Category Archives: terrorism

German police arrest neo-Nazis after occupation of Dortmund church | News | DW.COM | 17.12.2016

The neo-Nazi group barricaded themselves in the steeple of the Lutheran church on Friday at 6:40 p.m. (1740 UTC), Dortmund police said in a statement.They hung a banner from the tower parapet, lit flares and shouted right-wing slogans down at the bustling Christmas market crowd below using a megaphone. The neo-Nazi group also appeared to light fireworks from the steeple in a picture circulating on social media.Police used force to break through the barricade with the help of Dortmund’s fire department and ended the illegal occupation, a police statement said.Authorities also took action against other far-right extremists who were gathered around the outside of the church, some of whom were passing out flyers.Eight of the right-wing extremists in the church tower, who were already known to police, were arrested but later let go from police detention.

Source: German police arrest neo-Nazis after occupation of Dortmund church | News | DW.COM | 17.12.2016

From IT specialist to guerilla fighter: Estonia’s citizen army gears up to deter Vladimir Putin’s war machine – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Estonians eye Russia’s annexation of Crimea and United States President-elect Donald Trump’s comments about reining in NATO spending, which provided a bulwark against Russian expansion during and after the Cold War.Now thousands of Estonians, many without previous military experience, have flocked towards the EDL for specialised conflict training.They learn to fire weapons, recognise Russian armoured vehicles, and live in the country’s vast forests.Some of the more experienced recruits are given instructions on how to make roadside bombs. Others learn how to run a field kitchen capable of feeding thousands of people.The EDL chief, Commander Meelis Kiili, puts it simply — “if you want peace prepare for war”.

Source: From IT specialist to guerilla fighter: Estonia’s citizen army gears up to deter Vladimir Putin’s war machine – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Walter Scott’s Mother and Lawyer React to Mistrial – Video – NYTimes.com

Walter Scott’s Mother and Lawyer React to Mistrial

By REUTERS | Dec. 5, 2016 | 0:53L. Chris Stewart, the lawyer for the family of Walter L. Scott, the black man who was shot dead by the former South Carolina police officer Michael T. Slager, spoke after news of Mr. Slager’s mistrial, as did Mr. Scott’s mother. Mr. Stewart said that the officer had “delayed” justice but that he would not “escape” it.

Source: Walter Scott’s Mother and Lawyer React to Mistrial – Video – NYTimes.com

Israeli teens charged for brutally beating asylum seeker to death | +972 Magazine

Two weeks ago two Israeli teens murdered Babikir Adham-Uvdo, a Darfuri asylum seeker who lived in the city of Petah Tikva, not far from Tel Aviv. Adham-Uvdo was attacked after he reportedly spoke to two white teenage girls. The teenagers kicked him in the head for an hour and a half, leaving him for dead. His body was found and brought to Rabin Medical Center. After four days in the hospital, Adham-Uvdo was taken off life support and died.On Sunday the State Attorney indicted the two teenagers, 19-year-old Dennis Bershivitz and a 16-year-old minor, on manslaughter charges. Manslaughter, not murder, since the State Attorney argues that it cannot be proven that the two intended to kill Adham-Uvdo. The State Attorney claims that it cannot be proven that the two acted out of racism.This is an absurd claim: whoever kicks a helpless person in the head for an hour and a half clearly intends to kill him. It is also clear that the killing was racially motivated: had a white person been caught with the teenage girls, we would safely say that the two attackers would not act the same way.Channel 10’s Itay Vered’s excellent report [Hebrew] shows how several Petah Tikva locals responded to the attack. One woman can be seen saying “whoever isn’t Jewish can go fuck himself,” a different woman says “this is the Jewish state, why do we need Muslims?” while a passerby is asked his opinion on the fact that a brutal killing had taken place right where he was standing. His response: “Okay, so what? Yalla.”

Source: Israeli teens charged for brutally beating asylum seeker to death | +972 Magazine

More than a quarter of Europeans say rape is ′okay′ sometimes | Europe | DW.COM | 30.11.2016 – “Sexism and delusional thinking are universal – much more work needed on the dense and those who delude themselves – thinking it could never happen to them.”

What the numbers sayAccording to the study, 27 percent of EU citizens – more than one in four – polled in the survey feel that “sexual intercourse without consent can be justifiable.” This means, women should not complain about sex without their consent if they happen to find themselves in certain situations, including being drunk or being on drugs, voluntarily going home with someone, wearing provocative or sexy clothes or not clearly saying no or not fighting back. The Eurobarometer poll shows women are more likely to be targets of gender-based violence compared to menIn 16 member states, respondents said being drunk or using drugs justified sexual intercourse without consent. The numbers were the highest in Romania (30 percent), Hungary (24 percent) and Bulgaria (21 percent). In Romania, over a quarter of respondents said rape was justified if a woman voluntarily decided to go home with someone. Only 3 percent of the poll participants in Spain and Sweden thought this way.For Germany, the figure was 7 percent, while 14 percent thought that sex without consent could be justified if the victim did not clearly say no or didn’t fight back. Altogether, in Spain and Sweden, only 6 percent of the respondents thought sexual intercourse without consent was justified. Some 55 percent of Romanians agreed that at least one situation justified sex without the partner’s approval, a view shared by 27 percent of German, 28 percent of Italian and 31 percent of French respondents.Differing attitudesEurope’s 27 percent figure is not very surprising, considering the differences between attitudes in Western and Eastern European nations. According to Kanchana Lanzet, gender advisor and former head of the UN Women’s national committee in Germany, “It is my observation that in Western Europe – I have also experienced this – children are brought up differently. Things are open here. The media also talks against violence against women and about responsible sex and they also say sexual intercourse should take place between two adults with their consent.”

Source: More than a quarter of Europeans say rape is ′okay′ sometimes | Europe | DW.COM | 30.11.2016

Twitter Says It Would Consider Banning Donald Trump’s Account: SFist – Facebook’s Zuckerberg would have not said no to Hitler? You bet he would not have…

“Our real goal is to reflect what our community wants,” he explained in a tech conference interview. “That kind of content, we would have thought previously that would make a lot of people feel uncomfortable, and people wouldn’t want that. But at the point where the person who’s elected president of the United States is expressing that opinion and has 60 million people who are followers, then the question is, OK, I think that that is mainstream political discourse that I think we need to be pretty careful about saying that that’s not a reasonable [inaudible].”

Source: Twitter Says It Would Consider Banning Donald Trump’s Account: SFist

I Was Raped / I Was Battered – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

I passed signs boasting “98% of Our University is Nonviolent!” while on my way to a sexual assault survivors group to meet with twenty other women who were raped on campus in the last year.Hers: four men behind the science building, her face grating the asphalt, turns taken from behind. Two officers found her, they took no notes, they asked her to calm down, she was hysterical.Hers: a rapist with a name engraved on some campus building, a rape kit that showed her lacerations, a rape kit that showed his semen, a rape kit that was thrown out prematurely, a rapist that walked.Hers: a professor, but he was tenured.Hers: a long walk to the police, freshly raped, dress wadded between her legs, bloodied from all that tearing. The officer asked if she was sure it wasn’t her period. “Are you sure?” he pressed. “Are you sure? Are you sure?”Hers: a drug in a drink at a frat party, her body left between the cars in a gravel parking lot, a mandatory alcohol-education course courtesy of the Institution. The class met on Fridays; she heard the frat parties’ music through the cinder-block walls.Once, we counted all the other rape survivors we knew. There should have been two hundred of us there, not twenty.And at the end of the semester, the Institution reported zero assaults. They hung banners in the halls.

Source: I Was Raped / I Was Battered – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

Israel’s biggest paper ignores anti-Semitism of senior Trump advisor | +972 Magazine

Hundreds of thousands of Israelis will have no idea that a bonafide anti-Semite is going to be the next U.S. president’s left-hand man. President-elect Donald Trump announced on Sunday he will be appointing Stephen K. Bannon, a white nationalist anti-Semite and one of the faces of the pro-Trump alt-right movement, as the new White House chief strategist. But you wouldn’t know any of that if you leafed through Israel Hayom, Israel’s most widely-read newspaper on Monday.

Source: Israel’s biggest paper ignores anti-Semitism of senior Trump advisor | +972 Magazine

Swedish politician suspends Twitter account over ‘hate’ – The Local

A former Social Democrat MP and one of the party’s most outspoken feminist and anti-racist campaigners on Tuesday said ‘lies and hate’ had prompted her to take a break from Twitter.Racist and sexist trolls target Sweden’s Twitter account (06 Oct 16)Veronica Palm, a former member of parliament and chairwoman of the centre-left Social Democrat party’s local branch in Stockholm, said the increasingly hostile social climate on Twitter was behind her decision to suspend her account.”As you have noticed I’ve been tweeting less and less. The reason is simple: it actually bloody hurts,” she wrote in a tweet on Tuesday morning.”I simply don’t have the energy. I am human and want to continue to be human. Not switch off my feelings about what other people say. And in that case, lies and hate hurts. It gets under my skin, every day,” Palm, 43, continued.”I have promised that I won’t be silenced by hate and threats. I know that the democratic conversation and free speech is the foundation of democracy, but right now I just can’t do it. I won’t stay quiet, but I’m taking a break from Twitter.”

Source: Swedish politician suspends Twitter account over ‘hate’ – The Local

Netanyahu denies inciting 1995 Rabin assassination | German-Jewish cultural heritage in Israel | DW.COM | 13.11.2016 As good as admitting he has Rabin’s blood on his hands.

The Israeli leader took to Facebook on the 21st anniversary of Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination to deny any responsibility for the latter’s death. He called the killing of Rabin by Jewish extremist Yigal Amir a “shocking political murder that all of us condemn.”He wrote: “Since the murder there have been continuous attempts to distort the historical truth and blame me for the incitement that preceded the killing.”He also posted video clips showing himself condemning virulent statements against Rabin in the weeks before the prime minister was killed.

Source: Netanyahu denies inciting 1995 Rabin assassination | German-Jewish cultural heritage in Israel | DW.COM | 13.11.2016