Category Archives: Gun-violence

The third intifada is here – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East

“Temple Mount Faithful” members and right-wing activists in Israel maintain that Jews have the right to ascend to the Temple Mount, similar to the Muslim right to do so. Even if we assume that their claim is just and that Jews do indeed have the historic right to ascend and pray on the Mount as Muslims do, the choice is between a religiously motivated intifada, and distancing right-wing activists from the center of conflict — the Temple Mount.

Perhaps in the past understandings could have been reached with the Palestinians to allow Jewish groups to ascend to the Mount and pray. But that was not accomplished. Solutions were not obtained, not even in the course of peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians, talks that have collapsed in the meantime.

What was not accomplished in the past through dialogue and understandings cannot, so it seems, be created now, when the earth in Jerusalem is burning under our feet and there is concern that a “second Al-Aqsa intifada” may well spill over into the West Bank. At that point, no security coordination will be able to stop it. Apparently, there is only one way to try to halt the downward spiral, before we again use a million bullets and transform the bus stations in the capital city into shelters: To close the Temple Mount to Jews.

On the advice of Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch and the Jerusalem police, it was decided to place concrete railings around bus stations and underground train stations to protect pedestrians. While these may give some local protection to travelers, they ostensibly won’t be able to stop assailants from among the residents of East Jerusalem who believe that they are engaged in a religious war.

via The third intifada is here – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East.

Standing in the Firing Squad: An Interview with Brianna Wu

The culprit is obvious. It’s male privilege. And, if there is a mecca of male privilege, it’s gamedev.

It’s filled with men that frequently harbor resentment towards women they don’t understand. While they intellectually feel we should be here, they unconsciously assume it’s their space and that their comfort is paramount. There’s no way to describe it but really, really shitty. I think we all address it in our own way. I try to make it better by never taking any shit, and speaking up on this stuff. I don’t accept excuses. That’s not going to work for everyone, but I think I’m helping make it better.

via Standing in the Firing Squad: An Interview with Brianna Wu.

One Canadian soldier killed as shots ring out in nation’s capital – LA Times

Canadian soldier was killed and the nation’s Parliament was on lockdown Wednesday after gunfire rang out in downtown Ottawa.

A hospital said it had received three victims, two of whom were in stable condition.

Details were sketchy, but police said several shooters were believed to be involved.

At least one gunman opened fire on a soldier who was standing guard at the National War Memorial, then headed in the direction of the nearby Parliament building, witnesses told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

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Gunfire inside Canadian parliament building

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CBS News Special Report: Shooting at Canada’s Parliament

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Parliament MP describes shooting in Ottawa

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Soldier shot near Canadian parliament building

The soldier was given emergency aid at the scene and put in an ambulance. Police later confirmed that a member of the Canadian forces had died of his injuries.

Moments later, shots were fired inside Parliament, according to journalists and lawmakers inside the building who saw a body lying motionless on the floor that they presumed to be a suspect. Some reported that the sergeant-at-arms of the House of Commons had shot the assailant.

via One Canadian soldier killed as shots ring out in nation’s capital – LA Times.

PressTV – Press TV reporter in Turkey killed in suspicious car accident

Shim was killed on Sunday as she was on a working mission in Turkey to cover the ongoing war in the strategic Syrian town of Kobani.

She was going back to her hotel from a report scene in the city of Suruç in Turkey’s Urfa Province when their car collided with a heavy vehicle. The identity and whereabouts of the truck driver remain unknown.

Shim, an American citizen of Lebanese origin, covered reports for Press TV in Lebanon, Iraq, and Ukraine.

On Friday, she told Press TV that the Turkish intelligence agency had accused her of spying probably due to some of the stories she has covered about Turkey’s stance on the ISIL terrorists in Kobani and its surroundings, adding that she feared being arrested.

Shim said she was among the few journalists obtaining stories of militants infiltrating into Syria through the Turkish border, adding that she had received images from militants crossing the Turkish border into Syria in World Food Organization and other NGOs’ trucks.

Shim flatly rejected accusations against her, saying she was “surprised” at this accusation “because I have nothing to hide and I have never done anything aside my job.”

via PressTV – Press TV reporter in Turkey killed in suspicious car accident.

Meshaal calls on Muslims to defend Al-Aqsa Mosque

He added, “Al-Aqsa is worth us becoming martyrs for, and anyone who can carry a weapon in the region should go and defend it, as this is the true meaning of jihad.”

via Meshaal calls on Muslims to defend Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Trying to light fuse to violence without being at risk himself and trying to be tough guy, when what is needed is leader guy.

When black women die from street harassment

You’ve read this piece before. You’ve read it a dozen times over. I’ve written it before. I could have written it a dozen times over. It’s the piece where someone complains about how little outrage there is surrounding something which deeply affects them, and then the reader is left to wonder, “Well, if it means that much to you, what are YOU doing about it?” You may have written that piece before. And we keep writing them because I don’t think any of us are quite sure what to do.

Where black women are concerned, we aren’t just talking about mounting the evils of misogyny, or even racism. We compete with the sacrifices black women make for their community.

I understand that there’s an impulse to not make black men the faces of street harassment, given all of the ideas that already exist around black male hypersexuality, as well as the disproportionate amount of police violence that black men face as the result of the constant criminalization of behaviors associated with black men. But black women have been allowed to suffer too much for the protection of black men. They have paid with their lives.

And here I am, writing another blog post wondering why no one seems to care.

Street harassment is vile. It makes women feel unsafe in public. But when black women die because we have failed to teach boys and men to keep their thoughts and hands to themselves, that they are not entitled to the sexual attention of any and every woman, or that their attempts at proving their masculinity through verbal and physical assaults on women are failures, the concern fades before it has a chance to actually surface. Black women are expected to keep sacrificing.

Who cries when black women die? Nobody. No damn body.

via When black women die from street harassment.

Anita Sarkeesian, Video Game Critic, Cancels Speech After Threats of Massacre – NYTimes.com

Anita Sarkeesian, a feminist cultural critic who has become a target of harassment by gamers, canceled a public speech scheduled for Wednesday after the college holding the event received threats of violence.

Ms. Sarkeesian was set to speak at Utah State University in Logan. Even after school administrators received the threats against Ms. Sarkeesian and those who attended her speech, she planned to give her talk. Ms. Sarkeesian, who hosts an online video series that has challenged how women are portrayed in videogames, has been a frequent target of threats because of her work.

But Ms. Sarkeesian reconsidered and canceled the talk over security measures at the event, according to a tweet by Ms. Sarkeesian and a spokesman for the school.

via Anita Sarkeesian, Video Game Critic, Cancels Speech After Threats of Massacre – NYTimes.com.

Electronic Village: Taser Death: Daniel Satre (Ballston Spa, NY)

It happened again! This time an unarmed man was electrocuted by 50,000 volts from each of the taser guns used on him by some or all of the six unidentified Ballston Spa (NY) police officers called to his home on Saturday, September 20, 2014.

The police officers were coming to arrest 43-old Daniel Satre for ‘disorderly conduct’. I’m not a lawyer … but, I’m fairly certain that the death penalty is not the legal penalty for ‘disorderly conduct’. Again, we see a case of overzealous police officers using their not-quite-lethal taser guns when they feel the slightest bit of disrespect from a citizen.

via Electronic Village: Taser Death: Daniel Satre (Ballston Spa, NY).

(I guess no one except relatives cares and that news organizations and people figure “tough luck” you got killed because “you” were not cooperative with police – which is an excuse for “oops” killing someone. Nothing will be done, I expect, until some 5-year old, white girl from a “good” family is killed for having a tantrum in a school, or someone famous or an elected official is killed for being disrespectful and not following “order.” )

JBTC – Just because they can – Palestinian teenager shot in head by Israeli forces dies – Autopsy announced for Monday

16 year old Muhammed Sunuqrut died in hospital on Sunday after being critically wounded by Israeli forces in an East Jerusalem protest last week. Relatives state that the teenager was shot in the head at close range with a rubber-coated bullet. 

Muhammed Sunuqrut was declared clinically dead at Hadassah University Hospital, Ein Karem, on Thursday before dying on Sunday.

He was wounded in the Wadi Joz neighborhood close to his home on the 31st of August. The teenager’s uncle, Motabi Sunuqrut, said the boy had not even taken part in the demonstrations and that the area was quiet at the time of the incident.

“Ten minutes earlier I returned home and nothing was happening. He left home and was talking to his aunt on the phone, when suddenly he was shot at close range. After he fell the soldiers went on beating him and wouldn’t let anyone come near him to treat him,” he said.

via Palestinian teenager shot in head by Israeli forces dies – Autopsy announced for Monday.