Category Archives: human rights

#ImSoEstablishment: Why words (and the absence of them) matter — Medium

Senator Sanders is a great man. He fights for so many things we believe in, but he’s not the champion we need in this perilous moment for women and families. His voice is an important one, which is why his rhetoric matters.Words matter. So do the absence of them. And so do we.

Source: #ImSoEstablishment: Why words (and the absence of them) matter — Medium

Netanyahu: We will allow settlers to return to Hebron houses – PNN

The Israeli prime minister,  Benjamin Netanyahu during cabinet meeting on Sunday said that “Israel will allow the settlers evicted from two houses in Hebron to return once the proper paperwork is in order,” Haaretz reported.Haaretz cited Netanyahu saying that “The government supports the settlements, especially in days like these, when they are under terror attacks,” adding that “at the same time, we are a lawful country and must respect the rule of the law. The moment that the purchase process is authorized, we will allow the population of the two houses in Hebron.”

Source: Netanyahu: We will allow settlers to return to Hebron houses – PNN

Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu calls for execution of Palestinians – PNN

Israeli newspaper Jerusalem Post reported him saying: “Should we leave them alive in order to then free them in another gesture to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas? The fact that they still have a desire to commit terrorist attacks shows that we are not operating strongly enough,” he said.Explaining more about his fatwa, Eliyahu wrote on his facebook page that “The Israel Police officers who do keep terrorist Palestinians alive should be prosecuted under the law.”He went on: “We must not allow a Palestinian to survive after he was arrested. If you leave him alive, there is a fear that he will be released and kill other people.” He added: “We must eradicate this evil from within our midst.”

Source: Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu calls for execution of Palestinians – PNN

vintage everyday: Babies are strapped into airplane seats enroute to LAX during “Operation Babylift” with airlifted orphans from Vietnam to the US. April 12, 1975

No words or judgements but brings up a whole lot of feelings from then and what if these were US orphans being shipped to another country after some national disaster? Or if they were refugees being flow from (x) to (y) to save their lives?

Source: vintage everyday: Babies are strapped into airplane seats enroute to LAX during “Operation Babylift” with airlifted orphans from Vietnam to the US. April 12, 1975

Sarah Palin, This Is What PTSD Is Really Like – The New York Times

Because there is a stigma attached to mental health issues, there is a personal and professional risk attached with admitting an unseen ailment. I have the benefit of being a veteran, but I still worry about future graduate school applications or academic job searches. I worry about my own tenuous employment as an adjunct English lecturer. I also know that I’ve managed to improve my symptoms greatly by seeking counseling, avoiding destructive behaviors and writing about my experiences. I can function in society because I was able to seek care, and I want to make that care more accessible to people who need it.That process begins by speaking frankly. Facing up to destructive or abusive behavior comes next, along with the assertion that we are responsible for our actions, no matter what burdens we carry. Post-traumatic stress is no excuse for violence or abuse, nor should it be considered a default association. I’d like to hope that, beneath the bluster and the political talking points, Sarah Palin understands this. I hope even more that her son seeks care and finds peace.

Source: Sarah Palin, This Is What PTSD Is Really Like – The New York Times

Cologne imam: Women provoked sex attacks by ′wearing perfume′ and being ′half-naked′ | News | DW.COM | 22.01.2016

{Too many males of all different religions and a number of women believe this foolishness and evil blame the victim position that lets gross men off the hook of being inhumane.}

 

In light of the attacks, women’s rights groups have taken to the streets of Cologne in recent weeks to protest against violence directed at women. Organizers of the demonstrations have strived to highlight a wider problem, however, arguing that women are facing assaults and harassment on a daily basis, regardless of who’s committing them.

Source: Cologne imam: Women provoked sex attacks by ′wearing perfume′ and being ′half-naked′ | News | DW.COM | 22.01.2016

A Feminist View of Cologne: ‘The Current Outrage Is Very Hypocritical’ – SPIEGEL ONLINE

Wizorek: But it is also wrong to look only at the origin of the perpetrators. When I see the kinds of people that are now jumping into the debate over women’s rights, it also includes, among others, the same politicians who, during the #aufschrei debate in 2013, said that women shouldn’t be so demanding. Now that men with immigration backgrounds have committed sexual assaults, it is being instrumentalized in order to stigmatize them as a group. I think that is racist.

SPIEGEL: Do you consider Ms. Schwarzer to be a racist?

Wizorek: It is racist to act as though it is only immigrant men who (commit sexual assault). I would really like to see a more nuanced debate about sexual violence. Such violence is a problem for all of society, for all genders, and it cannot be allowed to become the standard in gender debates that only male migrants are considered to be those responsible.

Schwarzer: It is always the right move to take a closer look. Of course we in Europe also have epidemic, structural sexual violence. Violence is always the dark core of dominance. The men who are now coming to us from Islamic cultural circles are, of course, shaped by conditions there, which are still much more antiquated than here. That’s a problem that we have ignored for far too long. In the name of a false tolerance, we have accepted that women are kept at home like prisoners and are forcibly married.

Wizorek: But now we have reached the core of the issue. We have to engage an integration debate, not an exclusionary debate.

Schwarzer: But who’s leading an exclusionary debate?

Wizorek: The majority society in Germany.

Schwarzer: I’d like to tell you something about majority society. Majority society has really been taken for a ride over the past 25 years. There was and there is a growing uneasiness within majority society as a result of this false tolerance. Parallel societies have emerged. A young woman can no longer go through certain neighborhoods without one of the young men shouting, “You slut!” Friends of mine who live in Kreuzberg (eds. note: a neighborhood in Berlin with a large Muslim population) have told me about it.

Wizorek: I live in Berlin and I have never heard that in Kreuzberg.

Schwarzer: Then you’ve been lucky. But if we keep denying that there are problems with some male immigrants, then we will just drive the people into the arms of the right-wing populists. Without the ignorance or the trivialization on the part of all the political parties, there would be no Pegida (eds. note: a xenophobic movement based in Dresden) or Alternative for Germany (eds. note: a new, and growing right-wing populist party in Germany).

Wizorek: I am not denying that the patriarchal structures are stronger in some countries than in Germany. But the core of the problem is not Islam, it is patriarchy.

Source: A Feminist View of Cologne: ‘The Current Outrage Is Very Hypocritical’ – SPIEGEL ONLINE

Israeli settlers seize West Bank buildings in Hebron | News | DW.COM | 21.01.2016

Dozens of Israeli settlers entered two homes in a building in the center of the Palestinian city of Hebron on Thursday, sparking violent clashes over disputed ownership claims, witnesses told news agencies.”A group of dozens of settlers accompanied by rabbis broke into a building on Shuhada Street,” Jawad Abu Eisheh, an activist with the local Youth Against Settlements group, told the news agency AFP on Thursday. He added that Palestinians lived in the building, described by some settlers as empty.Israeli forces were deployed to protect the settlers. Some demonstrators threw stones and soldiers, in turn, used sound grenades, taking a number of injured Palestinians to the hospital, AFP reported. An army spokeswoman said the clashes subsided later.

Source: Israeli settlers seize West Bank buildings in Hebron | News | DW.COM | 21.01.2016

Former Political Prisoner Wai Wai Nu on Discrimination, the Rohingya People, and the Future of Myanmar | wnn interviews global

I am hopeful. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is very much eager to promote rule of law, so I believe she has a plan to do this. We want to see less discrimination, less arbitrary arrests, less killings. I think she can revoke some of these repressive and unnecessary laws. In terms of what she can do immediately in Rakhine State, I think she could work to return IDPs and work for proper resettlement, as well as remove the restrictions faced by the Rohingya in regards to education, movement and both general and reproductive healthcare. Those are some of the easier jobs for her to do, but even then I could see it taking two to three years.

Source: Former Political Prisoner Wai Wai Nu on Discrimination, the Rohingya People, and the Future of Myanmar | wnn interviews global