Category Archives: human rights

Mission-driven Mobile Market targets food deserts, underserved schools | Kaid Benfield’s Blog | Switchboard, from NRDC

“The group efficiently sets up shop at the wellness center.  Tents and an awning come out to keep people and products cool. Crates holding bundles of greens, boxes of strawberries and glass jars filled with herbs are placed on the side of the bus on removable metal shelves.  The market also sells local meat, eggs, dairy and honey, which, like the produce, is a mix of items from Arcadia and other local farms . . .

“When it’s time to move on, [summer fellow Anna] Hymanson sets the timer, as the group is informally competitive about how quickly they can break everything down.  A lot of precise stacking is required, using one of what [culinary educator JuJu] Harris affectionately calls Bartley’s ‘Ben-ventions,’ a series of wooden frames that prevents things from sliding around.”

via Mission-driven Mobile Market targets food deserts, underserved schools | Kaid Benfield’s Blog | Switchboard, from NRDC.

Child Migrants and Media Half-Truths

the “solution” suggested blames the victims for risking the journey.

So why does the mainstream press seek to place the blame on the parents and a supposed softening of immigration policy?

Because the alternative to blaming migrant families themselves is unpalatable to them.

The alternative is to accept that the Central American and North American Free Trade Agreements have left thousands of youth with no economic opportunities.

It is to accept that US security aid for drug wars has armed and aggravated violence in Mexico and Central America.

It is to understand the high cost of supporting the Honduran coup and how the Honduran people and the US population continue to pay that price, as out migration has surged over 500% in the past two years and human rights violations, instability and violence are skyrocketing.

via Child Migrants and Media Half-Truths.

Homeless in Germany given the boot | Germany | DW.DE | 23.06.2014

{Article, itself demonstrates social view of German homelessness – featured is a depressed former gambler and no discussion about range of reasons why so many are homeless and how they got that way.}

Germany’s umbrella organization for housing assistance (BAGW) says the number of people without a domicile in Germany has gone up dramatically over the last few years. In 2012, 284,000 people had nowhere to live – a rise of 15 percent compared to 2010. And BAGW expects that figure to rise again by a further 30 percent to 380,000 by 2016.

via Homeless in Germany given the boot | Germany | DW.DE | 23.06.2014.

Israel: Policeman killed in April shot by freed Shalit deal prisoner | Maan News Agency

{Announced now to justify calls for going back on deal to exchange hostage and release imprisoned.}

Israeli forces arrested Ziad Awad, 42, and his 18-year-old son, on May 7 and they were charged in a military court on Monday, the Jerusalem Post reported.

Ziad is a former prisoner who was released in the 2011 Gilad Shalit deal.

Israeli police officer Baruch Mizrahi was shot dead while he was driving near Hebron in the southern West Bank on April 14. His wife and son were also injured in the shooting.

via Israel: Policeman killed in April shot by freed Shalit deal prisoner | Maan News Agency.

Settlers vandalize 12 Palestinian cars in East Jerusalem | Maan News Agency

Settlers vandalized 12 Palestinian vehicles and a school bus in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina on Monday, locals said.

Owners of the vehicles told Ma’an that three masked settlers raided the al-Ashqariya neighborhood at 3 a.m. and punctured tires on 12 cars.

The settlers also sprayed “Death to Arabs” and “Revenge” on a school bus and another private vehicle.

Local resident Mahmoud Shanak told Ma’an that this is the first incident of its kind in al-Ashqariya.

The damaged vehicles belong to Riyad al-Halwani, Ramadan Bader, Mahmoud al-Shanak, Muhammad al-Shanak, Alaa al-Leftawi, Ulfat al-Bakri, Muhammad Hussein Barqan, Nisreen Hamad, Younes Ghazawi and Issa Jabarin.

via Settlers vandalize 12 Palestinian cars in East Jerusalem | Maan News Agency.

Fighting sexism – 30 years on — New Internationalist

I remember how 30 years ago, I raged, raved and ranted when I heard that a drunken husband had kicked his pregnant wife in the stomach, causing her to lose her baby. I waved an article at the group of women and asked them to form a vigilante team to beat up drunken men who entered the village, as women in Nagaland had done, according to a newspaper report I had read.  An old woman calmly said to me: ‘You are very young. But don’t say such (silly) things to our women. If a woman joins a mob to beat up her husband, how will she face him the next day? How will life go on?’

And so we continue. Thirty years later.

via Fighting sexism – 30 years on — New Internationalist.

6 Books That Helped Me Recover From Depression –

“This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body”

via 6 Books That Helped Me Recover From Depression –.

Israeli settlers posse’s shoot at Palestinians near Ramallah | Maan News Agency

Israeli settlers opened fire at Palestinians northwest of Ramallah late Sunday in the second such incident in hours, locals said.

Two settlers shot at nine men who were working in a quarry near the village of al-Mazraa al-Gharbiya, without causing injuries, the workers told Ma’an.

They said they noticed the settlers sneaking into the quarry and fled the scene as settlers opened fire with an automatic rifle.

After being chased for nearly two miles, the workers reached al-Mazraa al-Gharabiya unscathed, they told Ma’an.

via Israeli settlers shoot at Palestinians near Ramallah | Maan News Agency.