a public school as a measure against the spread of the new coronavirus, in the Taguatinga neighborhood of Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, July 28, 2020. The local government has began preparing for the safe reopening of schools in mid-August, as restrictions related to the COVID-19 lockdown are eased.

A sign hangs outside Bruno’s Tavern in New Orleans on Tuesday, July 14, 2020. Bruno’s is one of many bars around the city that shut down under new restrictions the state announced over the weekend to fight the spread of coronavirus. Bars in New Orleans had been allowed to open, with limited capacity, a month earlier when the number of hospitalizations from the virus in Louisiana was in decline.

Aziah Sajerstein, who works as a volunteer at the Cat Cafe South Beach, wears a protective face mask and gloves as she sanitizes touch points during the coronavirus pandemic, Wednesday, July 29, 2020, in Miami Beach, Fla. The cafe offers a place for cat lovers to spend time with cats, which are also available for adoption. The business, independently owned by Celyta Jackson, will be closing at the end of the week as the tourism sector in Miami-Dade County is suffering due to the pandemic.

GermBlast employee Jade Davis fumigates disinfectant onto student lockers at Bowie Middle School in Odessa, Texas on Tuesday, July 28, 2020. The cleaning crew that Davis is part of is one of many measures to be implemented to help ensure the safety of students and school staff from COVID-19 in the case of an in-person return to school in Odessa.

Volunteer Rachel Friedland prepares to load food in a car at a kosher food drive-thru distribution site, Wednesday, July 29, 2020, at the Greater Miami Jewish Federation building in Miami.

Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards holds up his own mask, taken off while he was speaking, to remind Louisiana residents that a highly effective thing within their power to do to prevent the spread of COVID-19 is to simply wear a mask, Tuesday, July 28, 2020, at a press conference update on the state’s COVID-19 situation at the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness in Baton Rouge, La.

Passengers arrive at Heathrow Airport, in London, Sunday July 26, 2020. The British government has announced 14-day quarantine restrictions from Sunday, for people arriving into England from certain countries including Spain, after Covid-19 second wave fears saw the European country struck off the UK’s safe list.

Silva Cossa, the caretaker, looks up as he ties ribbons onto the fence to represents a South African who has died from Covid-19, at St James Presbyterian church in Bedford Gardens, Johannesburg, South Africa, Wednesday, July 29, 2020.

Volunteer Malka Rodrig unpacks meals at a kosher food drive-thru distribution site, Wednesday, July 29, 2020, at the Greater Miami Jewish Federation building in Miami.

A funeral home worker wearing a full protective gear to protect himself from the spread of the new coronavirus waits to enter La Verbena cemetery in Guatemala City, Tuesday, July 28, 2020.

FILE – In this Tuesday, July 28, 2020 file photo, Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks to local people at the Canal Side Heritage Centre in Beeston near Nottingham, England. Johnson is looking for a spokesperson with broadcasting experience— and a thick skin — to become the government’s face at televised media briefings. The government placed a job ad Wednesday, July 29 on the governing Conservative Party’s website seeking applicants with news judgment, the ability to remain calm under pressure and “excellent risk management and crisis communications skills.”

A man sunbathes at a park in Hong Kong Thursday, July 30, 2020. As of Wednesday, Hong Kong reported over 3,000 coronavirus infections, with dozens of deaths. Businesses such as bars, karaoke bars and amusement parks remain temporarily closed.

A new work of art entitled ‘The End’ by artist Heather Phillipson newly unveiled on the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square in London, Thursday, July 30, 2020. Described as representing “exuberance and unease” and a “monument to hubris and impending collapse”, The End, by British artist Heather Phillipson, will stay in place until spring 2022.

People riding the subway wear face masks to protect against the spread of the coronavirus in Taipei, Taiwan, Thursday, July 30, 2020.

A medical staff takes a sample for a voluntary coronavirus disease test (COVID-19) at the new corona test station at the ‘Hochfelln’ service station on the A8 motorway between Salzburg and Munich near Bergen, Germany, Thursday, July 30, 2020.

Dr. Deborah Birx, U.S. Global Aids Coordinator & U. S. Special Representative for Global Health Diplomacy, left, speaks with Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam, right, and a roundtable of community and state health officials inside the Patrick Henry Building in Richmond, Va. Tuesday, July 28, 2020.

FILE – In this June 26, 2020, file photo Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci, center, speaks as Vice President Mike Pence, right, and Dr. Deborah Birx, White House coronavirus response coordinator, left, listen during a news conference with members of the Coronavirus task force at the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington. Fauci has warned that the United States could soon see 100,000 infections per day. “We haven’t even begun to see the end of it yet,” Fauci said during a talk hosted by Stanford University’s School of Medicine.

Employees disinfect a closed mall in Mumbai, Thursday, July 30, 2020. Malls and market complexes will reopen on Aug. 5. However theaters, food courts and gyms will remain closed.

Employees disinfect a closed mall in Mumbai, Thursday, July 30, 2020. Malls and market complexes will reopen on Aug. 5. However theaters, food courts and gyms will remain closed.

Dr. Yomaris Pena, of SOMOS Community Care in New York, disinfects chairs at the new COVID-19 testing site at Pinellas Community Church on Wednesday, July 29, 2020, in St. Petersburg, Fla. A new free testing site opened Wednesday in south St. Petersburg with the help of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Cuomo sent 7,500 tests to seed the site at the church. Tests are by appointment only, but don’t require symptoms or exposure. And since appointments are required, the testing site doesn’t require those seeking a test to wait in line or come in a vehicle.

Wearing masks to curb the spread of the new coronavirus, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro and his wife Michelle Bolsonaro, arrive to attend the launching of a rights guarantee program for rural women, at the Planalto Presidential Palace in Brasilia, Brazil, Wednesday, July 29, 2020.

People wearing face masks line up to have their coronavirus rapid tests as they hope to use the government’s transportation assistance program to return to their outlying provinces on Tuesday, July 28, 2020 at a stadium in Manila, Philippines. Hundreds of people who were stuck in the capital due to travel restrictions during the lockdown stayed at a crowded stadium as they wait for free rides back to their provinces.

An Indian worker crosses a street holding a shovel during monsoon rains in Prayagraj, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Wednesday, July 29, 2020.

A man carries milk vessels and rides a bike in the monsoon rains in Prayagraj, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Wednesday, July 29, 2020.

Women wearing face masks wait to join a parade in Bali, Indonesia, on Thursday, July 30, 2020. Indonesia’s resort island of Bali will reopen for domestic tourists on Friday after months of virus lockdown.

A woman wearing a face mask carries an offering to local deities on her head during a parade in Bali, Indonesia on Thursday, July 30, 2020. Indonesia’s resort island of Bali will reopen for domestic tourists on Friday after months of virus lockdown.

Residents sit spaced apart to practice social distancing as a precaution against the new coronavirus outbreak as they access free wifi on their mobile phones at Jatirahayu village office in Bekasi on the outskirts of Jakarta, Indonesia, Wednesday, July 29, 2020.

Indonesian students wear face masks to help curb the spread of the new coronavirus as they access free wifi on their mobile phones at Jatirahayu village office in Bekasi on the outskirts of Jakarta, Indonesia, Wednesday, July 29, 2020.

In this July 29, 2020 photo made available by the Monroe County Sherif’ss Office, Fla., shows Yohana Anahi Gonzalez. Gonzalez and her partner Jose Antonio Freire Interian, both COVID positive, were arrested, Thursday, July 29, 2020, in the Florida Keys after authorities said they violated quarantine rules. The rare arrests underscore the fervent national debate over how to enforce rules on masks and self-quarantines.

FILE – In this Dec. 13, 2019, file photo, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine speaks about his plans for the coming year during an interview at the Governor’s Residence in Columbus, Ohio. Ohio’s Republican governor was hailed as prophetic for his decisive steps to shut down schools and stop the state’s presidential primary election early during the coronavirus outbreak. Since then, he’s found navigating a path out of the state’s pandemic shutdown to be a bumpy one.

District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser speaks during an announcement that District of Columbia public schools will be all virtual through Nov. 6, during a news conference, Thursday, July 30, 2020, in Washington.

Rob Glassman, general manager of the Over the Top rental linens company, protests in support of the live events industry receiving federal aid outside of the office of Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., during the coronavirus pandemic, Thursday, July 30, 2020, in Miami. Many small businesses in the events industry have been shut down since March due to the pandemic.

In this July 29, 2020 photo made available by the Monroe County Sherif’ss Office, Fla., shows Jose Antonio Freire Interian. Interian and his partner Yohana Anahi Gonzalez, both COVID positive, were arrested, Thursday, July 29, 2020, in the Florida Keys after authorities said they violated quarantine rules. The rare arrests underscore the fervent national debate over how to enforce rules on masks and self-quarantines.

A couple of tourists, one wearing a mask, walk towards the fountains in Trafalgar Square in Trafalgar Square in London, Thursday, July 30, 2020.

A sign is posted on a pole along the main street to encourage visitors and residents to wear face coverings while walking around Monday, July 27, 2020, in the mountain tourist town of Georgetown, Colo.

President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference at the White House, Thursday, July 30, 2020, in Washington.

A woman in a face mask speaks on the phone on a sidewalk during the coronavirus pandemic in downtown Ottawa, Ontario, Friday, July 24, 2020.

FILE – In this March 31, 2020, file photo, a sign applauding health care workers is displayed outside the University of Oklahoma Medical Center in Oklahoma City. The head of coronavirus response at the university medical center says an increase in the number of younger Oklahomans dying as a result of the illness caused by the virus has become a worry. Dr. Dale Bratzler said Friday, July 24, 2020, that even though most deaths remain in the 65 and older age group, the increase in deaths among those 36-49 years old shows it can kill younger people as well.

Des Moines Area Quilters Guild member Deanna Wilson, of West Des Moines, Iowa, chooses a face mask kit that once completed will be distributed to Des Moines Public Schools students, Thursday, July 30, 2020, in Des Moines, Iowa.

Visitors to Karmel Plaza wear face masks as they gather Wednesday, July 22, 2020 in Minneapolis. Gov. Tim Walz issued a statewide mandate Wednesday requiring Minnesotans to wear masks in indoor public spaces.

Jean White and her great-grandson Mason Shumpert, 7, of Tupelo, wear their masks as they shop the vegetable aisle at Todd’s in Tupelo on Friday, July 24, 2020 as the coronavirus earns attention in Northeast Mississippi.

A street barber wearing a face mask to protect against the coronavirus attends to his customer near a banner on the pandemic which reads “Discover early” in Beijing, Thursday, July 30, 2020. China is stepping up testing for COVID-19 in an attempt to get a handle on new outbreaks that have defied the country’s considerable success in containing the coronavirus that was first detected in the central city of Wuhan late last year.

Residents at a Uniting Gen Regen AOD residential facility try on new masks in Melbourne, Thursday, July 30, 2020. Australia’s coronavirus hot spot, Victoria state, will make wearing masks compulsory after reporting a record more than 700 new cases on Thursday, mostly among the vulnerable residents of aged care homes.

A fan wearing a face masks to help protect against the spread of the new coronavirus cheers during the KBO league game between Doosan Bears and LG Twins in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, July 27, 2020. Masked fans hopped, sang and shouted cheering slogans in baseball stadiums in South Korea on Sunday as authorities began bringing back spectators in professional sports games amid the coronavirus pandemic.

BEIJING — China is tightening travel restrictions in the capital of the Xinjiang region amid a COVID-19 outbreak in the northwestern city.

People arriving in Urumqi from regions considered to have high infection risk must undergo a two-week quarantine. Others arriving from less risky areas most show proof of good health. Locals “in principle” must stay in the city or show proof of health to be allowed to leave.

Hong Kong, meanwhile, continues to see a third wave of infections, with almost 150 new cases reported Friday to bring its total to 3,151 cases and 25 deaths.

Despite that, authorities issued an order Thursday allowing restaurants to operate under limited hours and with limited capacity. But businesses such as bars, karaoke bars and amusement parks still must remain closed.

HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:

— Florida tallies another record high daily deaths

— India says herd immunity won’t work, need vaccine

— Health officials Birx, Fauci recommend face shields, masks

— Deaths are mounting rapidly in the U.S., and cases are rising in close to 30 states in all. The outbreak’s center of gravity seems to be shift from the Sun Belt toward the Midwest.

[glittergummicandypeach]

Behind a Recent Stunt in Idaho Lies a Dangerous Theocratic Movement | Religion Dispatches

Last Tuesday, just days before Idaho became one of a handful states to see a record high in new COVID-19 cases, 15 Republican members of the Idaho House of Representatives went rogue, gathering in the House chambers for what they had billed as an “extraordinary session” of the state legislature called to rein in what they claim is the overstepping of authority by Governor Brad Little, also a Republican, in his response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The gathering was “protected” by heavily-armed men, including infamous “Vanilla ISIS” terrorist Ammon Bundy, a Mormon anti-government extremist who led the occupation of Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in 2016. Having failed to gain the backing of the state GOP apparatus or of any state senators, the small group of extremist legislators ultimately admitted that they did not have a quorum. Nevertheless, they grandstanded and read the proclamation they’d put out claiming that Governor Little’s handling of the coronavirus crisis was unconstitutional, particularly with respect to the spending of federal money and the issue of contact tracing.

It’s a somewhat impressive feat to be right of center in the already quite red and theocratically-inclined Idaho GOP. After all, in March, the state passed two bills enshrining discrimination against transgender people into law, prompting California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to add Idaho to a list of states banned by California from taxpayer-funded travel. But, representing a sort of nexus of New World Order conspiracy theories, apocalyptic Christianity, (often not overt) white supremacism, and gun-toting militia members, the legislators involved in the June 23 stunt managed to pull it off.

“I feel that the Republican Party in my state right now has been taken over by anti-government libertarians, and it is very split,” explains local political organizer Alicia Abbott, who works with an initiative called Reclaim Idaho, in a phone interview with RD. An entrepreneurial professional home builder and remodeler, Abbott focuses her advocacy on issues like Medicaid expansion and improving education rather than on candidates or parties. 

While she’s quick to point out that she’s not a journalist, Abbott feels compelled to do what she can to observe, document, and raise awareness of the extremist, conspiratorial, and theocratic positions and related activities of certain Idaho state politicians and their supporters. When she does so, she finds that many of their constituents don’t like what they see. Indeed, evidence of more mainstream Idahoan conservative frustration with the radicals can easily be found online.

In an op-ed on the events of June 23, Idaho Statesman opinion editor Scott McIntosh described the rogue session as exhibiting “all of the passion and religious fervor of a good Sunday service.” McIntosh’s choice of words is neither accidental nor unique. Abbott, who posted video of the event via Facebook Live, has taken to calling such spectacles “political sermons,” and she sees the threat posed by Idaho’s far-right radicals as theocratic at its core, an assessment essentially in agreement with analysis by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

While he didn’t exactly preach a sermon at the June 23 session, Idaho State Representative Tim Remington, senior pastor of a “non-denominational Bible teaching” church in Coeur D’Alene called The Altar, did open and close the unsanctioned event in prayer. Remington was appointed to his seat by Governor Little after its previous occupant, John Green, was removed because of a felony tax fraud conviction.

Remington’s church may be non-denominational, but it’s clearly fundamentalist. The Altar’s website, for example, calls evolution a “lie,” and claims to demonstrate that this foundational scientific theory is “unscientific” by citing Merriam-Webster’s dictionary. The site further laments, “The sad part is they [scientists] refuse to accept the Genesis account of Creation [sic.], because that would mean they are responsible to God.” This rhetoric, which slides from supposed concern with science into (equally nonsensical) moral consequentialism, is a perfect example of the fundamentalist approach to apologetics known as presuppositionalism.

Meanwhile, Remington, Green, Idaho State Representative Heather Scott, and failed state senatorial candidate Scott Herndon all spoke at a church service in Coeur D’Alene back in December that was dedicated to a political effort to ban abortion in Idaho without exception and to make abortion doctors and their patients legally liable for murder. Scott, who is Abbott’s state representative, leads this initiative, and in January 2020 she introduced a bill with the Orwellian title of “Idaho Abortion Human Rights Act.” Although the bill has no realistic prospects for passing, simply arguing in the state legislature that abortion doctors and those who have abortions should be tried for murder pushes the Overton window to the right and can inspire violence.

The video of the church service, which Remington closed in prayer, featured a slide presentation entitled “Idaho Abortion Human Rights Act: Abortion Abolition through State Sovereignty.” The subtitle is telling, as elevating “states’ rights” over the federal government has long been used by white American conservatives to “justify” human rights violations like slavery and Jim Crow. 

Appropriating the language of abolitionism is also in line with white conservatives’ proclivity for claiming the mantle of the Civil Rights Movement in bad faith efforts to undermine both racial justice and women’s rights. In the video, Scott explains at length to those in attendance about how to contact their state legislators in support of her bill. The video also reveals that the church was prepared to mail out letters to legislators produced in advance from those in attendance; the letters were reportedly available to sign after the service.

On June 25, according to local reporter Nathan Brown, the Idaho state GOP adopted both the nullification of “federal court rulings the state deems unconstitutional” and the defining of “all abortion as murder, including in cases of rape or incest,” as official planks of the party platform. Both proposals, the inclusion of which represents a serious danger to women and trans men, were introduced by Herndon.

In her phone interview with RD, Abbott brought up the December 22 service as an example of likely illegal political organizing by a tax-exempt church, which she says is one of her biggest concerns. A self-described “fourth-generation Bonner County girl” who forthrightly states, “I deeply care about consensus issues; I hate political parties,” Abbot referred to the year of Trump’s election as a “paradigm shift.” Since roughly 2017, she’s been live-streaming every public meeting she attends “and making sure there is coverage for them, which is not something our fundamentalist faction appreciates,” as its members would prefer not to have a spotlight trained on their activities.

Because of her advocacy, Abbot says she faces intimidation from members of the anti-government “Patriot” movement, who represent the base for politicians like Heather Scott. Following James Wesley, Rawles (he insists on the inclusion of a comma in his name), these anti-government extremists view eastern Washington, eastern Oregon, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming as “The American Redoubt,” a place where right-wing survivalists can go to hunker down and prepare for a supposedly coming catastrophe and/or the next civil war. A self-described “Constitutionalist Christian libertarian” and “religious separatist,” Rawles stokes fears of a “globalist” agenda and of “the Second Civil War… caused by the gulf between the right and left—or between the godly and the godless—or between the libertarians and the statists—or between the individualists and the collectivists.” (This “American Redoubt” just happens to overlap quite neatly with the decades-old neo-nazi separatist project known as the “Northwest Territorial Imperative.”)

Not coincidentally, at the June 23 session, Scott stated, “I truly believe a civil war is coming if we do not put an end to what we are seeing.” Meanwhile, Rawles, a former U.S. Army intelligence officer, has clearly inspired many people to move to the Western enclave he and his fellow travelers consider a haven for religious conservatives. Although it would be very difficult to determine precisely how many have done so, local observers are feeling the impact. “I have a firm grasp on the number of Heather Scott supporters in my district,” Abbott says, “and in two years, from roughly 2018 to 2020, her base has increased roughly from 3800 to 6000. That’s quite a jump, and it’s definitely correlated to new residents.”

When asked where the new residents came from, Abbott explains, “We have an active community of American Redoubters who advertise our area in publications across the country.” She pointed specifically to Black Rifle Real Estate, which she describes as “so damaging to our community.” The company’s website states, “That’s right liberals, Rural America and the Redoubt is for law abiding Liberty-minded Patriots only. So go back to your sh#thole Sanctuary City and live in your crime infested streets.” In case you have any doubts about the import of that statement, the site also states: “This means Snowflakes, Liberals, Socialists, Marxists, Communists and other Tyrants that hate our Constitutional Republic and the Bill of Rights are not allowed to engage our services.” (The erratic incorrect capitalization is in the original in both cases.)

A recent Black Rifle Real Estate Craigslist ad features a mushroom cloud reminiscent of the legendary “Daisy” political ad produced for the Lyndon B. Johnson campaign in 1964, and features the text: “Time is not on your side, Flee [sic.] the city NOW before the coming collapse!” Like the company website, however, the ad features no explicitly religious language. Indeed, Black Rifle Real Estate’s website informs potential buyers:

“We are conservative Constitutional Libertarians who believe you can do anything you want on your land as long as you’re not hurting anyone. Don’t preach to me and I won’t preach to you. Let’s disagree but respect one another.” 

What gives?

Inasmuch as the American Redoubt project is theocratic, it is, in a certain sense, “ecumenical”—an example of what I’ve elsewhere called “bad ecumenism.” The collaboration of both Mormon and evangelical fundamentalists illustrates this. Religious studies scholar Cristina Rosetti commented to RD, “Early Mormon focus on the government’s protection of human agency informs contemporary Mormon belief about government. Mormon Libertarianism is centrally located in historic weariness of a government that both failed to protect and overstepped at crucial times in the history of the Saints.”

Seen in the light of LDS history, she explained, “the libertarian political ideologies of the Bundys” are “not a radical departure from Mormonism.” To be sure, many anti-government extremists do not view themselves as anti-government. As Rosetti relates, “When we asked Ryan Bundy about his views, he recoiled at the sentiment that he is ‘anti-government.’ He described himself and fellow ‘patriots’ as pro-government, as long as it is righteous and not practicing unrighteous dominion. This speaks to a very specific reading of the 12th Article of Faith and the historic memory of Mormon persecution.” It’s also perfectly in keeping with the extreme Calvinist ideology of Christian Reconstructionism, whose adherents seek Christian dominion over the United States in order to bring it under what they understand to be “biblical law.”

University of North Florida Religious Studies Professor Julie Ingersoll literally wrote the book on Christian Reconstructionism and its wider influence, a topic she’s covered extensively for RD. Asked to explain how economic libertarianism gels with authoritarian Christianity, Ingersoll told RD, “These perspectives are compatible because, for far right-wing Christians, a society organized according to biblical law will leave patriarchal families operating unfettered by an extraordinarily limited civil government.” 

As an example, she mentioned Christian Reconstructionist leader Gary North, a sometime economic adviser to Ron Paul, “working in concert with more secular libertarians in the Von Mises Institute to promote Austrian economics.” Indeed, the cross-fertilization of more “secular” anti-government and apocalyptic conspiracy theories with more “religious” ones has been well underway at least since 1991, when Pat Robertson pushed New World Order conspiracies in a bestselling book. This trajectory has culminated at present in the QAnon phenomenon, which has attracted evangelical adherents. 

In some contexts—perhaps in the case of Black Rifle Real Estate’s advertising—it may be seen as more strategic to downplay specific religious views, as they may be off-putting to some. However, this may just be the company’s preference. And yet Abbott is not wrong to frame the extremists she works to expose as oriented toward theocracy. 

Religions are complex cultural systems, and the toxic mixture that comes together in the American Redoubt movement represents a feedback loop between American-style white supremacist patriarchy on the one hand, and the varieties of Christianity that have been invoked throughout U.S. history to uphold it, on the other. A similar dynamic can be observed in the conspiratorial John Birch Society (JBS), in which Catholic and Protestant members come together in advocating a return to the gold standard, undermining the federal government, waiting for the outbreak of a “race war,” and finding “Communists” behind every bush and tree.

In her work, Abbott has observed that many Idaho Republicans care about public education, but her own state representative is part of what she calls “the anti-education crowd.” She reports, “Heather Scott and a few others regularly tell people in their speeches to take their kids out of public school.” The Birchers have recently stepped up their efforts in pursuit of this same goal, and Scott praised JBS literature as “really informative” in one of her recent speaking engagements, adding that her husband reads it whenever he gets the chance. The new “Public School Exit” initiative, which is a project of the JBS and the Council for National Policy, pushes Christian schools and homeschooling so that children can be closely controlled by their parents and indoctrinated into right-wing extremism.

Abbott says she often receives phone calls from Idaho Republicans asking her what to do about the party’s extremism problem. Noting that the extremists “are organized, and they show up,” Abbott tells these concerned Republicans that they need to start showing up themselves if they want to reclaim their party and stop local officials from refusing to enforce state and federal directives. “You can’t just sit back and not say anything,” she says.

Meanwhile, the spread of nullification and unchecked extremism in the Republican Party is hardly limited to the Northwest. Unfortunately, the Trump administration seems far more concerned with preventing and punishing the destruction of racist monuments and with painting those protesting racial injustice as “terrorists” than it does with reining in the excesses of anti-government extremists like the American Redoubters, with whom the administration shamefully holds much ideological common ground.

This content was originally published here.

[thewebofslime]

An open database in China contains the personal information of more than 1.8 million women, including their phone numbers, addresses, and something called “BreedReady” status, according to a researcher. Victor Gevers, a Dutch internet expert from the non-profit group GDI.Foundation, found the insecure data cache while searching for open databases in China. He posted a series of screenshots of it over the weekend. The database, whose server is in China, included fields labeled in English for sex, age, education, marital status, as well as a column titled “BreedReady”, which could be a poor translation of Chinese terms to describe whether a woman has children or is of child-bearing age, observers noted. It was taken down late on Monday afternoon local time, according to Gevers. The data breach is alarming in the context of official concerns over China’s falling birthrates. Women rights advocates and critics of China’s use of strict family planning rules worry about how far the government will go to encourage more women to have children. It is not clear whether the database is related to a dating app, a government registry, or another organisation or company. Gevers, who also identified a database maintained by a surveillance company tracking at least 2.5 million residents in Xinjiang, said he was still taking samples and working on verifying the data. “More than this, we don’t have at the moment. Our primary concern is that it gets secured ASAP,” he told the Guardian. The average age of women in the database was 32, with the youngest being 15, he said. Almost 90% of included entries were described single and 82% were listed as living in Beijing. The database also included fields labeled “political” and “hasvideo” as well as links to what appear to be Facebook profile pages. Facebook is blocked in China and can only be accessed through virtual private networks. The researcher said he and others were contacting some of those whose profile pages were linked to see if they were aware of the database or had registered such information. In a thread titled “Is this the prologue to The Handmaid’s Tale?” on the discussion forum Douban, Chinese internet users likened the database to the television show based on a future where women are forced to reproduce. “This kind of database is very indicative and frightening,” said one user, adding: “I’m a pessimist and the fact that stories like The Handmaid’s Tale exist means the signs are already there.” Others were less surprised and wondered whether the information could be related to a Chinese dating website Jiayuan, which was hacked by a security researcher aiming to highlight the site’s vulnerabilities in 2015. One user on Douban wrote: “To tell the truth, this kind of data is everywhere.”

[clubofinfo]

Expert: The first time it was reported that our friends were being butchered there was a cry of horror. Then a hundred were butchered. But when a thousand were butchered and there was no end to the butchery, a blanket of silence spread. When evil-doing comes like falling rain, nobody calls out ‘stop!’ When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible. When sufferings become unendurable the cries are no longer heard. The cries, too, fall like rain in summer. ― Bertolt Brecht, Selected Poems, March 24, 1971 There are days I wake up, and I’m not sure what country I live in anymore. There are days I wake up and want to go right back to sleep in the hopes that this surreal landscape of government-sanctioned injustice, corruption and brutality is just a really bad dream. There are days I am so battered by the never-ending wave of bad news that I have little outrage left in me: I am numb. And then I get hold of myself, shake myself out of the doldrums, and remind myself that it’s not yet time to give up: America needs our outrage and our alertness and our tenacity and our fierce determination to remain a free people in a land where justice matters. This is still our country. Don’t just sit there. Do something. When you hear that the U.S. government “lost” 1,475 migrant children within its care over a three-month period, in some cases handing them off to human traffickers, don’t just chalk it up to incompetent bureaucrats. The Trump Administration’s plan to separate immigrant children from their parents at the border should outrage anyone with a moral conscience, especially in light of the government’s latest revelation that it is unable to account for the whereabouts of 1500 of those children. Mind you, this is not just a Trump problem. A recent report indicates that under President Obama’s watch, migrant children were allegedly beaten, threatened with sexual violence and repeatedly assaulted while under the care of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials. According to Newsweek, “Border authorities were accused of kicking a child in the ribs and forcing a 16-year-old girl to ‘spread her legs’ for an aggressive body search. Other children accused officers of punching a child in the head three times, running over a 17-year-old boy and denying medical care to a pregnant teen, who later had a stillbirth.” ACT. It doesn’t matter what your politics are or where you stand on immigration issues. There are some lines that should never be crossed—some government actions that should never be tolerated or justified—no matter what the end goal might be, and this is one of them. Demand that Congress stop playing politics and endangering children’s lives. When you read that Attorney General Jeff Sessions wants police to use stop and frisk tactics randomly against Americans without even the need for reasonable suspicion, don’t just shake your head disapprovingly. ACT: Call the Justice Department (202-353-1555) and read them the Fourth Amendment: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” After you watch the video of how the Transportation Security Administration, unfailingly tone deaf to the spirit of the Fourth Amendment, subjected a 96-year-old World War II veteran in a wheelchair to a patdown that left no part of her body untouched, don’t just seethe in silence. ACT: Contact your representative in Congress and file a complaint on the TSA’s egregious practices. When old women and little children are being groped by government agents, things have gone too far. In light of revelations that the TSA “has created a new secret watch list to monitor people who may be targeted as potential threats at airport checkpoints simply because they have swatted away security screeners’ hands or otherwise appeared unruly,” you can expect even more headache-inducing behavior in the near future. When you find out that Amazon is selling police real time facial recognition software that can scan hundreds of thousands of faces, identify them, track them, and then report them to police, don’t just shrug helplessly. ACT: Harness the power of your wallet to urge Amazon to favor freedom principles over profit motives. It’s only a matter of time before these programs are used widely here in the U.S. They are already being used and abused abroad. For instance, Amazon’s Rekognition software was used by broadcasters to identify attendees at the royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. Chinese police have used similar facial recognition tools to scan crowds at rock concerts, malls and gas stations in order to catch alleged lawbreakers. Just recently, Chinese police used the technology to capture a suspect who had been living under a pseudonym after he failed to pay for $17,000 worth of potatoes. Chinese schools are even employing the facial recognition cameras in classrooms to alert teachers to students who aren’t paying attention. When you hear Sessions bragging about how much he loves civil asset forfeiture, which allows the government to seize Americans’ personal property—money, cars, homes and other valuables—without having to first prove that any criminal conduct has taken place, don’t just take his word for it. ACT: Do your own research. You’ll soon discover that because of the corruption that surrounds this abusive program, countless innocent Americans have been robbed blind by government agents out to get rich at their expense. Billions of dollars have been taken without probable cause. Anthonia Nwaorie, a Texas nurse who had saved up $41,377 to start a medical clinic for women and children in Nigeria, had her life savings seized by Customs Agents who refused to return the money unless she agreed to pay their “expenses.” Six months later, even though Nwaorie was never charged with a crime, she’s still waiting to get her money back. When you hear about armed Denver police pulling a gun on a school official and conducting a classroom-to-classroom search for a missing student at an area high school, don’t just thank your lucky stars your childhood was more idyllic. Likewise, when you hear that the lieutenant governor of Texas thinks the solution to school shootings is fewer school doors (entrances and exits), don’t just marvel at the short-sightedness of government officials. ACT: Say “enough is enough” to government-sponsored violence. The systemic violence being perpetrated by agents of the government has done more collective harm to the American people and our liberties than any single act of terror or mass shooting. Violence has become the government’s calling card, starting at the top and trickling down, from the more than 80,000 SWAT team raids carried out every year on unsuspecting Americans by heavily armed, black-garbed commandos and the increasingly rapid militarization of local police forces across the country to the surveillance drones that are already crisscrossing American skies. When you read about how 28-year-old Andrew Finch of Kansas answered a 5 pm knock on his front door only to be shot in the head and killed ten seconds later by a police sniper because a SWAT team responded to a prank “swatting” phone call with full force, don’t just tsk-tsk over the senseless tragedies arising from militarized and police and overzealous SWAT teams. Not only did police refuse to identify the officer who pulled the trigger, but he was also never charged with Andrew’s death. ACT: Demand accountability. If any hope for police reform is to be realized, especially as it relates to how SWAT teams are deployed locally and holding police accountable for their actions, it must begin at the community level, with local police departments and governing bodies, where citizens can still, with sufficient reinforcements, make their voices heard. The rise of SWAT teams and militarization of American police—blowback effects of the military empire—have unfortunately become entrenched parts of American life. SWAT teams originated as specialized units dedicated to defusing extremely sensitive, dangerous situations. As the role of paramilitary forces has expanded, however, to include involvement in nondescript police work targeting nonviolent suspects, the mere presence of SWAT units has actually injected a level of danger and violence into police-citizen interactions that was not present as long as these interactions were handled by traditional civilian officers. Nationwide, SWAT teams have been employed to address an astonishingly trivial array of criminal activity or mere community nuisances: angry dogs, domestic disputes, improper paperwork filed by an orchid farmer, and misdemeanor marijuana possession, to give a brief sampling. In some instances, SWAT teams are even employed, in full armament, to perform routine patrols. All too often, botched SWAT team raids have resulted in one tragedy after another for American citizens with little consequences for law enforcement. When you find out that police and other law enforcement agencies are accessing the DNA shared with genealogical websites and using it to identify possible suspects, don’t offer up your DNA without some assurance of privacy protections. ACT: Protect your privacy. It’s not just yourself you have to worry about, either. It’s also anyone related to you who can be connected by DNA. These genetic fingerprints, as they’re called, do more than just single out a person. They also show who you’re related to and how. As the Associated Press reports, “DNA samples that can help solve robberies and murders could also, in theory, be used to track down our relatives, scan us for susceptibility to disease, or monitor our movements.” By accessing your DNA, the government will soon know everything else about you that they don’t already know: your family chart, your ancestry, what you look like, your health history, your inclination to follow orders or chart your own course, etc. Capitalizing on this, police in California, Colorado, Virginia and Texas use DNA found at crime scenes to identify and target family members for possible clues to a suspect’s whereabouts. Who will protect your family from being singled out for “special treatment” simply because they’re related to you? As biomedical researcher Yaniv Erlich warns, “If it’s not regulated and the police can do whatever they want … they can use your DNA to infer things about your health, your ancestry, whether your kids are your kids.” In the face of DNA evidence that places us at the scene of a crime, behavior sensing technology that interprets our body temperature and facial tics as suspicious, and government surveillance devices that cross-check our biometrics, license plates and DNA against a growing database of unsolved crimes and potential criminals, we are no longer “innocent until proven guilty.” Finally, when you hear someone talking about how two American citizens in Montana were detained by a Border Patrol agent because he overheard them speaking Spanish at a gas station, don’t just shake your head in disgust. ACT: Remind yourself (and those around you) that despite the polarizing, racially-charged rhetoric being tossed about by President Trump, this is still a nation whose strength derives from the diversity of its people and from the immigrants who have been seeking shelter on our shores since the earliest days of our Republic. As President Ronald Reagan recognized in one of his last speeches before leaving office: We lead the world because, unique among nations, we draw our people—our strength—from every country and every corner of the world. And by doing so we continuously renew and enrich our nation… Thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity, we’re a nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge, always leading the world to the next frontier. This quality is vital to our future as a nation. If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost… Those who become American citizens love this country even more. And that’s why the Statue of Liberty lifts her lamp to welcome them to the golden door. It is bold men and women, yearning for freedom and opportunity, who leave their homelands and come to a new country to start their lives over. They believe in the American dream. And over and over, they make it come true for themselves, for their children, and for others. They give more than they receive. They labor and succeed. And often they are entrepreneurs. But their greatest contribution is more than economic, because they understand in a special way how glorious it is to be an American. They renew our pride and gratitude in the United States of America, the greatest, freest nation in the world—the last, best hope of man on Earth. As I  make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, if the freedoms enshrined in the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, are to mean anything anymore—if they are to stand for anything ever again—then “we the people” have to stand up for them. We cannot allow ourselves to be divided and distracted and turned into warring factions. We cannot sell out our birthright for empty promises of false security. We cannot remain silent in the face of ugliness, pettiness, meanness, brutality, corruption and injustice. We cannot allow politicians, corporations, profiteers and war hawks to whittle our freedoms away until they are little more than empty campaign slogans. We must stand strong for freedom. We must give voice to moral outrage. We must do something—anything—everything in our power to make America free again. As Reagan recognized, “If we lose this way of freedom, history will record with the great astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening.” http://clubof.info/

[melbynews-blog]

Israeli Supreme Court supports military's use of live fire on Gaza protesters

Neuer Beitrag veröffentlicht bei https://melby.de/israeli-supreme-court-supports-militarys-use-of-live-fire-on-gaza-protesters/

Israeli Supreme Court supports military's use of live fire on Gaza protesters

Israeli top court ‘gives green light’ to use of live fire in Gaza Al Jazeera 26 May — Israel’s Supreme Court has unanimously rejected two petitions brought by human rights groups demanding Israel’s army to stop using snipers and live ammunition against unarmed Palestinian protests in the Gaza Strip. The panel of three justices on Thursday sided with the Israeli military, which argued that the protesters constituted a real danger to Israeli soldiers and citizens. Israel maintains its forces use of live fire is in line with both domestic and international law, arguing the demonstrations are part of the country’s conflict with Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip. The court’s ruling gave Israel “a green light to its continued use of snipers and live fire against Palestinian protesters,”  Adalah-The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel and Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, which filed one of the petitions, said in a statement on Friday. “The Israeli Supreme Court completely ignored the broad factual basis presented to it by the petitioners, which includes multiple testimonies of wounded and reports of international organisations involved in documenting the killing and wounding of unarmed protesters in Gaza.” The human rights groups said the court “refused to watch video clips documenting Israeli shootings of demonstrators and, rather than actually examining the case, fully accepted the claims presented to it by the state.  “The extreme nature of the ruling is also highlighted by the striking absence of any mention of the casualty figures that had been presented to the court”…. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/05/israel-green-lights-live-ammunition-palestinians-180525091141209.html

Gaza

Two Palestinians die from serious wounds in Gaza IMEMC 25 May — The Palestinian Health Ministry has reported, Thursday, that two Palestinians who were shot and seriously injured by Israeli army fire in the Gaza Strip have succumbed to their serious wounds. Dr. Ashraf al-Qedra, the spokesperson of the Health Ministry in Gaza, said a young man identified as Ahmad Ali Qattoush, 23, died at the Shifa Medical Center in Gaza, from serious wounds he suffered several days ago [May 14th], after Israeli soldiers shot him with a live round in the head, east of the al-Boreij refugee camp in Central Gaza. It is worth mentioning that Ahmad has two other brothers, identified as Rami and Ibrahim, who were also killed by Israeli army fire in previous years. Ahmad is from Nusseirat city, in Deir al-Balah, in Central Gaza Strip. Dr. al-Qedra added that another Palestinian, identified as Mohannad Bakr Abu Tahoun, 21, died from serious wounds he suffered after an Israeli soldier shot him with a live round in the head on May 14th. Abu Tahoun, from Zawaida area in Gaza city, was moved to a hospital in Gaza before he was transferred, Wednesday, to the Al-Ahli Palestinian hospital in the southern West Bank city of Hebron, where he succumbed to his wounds on Thursday evening. http://imemc.org/article/two-palestinians-die-from-serious-wounds-in-gaza/

Body of Palestinian martyr denied entry into Gaza AL-KHALIL (PIC) 25 May — The Israeli occupation authorities on Friday prevented the entry of the body of the Palestinian martyr Muhannad Abu Tahoun into the Gaza Strip to be buried after he died Thursday at al-Ahli Hospital in al-Khalil. Abu Tahoun’s body was taken to Tarqumiyah crossing in the morning in preparation for its transfer to Gaza, his hometown, but the body was detained at the crossing for several hours before it was returned to al-Ahli Hospital. Abu Tahoun was shot in the head while he was taking part in the Great Return March in Gaza a few days go, and he remained in a coma until he died on Thursday, a day after he was transferred to a Palestinian hospital in al-Khalil in an attempt to save his life. https://english.palinfo.com/news/2018/5/26/Body-of-Palestinian-martyr-denied-entry-into-Gaza

Updated: ‘115 injured by Israeli gunfire on Gaza border; Palestinian succumbs to earlier wounds’ IMEMC/Agencies 26 May –The Palestinian Health Ministry said the soldiers injured 115 Palestinians, including seven children and four women, after the army attacked the protesters with live fire and gas bombs, across the border area in the eastern parts of the coastal region. Thousands of Palestinians participated in the protests, which started after evening prayers in various mosques of the coastal region, before they boarded buses that took them to protest tents, hundreds of meters away from the border fence. Media sources said Palestinian protesters, using slingshots, managed to down an Israeli military drone, east of Abu Safiyya area, in northern Gaza. Also on Friday, the Health Ministry said a young man, identified as Yasser Sami Habib, 24, succumbed to wounds sustained from Israeli army gunfire during the protests on May 14. Habib suffered a very serious injury before he was rushed to a hospital in Gaza, and was later transferred to Sr. Joseph Hospital in occupied Jerusalem, where he succumbed to his wounds. http://imemc.org/article/109-injured-by-israeli-gunfire-on-gaza-border-palestinian-succumbs-to-earlier-wounds/

Gaza tear gas baby left off official death count AFP 25 May — A baby who died near the Gaza border was not included in a Gaza health ministry list of Palestinians killed by the Israel army, after a dispute over how she died. The ministry and family members originally said 8-month-old Leila al-Ghandour had died after inhaling tear gas along the border during a day of clashes in which at least 61 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire. The Israeli army disputed the claim, calling it “fake news” by Hamas, the Islamist movement that rules the coastal enclave. The army claimed she had a pre-existing medical condition, citing an unnamed doctor with access to her file. A full list of those the ministry called “martyrs,” published this week for the first time, did not include Ghandour. The health ministry has said a full review of her death was underway. Ashraf al-Qudra, a spokesman for the ministry, said her name would not be included until the review was completed, without giving a time frame. “Her name was not included in earlier lists either,” Qudra told AFP, though no exhaustive list had previously been made public. “The investigation will determine (whether she had a pre-existing condition) and if the inhaled gas contributed to her death.” At least 61 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire on May 14th when thousands of Palestinians protested as the US officially moved its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, according to the ministry’s figures. At least 114 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the Gaza Strip since mass demonstrations broke out on March 30th, it said. This was several lower than previous tolls compiled by AFP on the basis of the ministry’s reports. The ministry’s list does not include those whose bodies were not recovered by Palestinian medics. The Israeli army is believed to have kept the bodies of several people shot near or along the border. https://www.afp.com/en/news/826/gaza-tear-gas-baby-left-official-death-count-doc-15b8m31

22 Gazans transferred to Jordan for medical treatment BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 23 May — Twenty-two wounded Palestinians from Gaza were transferred to Jordan on Tuesday to receive medical treatment in Jordanian hospitals. Israeli media said the medical transfer was made upon the request of Jordan’s King Abdullah in coordination with the Israeli officials. The wounded were transferred through the Erez Crossing in northern Gaza with the help of Jordanian ambulances, and left through the Israeli-controlled Allenby Crossing in the occupied West Bank during the early hours of Wednesday morning. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780149

  Video: Gazans burn Israeli soldiers’ watchtower 22 May Haitham Khatib — from Al Jazeera? — Gazan youths go beyond the border fence and burn a watchtower from which Israeli soldiers had shot at people. https://www.facebook.com/haytham.alkhateeb/videos/10214563882543765/

Flaming kites set settler farmlands alight near Gaza border GAZA (PIC) 25 May — Massive fires erupted on Friday in five sites in the 1948 occupied Palestinian territories by flaming kites and balloons launched from the Gaza Strip.Local sources reported that two fires flared up in the afternoon in settler farmlands east of Beit Hanoun town and al-Bureij refugee camp in the northern and central Gaza Strip respectively. Other fires were caused later by kites sent from Khan Younis and al-Maghazi refugee camp burning dozens of dunums of land. Thousands of Palestinians marched along Gaza’s eastern border fence to participate in the protests of the ninth Friday of the Great Return March. Since the start of the Great Return March in the Gaza Strip, dozens of flaming kites have been launched toward settler farmlands near the border fence causing heavy losses. Flaming kites are one of the tools used by Palestinian youths to confuse the Israeli snipers stationed at the border fence to shoot peaceful protesters. https://english.palinfo.com/news/2018/5/26/Flaming-kites-set-settler-farmlands-alight-near-Gaza-border

2 Palestinians from Gaza charged with flying incendiary kites into Israel BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 23 May — Two Palestinians from the Gaza Strip were indicted on Monday by an Israeli court on charges related to flying incendiary kites into Israeli territory during the weeks-long “Great March of Return” protests in the besieged coastal enclave. Israeli news website Ynet reported that Ahmed Amawi, 26, and Moataz Abu Eid, 20, were charged with “attempted incitement to murder, activity in a terror organization, arson as an act of terror, attempted arson as an act of terror, and armed infiltration, among others.” The two were arrested in late April when they crossed into Israel, allegedly with the intention of setting fire to a grove and Israeli military vehicles, Ynet said. They were arrested by Israeli forces stationed along the border. According to Ynet, Amawi and Abu Eid participated in five Friday “Great March of Return” during which they allegedly assembled some 30 kites that protesters fixes flammable materials to before sending them over the Israeli border fence around Gaza and into Israeli territory. The indictment reportedly accused Amawi of flying two incendiary kites into Israeli territory in April, both of which allegedly crashed into a field and sparked a fire. “Amawi did so knowing the kites could set fire to structures or vegetation and thus cause severe harm to people, and even death,” Ynet quoted the indictment as saying. The indictment went on to accuse Amawi and Abu Eid of acting out of “religious, nationalistic, political or ideological motive.” http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780140

Israeli airstrikes target Gaza seaport and alleged Hamas tunnel site GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 23 May — Israeli forces carried out airstrikes targeting Gaza City’s seaport and an alleged Hamas military site in the northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday morning. Locals told Ma‘an that explosions were heard three times across Gaza City as Israeli planes targeted the seaport. Witnesses said that the airstrikes targeted two boats. Teams of the Gaza Civil Defense forces rushed to put out the fire that erupted after the airstrike. The Gaza Ministry of Health said that no injuries were reported. An Israeli army spokesperson confirmed the airstrikes to Ma‘an, saying that an underground tunnel and naval targets that belonged to Hamas were targeted in the strike, which happened around 4 a.m. The spokesperson said “the strikes were carried out in response to ongoing attempts to dispatch drones and kites for the purpose of setting Israeli territories on fire.”  “The strikes were in response to events that took place on Monday morning, during which a number of terrorists infiltrated Israeli territory and set a military post on fire,” the spokesperson added. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780142

Israeli navy abducts two sibling fishermen in Gaza, confiscates a boat IMEMC 24 May — Israeli navy ships attacked, on Thursday morning, several Palestinian fishing boats, and opened fire at them in the Sudaniyya Sea, northwest of Gaza city, before abducting two sibling fishermen. The WAFA Palestinian News Agency said the soldiers used automatic fire against several Palestinian fishing boats, in Gaza territorial waters close to the shore, causing damage. WAFA added that the soldiers also abducted two fishermen, identified as Rassem Ishaq Zayed and his brother Mohammad, and confiscated a fishing boat. http://imemc.org/article/israeli-navy-abducts-two-sibling-fishermen-in-gaza-confiscates-a-boast/

Gaza Freedom Flotilla boat boarded and searched by German coast guard If Americans Knew 23 May — from Freedom Flotilla Coalition: Just before noon local time (May 23,2018), the Freedom Flotilla vessel Al Awda (The Return) was boarded by the German Coast Guard, at the orders of the German Ministry of Interior. They collected all the passports on board, wrote down everyone’s personal data, searched the vessel thoroughly, asked for detailed information about ports of call along the way to Gaza, and inquired about the whereabouts of the Swedish sailing boats traveling with us in parallel. The Scandinavian crew on this ship are all veterans of earlier Freedom Flotillas and attested that they have previously been harassed by other Coast Guards from European countries. Of course, our vessel is in international waters and we are doing nothing illegal – and this is by no means standard procedure.  The massive German Coast Guard ship had been tailing Al Awda all morning, and finally sent a rubber dinghy with a crew of four to check it out. We are within an hour-and-a-half of Kiel, having arrived early, and are moving slowly so that the sailboats can catch up with us and we can all arrive in unison at Kiel harbour. Reporting from the high seas off the coast of northern Germany. The vessels: Al Awda (The Return) Hurriya (Freedom), Falestine (Palestine) Mairead (for Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Maguire) The boats are scheduled to arrive in Kiel from Copenhagen on Wednesday May 23 and will be in port until Friday morning May 25. A reception is expected at 6PM. The boats will visit European ports on their way to challenge the illegal Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza in late July…. http://imemc.org/article/gaza-freedom-flotilla-boat-boarded-searched-by-german-coast-guard/

4277 Palestinians travel through Rafah crossing GAZA (PIC) 26 May — Some 4,277 people have traveled through Rafah crossing over the past ten days since the crossing was opened on May 12, 2018, a report by the government’s Information Office in the besieged Gaza Strip revealed on Friday. On average, 388 passengers were able to travel through Rafah crossing. However, the Egyptian authorities banned 490 Palestinians from travel via the same crossing, the report pointed out. Only 33 out of 13,000 people who required medical treatment were allowed to travel to Egypt, while 30 others headed to Jordan via the Israeli-controlled Beit Hanoun (Erez) crossing. Some 330 aid trucks entered Gaza Strip from Rafah crossing from the beginning of May until last Tuesday with aid worth nearly $199,000, the official document revealed, including food parcels, medicines and supplies. https://english.palinfo.com/news/2018/5/26/4277-Palestinians-travel-through-Rafah-crossing

Video: Who are the Palestinians traveling through Rafah crossing? Mondoweiss 25 May by Yumna Patel, Akram Al-Wa’ra & Nidal Wuheid —  Last week, Egyptian President Abd al-Fatah al-Sisi announced the opening of the Rafah border crossing with Gaza for the entire month of Ramadan, which he said was “in order to ensure the easing of the burdens on the brothers in the Gaza Strip.” …  We spoke to several Palestinians — students going abroad to study or in search of jobs, people traveling to reunite with families, and injured protesters seeking treatment in Jordan — as they waited for their chance to leave Gaza. http://mondoweiss.net/2018/05/palestinians-traveling-crossing/

In Gaza, border opening brings relief and anxiety RAFAH BORDER CROSSING, Gaza Strip (AP) 26 May by Fares Akram — Just after daybreak, Hamed al-Shaer came down the narrow stairway of his family’s home in southern Gaza pulling a black suitcase and said goodbye to his mother. They hugged at the gate and he kissed her hands in a show of devotion as she struggled to control her emotions. “Emigration is better,” she said of his plan to return to Saudi Arabia where he has lived for the past 13 years, most recently working as a driver. But by nightfall he was back, despondent after his third failed attempt this week to exit the blockaded Gaza Strip through the congested Rafah border crossing. Egypt has opened Rafah for the duration of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, temporarily easing a border blockade of Gaza that it has enforced, along with Israel, for the past 11 years. But thousands of people hoping to travel are on a waiting list, a backlog created by long periods of closures, and Egyptian border officials are processing them at an excruciatingly slow pace. Al-Shaer, whose name was near the top of the list of those cleared for travel, was getting increasingly desperate. If he didn’t get out by early June, his Saudi residency permit would expire. “I was shocked,” al-Shaer said, adding that he had considered not returning to his mother’s home after his latest failed attempt, “because I don’t want to make another round of hard farewells.” Despite his anxiety-filled ordeal, al-Shaer, 34, considers himself lucky. Most Gaza residents can’t travel at all under the strict blockade imposed after the Islamic militant Hamas group seized the territory in 2007…. https://www.apnews.com/99f96fadf9d044f0a557c1f03330ebb9/In-Gaza,-border-opening-brings-relief-and-anxiety

Emergency appeal launched by overwhelmed Anglican hospital in Gaza City Anglican News 22 May — The Anglican Diocese in Jerusalem has launched an emergency appeal for funds to support its al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City. The Anglican-run hospital has been overwhelmed by the number of casualties sustained during protests across the Gaza strip this month. “Our Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza had been literally working around the clock to serve the wounded from the escalating violence in the Gaza Strip ever since the United States formally opened its Embassy in Jerusalem on 14 May 14,” Archbishop Suheil Dawani, the Anglican Archbishop in Jerusalem and Primate of the Anglican Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East, said. “The wounded coming to our hospital have no money, but no one is ever turned away. Most of the men, women, and children who are treated at [the hospital] have been injured from live ammunition, rubber bullets and tear gas intoxication. “I appeal to all our friends around the world to give generously to this humanitarian crisis, as we, the Church, the hands of Jesus in this place, respond to this tragedy in love and compassion to the wounded.”…. http://www.anglicannews.org/news/2018/05/emergency-appeal-launched-by-overwhelmed-anglican-hospital-in-gaza-city.aspx

Opinion: It’s time to help the children of Gaza / Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish The Star (Toronto, Canada) — I once had eight children. On Jan. 16, 2009, three of my daughters and a niece were killed when an Israeli tank shell hit my old house in Gaza. I wrote a book about that day and how, ever since, I have tried not to hate, but to use love and peace as the way to heal myself and, as best I can, the deep, historic, and often lethal divide that still exists between Palestinians and Israelis. It’s hard. But I try every day, as a doctor and father, to honour the beloved memory of my lost daughters and niece by building bridges, not walls.  Last Monday, May 14, was the birthday of one of my surviving daughters. Her name is Raffa. But Raffa and I could not celebrate. We could not celebrate because, as the world knows, my brothers and sisters in Gaza were being shot and killed. Many more were injured badly. It was a massacre. Watching the horror unfold, I could once again hear the cries of wounded and dying Palestinian children, women and men who marched together peacefully to defend their freedom and humanity. Gaza is bleeding once more, just as it did in 2014 when Israel invaded. When the killing was over, more than 500 Palestinian children were dead and thousands more were maimed. By now, I was in Canada. At the time, I asked my fellow Canadians to help me help the scarred children of Gaza. The humanitarian initiative was called Heal 100 Kids. Many Canadians agreed to help. Doctors, nurses, hospitals and important politicians also agreed to help. One of those politicians was Justin Trudeau. Back then, he went on Twitter and urged his fellow Canadians to support Heal 100 Kids. He “applauded” the Ontario government for its “commitment” to the plan to arrange for safe passage of damaged Palestinian children to come to Canada to mend and eventually to return to Gaza better, and hopefully, happier. But Trudeau was not prime minister…. https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2018/05/22/its-time-to-help-the-children-of-gaza.html

We can’t stay silent as Trudeau offers empty words on Gaza bloodshed HuffPost 25 May — After weeks of callous indifference, the Canadian Liberal government has finally broken its silence on the ongoing bloodshed in Gaza. In a statement last Wednesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wrote: “Canada deplores and is gravely concerned by the violence in the Gaza Strip that has led to a tragic loss of life and injured countless people.” He goes on to express his outrage that Canadian Doctor Tarek Loubani was among the injured, calling for “an immediate independent investigation  to thoroughly examine the facts on the ground — including any incitement, violence and the excessive use of force.” …  However, in what has been described as “the swiftest and most cowardly flip-flops in Canadian political history,” a mere two days after stating that it favoured an inquiry into the violence in Gaza, Canada voiced its opposition to the independent investigation into the Gaza massacre at the United Nations Human Rights Commission. The reason? The UNHRC resolution calling for the investigation “prejudges the outcome of such an investigation,” is “one-sided and does not advance the prospects for a peaceful, negotiated settlement” between Israelis and Palestinians, and “singles out Israel without reference to other actors.”…. https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/genevieve-nevin/we-cant-stay-silent-as-trudeau-offers-empty-words-on-gaza-bloodshed_a_23443776/

Gaza crisis: early warning indicators – April 2018 UN OCHA Infographic 25 May — The Gaza Strip faces an unprecedented humanitarian crisis, caused by over 10 years of Israeli blockade, alongside an internal Palestinian divide, which worsened in 2017, and restrictions imposed by the Egyptian authorities on Rafah Crossing. These developments have triggered further deterioration in the humanitarian situation, impacting the availability of essential services and eroding the livelihoods of Gaza’s two million residents. The following indicators were identified by the Humanitarian Country Team (HCT) to monitor the evolution of the crisis, trigger humanitarian action and prevent further deterioration. https://www.ochaopt.org/content/gaza-crisis-early-warning-indicators-april-2018

How are Palestinians celebrating Ramadan? In Gaza, it is as if it ‘has not yet come’ Newsweek 21 May by Tom O’Connor — Palestinians in Gaza are celebrating one of the holiest occasions in Islam just days after they suffered through their bloodiest day in years amid more than six weeks of ongoing protests against Israel and the U.S. The coastal Palestinian enclave of Gaza is almost entirely Muslim and believers officially began observing the holiday on Thursday, when the young crescent moon finally appeared after initially being forecast for Tuesday or Wednesday. The roughly month-long holiday requires Muslims to fast during the day and arrives just as protests surrounding two controversial events amassed a total of some 62 dead and thousands more injured, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health. Nearly twice that many have died since the protests began in late March … Ayman Jamal Mghamis, an activist who founded local hip-hop group the “Palestinian Rapperz,” said the situation has become “tragic.” “The markets are empty, as if Ramadan has not yet come. As every year, there is no joy and there is no hope,” Mghamis told Newsweek. “Many families today are below the poverty line and cannot find a loaf of bread to break their fast for Ramadan. The situation today is more difficult than can be described simply by words.”… http://www.newsweek.com/gaza-it-if-ramadan-has-not-yet-come-crisis-deepens-holy-month-932289

Al-Haq calls on the authorities in the Gaza Strip to release Samah Abu Ghayyad 23 May — Al-Haq is following with great concern the case of Samah Ibrahim Muhammad Abu Ghayyad, arrested by the internal security apparatus in the Gaza Strip on 9 May 2018, and who has been detained since. Al-Haq calls on the authorities in the Gaza Strip to comply with the applicable constitutional and legal safe guards, and to respect and fulfil Samah Abu Ghayyad’s fundamental rights as enshrined in international human rights treaties to which the State of Palestine has acceded and which are applicable to the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), including the occupied Gaza Strip, regardless of the grounds and reasons for her detention. According to information available to Al-Haq, Samah has been detained since 9 May 2018, when officers from the internal security apparatus asked her husband to accompany them to her workplace, from where they proceeded to arrest Samah, confiscate her cell phone and computer, without providing any warrant for her arrest or informing her of the charges against her. Samah, a mother of six whose youngest child Watan is one year old, is the administrative director of the Women’s Programme Center in Nusseirat refugee camp in Gaza’s Central Governorate, which is overseen by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). As stated by her husband in an affidavit given to Al-Haq, Samah is a community activist and Fatah leader in Gaza’s Central Governorate…. http://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/topics/palestinian-violations/1260-al-haq-calls-on-the-authorities-in-the-gaza-strip-to-release-samah-abu-ghayyad

Israel lobby group spreads hoaxes to whitewash Gaza massacre EI Lobby Watch 23 May by David Cronin — Burying the truth is accorded a high priority when states commit atrocities. On 30 January 1972, the British Army shot dead 13 unarmed demonstrators during a civil rights march in Derry. Edward Heath, then prime minister, was determined that the ensuing inquiry into Bloody Sunday – as the massacre became known – would be a whitewash. “It had to be remembered that in Northern Ireland, we were fighting not only a military war but a propaganda war,” Heath told a judge tasked with “investigating” what happened. It was a bloody Monday in Gaza last week. Dozens of unarmed demonstrators were shot dead. And – like the British authorities more than 40 years ago – Israel’s supporters launched the latest salvo in their propaganda war. Europe Israel Public Affairs – a Brussels-based lobby group – alleged that Hamas had manipulated the media coverage of the killings. Journalists had been lured into “the sinister world of Hamas,” the group suggested. The “sinister world” was, according to Europe-Israel Public Affairs’ latest newsletter, one “where 62 innocents turn out to be overwhelmingly terrorists” and where photographs and videos are “doctored.”…. https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/david-cronin/israel-lobby-group-spreads-hoaxes-whitewash-gaza-massacre-0

The Rachel Corrie Gaza Sport Initiative kicks off GAZA (WAFA) 26 May — The 2018 Rachel Corrie Gaza Sport Initiative kicked off with the Rachel Corrie Ramadan Football Tournament for Young Men last week and the Juniors tournament scheduled to kick off this weekend, according to a press release. Both are scheduled to conclude on June 4. This year’s theme is the Right of Return, in honor of the Great March of Return protests that have captivated the world’s attention this spring. Participating teams are named for towns and villages of historical Palestine as a point of convergence between Rachel Corrie as a human rights defender and the Gaza refugees’ legacy in resisting injustice, said the press release from the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice. In an inspiring yet sobering moment during the opening ceremony for the Young Men’s tournament, Palestinian cyclist Alaa al-Dali, who lost his right leg after being shot by an Israeli sniper while protesting near the Gaza border fence on March 30, opened the games by kicking a soccer ball while supporting himself on crutches. Organizers on the ground commented, “Alaa today represents all the injured athletes who participated in The Great Return March, and will be a living symbol for all crimes which the Israeli Army commits towards the Palestinian talented athletes.” http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=20yUjca97864953978a20yUjc

Violence / Detentions — West Bank / Jerusalem Palestinian child dies from serious wounds he suffered eight days ago IMEMC 23 May — The Palestinian Health Ministry has reported, on Wednesday evening, that a child died from serious wounds he suffered, eight days earlier, after Israeli soldiers shot him at the northern entrance of al-Biereh city, in central West Bank. The Ministry said the child, Akram Odai Abu Khalil, 15, was shot with a live round in his abdomen, and was rushed to Palestine Medical Complex, in Ramallah, before he was moved to the Najah Hospital, in the northern West Bank city of Nablus. The child, from Ein Sinya village, north of Ramallah, remained in a coma, in a very serious condition, until he succumbed to his wounds. [Akram was critically injured while participating in a protest against the U.S. moving its Embassy to Jerusalem on Monday May 14th, 2018.] The Ministry stated that his death brings the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli army fire since the beginning of the Great Return March on Palestinian Land Day, on March 30, 2018, to 118 including 14 children. http://imemc.org/article/palestinian-child-dies-from-serious-wounds-he-suffered-eight-days-ago/

Israeli soldier critically wounded during raid on Ramallah-area refugee camp BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 24 May — An Israeli soldier was critically wounded early Thursday during predawn military raids in the occupied West Bank, according to a statement from the Israeli army. An Israeli military spokesperson said that during detention raids, the Israeli soldier sustained serious injuries resulting from a large rock that was thrown at him and hit his head. The incident took place during a raid in the al-‘Amari refugee camp in the central West Bank city of Ramallah. The soldier was left unconscious and was immediately transported to the Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem. Israeli military search and arrest operations are a nightly occurrence in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. Due to the typically violent nature of the raids, particularly in refugee camps, confrontations often break out between the armed Israeli soldiers and Palestinian youth who respond with stone throwing. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780154

Soldiers injure three Palestinians in Nablus, abduct one in Ramallah IMEMC 24 May — Several Israeli army jeeps invaded, on Thursday at dawn, the northern West Bank city of Nablus, and shot two Palestinians, in addition to wounding a third young man after ramming him with one of their jeeps. The soldiers also abducted a Palestinian in Ramallah, in central West Bank. Media sources in Nablus said the soldiers invaded the eastern part of the city, and fired live rounds, rubber-coated steel bullets and gas bombs at Palestinians, who protested the attack. They added that the soldiers rammed with their jeep a young man, identified as Lu’ay Nassar Abu Aisha, 20, from Balata refugee camp, causing a fracture in his left leg, in addition to numerous cuts and bruises. The soldiers also shot Mohammad Waleed Kalbouna, 19, and Zeid Sawafta, 19, with rubber-coated steel bullets in their heads. Local medics rushed to the area, and moved the three wounded Palestinians to Rafidia Hospital, for treatment… Furthermore, several Israeli army jeeps invaded ‘Azzoun town, east of the northern West Bank city of Qalqilia, abducted four Palestinians, and caused many to suffer the effects of teargas inhalation. In related news, the soldiers abducted four Palestinians, from their homes in Nablus and Hebron, in the northern and southern parts of the occupied West Bank, and invaded stores near Bethlehem before examining surveillance recordings. http://imemc.org/article/soldiers-injure-three-palestinians-in-nablus-abduct-one-in-ramallah/

A Palestinian vineyard annihilated with chainsaws, with a chilling message in Hebrew Haaretz 24 May by Gideon Levy & Alex Levac — The grapes are shriveled. The vineyard is dead. Reduced to a large, dried-out, yellowing stain in the heart of the verdant region along Highway 60 where the road runs past the town of Halhoul, north of Hebron. The “yellow wind” that David Grossman wrote about 30 years ago is a dying vineyard here. Two plots of land, with hundreds of vines that were slashed, their stems and shoots sawed off – and within a week everything here had withered and died. This is a particularly horrible sight because all the damage was wrought by the hand of man. A wicked, loathsome hand that hates not only Arabs but despises the land itself. In fact, we can assume that it wasn’t just one individual who raided and destroyed this vineyard late Tuesday night last week [15 May]. To saw off that many plants in such a short time requires a few pairs of nasty hands. And someone also had to smear the threatening words in Hebrew on a rock: “We will reach everywhere.” All before first light illuminated the dark deed. When dawn broke, the owner of the vineyard, Dr. Haitham Jahshan, a hematologist, arrived and couldn’t believe his eyes. His vines had been ravaged. First he saw one sawed trunk, then another and another – a sea of butchered vines, whose grapes were grown to be eaten, not for wine – until the full scale of the calamity hit home. For his part, Musa Abu Hashhash, a field researcher for the B’Tselem human rights organization, says he’s never seen an act of so-called agricultural crime on this scale…. https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-farm-terror-palestinian-vineyard-annihilated-with-chainsaws-1.6115888

Palestinian and Israeli settler fields set ablaze in Hebron district BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 23 May — Fire was set to a wheat field and hate slogans in Hebrew were graffitied on the walls of a home in the Palestinian village of al-Deirat before dawn on Wednesday in the southern occupied West Bank district of Hebron. The Times of Israel reported that the field belong to Ahmad Amara, who told the news website that he was eating ahead of the upcoming day of fasting when he saw the fire… Meanwhile, in the illegal Israeli settlement of Kfar Etzion, also in the Hebron district, fire was set to a cherry orchard before dawn on Wednesday. According to the Times of Israel, settlers from Kfar Etzion accused Palestinians from the nearby village of Beit Ummar of setting the fires days ahead of an annual cherry festival hosted by the settler Gush Etzion Regional Council. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780147

Israeli parliament proposes bill to ban photographing or recording soldiers on duty BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 25 May — The Israeli parliament, the Knesset, convened on Thursday to discuss a law that would prohibit the photographing or documenting od Israeli soldiers while on duty. According to Israeli media, the bill was proposed with the support of right-wing Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman. Entitled “Prohibition against Photocopying and Documenting IDF Soldiers,” the bill sets severe penalties for those who violate the law. “Anyone who filmed, photographed, and/or recorded soldiers in the course of their duties, with the intention of undermining the spirit of IDF soldiers and residents of Israel, shall be liable to five years imprisonment. Anyone intending to harm state security will be sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment,” the bill stated. The bill would also prohibit the distribution of photo or video content on social networks or in the media. The bill’s initiator, MK Robert Ilatov, claimed that the bill was “in response to harassment by left-wing operatives of Israeli soldiers while dispersing violent demonstrations by Hamas on the Gaza Strip border.” “For many years the State of Israel has witnessed a worrying phenomenon of documentation of Israeli soldiers. This is done through video, stills, and audio recordings by anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian organizations such as B’Tselem, Machsom Watch Women, Breaking the Silence, and various BDS organizations,” the bill’s explanatory notes state.  “It’s time to put an end to this absurdity…. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780157

Army abducts a Palestinian after his release from prison IMEMC 25 May — Israeli soldiers abducted, on Thursday evening, a Palestinian political prisoner from Sur Baher village south of occupied East Jerusalem, shortly after his release from prison after serving a prison sentence of 7.5 years. The Detainees’ Parents Committee in Jerusalem said the detainee, Mousa Hamada, 48, was released earlier Thursday from the Negev Desert detention camp, after sending 7.5 years in detention. It added that the soldiers abducted Hamada shortly after his release and moved him to the al-Maskobiyya detention and interrogation facility, in Jerusalem, without providing a justification for his arrest. http://imemc.org/article/army-abducts-a-detainee-after-his-release-from-prison/

Israeli forces detain 5 Palestinians in overnight West Bank raids BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 23 May — Israeli forces detained five Palestinians during predawn raids [Wed] across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS). PPS said that two Palestinians were detained from the southern West Bank district of Hebron. They were identified as Muhannad Ibrahim Zamaare, 22, and Munther Al-Sharawne, 33. In the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem, Israeli forces detained one Palestinian. He was identified as Muhammad Haitham Daamse. In East Jerusalem, PPS identified one detainee as Bashar Rubin Abu Shamsie. In the northern West Bank city of Nablus, Israeli forces detained one Palestinian identified as Nashaat Al-Jebali. An Israeli army spokesperson told Ma’an that four Palestinians were detained overnight. Israeli military detention raids in the Palestinian cities, villages, and refugee camps are a near-nightly occurrence. According to UN documentation, between April 24 and May 7, Israeli forces conducted 127 search and arrest operations and arrested 151 Palestinians in the West Bank. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780143

Prisoners / Court actions Hunger-striking Palestinian prisoner transferred to Negev jail RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) 25 May — Israeli authorities transferred a hunger-striking Palestinian prisoner from solitary confinement in the Ashkelon jail to the Negev jail on Thursday morning. The Palestinian Committee of Prisoners’ Affairs said in a statement that the Israeli Prison Service (IPS) transferred Ibaa Omar al-Barghouthi, 40, a resident of the central occupied West Bank village of Kobar, in the Ramallah district. Al-Barghouthi has been on a hunger strike against the renewal of his administrative detention. He has been held in administrative detention since August 2nd, 2017.According to the committee, al-Barghouthi has stopped drinking water and refused taking any vitamins. He is also boycotting Israeli prison clinics and is refusing to take medical tests. The committee added that al-Barghouthi’s health has deteriorated and” his body has become scrawny as he also suffers from severe exhaustion, muscle and bone pains, insomnia and severe bloody vomiting.” Al-Barghouthi’s eyesight has also suffered, according to the committee. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780152

Human Rights Watch director’s deportation overturned IMEMC/Agencies 25 May — Israel and Palestine Director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), Omar Shakir, was given leave to remain in the country, yesterday, after the Jerusalem District Court blocked his deportation order. Two weeks ago, Israel’s Ministry of Interior had ordered Shakir to leave Israel or be forcibly expelled on 24th May. The reason for this decision had been Shakir’s alleged support of the BDS campaign; he denied these claims and insists he has instead been targeted for his criticism of the Israeli government. According to the PNN, yesterday’s last-minute reversal allows Shakir to stay until 2ndJuly, when a court hearing is scheduled to determine whether he can work long-term in the region. The Ministry of Interior’s order was frozen by Jerusalem District Court on the grounds that it had been based on ‘old facts’. http://imemc.org/article/human-rights-watch-directors-deportation-overturned/

Israeli left-wing activist to be charged with breaking Oslo accord for informing on Palestinian land sales Haaretz 24 May by Nir Hasson — Israel informed left-wing activist Ezra Nawi Thursday it will indict him for assisting the Palestinian Authority against a Palestinian land broker who attempted to sell West Bank lands to Jewish settlers in the southern Hebron hills. Nawi was notified he will be indicted on the grounds of violating one clause of the Oslo Accords enactment law. The clause prohibits Israeli citizens from working for or with Palestinian security forces. The investigation was launched following a report on the Israeli show “Uvda” which showed materials obtained by a right-wing activist who infiltrated the Israeli-Palestinian group Taayush and documented Nawi. In the footage, Nawi, who is unaware of being recorded, is heard telling of four Palestinian landowners who contacted him, thinking he was also involved in the land trade. “I give their photos and their phone numbers immediately to the [Palestinian] Preventive Security Force,” Nawi says in the recording…. https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/israeli-left-wing-activist-to-be-charged-with-breaking-oslo-accord-1.6115424

Land, property theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing / Settlements Israeli court approves razing West Bank Bedouin village JERUSALEM (AFP) 25 May — Israel’s supreme court has ruled in favour of demolishing a Palestinian Bedouin village in the occupied West Bank, despite a campaign by European governments to save it. Campaigners said the hearing had been the final appeal open to the village of Khan al-Ahmar, located close to several Israeli settlements east of Jerusalem. It was unclear when the demolition of the village, home to about 180 residents, would take place. In its ruling on Thursday, the court said it found “no reason to intervene in the decision of the minister of defence to implement the demolition orders issued against the illegal structures in Khan al-Ahmar”. The residents would be relocated elsewhere, it added, in a move critics say amounts to forcible transfer. The court ruled that the village was built without the relevant building permits. Such permits are nearly impossible to obtain for Palestinians in Israeli-controlled areas of the West Bank. “This verdict takes away the absolute minimal protection the Bedouin communities received until recently from the court,” Shlomo Lecker, the lawyer representing the village, said in a statement. “By any standard of international humanitarian law, the verdict is an approval by the Israeli court of a crime against humanity.”…. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/25/israel-court-approves-razing-khan-al-ahmar-bedouin-village

Israel defense chief plans 2,500 new West Bank settler homes JERUSALEM (AP) 24 May by Ilan Ben Zion — Israel’s defense minister said Thursday he will seek approval next week to fast-track construction of 2,500 new West Bank settlement homes in 2018, an announcement likely to further ratchet up tensions between Israelis and Palestinians. Avigdor Lieberman’s office said in a statement that he aimed to fulfill a commitment to expand construction in the West Bank settlements, including some remote outposts and the Jewish settler enclave in the West Bank city of Hebron. Besides the 2,500, Lieberman said he will advance another 1,400 units that are in preliminary planning stages. “In the coming months, we will bring for approval thousands more housing units,” Lieberman said, according to the statement. The announcement came two days after Palestinians urged the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, to open an investigation into Israeli policies in the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, including settlement construction, accusing Israel of systematic crimes, including apartheid in the occupied territories. The request includes the recent round of bloodshed in the Gaza Strip, where Israeli fire killed over 100 Palestinians during mass protests along the Gaza border … Peace Now responded to Lieberman’s announcement, calling it a “scandal” and saying on Twitter that the “messianic right-wing government has distorted priorities, and this morning is proud to approve thousands of new housing units over the Green Line, and gives an incentive to continued creeping annexation.” Senior Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi condemned Lieberman’s announcement as “Israeli colonialism, expansionism and lawlessness” and called on the ICC to launch an investigation…. https://www.apnews.com/18d4b8e9fd3f401390a868ec0ebc4bfc/Israel-defense-chief-plans-2,500-new-West-Bank-settler-homes

76 members of Congress write to Netanyahu over Israel demolitions MEMO 23 May — Seventy-six Members of Congress have co-signed a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urging him to end the demolitions and evictions of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. According to J Street, a Washington DC-based liberal Zionist pressure group, “the letter notes that the destruction and displacement of these communities pose a serious threat to the human rights of Palestinians, to the prospects for a two-state solution and to Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state.” “This is the latest sign that US lawmakers are increasingly concerned by the alarming consequences of the Israeli government’s policies in the West Bank,” said Dylan Williams, J Street’s Vice President of Government Affairs …  The letter also “cites over 300 rabbis, organised by J Street and other American Jewish groups, who wrote to Netanyahu in January opposing demolitions”. https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20180523-76-members-of-congress-write-to-netanyahu-over-israel-demolitions/

Restriction of movement Israeli police prevent Palestinians from sitting at Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate courtyard JERUSALEM (WAFA) 22 May – To prevent Palestinians from sitting on the steps outside Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate courtyard, Israeli police Tuesday placed iron barriers on the stone stairs deeming them inaccessible to visitors of the Old City, according to WAFA correspondent. He said police left only a small corridor outlined by iron barriers for people to walk through to get into the Old City. Dozens of Palestinians occasionally sit at Damascus Gate after they finish the special Ramadan night prayers at Al-Aqsa Mosque, known as “taraweeh” prayers, where around 50,000 Muslims normally attend the prayers every night. According to the correspondent, the police did not want the Palestinians to have a good time sitting on hot summer nights at the entrance to Damascus Gate and therefore blocked it with metal barriers leaving them only a walking space into the Old City…. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=nQi0qfa97822125093anQi0qf

Opinion: I saw firsthand how West Bank Palestinians are treated like prisoners. Who will fix this? / Maneka Sinha USA Today 25 May — Palestinians are forced to live with severe constraints on every aspect of life. As an American, I wasn’t subjected to any of that when I visited — One spring day in 2015, I was driving with Palestinian colleagues on a dusty road in the West Bank when I looked up to see an Israeli soldier pointing an assault rifle at our windshield. We pulled over fast. “Where are you going?” It came out defensively, but my answer was true: We were just going to work. One look at my passport, though, and he let us go. I don’t think he was expecting an American. Three years ago, I was living in Ramallah, training public defenders in the West Bank. Seeing my colleagues stopped and questioned like truant children caught out during school hours was common. It was always degrading; occasionally, it was terrifying …  Israel and the United States blame Hamas for last week’s violence, but Hamas doesn’t govern the West Bank. Who do they blame for the oppressive conditions there? I saw those conditions firsthand. The West Bank is not the open-air prison that Gaza is often described as, but Palestinians there are still treated like prisoners. They are denied freedom to enter and leave and are forced to live with severe constraints on every aspect of life. Travel is especially miserable. I drove for hours up and down the West Bank with the office’s interpreter to work with budding defenders in three fledgling offices. It would have been quicker to drive straight through Jerusalem from Ramallah to the office in Hebron, but my colleagues are not allowed to enter Jerusalem. So we added miles by driving around it, forced to stop and explain ourselves at checkpoints along the way … Israel also controls access to essential resources like water. When I arrived, I didn’t know what Jewish settlements looked like. During one drive, my interpreter pointed to specks of black on top of Palestinian homes in the distance. Homes in settlements don’t have black tanks on their rooftops, she explained. But Palestinians often store extra water in cisterns; they are worried about when access will be denied next. For years, Israel banned 3G connectivity in the West Bank. (It is still banned in Gaza.) 2G services are too slow for GPS, which made driving near impossible. Without Waze or Google Maps, I once got hopelessly lost driving outside of Ramallah. After I gave up in frustration, a young man came over to help, but I couldn’t understand his directions through the language barrier. So he hopped in the passenger’s seat and directed me with gestures, turn by turn.  Why does this matter? Because time to find a solution is running out: …. https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/05/25/palestinians-treated-like-prisoners-west-bank-gaza-israel-column/641519002/

BDS Brazilian singer Gilberto Gil cancels Israel concert RAMALLAH (WAFA) 23 May – Brazilian singer and songwriter Gilberto Gil has cancelled a performance that was scheduled in Israel for the summer, citing “general sentiment of apprehension.” The legendary Grammy and Latin Grammy Award winner, once Brazil’s Culture Minister and now considered one of Latin America’s prominent and influential musicians, was supposed to perform in the city of Tel Aviv on July 4, but he cancelled the performance in what seems to be a response to Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians in the past few weeks. Gil sent a letter to the concert’s producers addressing the cancellation, and said: “The general sentiment of all is one of apprehension as Israel is going through this sensitive moment.” Although he didn’t mention Gaza or Palestinians, the “sensitive moment” is most likely a reference to the recent Israeli army massacre in the Gaza Strip, which left 63 Palestinians dead, including children, during a protest on May 14…. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=nQi0qfa97826883858anQi0qf

In legislative upset, Missouri anti-BDS bill fails JEFFERSON CITY, MO (IMEMC/Agencies) 25 May — A five-month grassroots campaign led by human rights groups and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Missouri celebrated a win on Friday, May 18, 2018, when the Missouri legislative session ended, failing to pass legislation that would have denied state contracts worth over $10,000 to businesses and organizations boycotting Israel over its subjugation and dispossession of the Palestinian people. The legislation was widely predicted to pass, enjoying widespread support by right-wing Missouri legislators with House Bill 2179 sponsored by GOP Speaker of the House Todd Richardson; and Senate Bill (SB) 849 co-sponsored by Majority Floor Leader, Republican Sen. Mike Kehoe, and Democratic Sen. Jill Schupp. Disgraced Gov. Eric Greitens helped prompt the legislative push, following his November trip to Israel, where he met with officials keen to punish supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement for Palestinian rights…. http://imemc.org/article/in-legislative-upset-missouri-anti-bds-bill-fails/

Israel calls on EU to end funding to pro-boycott groups JERUSALEM (AP) 26 May by Tia Goldenburg — Israel called on the European Union on Friday to halt funding to more than a dozen European and Palestinian non-governmental organizations that it says promote boycotts against Israel, saying the financial support violates the EU’s stated policy that it opposes boycotts against the Jewish state. Israel’s Strategic Affairs Ministry published a report with a list of groups that it says receive EU funding and call for boycotts against Israel. It said some of the groups had links to militant groups while receiving EU money. The report was the latest salvo by Israel in its fight against a global movement calling for boycotts, divestment and sanctions over of its treatment of the Palestinians. The movement, known as BDS, has urged businesses, artists and universities to sever ties with Israel and it includes thousands of volunteers around the world. Supporters of the movement say the tactics are a nonviolent way to promote the Palestinian cause. Israel says the campaign goes beyond fighting its occupation of territory Palestinians claim for their state and often masks a more far-reaching aim to delegitimize or destroy the Jewish state … EU officials said the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, received the report from Israel along with a letter requesting a reply and that it’s now under consideration. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not allowed to talk to the media…. https://www.apnews.com/0420370f0526481cbf3ca2e4f19f0e5c/Israel-calls-on-EU-to-end-funding-to-pro-boycott-groups Other news Government denounces new Israeli military law affecting Area C of the West Bank RAMALLAH (WAFA) 24 May – The Palestinian Government strongly condemned on Thursday a new Israeli military order affecting the so-called Area C, which amounts to more than 60 percent of the total area of the occupied West Bank and which is under full Israeli military and administrative control. “This illegal development would generate more crimes against Palestinian rights of access to a safe and stable living environment and would worsen the already dire conditions of 393,000 Palestinian citizens,” the government said in a statement issued by the Prime Minister’s Office. On May 9, the Israeli military published military order 1797 with the main objective of expediting Israel’s unlawful demolitions of Palestinian infrastructure in Area C. The new order further expands the authority of the Israeli army’s so-called “civil administration” to unilaterally target and demolish Palestinian structures within 96 hours, irrespective of the status of the underlying land or the issuing of building permits. The Palestinian government said that it consistently strives to support Palestinian citizens residing in the so-called “Area C”, which includes supporting their resilience and protection from Israeli violations. However, it said, “it is important to mention that Palestinians living under a belligerent military occupation are, under the international humanitarian law, a ‘protected population’, which obligates the occupying power to protect the occupied population. Israel has not merely neglected its duties as an occupying power, but rather has proactively and willfully done the opposite, flagrantly violating the inalienable rights of the occupied Palestinian population.”…. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=CHbPbVa97846870671aCHbPbV

Palestinian officials slam US ambassador for receiving doctored photo of Jerusalem BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 23 May — Palestinian officials are condemning the “despicable actions” of the US Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, who was photographed on Tuesday receiving a poster depicting an aerial image of occupied East Jerusalem, in which the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock have been erased and replaced by a simulation of the Jewish Third Temple. The photo shows a smiling Friedman — who is a vocal supporter of Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise — posing next to the poster during a visit to the Israeli city of Bnei Brak. The photo of Friedman sparked widespread controversy, forcing the US Embassy in Israel to issue a statement claiming that Friedman “was not aware of the image thrust in front of him when the photo was taken. He was deeply disappointed that anyone would take advantage of his visit to Bnei Brak to create controversy.” …. http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=780144

State of Palestine accedes to the Chemical Weapons Convention THE HAGUE (WAFA) 23 May — The State of Palestine deposited on May 17 its instrument of accession to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) with the Secretary-General of the United Nations, the depositary of the Convention, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said in a statement on Wednesday. The Convention will enter into force for the State of Palestine on 16 June 2018, making it number 193 State Party. Omar Awadallah, in charge of the United Nations file at the Foreign Ministry, said President Mahmoud Abbas has signed the accession papers to the CWC, along with Palestine’s accession to the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) on May 14. He said the accession of Palestine to international conventions and organizations aims at “strengthening the status of the State of Palestine” and “to engage and work with the international community, especially on important issues such as the spread of chemical weapons due to their threat to peace.”…. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=nQi0qfa97831642623anQi0qf

Palestine submits application for accession to UNCTAD GENEVA (WAFA) 24 May – Ibrahim Khreisheh, Palestine’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations and other international organizations in Geneva, submitted on Thursday the request for Palestine’s accession to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)…. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=CHbPbVa97845918918aCHbPbV

US mulls UN funding cuts over Palestinians UNITED NATIONS (AFP) 25 May — The U.S. is considering whether to cut funding to two U.N. agencies and the chemical weapons watchdog after the Palestinians joined the organizations, a U.S. official said Wednesday. In a move aimed at boosting their international profile, the Palestinians have joined the U.N. trade development organization UNCTAD, industrial development agency UNIDO and the Chemical Weapons Convention, which is upheld by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. U.S. legislation bars funding for U.N. agencies or affiliates that grant membership to Palestine, which has the status of a nonmember observer state at the United Nations. “It has been the consistent position of the United States that efforts by the Palestinians to join international organizations are premature and counterproductive,” a U.S. official said…. https://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2018/May-25/450768-us-mulls-un-funding-cuts-over-palestinians.ashx

Prince William’s trip to Israel, West Bank is history in the making: All the details USA Today 24 May by Maria Puente — Having just wound up a historic royal wedding, Britain is sending future king Prince William on a historic trip to Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian territories next month, Kensington Palace said Thursday, laying out some details of the much-anticipated visit. The Duke of Cambridge, the second in line to the throne, will visit Amman and Jerash in Jordan, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv in Israel, and Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, between June 24 and 28, a palace statement said. It’s likely security will be heavy over the five days of the visit. It will be the first official royal visit to Israel and what the British government calls the “Occupied Palestinian Territories” since 1948, when Britain’s 25-year control of the region (known as the British Mandate) ended on the eve of Israel’s independence …  Israelis have long considered it a snub that so far Britain and the royals have refused, especially when they have paid official visits to Israel’s Arab neighbors, such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar … But decisions about where royals go on official visits are made by the government of the day, not by Her Majesty. In 2015, the Telegraph reported that until there is a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians it was unlikely any royals would be turning up in Jerusalem. That has now changed. William is making the visit at the request of the British government and has been welcomed by the Jordanian, Israeli, and Palestinian authorities. “This is an historic visit, the first of its kind, and he will be welcomed here with great affection,” tweeted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in March …  Palestinian leaders also issued welcoming statements…. https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/2018/05/24/prince-williams-trip-israel-west-bank-history-making-all-details/641770002/

Israel threatens Abbas over Gaza staff cuts MEMO 25 May — Israel has threatened the Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas saying it will withhold tax revenues it collects on behalf of the PA if he does not resume paying the salaries of staff in the Gaza Strip. Israeli TV channel Kan revealed on Wednesday that the Israeli government conveyed a clear and firm message to Abbas stating that through his latest punitive measures he is seeking to ignite a confrontation between Israel and the Gaza Strip. According to the channel, the Israeli government told Abbas that It is not him “who decides whether there will be a new confrontation between us and the Gaza Strip; and certainly you are not the one who sets the timing”, adding that Israel fears that Abbas’s punitive measures against the Gaza Strip will create a new confrontation in the south.  It noted that international parties have appealed to Abbas and warned him against the continuation of imposing punitive measures against Gaza. https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20180525-israel-threatens-abbas-over-gaza-staff-cuts/

Over 76,800 students start general high school matriculation exams RAMALLAH, May 26, 2018 (WAFA) – A total of 76811 students started on Saturday the high school general matriculation exams known as Injaz (formerly Tawjihi) in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip, according to the Ministry of Education. It said a total of 45,056 students are in the West Bank and 31,755 students are in the Gaza Strip. In addition to sitting for the exam at home, Palestinian students in Qatar, Romania and Bulgaria can also take the exam in halls set up especially for Palestinians in those countries. The exams allow the students who pass to enter colleges at home or abroad. The usual pass/fail rate is around 60/40 percent. Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails who registered and studied for the Injaz exams are also expected to sit for the exam but at a different time and in only some prisons. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=WP26W8a97864002225aWP26W8

With EU support, West Bank center launched project for heritage preservation ANABTA (WAFA) 24 May – With support from the European Union (EU), the Women’s House Development Center in the northern West Bank town of Anabta launched its “Preservation of Cultural Heritage from extinction” project, according to an EU press release. In Palestinian rural areas, people use particular songs for each occasion. Unfortunately, these songs are threatened to disappear because of the lack of any recordings or knowledge among the young generation. However, these songs constitute an important part of culture and civilization for Palestinians. The idea behind the “Preservation of Cultural Heritage from extinction” project is to try to recover and preserve those old traditional songs from Palestine with the support of the European Union, said the press release….. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=nQi0qfa97839256647anQi0qf

Palestinian musical group Sabreen releases new video Waadtani (You Promised Me) JERUSALEM (WAFA) 23 May – Sabreen Association for Artistic Development just released a song and video titled “Waadtani”, which translates to “You Promised Me”, from the heart of East Jerusalem. Said Murad, the founder of Sabreen Association, wrote and composed the song and video. Murad is considered a pioneer in the Palestinian music scene. The video includes Palestinian artists and institutions based in East Jerusalem. “The goal of the video is to focus on the Palestinian individual living in the city,” Murad says, “and to remind the world that there are human beings living in East Jerusalem who are musicians, writers, artists, normal people who want to make a difference. Away from the big picture of politics and the media, the ones who suffer from the consequences are those people living in Jerusalem.” The chorus of the song is a traditional Arabic expression which translates to, “You promised me an earring, so I pierced my ear. And awaiting your promise the months kept passing.” Murad explains his motivation in writing the song this way: “The song is a metaphor for how the world gets riled up about the situation and countries promise to help, but in the end nothing happens. If anything the situation is only becoming worse as the city deteriorates.” Several cultural Palestinian institutions appear in the video including Al-Hakawati Theater, Sanabel Theater, Pyalara, and the Palestinian Art Court – Al Hoash, as well as other prominent Palestinian artists and personalities…. http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=nQi0qfa97827835611anQi0qf

Singer Fairuz releases a new song about Palestine RAMALLAH (WAFA)23 May  – Legendary Lebanese singer Fairuz has released a new song dedicated to Palestine and Jerusalem following the Israeli attacks on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip recently. The song, titled ‘Eela Mata Ya Rabb?’ (How Long, Lord?, was produced and directed by Fairuz’s daughter, Lebanese director and writer Reema Rahbany, who published the video of the song on her mother’s social media pages. In the video, Fairuz appeared to be in a church, wearing a black and gold outfit while covering her hair with a veil and standing in front of a picture of a suffering Jesus Christ, singing smoothly as pictures of intense clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces are on display. Both the song and the video were well-received by Fairuz’s fans and Arab listeners, who welcomed her comeback to singing songs about the Palestinian cause … She’s precisely famous in Palestine thanks to her album “Al-Quds Fil Bal” (Jerusalem In My Heart), which was released in 1967 and included well-known songs about Jerusalem and Palestine such as “Zahrat El Mada‘in” (Flower of the Cities) and “El Qods El Atiqa” (Old Jerusalem). http://english.wafa.ps/page.aspx?id=nQi0qfa97824028599anQi0qf

‘My culture is not your tote bag!’ People are accusing Anthropologie of cultural appropriation after the retailer released a $148 bag that looks like a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf Daily Mail 24 May by Aoibhinn McBride — Twitter users have accused Anthropologie of cultural appropriation after the retailer released a tote bag that bears a striking resemblance to the pattern on a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf. Twitter user @Saressaa  sparked the debate when she tweeted: ‘Did @Anthropologie really put handles on a keffiyeh??? And then proceeded to call it an ‘En Shalla Tapestry Tote’ for $148??????….So if y’all are profiting off of Palestinian labor/resistance, are you donating any $$ back to people getting their bodies blown apart in Gaza? Houses demolished in the West Bank?’ She added: ‘The description on the site says it’s perfect for a ‘beach adventure’ when we know the critical symbolism behind it. $148 for what? I respect the craft of each brand bc a lot goes into it but not when innocent people’s blood is just background noise. ‘There are literally old Palestinian men who struggle to sell 7attas for some money in their own occupied land so this just doesn’t seem right at all to me.’ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-5764235/People-accusing-Anthropologie-cultural-appropriation-keffiyeh-scarf-style-tote-bag.html groups.yahoo.com/group/f_shadi (listserv)

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[kansascityhappenings]

Belarusian sex worker held in Thai jail promises to reveal Trump-Russia secrets

PATTAYA, Thailand — A Belarusian woman jailed in Thailand for offering sex lessons without a work permit says she has a story to tell involving the Kremlin, Russian billionaires and even the president of the United States.

A police officer escorts Anastasia Vashukevich from a detention center in Pattaya, south of Bangkok, Thailand. (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)

Anastasia Vashukevich, whose extraordinary claims and racy selfies on Instagram have propelled her to internet fame in recent weeks, told The Associated Press from a police van Wednesday that she fears for her life, and wants to exchange information on alleged Russian ties to Donald Trump’s campaign for her own personal safety. But she refused for now to offer any such evidence, and it’s not clear if she has any.

Vashukevich’s story offers a glimpse into the shady world of Russian oligarchs. Trump’s one-time campaign manager, Paul Manafort, also had ties to that world through his consulting work for one of those oligarchs. Manafort has been indicted on money-laundering charges related to his overseas consulting work by special counsel Robert Mueller. But Mueller has offered no evidence that Manafort linked his Russian contacts to Trump’s campaign or helped Russia meddle in the U.S. election.

That has not stopped Vashukevich from claiming that she has such evidence as she faces possible deportation back to Russia.

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, center, and his wife Yulia, center right, attend a rally in memory of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, who was gunned down outside the Kremlin. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

Vashukevich shot to fame in early February when Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, one of President Vladimir Putin’s top foes, published an investigation drawing on Vashukevich’s social media posts suggesting corrupt links between billionaire Oleg Deripaska and a top Kremlin official, Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Prikhodko. The report featured video from Deripaska’s yacht in 2016, when Vashukevich claims she was having an affair with him.

Russians have focused on the ties between Deripaska and Prikhodko. But now Vashukevich says — so far without proof — that she can link the Kremlin to Trump and his former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, who worked for Deripaska a decade before Trump hired him. Manafort has been indicted on money-laundering charges in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election but Mueller has offered no evidence so far in his investigation that Manafort helped Russia in the U.S. election.

Vashukevich’s links to Deripaska do offer a glimpse into some of the shady associations that surround many Russian oligarchs.

Russian metals magnate Oleg Deripaska (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

Even Navalny told the AP on Wednesday that he has “certain doubts” that Vashukevich has any evidence about alleged direct ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.

“I think such statements are made because of fears for her own life because they have been detained in Thailand,” he said, adding he believes her fears are well-founded.

Navalny’s report made no claim that Vashukevich knew anything about a Russian campaign to influence the U.S. election, and she has produced no evidence that she does.

As for her claims of Deripaska’s ties to the Kremlin official, Deripaska has called them nonsense when Navalny alleged them.

Sergei Prikhodko (AP Photo/RIA-Novosti, Mikhail Klimentyev, Presidential Press Service)

In an emailed response Feb. 8, Deripaska’s spokesman said: “These scandalous and mendacious assumptions are driven by sensationalism and we totally refute these outrageous false allegations in the strongest possible way.”

Deripaska sued Vashukevich and her “sex guru,” Alexander Kirillov, for breach of privacy. The Russian court imposed an injunction, and communications providers blocked access to Navalny’s website for several weeks until he deleted the videos.

A Feb. 15 statement from Deripaska said: “Mr. Deripaska’s claim is to protect his right to privacy and has nothing to do with any political struggle between Mr. Navalny and his political opponents.”

A request for comment Wednesday from the Russian government went unanswered.

Former Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

Peter Carr, a spokesman for special counsel Robert Mueller, declined to comment Wednesday.

On Sunday, Vashukevich was arrested along with nine other people, including Kirillov, in the Thai resort of Pattaya while giving sex lessons to Russian tourists. Immigration Police Maj. Satawat Srirattanapong said the 10 were charged with working without a permit, and one with having an expired visa.

Vashukevich said she won’t give details of what she knows until she is guaranteed she won’t be sent to Russia.

“I can say something only when I will be in a safe place, sorry, because I am worried about my life,” Vashukevich told the AP from a police van that was taking the detainees from Pattaya to Bangkok’s Immigration Detention Center.

Vashukevich had earlier posted a video on Instagram, also apparently made while in custody in Pattaya, addressed to “Dear American media.”

Anastasia Vashukevich, right, and Alexander Kirillov walk from a detention center in Pattaya, south of Bangkok, Thailand (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)

“I didn’t want to tell you about many things. Now they’re trying to lock us up,” she said. “But now I’m ready to put together all the pieces of the puzzle that you have been missing, and back it up with audio and video regarding the ties of our esteemed lawmakers with Manafort, Trump and all this buzz around the U.S. election. I know a lot.”

Trump has repeatedly denied that he colluded with Russia to influence the U.S. election.

Kirillov, the “sex guru” known in Russia for staging high-profile sexual happenings that usually involve sending scantily clad women out in public, told AP from the police van that the Russian government was behind their arrests.

“Political reasons. We know so much. So that’s why they want us to go to Russia,” he said. “We think that in a few days, maybe even today, they will send us to Russia, very fast, and I think you will lose us, and never see us more.”

Kirillov and Vashukevich have both recorded their activities on social media, with racy photos and videos taken in many countries. One of the tamer photos on Kirillov’s feed shows him posing in front of Trump Tower in New York. Kirillov, who Thai police say is Russian, posts under the pseudonym Alex Lesley. Vashukevich, who is from Belarus, uses the name Nastya Rybka.

They were arrested in a hotel meeting room in Pattaya, a seaside resort noted for its sex industry and popularity with Russian visitors. The lessons were attended by about 40 Russian tourists, many wearing T-shirts bearing the English words “Sex animator” with an arrow pointing to the wearer’s crotch. Thai news media cited police as saying that the meeting was raided because hotel staff reported hearing strange sounds.

Police Maj. Satawat said all 10 arrested people have had their visas revoked and will be detained at the Immigration Detention Center in Bangkok until the charges of working illegally are resolved. He said police have up to 48 days to process the cases before handing them to prosecutors. If they plead guilty, he said, their cases could end without trial and they could leave the country.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov (Sergei Karpukhin/Pool Photo via AP)

Canceling a visa normally allows a country to expel a person without having to go through the legal process of extradition.

Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied Wednesday that the Russians’ case had anything to do with a visit to Thailand by Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev. He said Patrushev often makes overseas visits and that they are arranged in advance.

“It’s ludicrous to link this to the detention of Russian nationals in Thailand,” he said.

Navalny said given recent events — including a cocaine bust at the Russian Embassy in Argentina — he wasn’t so sure.

“I don’t know what to think,” Navalny told the AP. “Shows like ‘Homeland’ begin to look entirely realistic when you look at what is happening in Russia now. We thought the scriptwriters made the most impossible things up, but in Russia the most absurd things are possible.”

from FOX 4 Kansas City WDAF-TV | News, Weather, Sports http://fox4kc.com/2018/02/28/__trashed-8/

from Kansas City Happenings https://kansascityhappenings.wordpress.com/2018/02/28/belarusian-sex-worker-held-in-thai-jail-promises-to-reveal-trump-russia-secrets/

[optimisticprincepainter]

A 24 year old, now named Hadiya is the latest to be the centre of attention on the topic of ‘love jihad’. Formerly Akhila, she converted to Islam after being introduced to the religion through two of her friends. The only child of parents K.M. Ashokan and Ponnamma, Akhila, at the time joined a programme in homoeopathic medicine at Salem in Tamil Nadu in 2010. In early 2016, she arrived at her college wearing a hijab. An attempt to intervene by her father after some friends had alerted him roved in vain as she vanished. She later appeared in court with A.S. Zainaba, president of the National Women’s Front who the court allowed her to stay with. The main crux of the issue is if a 24 year old is mature enough to make her own life decisions including choosing to marry. The apex court will now hear Hadiya’s side of the story on November 27. In an op-ed for The Indian Express, Tahir Mahmood, the former chair of the National Minorities Commission and member, Law Commission of India, writes on the fundamental right to freedom to marry irrespective of faith – “Neither the Constitution nor any central or state law places any restraint on interfaith marriages. The Special Marriage Act, 1954, enables persons professing different faiths to become life-partners retaining their respective religious beliefs and practices, and yet one of them is often persuaded — or otherwise left with no choice — to embrace the other party’s religion”. “Conversion for the sake of marriage only is repugnant to Islamic teachings. I would even recommend outlawing this practice. However, I fully agree with the apex court’s afore-mentioned Lata Singh verdict that interfaith marriages (without conversion) should be encouraged”. Around this time was when she changed her name to Hadiya. In December of last year, upon arriving at a court hearing, she was married to Shefin Jehan; much to the courts ire. Journalist with India Today TV in a column explains how this case is deeply rooted in misogyny – “What’s interesting is that this case isn’t even a classic example of the so-called “love jihad”. The woman converted much earlier and got married years later. The court came to the conclusion that the woman is not fit to make a decision for herself and has been brainwashed”. The case had reached the Supreme Court where an NIA investigation was ordered; the report stated that various organizations are recruiting and radicalizing people for the purposes of joining and fighting for ISIS. “The most problematic aspect of this case has been that the woman who is legally an adult was sent to the “custody of her parents”. The NIA conceded in the Supreme Court yesterday, that “custody” for a major girl is a problematic word in law”. “Even if all the allegations of the NIA are to be believed and taken at face value that the girl was in fact radicalized and there is a concerted effort and a “well-oiled machinery that targets women”, is locking up Hadiya the solution of it”? “In the 21st century, though women are given full and equal rights, their bodies and sexuality remain the battleground for a political and cultural war. The case of Hadiya is a classic 21st century example when the law gives in to a political narrative, sidelines individual rights and women take the status of chattels and property”. The NIA report isn’t all wrong. An India Today investigation looked into Kerala’s Popular Front of India (PFI), which the right leaning magazine website Swarajya calls “an Islamic fundamentalist organization”. The PFI has maintained that it championed diversity and equality and has denied accusation of religious conversions, hawala funding, murderous assaults and any terror links. The PFI is a non-profit organization. The organization is under NIA investigation not just related to the Hadiya case. A.S. Zainaba, the head of the groups’ women wing and also with whom Hadiya is living, denied the allegations that the group engages in brainwashing and converting women to Islam, saying the allegations are baseless. She insists the marriage between Hadiya and Shefin Jehan was arranged and not a case of love jihad. However, according to the investigative report, Zainaba had shared some of the inner working of the group with undercover reporters saying, “In that institute of ours…around 5,000 people have converted to Islam over the past 10 years now. We don’t have to officially declare it to be a conversion centre. It’s an educational institute”. Swarajya in a report calls the issue of love jihad a national security threat citing the initial NIA probe which the CPI (M) rejected – “While no one questions the competence of the Kerala police who have had to deal with a large number of cases related to Islamic radicalization in the state, it is unwise for the government of Kerala to question the court’s directive, especially when it involves India’s counter-terrorism intelligence”. “It is clear that this issue is not the sole concern of Hindus but a collective problem faced by numerous communities in the state. Unfortunately, the government in the current political discourse seems to be ignoring this crucial development, which also runs the risk of being ignored by the police for the sake of political correctness”. Specific to the case of Hadiya, activist Rahul Eashwar met with Hadiya to hear her side of the story, which she is mandated to do after the Supreme Court has summoned her to speak on November 27, where the court stated that her consent as an adult is important and to hear her version of how and why she married a Muslim man in Kerala last year. Rahul, released videos of his meeting where Hadiya says she fears or her life and is afraid of her father saying, “Get me out of here. Today or tomorrow, I am going to die. I am sure about this. My father is getting angry, I can make out. He pushes me”. This signals that she could be kept there against her will. The India arm of Amnesty International stated that while they welcome the apex court order, her confinement is unlawful. The lawyer who represented Hadiya’s husband in the Supreme Court argued that Hadiya has the right to love and marry whoever she wants. She writes about this in an op-ed for the Hindustan Times – “Kerala offers very famous cases of Hindus who have converted to Islam, including the late poet and writer Kamala Das. What was so strange about Hadiya’s conversion, when she herself appeared in court and stated that her conversion was voluntary?” “We have a constitution which guarantees freedom of religion which includes the right to convert to any religion. Why then must she be denied agency to convert? And why must she be prevented from marrying a man of her choice?” “No one prevents the State from investigating threats to national security, but to say that an adult woman must not be allowed to convert to Islam or marry the man she loves violates her right to personal liberty and her right to freely practice the religion of her choice.” More columns by Varun Sukumar What Article 35A means for Jammu and Kashmir A list of sexual ‘predators’ raises debate in India Mersal row: BJP’s ‘Vijay is a Christian’ ploy backfires Yogi’s Ayodhya push reveals BJP’s desire to draw on Hindutva vote 2019 begins in Gujarat; A Congress resurgence? Aarushi Talwar case: A perfect botch-up? NEWS 1:27 News Clash breaks out between police, VHP workers over love jihad issue 2:24 News Suffering from ‘love jihad’, A woman returned in Hinduism after 12 years in Aligarh 1:06 Entertainment Kamya KIDNAPS Prem Sasural Simar Ka Colors On Location Powered by Sify.comNewsColumnsBattle of the old guards in Himachal Pradesh Battle of the old guards in Himachal Pradesh Source : SIFY By : Varun Sukumar Last Updated: Tue, Nov 07, 2017 16:24 hrs Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to WhatsApp Share to LinkedIn The approaching Himachal Pradesh assembly elections could be the bellwether for other elections down the road. All eyes are on the usual suspects – Rahul Gandhi of the Congress and the Prime Minister. Both have been doing the rounds; most recently Rahul in a speech in the state on Monday said the Goods and Services Tax (GST) will undergo changes to provide relief to traders and consumers if the Congress comes back to power in 2019. On the other side of the aisle, Home Minister Rajnath Singh blamed the Virbhadra Singh-led Congress government in the state for women in the light of the recent rape and murder of a schoolgirl in the state. He brought in reinforcements in the form of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat and Union Ministers Jagat Prakash Nadda and Smriti Irani who addressed rallies of their own. On the BJP side, party president Amit Shah announced Prem Kumar Dhumal as the party’s chief ministerial candidate in Himachal Pradesh. The decision came late and till Saturday was not clear if it would declare a chief ministerial candidate for the November 9 elections. Journalist Sanjeev Singh in a column for Times of India writes on the choice of Chief Ministerial candidate by the BJP in Himachal Pradesh shows the party is being pragmatic in its functioning and choices – “Political experts believe the battle for top honors in Himachal BJP was between two-time chief minister Dhumal and Union health minister JP Nadda. While Dhumal is popular among BJP cadre, Nadda made a name for himself within the party due to his organizational skills”. “Though Nadda may boast of his proximity to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Shah, he lacks the pan-state appeal of Dhumal nurtured since 1982 when he became vice-president of BJP’s youth wing”. “This was in line with the feedback received by Shah from party cadre as well that a local face was needed to counter the adverse effects of economic slowdown. This is also a reflection that the party cannot rely solely on Modi’s charisma to cross the finish line in the state”. The decision to announce a Chief Ministerial candidate days before the state goes to the polls is a departure for the BJP. In the past, the party did not announce or mention anyone in the run up to assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, and Haryana to name a few. The Indian Express editorial stated that in the past, the BJP fought and won assembly elections without projecting chief ministerial candidates; since the ascent of Modi to the national stage – “The BJP’s decision to project Dhumal, midway in the campaign, may have been influenced by its main rival in the state, the Congress, backing the present CM, Virbhadra Singh, for another term and mocking the BJP campaign as “bin dulhe ki baraat” (a marriage party without groom)”. “The PM loomed large in all these state campaigns and his wide appeal made the need for a charismatic local leader to head the state government even post-poll seems irrelevant. The Himachal example, however, points to the irresistible federal push in the Indian polity even at a time when the BJP has been emphasizing the winnability of a centralized model and strategy”. The strategy seems to be to capitalize on the success of Modi as a national leader since 2014 seemed to turn the tide in the BJP towards a more centralized and focused party structure. “The leader-centric politics championed by Modi could arguably press home, rather than decrease, the demand for a regional face to complement, and even amplify, the central message. Shah’s words in Himachal about a dual leadership — Modi at the Centre and Dhumal in the region — may mirror the BJP acknowledgement of a new political imperative”. Dhumal is a senior party leader and a two-time chief minister of the hill state. The state has traditionally always voted in favor of anti-incumbency and has seen power alternate between Congress and BJP governments for the last five terms. If this trend holds, Virbhadra Singh would be replaced by Dhumal for this third term. The Times of India editorial states that announcing the CM candidate for Himachal ahead of the polls shows that the BJP is not necessarily just relying on a national figure like Modi, but it also empowers regional leaders – “BJP had relied on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s charisma during the March assembly elections and won the crucial states of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand without a CM candidate. Dhumal’s anointment perhaps also reflects BJP’s decision not to over-burden Modi”. “BJP has experimented with a chief ministerial face in only three states of Delhi, Goa and Assam ever since they swept to power at the Centre in 2014. Projection of Sarbananda Sonowal in Assam and Manohar Parrikar in Goa delivered handsome returns for BJP.” “This should encourage BJP to delegate more authority and empower regional leaders, as Modi’s charisma may not work everywhere. Perhaps it is time for BJP to go ahead and strongly project a chief ministerial face in Gujarat as well.” The ruling Congress in the state is relying heavily on 83-year-old Virbhadra Singh, a six-time Chief Minister and five-time Lok Sabha member. Singh has announced that this will be his last election. Like Dhumal, he is a veteran of party politics for more than five decades. The criticism laid against him is that he stifles and actively discourages the rise of a second generation of leaders in the state. As the two elder statesmen battle it out at the top, their sons wait in the wings. Virbhadra Singh’s son, Vikramaditya Singh, is the head of the Himachal Pradesh Youth Congress. He makes his debut in the Shimla Rural seat which is a reliably Congress; hoping name recognition will play a role in helping him get elected. A contrast to Singh’s son is Anurag Thakur, son of Dhumal who is a rising star in the BJP. Often referred to as “tikka” meaning an inheritor, Thakur doesn’t use or invoke his father’s second name. More columns by Varun Sukumar No ‘Love Jihad’: Hadiya and the Freedom to Marry in Kerala What Article 35A means for Jammu and Kashmir A list of sexual ‘predators’ raises debate in India Mersal row: BJP’s ‘Vijay is a Christian’ ploy backfires Yogi’s Ayodhya push reveals BJP’s desire to draw on Hindutva vote 2019 begins in Gujarat; A Congress resurgence? SIFY : 3rd. Nov,17

NO ‘LOVE JIHAD’ AS HADIYA AND THE FREEDOM WILL MARRY IN KERALA : A 24 year old, now named Hadiya is the latest to be the centre of attention on the topic of ‘love jihad’.

[samanthasroberts]

Redneck Revolt: the armed leftwing group that wants to stamp out fascism

There are several commonalities between the far left and the far right including a disdain for liberals but the biggest divide is on the topic of intolerance

The cookout offered free food, a face-painting booth and a protest sign-making station a pile of cut-up cardboard boxes, paint markers and rolls of packing tape. A group of neighborhood boys, each no older than 12, gathered around. They wanted signs to tape to their bicycles, so they could ride around and tell Trump what they thought of him.

One grabbed a piece of cardboard and wrote in big letters: TRUMPS A BITCH.

Max Neely quickly stepped in.

Im not sure you should use that word, he said, his voice taking on a fatherly tone. At 6ft2in, he towered over them. That word isnt very respectful to women, and there are a lot of women around here today that we should be respecting. Maybe you can think of another word to use.

The boys conferred. Eventually, they settled on a different, less offensive protest sign at least in Neelys eyes. FUCK TRUMP, it read, followed by four exclamation points.

A 31-year-old activist with long hair and a full bushy beard, Neely had a full day of political activism ahead of him: Donald Trump was in Harrisburg to mark his 100th day in office with a speech at the Pennsylvania Farm Show Complex. In other parts of the city, the liberal opposition were also readying themselves: organizations such as Keystone Progress, Dauphin County Democrats and the local Indivisible group planned to march in protest.

Neelys group were not among them. Instead, they had set up a picnic site in a small park, offering a barbecue and leftist pamphlets. Someone had planted a bright red hammer-and-sickle flag in the grass. On a nearby table hung a black banner that bore the words Redneck Revolt: anti-racist, pro-gun, pro-labor.

Activist Steve Hilditch, who runs a chapter of the Redneck Revolt group. Photograph: Cecilia Saixue Watt

If you havent noticed, we arent liberals, said Jeremy Beck, one of Neelys cookout friends. You know, if you keep going further left, eventually, you go left enough to get your guns back.

Wooly liberals, theyre not. Redneck Revolt is a nationwide organization of armed political activists from rural, working-class backgrounds who strive to reclaim the term redneck and promote active anti-racism. It is not an exclusively white group, though it does take a special interest in the particular travails of the white poor. The organizations principles are distinctly left-wing: against white supremacy, against capitalism and the nation-state, in support of the marginalized.

Pennsylvania is an open-carry state, where gun owners can legally carry firearms in public without concealment. Redneck Revolt members often see the practice of openly carrying a gun as a political statement: the presence of a visible weapon serves to intimidate opponents and affirm gun rights. Many of the cookout attendees owned guns, and had considered bringing them today but ultimately they had decided to come unarmed, in the interest of keeping the event family-friendly.

Redneck Revolt began in 2009 as an offshoot of the John Brown Gun Club, a firearms training project originally based in Kansas. Dave Strano, one of Redneck Revolts founding members, had seized upon what he saw as a contradiction in the Tea Party movement, then in its infancy. Many Tea Party activists were fellow working-class people who had endured significant hardships as a result of the 2008 economic crisis which, in his eyes, had been caused by the very wealthy. And yet, Tea Partiers were now flocking in great numbers to rallies funded by the 1%.

By supporting economically conservative politicians, Strano thought, they would only be further manipulated to benefit the already rich.

The history of the white working class has been a history of being an exploited people, he wrote. However, weve been an exploited people that further exploits other exploited people. While weve been living in tenements and slums for centuries, weve also been used by the rich to attack our neighbors, coworkers, and friends of different colors, religions and nationalities.

Now, eight years later, more than 20 Redneck Revolt branches have sprouted across the US; the groups range widely in size, some with only a handful of members. Max Neely is a member of the Mason-Dixon branch, which encompasses central Pennsylvania as well as his native western Maryland. Many members are white, but the organization seeks to build on a redneck identity beyond race.

I grew up playing in the woods, floating coolers of beer down a river, shooting off fireworks, just generally raising hell, all that kind of stuff, said Neely. Things most people would consider a part of redneck culture. Were trying to acknowledge the ways weve made mistakes and bought into white supremacy and capitalism, but also give ourselves an environment in which its OK to celebrate redneck culture.

The group draws a great deal of inspiration from the Young Patriots Organization, a 1960s-era activist group consisting primarily of white working-class Appalachians and southerners. Im very impressed with Redneck Revolt, said Hy Thurman, one of the early founders of the Young Patriots. I think theyre right on with what theyre trying to do.

The group opposed racism and worked closely with the Black Panthers, but they did make use of the Confederate flag in their recruiting. Thurman explained that it was used only strategically, to start conversations with poor white people who might identify with the symbol.

In the same way that the Young Patriots once used the Confederate flag, Redneck Revolt seeks to employ another emblem of rural America: guns.

Redneck Revolt groups work on providing an explicitly anti-racist presence in rural areas, and focus particularly on gun shows. Many members are from places where guns are relatively normalized, and Neely wants Redneck Revolt to serve as a viable alternative for people who might otherwise join the growing right-wing militia movement.

Since the 1992 Ruby Ridge siege, the US has witnessed an increase in anti-government paramilitary organizations. Oath Keepers, for example, is a militia group that strives to defend the US constitution, which the group believes is under threat by its own government. They claim to be nonpartisan, but its members politics tend to skew far right. During last years presidential election, they announced that members would be monitoring voting booths to prevent election tampering, stating he was most concerned about expected attempts at voter fraud by leftists.

But groups like Oath Keepers have much in common with far leftists: concerns about the infringement of human rights, objections to mass surveillance and the ever reauthorized Patriot Act, anger at the continued struggles of the working poor.

We use gun culture as a way to relate to people, said Neely, whose grandfather was an avid hunter. No liberal elitism. Our basic message is: guns are fine, but racism is not.

Officially, Oath Keepers bylaws prohibit anyone associated with a hate group from joining, though their background checks have proven to be inconsistent at best. But there are other rightwing groups around the explicitly racist kind.

Im worried about Pikeville, said Neely. Ive got friends out there.

KKK members salute next to a pickup truck at a private campground in Whitesburg, Kentucky. Photograph: Pat Jarrett for the Guardian

Pikeville is a small Kentucky town deep in the heart of Appalachia. It has no major airport or interstate, a population of less than 10,000 and an abundance of idyllic mountain scenery. Mining has long been the major industry here, though Pikeville also attracts tourism: mid-April draws over 100,000 visitors to the annual Hillbilly Days festival, a celebration of Appalachian culture and music.

In the week after the festival ended, however, Pikevilles atmosphere had taken a distinct turn. Neo-Nazis were coming to town the same day as Trumps appearance in Harrisburg.

The Nationalist Front an alliance of far-right white nationalist organizations was planning a rally in front of Pikevilles courthouse. Take a stand for white working families, read an invitation that circulated online.

This begins a process of building and expanding our roots within white working class communities to become the community advocates that our people need and deserve, wrote Matthew Heimbach on the Daily Stormer, a neo-Nazi website.

Pike County chronically impoverished, overwhelmingly white is seen as a fertile setting for spreading their ideology. The city of Pikeville itself has actually experienced some growth in the past few years, but the greater area is struggling. Pike Countys unemployment rate is one of the highest in the nation: 10%, more than twice that of the US as a whole.

Trump successfully tapped into this desperation with his pro-labor, anti-immigrant rhetoric and successfully won more than 80% of votes cast. Citing this figure, Heimbach hoped to develop existing pro-Trump sentiments into full-blown national socialism.

Were doing this because we care about the people of Pike County, said Jeff Schoep, head of the neo-Nazi National Socialist Movement, in a video promoting the rally. Weve seen factories shut down, weve seen people losing their jobs, weve seen families getting desperate and reaching out for drugs or other things that they shouldnt be doing. We want to give people hope again. Something worth fighting for.

That something happened to be a white ethno-state, and many Pikeville residents were not interested.

The city approved a permit for the Nationalist Front to gather downtown, citing the constitutional right of free speech and assembly, though Donovan Blackburn, the city manager, also issued a statement promoting peace, respect and diversity.

Students at the University of Pikeville planned a counter-protest, but the event was quickly canceled due to safety concerns: university officials feared that a conflict between the Nationalist Front and members of the antifascist movement or antifa could escalate into violence.

An anti-fascist counter-march to #MarchAgainstSharia in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Sean Kitchen

Developed in Europe over the past few decades, antifascists represent the lefts own united front: a conflux of anarchists, communists, social democrats and others, dedicated to stamping out fascism by any means necessary, including violence which they see as a justified response to the inherent violence of fascism. They often employ black bloc tactics, where individuals wear masks and all-black clothing to avoid police identification.

Antifascist groups have never been as prominent in the US as they have been in countries such as Greece, where masked individuals recently smashed the windows of the Golden Dawns headquarters. But in the wake of Trumps election and the ensuing spate of hate crimes, they have swiftly mobilized. A masked man famously punched white nationalist Richard Spencer in Washington DC on Inauguration Day; two weeks later, antifascists lit fires on UC Berkeleys campus in protest of rightwing ideologue Milo Yiannopoulos.

We live in a historical moment where theres unprecedented wealth inequality, and the average person is struggling to get by, said Sidney (not his real name), an Appalachian antifascist who has been keeping a close watch on white nationalist activity in his area. When governments, as they characteristically do, fail to step in, people look to other institutions for an answer. Fascism is having a resurgence because were in that moment. Its not a problem thats going to be solved by leaving it alone. Thats like leaving an infection alone.

A 27-year-old native of West Virginia, Sidney comes from a coal mining family. He splits his time between installing drywall and organizing with Redneck Revolt.

Pikeville really caught my attention, said Sidney. The Traditionalist Worker partys been making real efforts to organize in Appalachia. Im not a Kentuckian, but Im a working-class Appalachian, and it really sticks in my craw.

Rednecks against racism: Anti-fascist protesters in downtown Pikeville. Photograph: Pat Jarrett

To dissuade antifascists, who often wear masks during demonstrations, the Pikeville city commission passed an emergency ordinance that prohibited the wearing of masks or hoods in downtown Pikeville. Anyone above the age of 16 wearing a mask or hood would be subject to 50 days in jail and a $250 fine.

Antifascist demonstrators would have to show their faces, which could be potentially dangerous: neo-Nazi groups have been known to use facial recognition software and other tactics to identify counter-protesters, acquire personal information and subject those identified to further harassment.

At Redneck Revolt, we tend not to cover our faces anyway, said Sidney. We want to make inroads with the community, and its easier if they knew who you are.

But Sidney had a greater concern: Kentucky is another open-carry state and Heimbach had encouraged members of the Nationalist Front to come armed, ahead of possible leftist attacks. At least, however, he would have his own firearm: his Smith and Wesson semi-automatic pistol, which he decided to carry concealed.

A couple locals had expressed to Sidney that they wished they would all go home both neo-Nazis and antifascists.

I cant blame them for feeling like that, said Sidney. Theyve got this huge ideological fight on their doorstep that they didnt ask for.

Regardless, some time after noon, a large group of antifascist protesters some armed, some wearing bulletproof vests headed to the courthouse, ready to face the Nationalist Front.

Instead, they saw only about 10 white nationalists, waiting in a little area that had been fenced off by police. They were members of the League of the South, a group that promotes a renewed attempt at secession from the US. The two major Nationalist Front delegations, the Traditionalist Workers party and the National Socialist Movement, were missing.

Rumor soon spread that they were lost.

Given that theyre not from this region, and they dont represent the people here, its not terribly surprising, said Sidney.

A Pikeville resident argues with Redneck Revolt protesters. Photograph: Pat Jarrett

Back in Harrisburg, a group of six young white nationalist men wearing a uniform of white polo shirts approached Neelys cookout site; they looked like missionaries, clean-shaven with neatly combed hair.

Max Neely approached them and asked, cautiously, whether they were interested in socialism.

No, they responded. They identified themselves as members of Identity Evropa, a white nationalist group that endorses racial segregation and only admits applicants of European, non-Semitic heritage. They had initially supported Trump as a presidential candidate, but were now in Harrisburg to protest him; they were disappointed that he had not yet created a white ethno-state.

Neely wanted to keep them away from the cookout. On another day, in a different setting, some of his associates might have come ready for a fight. But today was meant to be family-friendly, and many of the picnic attendees were young black activists from a local high school. They could handle themselves, Neely knew, but the task of arguing for the legitimacy of your existence against those who deny your humanity is an arduous one.

So while his Redneck Revolt friends kept a careful watch from across the street, Neely let the Identity Evropa members talk more about their ideology about how the US was a nation meant for white people, how white culture was under attack. Neely debated them as politely as he could, hoping his quiet listening could diffuse the situation. They thanked him for being so calm and civil.

Its easy to be calm when youre a white man, said Neely. Its easy when its not your life or your familys lives at stake.

They could not see the back of his shirt, which depicted a hooded figure dangling from a tree, and the words HANG YOUR LOCAL KLANSMAN.

The encounter ended rather decisively: three local teenage girls had chased off the white nationalists.

Resist: a eight-foot-tall sign made by the Redneck Revolt group in Harrisburg. Photograph: Cecilia Saixue Watt

By mid-afternoon, the cookout was in full swing. Nearby residents filled plates with barbecued chicken and strawberries. A neighborhood man looked at the pamphlets that Neely had laid out. Piece Now, Peace Later: An Anarchist Introduction to Firearms, read one title.

Yall trying to overthrow the government? he asked.

Its more about community defense, answered Travis, one of the Redneck Revolt members.

I just wanted to warn you, the man continued. West Philadelphia, 1985. Look what happened to them.

He was talking about the lefts own Ruby Ridge moment: in May 1985, a Philadelphia police helicopter dropped a bomb on to the row house that had served as a headquarters for Move, an armed black liberation group. There were 11 casualties, including the groups founder, John Africa, as well as five children. The resulting fire destroyed 65 houses. A special commission later appointed by the mayor to investigate the incident concluded that the bombing had been unconscionable.

When Neely and other white members of Redneck Revolt claim allyship with movements like Black Lives Matter, they are compelled to acknowledge their whiteness in particular, their ability to carry weapons with impunity.

When Oath Keepers began to patrol rooftops during the 2014 protests in Ferguson, Missouri, their intention was to protect protesters from the police but many activists were alarmed and intimidated by the appearance of heavily armed white men. When Redneck Revolt members show up at black-led protest events, they are generally invited.

They are our security, said Katherine Lugaro, an organizer with This Stops Today, Harrisburgs local iteration of Black Lives Matter. Theyre a wall between us and anyone hateful. They put themselves on the line.

A neo-Nazi demonstrator in Pikeville. Photograph: Pat Jarrett

Back in Pikeville, a full hour after the rally was scheduled to begin, a caravan rolled into the parking lot down the street. Matthew Heimbach and the rest of the neo-Nazis had arrived. Close to 100 people, dressed in head-to-toe black and carrying Nazi insignia, marched up to the courthouse building. Many in the front were visibly armed; others carried wooden shields decorated with swastikas and Norse runes. Someone had brought a shield featuring Pepe the Frog and the words Pepe ber Alles. They sieg-heiled to Heimbach.

They were outnumbered by protesters two-to-one.

Then came a few hours of scheduled neo-Nazi speeches. This turned into a few hours of shouting, as the antifascists attempted to drown out the sound system with drums and jeers. From the midwest to the south, they chanted, punch a Nazi in the mouth.

A handful of Pikeville residents lingered on the other side of the police barricade, listening to the Nationalist Front speeches. But most locals present had trickled in along with the protesters, eventually making up a third of the crowd, and had joined in with the jeering.

They were absolutely the most strident antifascist voices there, said Sidney. Im assuming most of these folks were apolitical, or maybe conservative, but they were drawing a line in the sand.

No injuries, no shots fired; the Nationalist Front finished their speeches and returned to their caravan. A heavy police presence had kept the two groups separated and prevented any opportunity for confrontation. It was over.

Cathi Lyninger of Louisville protests the neo Nazis in Pikeville. Photograph: Pat Jarrett

In Harrisburg, night fell. Max Neely and his band of companions eventually regrouped at a

Source: http://allofbeer.com/2017/09/23/redneck-revolt-the-armed-leftwing-group-that-wants-to-stamp-out-fascism/

from All of Beer https://allofbeer.wordpress.com/2017/09/23/redneck-revolt-the-armed-leftwing-group-that-wants-to-stamp-out-fascism/

[myupdatesystems-blog]

Reality Revised - The Way to Change the Past

New Post has been published on https://myupdatesystems.com/2017/04/14/reality-revised-the-way-to-change-the-past/

Reality Revised - The Way to Change the Past

“Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” – George Orwell

Ministry of Truth employee Winston Smith, in Orwell’s prophetic 1984, spends his time altering reality. His job is to change or eliminate all documented evidence about certain people and events – to the extent that all memory about them is completely erased. The truth, for all practical purposes, never existed. The past is thereby controlled, as is the future.

Orwell created an imaginary, nightmare world of fascinating fiction. Couldn’t happen here, of course. Or could it? Newsflash: It could indeed!

Our so-called “Free” press, the current Ministry of Truth, does an exceptional job of manipulating reality. The real news is hidden, manipulated or ignored completely. Scant coverage is given to anything resembling actual truth, and your attention is directed elsewhere.

Twenty million illegal aliens? No problem. Fifty million Americans without health insurance? Who cares? Another hundred killed or maimed today in our proxy war in the Mideast? Look, over here! We’ve got a missing cheerleader! And how about the latest loser on American Idol? You say you just lost your job and your house and your kid can’t read his high school diploma? Bummer. As they say in New York, Fuhgeddaboudit! The Ministry of Truth will decide what’s important and what’s not.

And mentioning American Idol., I realize I am in the minority but, for some unknown reason, I’ve never enjoyed the spectacle of watching unqualified (to be generous) people who consider making fools of themselves on TV to be the highlight of their lives. Idol, of course, is broadcast on the Fox Network. Fox News is known out here in sheeple and as the Satire Channel, or the War Channel. To any perceptive viewer, it is obviously the 100% Government Controlled Channel.

Getting back to the subject of Reality Control (which we never left), consider the case of Randall Tobias, former Deputy Secretary of State and Administrator of the US Agency for International Development, the Bush global AID program. Tobias suddenly resigned on April 27 after being exposed as a client of DC madam Deborah Jean Palfrey. Deputy Tobias claimed, of course, that he only availed himself, on occasion, of the good madam’s innocent massage services. Sure.

So far, nothing unusual. Politicians have been screwing their constituencies forever. When they pay for the indulgence, they sometimes get caught. In this case, the enterprising Ms. Palfrey goes on to lucrative TV and book deals, and Mr. Tobias finds himself consigned to oblivion.

But something about this little incident is quite remarkable and not generally known. Washington Post columnist Al Kamen reports receiving an incredible email from senior AID official Steve Tupper. The email advises State Department and AID employees of the necessity of erasing all documented evidence of Randall Tobias – such evidence to include all pictures and statements contained in any and all printed publications, websites, reception room walls, newsletters, brochures, etc., etc., etc. All ongoing projects to be stopped, reviewed and resubmitted for publication approval after all mention of the offending Mr. Tobias has been dutifully erased.

Shades of 1984! There it is. Documented evidence that people are being erased from memory. I wonder how thorough they’ll be. Will they try to white-out all school records? Threaten or bribe all family members and casual acquaintances? Convince his mother she had one less son? Remove all evidence of former Boy Scout merit badges?

I wonder how many other hapless victims have been erased. Maybe they’re all in the Witness Protection Program. Maybe they’re working alongside you right this moment, pretending to be someone else. Ever irritate the government? You could be on a list. Scheduled to disappear. All memories of you wiped out forever. Nice knowing you…whoever you were.

The Ministry of…I mean the Media, has an easier method of controlling reality, by simply not reporting something at all, or just changing the facts to suit their own nefarious purposes. Consider the recent so-called debate held on the Fox so-called News channel between Republican presidential candidates on May 15.

At one point, candidate Ron Paul, arguably the only honest candidate actually representing the interests of the American people, said that our Middle East problems were the result of blowback, or unintended consequences, stemming from our own hegemonic actions.

Needless to say, no other candidate agreed. Rudy Giuliani demanded a retraction. Mitt Romney advocated doubling the size of our Guantanamo concentration camp. They both advocated torture, calling it “enhanced interrogation” which elicited a comment from Ron Paul about the term sounding very much like Newspeak, George Orwell’s definition of misleading doubletalk. He was, of course, right on the mark.

Candidate Duncan Hunter agreed with the necessity of torture, as did Tom Tancredo, who expressed a desire for “24” torture expert Jack Bauer to handle the gory details. The crowd greeted each advocacy for torture with cheers, laughter, and thunderous applause. John McCain, who might be presumed to know a little about the practice, protested against it. Which met with absolute silence. The bloodthirsty crowd, these Republicans. Which might explain more than a little about our newfound standing in the world.

The most interesting aspect about all this is that in every legitimate poll taken after the debate, there was one unqualified winner – though you’d never know it if your only source of information was the controlled mainstream media. Ron Paul won the debate hands down. The next candidates weren’t even close.

The media’s assessment? Ron Paul barely registered in the polls! The winners? Your choice of Romney or Giuliani. And if either wins the race for President, I guess we can expect a building boom of more Guantanamo and maybe a new reality TV show based on water-boarding and other forms of “enhanced interrogation”. At least until the American people lose their indifference and regain their sanity.

Speaking of polls, by the way, be wary of accepting the results of any poll. I would tend to believe the polls mentioned above regarding Ron Paul. They were taken from numerous sources, many not subject to absolute media control, and they all confirmed each other’s results. The polls taken exclusively by the controlled media can, for the most part, be considered their usual exercises in influencing public opinion in a predetermined direction.

Most of the time, it works, and you can’t completely blame those who answer such polls for their answers. Not when their sole sources of information do little but provide manufactured news. Polls become irrelevant when based entirely on tainted information. The media has learned this quite well.

Disinformation has become the media’s stock in trade. You may think the media’s obligation is to report the truth and keep you informed. Sorry, Charlie. You’ve been taken again. The media’s primary purpose is to make a profit. That’s right. Advertising profits drive the media. Nothing else. They have no obligation to tell you the truth about anything. Remember Don Imus? His employers were loyal for a good ten seconds. When advertisers pulled their ads, he was gone.

Getting back to the media’s news manipulation, consider the Iraq war – the most censored war in history. American TV viewers see pictures of smoke and hear bombs going off in the distance. They see pictures of American soldiers kicking doors in. In fact, they see so many doors being kicked in that prospective recruits are led to believe that their military careers will consist entirely of kicking doors in.

But the Arab world sees a different picture. They see the closeups of what the American bombs have done. The total destruction of their homes and way of life. The horrible effects of our depleted uranium weapons (perhaps the biggest unreported war crime ever) and the innocent men, women, and children are blown to bits and left to die.

Show a few of those pictures in the American media, and the war might come to a halt. But Americans aren’t allowed to know such things. They’re not even allowed to see the remains of their servicemen killed in action. Nobody bags. No caskets. Might upset someone. Speaking of which, they’re not even allowed to know how many have given their lives!

As of today, the official count of American war dead in Iraq is 3444. According to the controlled media. Do you believe that number? Or do you count yourself among those who believe that our government routinely lies about almost everything?

The 3444 number might be considered correct, as long as you didn’t count any number of additional categories. That number does not include an exceptionally high number of deaths by accidents and suicides. It doesn’t include the deaths of private contractors, journalists, deaths in foreign hospitals and other non-combat related deaths. I understand that if a wounded serviceman is transported to our base in Germany for treatment, and he happens to die seconds or minutes after the plane leaves the ground, his death is not counted either. You can’t imagine the number of deaths that would fall into that category alone.

Many deaths aren’t reported, and I’ve seen a recent report indicating that only about 10% of military deaths are reported at all. Which would mean that our proxy war in Iraq may have cost some 34,000 lives, not the 3400 we are told. We’ll probably never know the truth, but the larger number seems more credible. Perhaps an investigation could be made – over here, not in Iraq – of County Clerk’s offices in every county in the country, or where ever such records are kept, of all bodies returned from Iraq. And Afghanistan. And wherever the next war breaks out.

One more example of how the controlled media controls events. You may remember an incident in 2004 where 4 American contractors were killed in Iraq, their bodies mutilated and dragged through the streets. Just as an aside, what do you think of when you hear the word contractor? A roofing contractor? Electrical contractors? We have another fine example of Orwell’s Newspeak. I remember reading at the time that these 4 “contractors” – in this case meaning very well paid, heavily armed mercenaries – were sent by American occupation chief Paul Bremer to kill the mayor of Fallujah. Word of the plot got out and the contractors paid the price.

Incidentally, some contractors are security personnel and other actual contractors. They’re not all mercenaries. Thanks to the Media, it’s hard to tell anymore who is who. At any rate, the latest government figures show at least 917 contractors killed in Iraq and more than 12,000 wounded in battle. Latest reports indicate 146 contract workers killed in the first 3 months of 2007. Funny, I don’t recall reading or hearing about that in our “free” media.

I can’t attest to the validity of the Bremer/contractor connection, but their deaths resulted in the destruction of Fallujah, home to some 300,000 Iraqis. Three-quarters of all buildings were destroyed or heavily damaged by the US assault in November 2004. Hospitals were targeted first, then mosques, schools, electrical and water treatment facilities. Reports of the US military using chemical and napalm-like weapons were widespread.

Charred and half-eaten corpses littered the streets. At least 6,000 Iraqis were killed. The US military claimed “at least” 600. (There’s that 10% figure again. Our beloved government, of course, has more than a little experience in manipulating numbers). But 600 or 6,000, the collective punishment inflicted upon Fallujah by the Bush administration was one of the greatest war crimes of all times. It will never be forgotten. Or forgiven. Too bad you didn’t hear about it.

As to the media reports of this atrocity, you may have seen some American soldiers kicking down a few doors. Nothing more. Sometimes when you have little better to do, check out some of the stories about Fallujah from people who were there. They’re unbelievable and they’re true. Thanks to our “free” press, it was something minor that never happened. Ignorance, as they say, is bliss. This time, however, it may come with a price.

Our actions in Fallujah led to another incident. You may recall the attempted assassination by our military of Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena in March 2005. (“unfortunate incident” or “mistaken identity” as misinformed by our “Free” press). Held for a month by Iraqi insurgents, she was being driven to freedom when the attempt occurred, wounding Sgrena and killing Italian Secret Service agent Nicola Calipari, who gave his life trying to protect her. We denied the assassination charge, of course. Don’t we always? But the outraged citizens of Italy where agent Calipari was quite popular, had a different opinion.

Giuliana Sgrena was reportedly writing a story about Fallujah – what really happened there. As such, she found herself on the endangered species list of journalists who risk their lives in pursuit of the truth. 92 journalists have been killed in Iraq since March 2003. In 2006, about 11 percent died in combat incidents. Worldwide, the leading cause of journalists deaths was murder.

Thanks to the reality revising functions of our press, most Americans haven’t a clue as to what really happened in Fallujah. I’ve only just barely touched on some of the details above. Perhaps the truth will come out in the forthcoming war crimes trials many are hoping for.

In the meantime – as another little example of media manipulation, consider the periodic Bin Laden videos which magically appear whenever the government needs a compelling diversion. Since Bin Laden apparently died of kidney failure in December 2001, his latest videotaped Fatwa can be disregarded. Bad news for John McCain who still plans to chase Bin Laden down, even to the gates of Hell. Sorry, John. You’ll have to find another boogeyman.

I keep looking for a little sign saying CIA Productions on those videos. Haven’t seen it yet. Incidentally, did you know that our government has no documented evidence tying Bin Laden to 9/11? Not a shred. Not a single sheet of paper. What we do know, is that his name was given as the perpetrator, even as the World Trade Center burned. Which means we should double the salary of everybody in the FBI for doing some fantastic instant investigative work. Or that Mr. Bin Laden was selected as the designated villain some time in advance of the actual incident.

But enough about 9/11. There’s a ton of information out there about it. Some of it quite good. At this point, the only thing absolutely certain is that the government’s version of events is little more than an exercise in creative fiction. Maybe the truth will come out in the above-mentioned war crimes trials.

Examples of Reality Revision abound in every area of everyday life. Forget phony wars on phantom terrorists. There are terrorists of another kind, motivated by greed and power and the desire to manipulate and control every aspect of your lives. Examples are endless, but let’s consider just one or two more.

Consider how the media presents questionable evidence as fact. The weekly health scare, for example. You’re constantly bombarded with dire warnings about the deadly dangers of – believe it or not – Vitamins. Do you take vitamin C? Quick, throw it away. Maybe your hair will fall out. Vitamin E? What’s the matter with you? Don’t you know that Vitamin E causes high blood pressure? And acne? And ingrown toenails? How about Echinacea? Doesn’t work. Throwing your money away. Get rid of it. Now.

Whenever I hear the latest health warning, I wonder which pharmaceutical company sponsored it. What usually happens is that a few weeks later, the “warning” is downplayed or dismissed – unreported, of course. You never hear about how the test was conducted on only a handful of people – who had tried everything else with no success. People who might be real basket cases, given minute, guaranteed unworkable amounts of something – for the express purpose of “proving” very questionable results.

Many people hearing about the scare will discard the supplements in question – give up whatever protection they afforded, possibly acquire a resulting illness, visit their accommodating doctor, and start taking a prescription drug. And then another prescription drug, for the side-effects of the first one. And maybe a third drug after that. Maybe forever.

Mission accomplished! A little reality revision and you have a new, lucrative prospect perfectly programmed to contribute to a drug company’s obscene bottom line.

Of course, the FDA will protect you, won’t they? The drugs they push have to be beneficial, don’t they? Think again. The function of the FDA is to protect the interests of the drug companies, not the misguided consumer. Peer-reviewed published studies reveal that FDA-approved prescription drugs kill some 100,000 Americans every year, and injure over 2 million more. Other realistic estimates put the death rate at over 200,000. Every year.

I think I’ll take my chances with a few vitamin supplements. You have the freedom – so far – of doing the same. Just ask your doctor for nutrition and supplement recommendations. When he or she stops laughing, you’ll be advised that vitamins don’t work. That all evidence that they do is merely anecdotal. And that, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll take this prescription drug today. In fact, you had better head down to your friendly drug store post haste.

I was once employed as a real estate broker – so long ago, that women had yet to take over the industry. Yes, there really was such a time. I remember how I used to feel just after selling a property, to be advised by my buyer that he just had to have his attorney review the contract before he could sign it.

I would mentally start the search for another buyer because chances were the attorney would kill the deal. Why? What if you recommended something, and your advice led to problems? What if you bought a house and the roof leaked or the plumbing had to be replaced, or any number of other potential disasters? What if something went wrong? Who would you blame? Your lawyer!

My point: consider the source of any advice you get. Especially any nutritional advice you get or don’t get from your doctor, who received a grand total of one-hour instruction in the subject in all his years of training. Consider the fact that he actually can’t recommend any natural supplements unless he is a naturopathic doctor. What if he recommended a specific vitamin instead of the prescribed drug for your condition? What if your condition worsened? What if you died? Who would your family sue? Your doctor, that’s who!

Try to ask advice only from those qualified to give it, and don’t take anything at face value.Take every bit of advice, no matter what it is, with a grain of salt. Several grains. In fact, so many grains that it could cause high blood pressure – another myth that I plan to demolish in another article.

One more example of reality manipulation – an extremely important one – and then I’ll leave you to pondering what kind of future you can realistically expect. What do you know about the forthcoming North American Union? Probably very little, since it has been all but completely ignored in the mainstream press.

When the North American Union goes into effect you will wake up one day to find that you are no longer an American citizen, because America will have ceased to exist. The plan is to completely eliminate the borders of Canada and Mexico and to surrender individual national sovereignty. The Constitution (what’s left of it now) would no longer exist. The Supreme Court would be subservient to a new Court of Justice. The dollar would be worthless, to be replaced by something called the amero.

Sound far fetched? This treasonous travesty has been in the works since March 23, 2005. It is spelled out in the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, and it’s being created by a governmental regulation process that effectively bypasses Congressional approval or the necessity for any kind of referendum or popular vote.

This is perhaps the greatest betrayal of the American people of all time – and a subject hardly worthy of mention by our obedient controlled press. Thank God for the internet, where you can still find a modicum of truth. Check out stopthenorthamericanunion.com one of the better sites giving quite a bit of good information about the impending disaster. Or just Google North American Union for about 92 million references to this freedom-grabbing monstrosity. Interesting, isn’t it? How Google can turn up 92 million references when your TV talking heads and local news rags refuse to mention it at all.

Can’t see writing a hundred-page warning of what to expect, so I won’t go into any greater detail here. I’m afraid we’ll all find out soon enough, sometime within the next 3 years, when it is due to go completely into effect. Unless, by some miracle, we can find a way to stop it. If you discover a way, let me know. I’ll pass it on.