Category Archives: Gun-violence

Mattea Kramer: Killing Someone Else’s Beloved – Guernica

Once in a while a drone operator comes forward to reveal the emotional and psychic burden of passing 12-hour shifts in a windowless bunker on an Air Force base, killing by keystroke for a living. One serviceman’s six years on the job began when he was 21 years old and included a moment when he glimpsed a tiny figure dart around the side of a house in Afghanistan that was the target of a missile already on its way. In terror, he demanded of his co-pilot, “Did that look like a child to you?” Feverishly, he began tapping messages to ask the mission’s remote observer — an intelligence staffer at another location — if there was a child present. He’ll never know the answer. Moments later, the missile struck the house, leveling it. That particular drone operator has since left the military. After his resignation, he spent a bitterly cold winter in his home state of Montana getting blackout drunk and sleeping in a public playground in his government-issued sleeping bag. Someone else has, of course, taken his seat at that console and continues to receive kill orders from above. Meanwhile Donald Trump and most of the other Republican candidates have been competing over who can most successfully obliterate combatants as well as civilians. (Ted Cruz’s comment about carpet-bombing ISIS until we find out “if sand can glow in the dark” has practically become a catchphrase.) But it’s not just the Republicans. Every single major candidate from both parties has plans to maintain some version of Washington’s increasingly far-flung drone campaigns. In other words, a program that originated under President George W. Bush as a crucial part of his “global war on terror,” and that was further institutionalized and ramped up under President Obama, will soon be bequeathed to a new president-elect. When you think about it that way, election 2016 isn’t so much a vote to select the leader of the planet’s last superpower as it is a tournament to decide who will next step into the Oval Office and have the chance to play god. Who will get your support as the best candidate to continue killing the loved ones of others? Go to the polls, America.

Source: Mattea Kramer: Killing Someone Else’s Beloved – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

On Women’s Day: IOF kidnap high profile activist, mother of six, Manal Tamimi – PNN

Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) on Tuesday overnight have kidnapped iconic activist against the Wall and settlements, and mother of six, Manal Tamimi (43) from her home in Al-Nabi Saleh village near Ramallah. On the International Women’s Day, 8th of March, at 1:30 AM, dozens of soldiers stormed Manal’s home, raided it and detained her family in one room, while female Israeli soldiers have taken Manal to another room in the house, thoroughly inspected her, then kidnapped her. Manal’s husband, Bilal Tamimi (50) said that a few hours after the arrest, the family knew that Manal was taken to Benyamin Israeli police center near Ramallah, calling it “the Israeli gift to the Palestinian women on women’s day.” Manal’s lawyer, Gabi Lasky, said that Tamimi went through investigation at the police center, and has asked for a hearing session to take place as soon as possible to know the charges held against her.

Source: On Women’s Day: IOF kidnap high profile activist, mother of six, Manal Tamimi – PNN

Agenzia Fides News : Murder in Yemen

Regarding the responsibility for the massacre, the Vicar for Northern Arabia warns not to heed the manipulations of persons who aim to criminalise Islam indistinctly as a whole: “To kill in the name of God” Ballin tells Fides “is something terrible which no genuine Muslim can accept. Those who commit similar inhuman crimes are individuals dominated by and ideology which unbalances the human person”. Often, vicissitudes of Christian martyrdom intersect in a mysterious manner, historic convulsions fomented by clashes for power: “These outbreaks of violence” the Comboni Bishop continues “must also be seen in connection with unbalance produced in the area by the lifting of sanctions on Iran , which has now become more powerful and open. To blame is also the race to lower the price of oil and the battle for hegemony in the region, between Arabia anxious to maintain its Wahabit Empire and Iran anxious to reestablish the Persian Empire”. Pope Francis described the massacre in Aden “senseless and diabolic violence”, and in a message issued through his Secretary of State cardinal Pietro Parolin he prayed that the sacrifice of the sisters and their friends and helpers “will awaken consciences, lead to a change of hearts and inspire all parties involved to lay down their weapons and turn to the path of dialogue”. There is still no information on the plight or whereabouts of Salesian Father Tom Uzhunnanil, who was in the assaulted residence. “It would seem he has been abducted, but this has yet to be confirmed ” said official Salesian sources. In the meantime a statement issued by the al Qaida network in the Arabian peninsula and taken up by Arab media denied any involvement of the Jihadist group in the massacre in the Care Home in Aden.

Source: Agenzia Fides News

Protests break out at memorial for slain Honduran activist Berta Caceres | News | DW.COM | 05.03.2016

International outrage There has been strong international condemnation of the murder, and the US government on Friday called for a thorough investigation into her death: “The United States condemns the murder of civil society activist Berta Caceres and calls upon the Honduran government to conduct a prompt, thorough, and transparent investigation and to ensure those responsible are brought to justice,” a State Department release said. “We offer our sincere condolences to her family, friends, and the people of Honduras, who have lost a dedicated defender of the environment and of human rights. We offer again the full support of the United States to help bring the perpetrators to justice.” A coalition of more than 40 human rights groups from across the Americas called for an “independent, impartial” investigation into the killing.

Source: Protests break out at memorial for slain Honduran activist Berta Caceres | News | DW.COM | 05.03.2016

Despotic Erdoğan seizes control of leading daily – Reporters Without Borders

True to form, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan today orchestrated an Istanbul court decision to place Zaman, a leading daily newspaper that supports the opposition Gülen movement, under state control. “The Turkish presidential office’s interference in the media has reached a new level,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Christophe Deloire said. “It is absolutely illegitimate and intolerable that Erdoğan has used the judicial system to take control of a great newspaper in order to eliminate the Gülen community’s political base. “This ideological and unlawful operation shows how Erdoğan is now moving from authoritarianism to all-out despotism. Not content with throwing journalists in prison for ‘supporting terrorism’ or having them sentenced to pay heavy fines for ‘insulting the ‘head of state,’ he is now going further by taking control of Turkey’s biggest opposition newspaper.” With a print run of more than 600,000, Zaman supports the religious movement led by Fethullah Gülen, who was closely allied with Erdoğan until they fell out in 2012. Since then, the authorities have been suspending the licences of pro-Gülen media outlets and have been bringing charges against their journalists.

Source: Despotic Erdoğan seizes control of leading daily – Reporters Without Borders

Middle East – Gulf States declare Lebanon’s Hezbollah a terrorist group – France 24

{US and NATO needs more than a 10-foot pole to distance themselves from Saudi-led war against Shia}

Wednesday’s move against Hezbollah reflects deeper regional divisions between Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia and Shiite powerhouse Iran, Hezbollah’s patron. Saudi Arabia cut diplomatic relations with Iran earlier this year after protesters angry over the kingdom’s execution of influential Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr set fire to the Saudi Embassy and another diplomatic mission inside Iran. Saudi Arabia in 2014 designated a Saudi affiliate of Hezbollah a terrorist group along with the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Qaida, Yemen’s Shiite Houthis and other groups. The GCC announcement came a few hours after a televised speech by Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah in which he harshly criticized Saudi Arabia for punitive measures that targeted Lebanon recently, including the halt in aid and Gulf travel warnings. He repeated his accusations that Saudi Arabia was directly responsible for some of the car bombings in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq and denounced Saudi “massacres” in Yemen. “Who gives Saudi Arabia the right to punish Lebanon and its army and Lebanese people living in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf just because Hezbollah is speaking out? We urge Riyadh to settle accounts with Hezbollah and not all the Lebanese,” he said. He also accused Saudi Arabia of seeking to cause strife between Sunnis and Shiites everywhere in the world and said its execution of al-Nimr in January came in that context.

Source: Middle East – Gulf States declare Lebanon’s Hezbollah a terrorist group – France 24

Couple Killed By Inglewood Police Were Unconscious When Officers Arrived: LAist

When will it stop?

Upon seeing the unconscious couple in the car, Inglewood Mayor James Butts explained to NBC 4 how “the officers retreated, isolated the vehicle, and spent about 45 minutes attempting to rouse the occupants and to deescalate the situation.” Originally, Inglewood police said officers opened fire on the couple after they noticed the woman had a gun. According to the department, officers ordered both people in the car to exit before taking cover and opening fire. At some point before the shooting, an officer can be heard on a police radio transmission saying the woman had a gun in her right hand. However, it’s still unclear why officers opened fire, or if the couple were even conscious at the time—the department has been mum on the subject. “Obviously at some point they were conscious because somebody felt threatened,” said Inglewood Mayor Butts told KNBC in an effort to explain on his police department’s behalf. A total of seven children survive the two victims: Michael was a single mother of three sons, and Sandlin a single father of four daughters. According to their families, the two were on a date that night.

Source: Couple Killed By Inglewood Police Were Unconscious When Officers Arrived: LAist

A disastrous end ..the story of the PA | nadiaharhash

I do believe that we are standing on a verge of a revolution as people. This time, it is inevitable, unless Israel makes a move to save the PA. While we are living under a life of daily attacks and killing, within a context that death of youngsters and corpses laid on the street bleeding is just becoming another normal scene. Like the checkpoint, the separation walls … the daily killings of alleged stabbing or whatever. It is a historical moment in the life of Palestinian people. A time when the occupation is no longer the only oppressive component in life under occupation. An oppression that is equally practiced on the people from the occupier and the guardians of that occupying power. This deterioration amid the ongoing oppression is almost impossible to believe. But yet it is happening. And like those dominoes pieces in a raw, everything is falling in a quick systematic fall. The PA managed to survive especially in the last years, within the absence of the rule of law that is basically represented by conducting elections, through the continuous oppression of the occupation. People tend to shut up infront of the bigger tragedies of life. How could we revolt against the government when Israeli forces kill our children and continue to humiliate our existence in every single manner and given opportunity?

Source: A disastrous end ..the story of the PA | nadiaharhash

Alfred W. McCoy: How a Pink Flower Defeated the World’s Sole Superpower – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

Long and good on analysis – very, very short on plausible solutions.

Even in troubled Afghanistan, however, there are alternatives whose sum could potentially slice through this Gordian knot of a policy problem. As a first and fundamental step, maybe it’s time to stop talking about the next sets of boots on the ground and for President Obama to complete his planned troop withdrawal. Next, investing even a small portion of all that misspent military funding in rural Afghanistan could produce economic alternatives for the millions of farmers who depend upon the opium crop for employment. Such money could help rebuild that land’s ruined orchards, ravaged flocks, wasted seed stocks, and wrecked snowmelt irrigation systems that, before these decades of war, sustained a diverse agriculture. If the international community can continue to nudge the country’s dependence on illicit opium down from the current 13% of GDP through such sustained rural development, then perhaps Afghanistan will cease to be the planet’s leading narco-state and just maybe that annual cycle can at long last be broken.

Source: Alfred W. McCoy: How a Pink Flower Defeated the World’s Sole Superpower – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics