#sara ethnic

[kemetic-dreams]

Analysis of classic genetic markers and DNA polymorphisms by Excoffier et al. (1987) found that the Sara are most closely related to the Kunama people of Eritrea.

Both populations speak languages from the Nilo-Saharan family. They are also similar to West African populations, but biologically distinct from the surrounding Cushitic and Ethiopian Semitic Afro-Asiatic-speaking groups

The Sara people are a Central Sudanic ethnic group native to southern Chad, the northwestern areas of the Central African Republic, and the southern border of North Sudan. They speak the Sara languages which are a part of the Central Sudanic language family. They are also the largest ethnic group in Chad.

Sara oral histories add further details about the people. In summary, the Sara are mostly animists (veneration of nature), with a social order made up of several patrilineal clans formerly united into a single polity with a national language, national identity, and national religion. 

[news4dzhozhar]

[ramayantika]

The day I see Indian men wear dhoti kurta and every piece of clothing in Indian culture at home and at work, I will wear my sarees too

[young-royals-confessions]

im american (afrolatino). and race and ethnicity in america is very very much not the same thing. sara would still not be considered a poc in america. the only reason people might think being latino = not white is because people mix up race and ethnicity a lot over here.

her race would be white and her ethnicity would be latino (nationality depending on where in sa their family is from). my race is black and my ethnicity is latino (i was born in mexico).

i am considered a person of color because i am black. sara is white. she would be considered white in america with latino heritage/blood. idk how it works in europe so im not gonna argue against that.

but again, whether sara is considered a person of color or not, colorism is still a thing. she would be a person of color who does not face discrimination for her skin color.

.

[horizon-verizon]

It's kinda weird how some green stans call Rhaegar an evil racist for falling in love with Northern Lyanna instead of Dornish Elia but then cackle with glee over the idea of Jace in the show ditching Baela, played by a black actress, for Sara Snow who is probably someone Mushroom pulled outta his ass and might be played by a white actress if she even exists in the show.

Anon, thanks, but logic is not welcome here in the HotD fandom.

@ozymalek make some points about who the Dornish are made up of HERE:

grrm gives the following inspirations for dorne:

wales (historical influence more than cultural or ethnic)

spain and palestine (in terms of climate)

moor-influenced spain (ethnicity; rhoynar influence on the region paralleling that of moors)

therefore, dorne is spain, and the rhoynar are the closest functional equivalent to the moors. dornishmen are andals with rhoynar influences, much like spaniards are europeans with moorish influence.

I mean, can you believe?!

And the quote you refer to in Fire and Blood is HERE.

[sapphic-sprite]

Something that I’m passionate about is public libraries because of all the support and resources that they provide to their local communities. I know I’ve probably spoken on here before about how important it is to get a library card and use it because of all the perks it can give you (such as free access to online books, movies, and such). For those who are lower class it can provide them with programs, free wifi, free computer use, etc… Public libraries are just so overwhelmingly good for everyone.

In terms of the Global strike, I would like to suggest that people go to their libraries and recommend different Palestinian books. I’m not sure if it differs per state/per library on how you recommend a book, but I know if you use the Libby app through your library card that you can recommend books by tagging them “Notify me”. I know my library system is quite different as it branches out statewide and so I have access to statewide books. I would suggest filling out the forms that come up to recommend a book or talking to a librarian over the phone if you notice they are missing a Palestinian book that you would like to read.

Here is a list of Palestinian nonfiction books that I’ve found:

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Ilan Pappe

On Palestine by Noam Chomsky and Ilan Pappe

Except for Palestine by Marc Lamont Hill and Mitchell Plitnick

This Arab is Queer by Elias Jahshan

Blood Orange by Yaffa AS

Freedom is a Constant Struggle by Angela Y Davis

The Hundreds Years’ War on Palestine by Rashid Khalidi

Here is a list of Palestinian fiction books that I’ve found:

Where Black Stars Rise by Nadia Shammas and Marie Enger

Nayra and the Djinn by Iasmin Omar Ata

You Exist Too Much by Zaina Arafat

Salt Houses by Hala Alyan

Squire by Nadia Shammas and Sara Alfageeh

Against the Loveless World by Susan Abulhawa

Trees for the Absentees by Ahlam Bsharat

Something More by Jackie Khalilieh

Muneera and the Moon by Sonia Sulaiman

I haven’t been reading a lot lately because of my health, but a lot of these came recommended from people I trust to give good recommendations. Feel free to add recommendations in the comments and please contact your local libraries about acquiring the books you see here that they don’t have!

[soon-palestine]

The war in Gaza isn't just about Palestinian rights; it's about the very nature of the world we live in. Last week, I wrote this piece (link below), reflecting on earlier writings by scholars about how Gaza has become a model for making entire populations rightless and justifying their exclusion from life, taking away their dignity, and using tools of explicit and implicit violence and surveillance to kill and discipline them when they rebel against these conditions.

So, when Gaza says NO to all these things, it's not just defending itself and the Palestinian cause; it's also protecting the world from normalizing policies that make people unworthy of life and dignity just because they belong to the "wrong" ethnic, religious, or class group. When this battle is over, you'll thank Gaza for stopping dangerous precedents from being set and established, and for asserting that people cannot be killed, erased, and destroyed by the more privileged.

[yourdailyqueer]

Sara Tavares (deceased)

Gender: Female

Sexuality: Bisexual

DOB: 1 February 1978 

RIP: 19 November 2023

Ethnicity: Cape Verdean

Nationality: Portuguese

Occupation: Singer, songwriter, musician, reality star

Note: Represented Portugal in Eurovision 1994

[ahaura]

Zachary Foster, Ph.d, historian of Palestine, has made a thread of a brief history of Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from 1890 to present. [His newsletter: Palestine, in Your Inbox] Pasted below:

Yesterday, on October 24, 2023, Israel's plans to expel Gaza's Palestinian population to Sinai, Egypt were leaked. Not surprisingly, this plan has a decades long history and dates to at least 2004, if not earlier. (Source)

Between Oct 7, 2023-present, Israel has displaced ~1.4 million Palestinians in Gaza through its campaign of indiscriminate bombing. (Source)

In May 2023, 178 Palestinian Bedouins were forced out of Ein Samiya (West Bank) after Israel repeatedly demolished their homes, threatened to destroy their only school & after their grazing land was taken by settlement expansion & b/c of settler violence: [Link]

In July 2022, the 100-person community in Ras a-Tin (WB) was pushed after a Jewish settler outpost was established 2km away. Since then, members of the Palestinian community have suffered from verbal abuse, harassment, theft & vandalism of property. [Link]

Between Aug 2022- August 2023, the 88-person community in al-Qabun was pushed out by Israeli Jewish settler violence & assaults by the Israeli army. [Link]

In July 2020, Israel made 70 Palestinians homeless in Khirbet Humsa for the 6th time. Israeli forces loaded the residents' personal belongings and dropped them off 7 miles away. [Link]

In 2019, 2 groups of Palestinian families near the Taybeh junction were pushed out:

Between June 1967 - 2016, Israel revoked the residency status--and thus the right to live in Jerusalem (or anywhere else in Israel) -- of at least 14,595 Palestinians from East Jerusalem in what amounts to "forcible transfers," according to @hrw. (Source)

Between 1968 -1971, Israel expelled 615 Gazan residents. Between, 1971-1988, Israel expelled another 90 Palestinains from Gaza. Source: Sara Roy, The Gaza Strip: The Political Economy of De-development, p.110

In 1967, Israel expelled 250K-325K Palestinians, including from Imwas, Yalo, Bayt Nuba, Surit, Beit Awwa, Beit Mirsem, Shuyukh, Jiftlik, Agarith & Huseirat. (Source: one, two)

In 1948, Zionist forces expelled hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes. They also refused to allow ~750,000 Palestinians who were made refugees during the war back to their homes.

Source:

B/w 1891-1948, most Zionist leaders, inc. Theodor Herzl, Ahad Ha'am, Israel Zangwill, Arthur Rupin, M. Smilansky, L. Motzkin, Yoseph Weitz, Chaim Weizmann, M. Usshishkin, D. Ben Gurion, Moshe Shertok, thought it would be required to expel the Palestinians: [Quote Tweet]

Here are some additional screenshots if the statements of Zionist leaders from 1890-1948. And you wonder why so many people think Zionism was such a problematic, dare I say, racist idea?

[saraannereads]

On the portrayal of Illyrian culture in ACOTAR

I’m Sara - by ethnic origin, I am Arabic and Turkish. I was othered my entire childhood and dealt with seriously atrocious racist attacks.

As I got older, those things lessened and people started assuming I was white or biracial in part due to my having dyed my hair blonde.

Since then, I’ve experienced racism of a different kind - I get told I am a “shallow white girl” who doesn’t have the right to speak about issues facing POC by people from all different ethnicities.

I’ve had enough of that. I may not look like your typical WOC but I am a woman of color. And I will not be silenced.

Why I am not offended by the portrayal of Illyrian culture in Sarah J Maas’s books:

1. I’m from a Muslim family and grew up going to mosques in the Western World, where some of the very oppressive and sexist ideals about women and their place in society were preached from the stands and actively shared by members of the community.

2. I was chronically shamed by my peers in the community for being into my education and for wearing makeup or for daring to speak to boys.

3. The above happened in the United States in the community I grew up in because oppressive, sexist ideals travel across immigration. I clawed my way out of this community and will never look back.

3. Honor killings still happen where I’m from. To this day.

4. Genital mutilation still happens in the regions where I’m from to this day.

5. Women are not allowed to drive in some countries in the region where I’m from to this day.

6. Women are publicly beaten or stoned to death in those regions to this day.

7. Women have to be fully covered up when they leave the house in the region where I’m from to this day.

8. Women are silenced and told not to speak in public - even just to talk to someone - and not to leave their houses without a male chaperone in the region where I’m from to this day.

9. Women are glorified birthing vessels and it is socially accepted for men to have multiple wives to have as many children as possible in the region where I’m from to this day.

10. Women do not have full equality or even basic, fundamental human rights in the the region where I’m from to this day.

How does this relate to Illyrian culture and ACOTAR?

Do I really need to explain the answer to that? I realize that some people may have grown up in Middle Eastern families and not had the experience I had. Some of my experience is also due to Islamic religious ideas and not simply cultural ideals. And there are some people who may love where they came from and have had a radically different experience than my own. That does NOT make my experience less valid, nor does it make my criticisms of the culture and countries I’m referring to less valid or accurate.

To me, the portrayal of the Illyrians is an accurate representation of what goes on in some pockets of the mid east, and for that very reason, I’m not offended.

In fact, wing clipping is essentially the fictional version of genital mutilation, which still happens in the cultures that people say Illyria is inspired by.

It is not racist to look at something and call it out for what it is. If I were to say, every single ME person I’ve ever met adheres to some of the more fundamentalist and sexist rhetoric I heard and continue to see, that would be racist and untrue.

The reality is there will also always be people who attack Sarah J Maas because she’s Jewish, especially at this time with conversations about Zionism running rampant. I married a Jewish man. I’ve seen anti-semitism firsthand. I also saw it growing up among the more nationalistic people I grew up with who hated the idea of an Israeli country.

What you can do:

Stand up for women around the world who don’t enjoy the same freedoms you do, and quit picking fights about a book series. Look to solve real problems instead of making some up.

Note - If you attack me in the comments, I will not respond. I will immediately block. This was not an easy post for me to make in any way, and I feel vulnerable having shared so much.

[sixcostumerefs]

Happy Asian and Pacific Islander Month to our queens!

Here in the US, May is Asian-American and Pacific Islander month. So just like last year, I'll be highlighting the Asian and Pacific Islander queens of Six. This year is especially fun as there's currently an Asian or Pacific Islander queen in every currently-running replica production of Six!

Pictured: Aragon: Grace Mouat (Burmese, 1st UK Tour and West End), Nicole Kyoung-mi Lambert (Korean, pre-Broadway regional tour and Broadway); Jasmine Shen (Chinese/Hong Konger, Breakaway 1.0); Chloé Zuel (Mauritian, 2020 Sydney); Phoenix Jackson Mendoza (Filipino, 2021-23 Aus Tour); Kristina Leopold (Chinese/Thai/Indian, Broadway/Boleyn Tour); 이아름솔/Lee Arum-soul (Korean, South Korea); 손승연/Sonnet (Korean, South Korea) Boleyn: Andrea Macasaet (Filipino, pre-Broadway regional tour and Broadway); Cherelle Jay (West End and 2nd UK Tour); Amanda Lindgren (South Korean, West End); Sunayna Smith (Indian, Breakaway 3.0 and 5.0); 김지우/Kim Ji-woo (Korean, South Korea); 배수정/Pae Su-jeong (Korean, South Korea); Fiorella Bamba (Filipino, Bliss 6.0); Thảo Therése Nguyễn (Vietnamese, West End) Seymour: Jasmine Forsberg (Filipino, Aragon Tour/Broadway); 박혜나/Park Hye-na (Korean, South Korea); 박가람 /Park Ga-ram (Korean, South Korea); Singh Viki (Indian, Hungarian non-replica) Cleves: 김지선/Kim Ji-sun (Korean, South Korea); 최현선/Choi Hyun-sun (Korean, South Korea); Danielle Mendoza (Filipino, Breakaway 3.0/Boleyn Tour); Kardffy Aisha (Persian, Hungarian non-replica) Howard: Jaina Brock-Patel (Desi/Indian, 2nd UK Tour); Zoe Jensen (Filipino, Broadway); 김려원/Kim Ryeo-won (Korean, South Korea); 솔지/Solji (Korean, South Korea); Elysia Cruz (Filipino, Canadian); Hien (Vietnamese, Hungarian non-replica); Sierra Fermin (Filipino, Broadway); Alizé Ke'Aloha Cruz (Filipina, Bliss 3.0/Boleyn Tour) Parr: Shimali de Silva (Hong Konger/Sri Lankan, original student cast); Vidya Makan (Desi/Indian heritage, 2020 and 2021-23 Australian Tours); Shannen Alyce Quan (Eurasian, 2020 and 2021-23 Australian Tours); Karis Oka (2020 and 2021-23 Australian Tours); Megan Leung (Chinese/Hong Konger, Bliss 2.0 and Breakaway 5.0); Roxanne Couch (Maori, West End); Joy N Woods (Southeast Asian and/or Pacific Islander, Broadway); Elena Breschi (Filipino, Breakaway 4.0) 유주혜/Yoo Ju-hye (Korean, South Korea); 홍지희/Hong Ji-hee (Korean, South Korea); Aoife Haakenson (Taiwanese, UK Tour); Lauren Mariaoosay (Indian/Polynesian/Malaysian/Cambodian, Canada) Notes: - All information is from this post. There may be additional info or queens missing, as it's only information I specifically have been able to verify. This list also doesn't encompass the full breadth of many queens' identities; many of them are of mixed race and ethnicity, or of several nationalities. That post provides further information. - I usually don't include actors who haven't debuted. That means that Kimberley Hodgson and Deirdre Khoo (both of the recently-announced Australian Tour) and Fia Houston-Hamilton (cancelled Breakaway 2.0) are not included.

Credits: Aragon: anniekwithacamera; Lloyd Bishop; _jasmine_shen_; jamesmorganphoto; sixthemusicalau, unsure of origin; ymduck_pic; _young_img Boleyn: Sara Crulwich; jonalderson_; Pamela Raith; sunaynasmith; _young_img; _shannon1025_, unsure of origin; fiorellabamba; Pamela Raith Seymour: Joan Marcus; hbiiii._.iin; jjang_beautiful; Szabina Jardek Cleves: hbiiii._.iin; gren_pic; Joan Marcus; Szabina Jardek Howard: Pamela Raith, Joan Marcus, day_star_._, 890110kr; Joan Marcus; Szabina Jardek; sierrafermin; Joan Marcus Parr: sixthemusical, unsure of origin; sixthemusicalau, unsure of origin; daynaransleyphoto; daynaransleyphoto; meganswleung; Pamela Raith; michaelah.jpg; elenabreschi; yoozuyoozu, unsure of origin; jjang_beautiful; Pamela Raith; Joan Marcus

[probablyasocialecologist]

Israeli president Isaac Herzog insisted that “an entire nation” was to blame for Hamas’s actions, and that the idea of “civilians not being aware, not involved” was “absolutely not true”. While Rageh Omar reported on this for ITV News, it did not make the BBC or the New York Times or Sky News. Nor did it make most anglophone outlets. Ariel Kallner, in a now-deleted tweet, called for another Nakba on the Palestinians, repeating the crime of 1948 in which 700,000 Palestinians were ethnically cleansed. “Right now, one goal: Nakba!” He exhorted. “A Nakba that will overshadow the Nakba of 48.” This was picked up by Associated Press but missed by most anglophone broadcasters and press. When Tally Gotliv, a Knesset member for Likud, called for a nuclear strike on Gaza – “Jericho Missile! … Doomsday weapon!” ­– and for “crushing and flattening Gaza … Without mercy! Without mercy!”, this also went curiously unnoticed. Again, when an anonymous Israeli defence official briefed Israeli broadcasters that Gaza would become “a city of tents” where “there will be no buildings”, it was largely ignored. When Sara Netanyahu’s advisor, Tzipi Navon, said that it would not be enough to “flatten Gaza”, and that Palestinians suspected of involvement in the Hamas attack should have their nails pulled out, their genitals removed and their tongues and eyes saved for last “so we can enjoy his screams”, “so he can see us smiling”, that too was curiously overlooked. The studied obtuseness of Western media includes carefully ignoring the most severe warnings about what is about to be done by Israel to Gaza. On Friday 13th, Israel ordered residents in the north of Gaza to “evacuate” to the south within 24 hours on pain of being bombed. Former Israeli ambassador Danny Ayalon suggested with a cynical smirk that they could go to the Sinai desert and live in “tent cities”. The Biden administration appears determined to enable this to happen, lobbying Egypt to take the refugee population. The language of evacuation, widely used by newspapers, was euphemistic. Over a million Gazans had just been given a death threat. They were being told at gunpoint to flee in an unrealistic amount of time, on just two roads that they were assured were safe from bombardment, only for a convoy fleeing south to be bombed, killing seventy people. They had no reason to believe they could ever return to their homes or that their homes would even exist. Here was the second Nakba that Ariel Kallner shouted for. A UN press release warned of “mass ethnic cleansing”, that would repeat the Nakba of 1948 “yet on a larger scale”. Two days after that warning, only the Independent among British newspapers had covered it. One honourable exception to the general omerta on explaining what the “expulsion” order means is the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire who, interviewing former Israeli ambassador Mark Regev, quoted former UN head of humanitarian affairs Jan Egeland, saying: “The Israeli order for civilians to move from north to south is impossible and illegal. It amounts to forcible transfers and a war crime.” No anglophone newspaper, of course, mentions the word “genocide” in this context, though that is the term used by both Palestinians and Jewish groups opposed to Israel’s war, and is clearly what is implied by Israeli statements and actions. As Mustafa Bhargouti told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, Israel is inflicting the triumvirate of “siege and collective punishment”, “genocide” through bombardment, and “ethnic cleansing”. The Israeli historian of the Holocaust, Raz Segal, describes Israel’s indiscriminate war on Gazan civilians and its assault on the conditions for life for the whole community, as “a textbook case of genocide” unfolding in front of us. For the press and the majority of pundits, the problem cannot be named. At most, liberal dissent attains to the insight that vengeance is not justice, as though what Israel is now threatening is merely reactive rather than programmatic.

[news4dzhozhar]

Unfortunately he's not been fired yet, only suspended although it is a bit laughable that he's in trouble for reporting lies when that's quite literally his entire job.

[lilithism1848]

Atrocities US committed against AFRICA

In early 2017, the US began conducting drone strikes in Somalia against Al Shabab militants. An attack on July 16th killed 8 people.

In 1998, the US bombed the Al Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan, killing one employee and wounding 11. It was the largest pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum, producing medicine both for human and veterinary use. The US had acted on false evidence of a VX nerve agent from a single soil sample, and later used a false witness to cover for the attack. It was the only pharmaceutical factory in Africa not under US control.

In June 1982, with the help of CIA money and arms, Hissene Habre , dubbed Africa’s Pinochet, takes power in Chad. His secret police, use methods of torture including the burning the body of the detainee with incandescent objects, spraying gas into their eyes, ears and nose, forced swallowing of water, and forcing the mouths of detainees around the exhaust pipes of running cars. Habré’s government also periodically engaged in ethnic cleansing against groups such as the Sara, Hadjerai and the Zaghawa, killing and arresting group members en masse when it was perceived that their leaders posed a threat to the regime. Human Rights Watch claimed that Habre was responsible for thousands of killings. In 2001, while living in Senegal, he was almost tried for crimes committed by him in Chad. However, a court there blocked these proceedings. Then human rights people decided to pursue the case in Belgium, because some of Habre’s torture victims lived there. The U.S., in June 2003, told Belgium that it risked losing its status as host to NATO’s headquarters if it allowed such a legal proceeding to happen. So the result was that the law that allowed victims to file complaints in Belgium for atrocities committed abroad was repealed. However, two months later a new law was passed which made special provision for the continuation of the case against Habre. In May 2016 he was found guilty of human-rights abuses, including rape, sexual slavery and ordering the killing of 40,000 people, and sentenced to life in prison.

In the 1980s, Reagan maintains a close relationship with the Apartheid South african government, called constructive engagement, while secretly funding it in the hopes of creating a bulwark of anti-communism and preventing a marxist party from taking power, as happened in angola. Later on, in the wars against Apartheid in South Africa and Angola, in which cuban and anti-apartheid forces fought the white south african government, the US supplied south africa with nuclear weapons via Israel.

In 1975, Henry Kissinger launches a CIA-backed war in Angola, backing the brutal anti-communist leader of UNITAS, Jonas Savimbi, against Agostinho Neto and his Marxist-Leninst MPLA party, creating a civil war lasting for 30 years. The CIA financed a covert invasion via neighboring Zaire and a drive on the Angolan capital by the U.S. ally, South Africa. Congress continues to fund UNITAS, and their south-african apartheid allies until the late 1980s. By the end of the war, more than 500,000 people had died and over one million had been internally displaced.

In 1966, a CIA-backed military coup overthrows he widely popular Pan-Africanist and Marxist leader Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana, inviting the International Monetary Fund and World Bank to take a lead role in managing the economy. With this reversal, accentuated by the expulsion of immigrants and a new willingness to negotiate with apartheid South Africa, Ghana lost a good deal of its stature in the eyes of African nationalists.

In 1965, a CIA-backed military coup installs Mobutu Sese Seko, described as the “archetypal African dictator” in Congo. The hated and repressive Mobutu exploits his desperately poor country for billions.

In 1962, a tip from a CIA spy in South Africa lead to the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela, due to his pro-USSR leanings. This began his 27-year-long imprisonment.

In 1961, the CIA assists in the assassination of the democratically elected congolese leader Patrice Lumumba, throwing the country into years of turmoil. Before his assassination the CIA sent one of its scientists, Dr. Sidney Gottlieb, to the Congo carrying “lethal biological material” intended for use in Lumumba’s assassination. This virus would have been able to produce a fatal disease indigenous to the Congo area of Africa and was transported in a diplomatic pouch.

In 1801, and again in 1815, the US aided Sweden in subjugating a series of coastal towns in North Africa, in the Barbary Wars. The stated reason was to crack down on pirates, but the wars destroyed the navies of Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco, and secured European and US shipping routes for goods and slaves in North Africa. US Representatives stated: “When we can appear in the Ports of the various Powers, or on the Coast, of Barbary, with Ships of such force as to convince those nations that We are able to protect our trade, and to compel them if necessary to keep faith with Us, then, and not before, We may probably secure a large share of the Meditn trade, which would largely and speedily compensate the U. S. for the Cost of a maritime force amply sufficient to keep all those Pirates in Awe, and also make it their interest to keep faith.” Thomas Jefferson echoed and carried out the war, saying that war was essential to securing markets along the Barbary Coast.

[young-royals-confessions]

i remember making a post on my own blog a while back about how sara is not a poc just because she’s latina, and a bunch of europeans attacked me and said “well actually race is viewed differently in europe”.

and honestly that may be true. i don’t really care. but colorism exists everywhere. you simply cannot tell me that even if sara is considered a person of color in europe that she would experience the same kind of discrimination as people who look like simon or felice. especially in europe. be so serious. colorism exists no matter the country and that’s a problem. but let’s not pretend it doesn’t exist just cause people wanna argue semantics

.

[odinsblog]

In the occupied Palestinian territories, there are cameras everywhere. In Silwan, in occupied East Jerusalem, residents say cameras were installed by Israeli police up and down their streets, peering into their homes. One resident named Sara said she and her family “could be detected as if the cameras were just in our house … we couldn’t feel at home in our own house and had to be fully dressed all the time.”

Surveillance cameras now cover the Damascus Gate, the main entrance into the old city of Jerusalem and one of the only public areas for Palestinians to gather socially and hold demonstrations. It’s at that gate that “Palestinians are being watched and assessed at all times”, according to an Amnesty International report, Automated Apartheid. These cameras have created a chilling effect on not just the ability to protest but also on the daily lives of Palestinians who live under occupation, according to Amnesty investigators. The organization had previously concluded that Israel has established a system of apartheid against Palestinians.

Among the vendors behind these surveillance cameras is a company that has been accused of aiding what the US has categorized as a genocide: Hikvision. Based in Hangzhou, China, the company is one of the world’s largest makers of video surveillance equipment. Already infamous among international human rights groups, it has been blacklisted by the US and identified by the UK as a security threat for being complicit in China’s repression of the Uyghur ethnic minority.

(continue reading)