Category Archives: Feminism

UN: ‘world stands disgraced’ as shelter for Gaza children is shelled by Israel | World | The Guardian

United Nations officials described the killing of sleeping children as a disgrace to the world and accused Israel of a serious violation of international law after a school in Gaza being used to shelter Palestinian families was shelled on Wednesday.

At least 15 people, mostly children and women, died when the school in Jabaliya refugee camp was hit by five shells during a night of relentless bombardment across Gaza. More than 100 people were injured.

Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general, said the attack was “outrageous and unjustifiable” and demanded “accountability and justice”. The UN said its officials had repeatedly given details of the school and its refugee population to Israel.

via UN: ‘world stands disgraced’ as shelter for Gaza children is shelled by Israel | World | The Guardian.

The Satantic Temple uses Hobby Lobby ruling to claim religious exemption from anti-choice biased counseling laws

The Temple has helpfully provided a letter that people seeking an abortion can print out to explain to their doctor that they are exempt from informed consent mandates:

I regard any information required by state statute to be communicated or offered to me as a precondition for an abortion (separate and apart from any other medical procedure) is based on politics and not science (“Political Information”). I regard Political Information as a state sanctioned attempt to discourage abortion by compelling my consideration of the current and future condition of my fetal or embryonic tissue separate and apart from my body. I do not regard Political Information to be scientifically true or accurate or even relevant to my medical decisions. The communication of Political Information to me imposes an unwanted and substantial burden on my religious beliefs.

via The Satantic Temple uses Hobby Lobby ruling to claim religious exemption from anti-choice biased counseling laws.

Cop Allegedly Puts Pregnant Woman In Chokehold Over Illegal Grilling: Gothamist

Chokeholds were prohibited as a restraint tactic by the NYPD in 1993. Nevertheless, several instances of the maneuver have been widely publicized in recent weeks, following the death of Eric Garner, a Staten Island man who perished earlier this month as police restrained him in a chokehold. Garner, who suffered from asthma, repeatedly told cops that he couldn’t breathe as they held him.

via Cop Allegedly Puts Pregnant Woman In Chokehold Over Illegal Grilling: Gothamist.

The US is locking up pregnant immigrants despite policy against it

According to official Immigration and Customs Enforcement guidelines, pregnant immigrants aren’t supposed to be detained except if they pose a public safety threat. ICE officials have claimed this is such a rare occurrence it’s not even worth asking about.

But an investigation by Fusion found that 559 pregnant women have been detained by ICE in just six facilities since 2012. Unsurprisingly, given the inhumane conditions in many ICE detention centers, activists say pregnant detainees have been underfed and denied medical care, and at least 14 women had miscarriages while locked up.

via The US is locking up pregnant immigrants despite policy against it.

(7) Humans of Singapore

Moving from a corporate job to be a lecturer was definitely a 360 degree change, but it was definitely a lot more meaningful. In a corporate environment, after work you feel good. But after school, every day, you feel like you’ve done something right. And that made a huge difference to me, because my life suddenly became a lot more about empathy. Empathy towards students, towards guiding them, and towards helping them become more like their role models.”

“Is there one such situation that you can recall in particular?”

“This one time, there was a student who had just finished her O levels. I was talking to her, and after speaking with her for over half an hour, my instinct told me that she would fit well within human resources. So that’s what I suggested to her as well. One year later, I got a long message from her, telling me how happy she was with her course, and that she had no regrets going about it. And that made me happy. So yes, it has its challenges, and there’s a lot of implications and commitments that come with this job – but it also has its rewards.”

via (7) Humans of Singapore.

Today I was spat on because I looked different. | Úna-Minh Kavanagh

And you’re a fucking chink!’

That’s how I was greeted today while hovering outside a hotel in Dublin City Centre while I waited for a friend. The group went by laughing, I exclaimed an exasperated ‘oh fuck off…’, one of the young boys then grabbed my face and shook it, I was spat on.

This was the first time I had received a physical racial assault – I was shook. I’m 21 and had become slightly desensitized to all the racial slurs I was thrown on a regular basis, but this was frightening. I felt humiliated taking the spit out of my hair and sadly no one came to my aid, or asked it I was ok, even on this bustling street.

I met with my friend and contemplated what had actually happened. The more I thought about it the more I got the courage to act. This was the time to do something, anything, to tackle the closemindedness of a nation who prided themselves on being ‘welcoming.’ There and then it truly was a lie.

I gathered my thoughts, posted my outrage online and then reported it to the Gardaí. The experience was horrible and terrifying but I am not a coward.

These kids were in their teens. What these boys did was unacceptable and foolish.

I shouldn’t need to hide or feel scared in my own country. Racism. Hate. How dare anyone think that this disgusting behaviour is ok?

Do I hate them? Absolutely not. I pity them and I pity their parents who have no idea of richness a multicultural society can bring. I feel sorry for them. Oh and by the way, I’m Irish.

via Today I was spat on because I looked different. | Úna-Minh Kavanagh.

Isis denies ordering that all girls in Mosul undergo FGM | World | The Guardian

Was it spin? No matter now – it would be difficult for them to do secretly now! There are no secrets anymore guys.

Ahmed Obaydi, a spokesman for Mosul police, told BasNews: “Baghdadi’s decision to have all women circumcised is, as he claims, to prevent immorality and promote Islamic attitudes among Muslims. The decision was made by Baghdadi as a ‘gift’ for people in Mosul.” But Mohammed, a local journalist, told the Guardian he knew no one who had been told by Isis that their female relatives should undergo FGM. “This is mainly media hype with no substance,” he said.

Isis supporters quickly dismissed the story as a hoax. “If Isis responds to every lie and rumour they will not be able to control all these areas you hear about,” tweeted one. “Please ask UN to prove their claims before you hear from us.” The same Twitter account, whose name is derived from an Arabic word meaning “monster”, contains multiple images of the decapitated heads of Syrian soldiers taken in the Raqqa areas near the Iraqi border.

According to the Iraqi paper al-Mustaqbal, which also reported on the alleged fatwa earlier this week, the practice of FGM is alien to Iraqi society except the Kurdish provinces. Worldwide, more than 130 million girls and women have undergone FGM.

The FGM story broke against a background of wider concern about the situation in Mosul, whose Christian community has been forced to flee under threat of forced conversion or execution by jihadists who have turned churches into mosques and confiscated property.

Iraq’s prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, has lambasted Isis for its “criminality and terrorism”. Last weekend Isis gave the city’s Christians a stark choice: convert to Islam, pay a religious tax, or face death.

via Isis denies ordering that all girls in Mosul undergo FGM | World | The Guardian.

Israeli artists opposing the war come under attack on social networks – Diplomacy and Defense Israel News | Haaretz

Israeli artists opposing the war come under attack on social networks – Diplomacy and Defense Israel News | Haaretz.

As the guns roar in Gaza, Israeli artists who express sorrow over the deaths on both sides have been pilloried on social networks. “A disgrace to the State of Israel,” is one of the kinder phrases.

Comedienne and actress Orna Banai is just one example. She described herself as a “weirdo left-wing Arab-lover” on a news broadcast — and yes, expressed sorrow over the deaths of civilians on both sides and said she opposed the war. In turn, wags on social networks have turned the guns on her, mixing in a dose of misogyny and homophobia; Banai is a declared lesbian.

The actress discussed her views with a local Tel Aviv newspaper, whose editor provided the following headline: “Orna Banai: ‘I’m ashamed that this is my people.’”

Over the weekend, a Hebrew-language Facebook page surfaced entitled “Orna Banai and anti-Israel artists to Gaza.” The page’s custodians made sure to add a subtitle: “Over there they’ll be happy to rape you and your daughters in front of your husband, and only afterward slaughter him as well.”

During the Jerusalem Film Festival, which ended Sunday, a raft of directors called for a cease-fire in a letter; one of them was Shira Geffen. None other than Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat replied in a Facebook post, referring to the directors as “a disgrace to the State of Israel.”

When Geffen’s film was about to be screened, the director went onstage, read out the names of four Palestinian children who had been killed on a Gaza beach, and asked those who felt as she did to stand for a moment of silence.

The responses were harsh. A Hebrew-language Facebook page entitled “Contra B’tselem” — referring to the rights group — published a post reading: “Does such a woman have a place in the State of Israel?! Does such a woman deserve that Israeli army troops should protect her while she sleeps?! Our troops are fighting and she stands for a moment of silence for the enemy that fires on us without letup?!

“Shira Geffen, you are a disgrace to the country! Why don’t you stand in silence in memory of Staff Sgt. Eitan Barak, a combat soldier who fell defending the country? We are ashamed that there are people like you in the country. And it’s even sadder to me that Staff Sgt. Eitan Barak, of blessed memory, was killed as he protected a woman like you. What does your brother [the singer Aviv Geffen] sing? We’re a screwed-up generation? Well, we’re a screwed-up generation because of people like you!”

Shira Geffen’s own Facebook post about the incident reads: “The fact that expressing empathy for the four dead children draws such hateful and violent responses shows how low our society has sunk. With your permission, I would like to come out of the closet — when a child is killed, it hurts me no matter whether he is an Israeli or a Palestinian, from Ashkelon or from Gaza.”

According to Geffen, “My very ability to feel empathy for both sides does not make me anti-Israel. I can have compassion and mourn with the three mothers who lost their children in the abominable terror attack of kidnapping and murder, just the same as I can feel compassion for a child who was burned alive.”

Trouble in Spain, too

On Thursday, the singer Achinoam Nini, also known as Noa, described an anti-Israel demonstration outside one of her concerts in Spain.

“Before the concert, there was a very loud demonstration against Israel,” including cries of “Noa terrorista.” As Noa described the situation on Facebook, in Israel she is attacked by the right and pays “a very high price for being outspoken about peace and expressing left-wing political views, and in Spain, the left calls me a terrorist.”

According to Noa in her English-language post, before the concert she told the audience how once again “we are paying the price of the failure and cowardice of political and religious leaders, who have betrayed us, Arabs and Jews alike, by not doing everything in their power to avoid violence. No excuses are acceptable.

“I believe in peace, I believe in two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side, supporting each other, growing together. I believe in dialogue, it is the only way.”

On the other side of the political map, rapper Yoav Eliasi, also known as Shadow, has launched a group called Shadow’s Lions, which expresses hatred of the war’s opponents. Eliasi’s people hold right-wing demonstrations directly across from left-wing rallies.

The Lions say they’re for anyone “tired of the left wing’s hypocrisy – anyone tired of sitting at the keyboard who wants to do something beyond putting up angry posts.” Eliasi marks out targets for the group and has his picture taken with rifles.

But he, too, has a tough adversary: the left wingers who make fun of the images he posts. They bash his musical career and create Facebook pages with titles like “Shadow does cute things.” Or they report his posts as offensive and try to get them taken off Facebook. He details these problems on his own page.

In the meantime, Noa is on the defensive. “To remove any shadow of a doubt: I have no sympathy for Hamas or any of the insane jihadis of whatever kind. The relentless, deliberate bombings of civilians are intolerable, and I too am frightened for the welfare of my family and for all of Israel,” she wrote in Hebrew on Facebook.

“I’m worried about the welfare of innocent civilians wherever they may be, even in Gaza! What — are they fair game? But I say again and again that our leaders have a responsibility to make peace in any way possible, and by doing so to protect our lives.”