Society's Child

Recent protests in Gaza - another example how the Israeli right is immune to criticism

Daniel Amir
Independent
Sun, 01 Apr 2018 00:00 UTC

The line between criticism of Israel and prejudice against Jews is both fine and blurred. In Israel, these accusations are weaponised against politicians and activists that step out of line.

On Friday, as Jewish people prepared to celebrate Passover and Christians gathered for Easter, tens of thousands of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip participated in largely non-violent protests as part of the Great Return March. Palestinian participants began walking towards the fence that separates the strip from Israel and were met with live fire that saw hundreds of people injured and 16 killed.

The protests were held to commemorate Land Day and demonstrate for the rights of Palestinian refugees to be resettled in Israel. Israel's response was that Hamas, which controls the strip, had "cynically" sent women and children to the fence as a human shield. Rather than expressing the grievances of Palestinians at large, then, the protests were to be seen in the context of long-standing tensions between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

Comment: See also:

Harvard investigation: Doctors paid big to prescribe addictive opioids

Phillip Schneider
Waking Times
Wed, 14 Mar 2018 00:00 UTC

In 2010, it was found that roughly 100,000 Americans die each year from prescription drugs alone. When it comes to opioids, the number of deaths is in the tens of thousands while a quarter of patients who were given a short-term prescription transitioned to long-term use.

Now, according to a recent Harvard University analysis, doctors who prescribe these pain-killers are being paid huge sums of money from their manufacturers.

The research, which was conducted by Harvard scientists and CNN, discovered that in 2014-2015 thousands of doctors were paid over $25,000 from opioid manufacturers and hundreds more were rewarded with six-figure sums. Also, the more opioids that were prescribed, the larger the reward.

"It smells like doctors are being bribed to sell narcotics, and that's very disturbing." - Dr. Andrew Kolodny, Executive director of Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing

Comment: More about America's scourge-like opioid crisis, and what's causing it:

Discourse shifting? Killing of unarmed Palestinian protesters has turned into a public relations nightmare for Israel

Philip Weiss
Mondoweiss
Mon, 02 Apr 2018 00:00 UTC

Land Day protests, israel tear gas Gaza protesters

© Agence France-Presse
Palestinians fleeing as tear gas grenades begin to drop during a demonstration near the border with Israel east of Gaza City to commemorate Land Day.

Something has shifted in the discourse of Israel since the Friday killings of 17 Palestinian protesters in Gaza, many of them plainly unarmed, by Israeli snipers from across a security fence: the hasbara- Israeli propaganda- is not working.

The country has plainly done something indefensible. The usual defenders are silent, and the criticism from the left/center is stronger than ever. Senator Bernie Sanders's sharp criticism is actually leading the U.S. discussion of the event.

Ori Nir of Americans for Peace Now captures the moment, tweeting in Hebrew (roughly translated):

"National Public Radio" Morning Edition, the United States's largest radio network, opened its news: Israel says it will not investigate the circumstances of the 15 Gaza residents killed on Friday's clashes. Another propaganda achievement of the government whose army is the most moral in the world.

Comment: Israel has literally been getting away with outright murder for decades and clearly considers itself above the law. Whether the international outrage will finally gather enough momentum to force a change in Israeli policies toward the Palestinians remains to be seen, but we are not holding our breath.

See also:

Moscow home-buying has boosted demand as Britain spooks wealthy Russians

RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 13:40 UTC

The forced return of wealthy Russians from Europe as a result of explicit threats issued by UK authorities has boosted demand for premium property in Russia's real estate market.

The number of inquiries for luxury property in Moscow and the Moscow region surged by 21 percent in the first quarter of the current year, according to market research carried out by consulting and real estate company, Metrium Group. Nearly 66 percent of the inquiries reportedly came from the UK, 23 percent from Germany, and nine percent from the US.

According to Russia's Central Bank data, the volume of cash remittance for buying elite property from abroad hit an all-time high in the fourth quarter of 2017, when Russian immigrants transferred some 7.1 billion rubles ($122 million), representing 36-percent growth. The analysts say that the previous peak was fixed in the first quarter of 2014, when Russians brought back $102 million to buy real estate.

Comment: See also: Fallout: Blaming Russia for ex-spy poisoning could harm British business

US Air Force will deploy Ospreys to Tokyo base early despite Japanese requests to ground aircraft

RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 19:19 UTC

The US military announced it will deploy five Air Force CV-22 Ospreys to a base in Tokyo, more than a year early. It follows a series of issues with the tilt-rotor aircraft, including a crash that killed three US marines.

The Ospreys are due to arrive at Yokota Air Base in the Japanese capital later this week. The arrival will mark the first time that Ospreys have been stationed at a Japanese military base outside of Okinawa, according to the Japan Times.

The five units are part of a deployment of 10 Ospreys that was initially scheduled to take place in the fiscal year which begins October 2019. However, the date for the five Ospreys was moved up in order to address "regional stability concerns in line with the recently released 2018 National Defense Strategy," the US military said in a statement cited by Stars and Stripes. It went on to state that the deployment "provides a platform that can rapidly react to natural disasters or crises."

Proposal for visa applicants to surrender 5 years of social media history will have 'huge impact' on travel to US

RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 19:11 UTC

The proposal for visa applicants to surrender 5 years of their social-media history will have a "huge impact" on travel to the US and could be "very damaging" for those seeking to come to America, an immigration attorney told RT.

While diplomats and travelers facing medical emergencies are expected to be exempt from the new extreme vetting procedure proposed by the US State Department, all others, including both immigrants and tourists, would have to disclose their social-media history over the past five years, along with telephone numbers and email accounts used during the same period.

Attorney Rosanna Berardi, a first-generation Italian-American with several decades of legal experience, believes a lot of people would be denied entry should the proposal go through. "I'm guessing that if we take that one step further in this arena, they will be able to refuse people entry, as long as they can deem it as a threat to national security. That can be described in many different ways, being an opportunity here for a lot of people to be denied entry," she said.

Berardi explained that US border control already has all the authority needed to look through people's mobile phones and refuse entry if it deems necessary. "For example, if you cross the border between the US and Canada, the government can pretty much search whatever they want in the name of national security. So, they have a lot of freedom in terms of what they can look at and why they can keep you out of the country," the lawyer explained.

Assange is working for the people, and now we need to help him

Slavoj Žižek
RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 18:56 UTC

Julian Assange has been silenced again, and the timing is most suspicious. With the Cambridge Analytica story dominating the news, it seems some powerful people have reasons to keep the brave WikiLeaks boss quiet right now.

Ecuador is a small country, and one can only imagine the brutal behind-the-scenes pressure exerted on it by Western powers to increase the isolation of Julian Assange from the public space. Now, his internet access has been cut off and many of his visitors are refused access, thus rendering a slow social death to a person who's spent almost six years confined to an apartment at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

This happened before, for a short period around the time of the US elections, but back then it was a reaction to WikiLeaks publishing documents which could have affected the outcome of the Trump/Clinton race, while there is no such excuse now. Because, currently, Assange's "meddling" in international relations consists only of publishing on the web his opinions about the Catalonia crisis and the Skripal poisoning scandal. So why such brutal action now, and why did it cause so little uproar in the public opinion?

Puigdemont breaks his silence in prison interview - 'I am not a criminal, we won the elections twice'

RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 18:51 UTC

Former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont said he is "not a criminal" in the first interview since his arrest. The exiled leader reaffirmed the region's campaign for independence, saying it's based on democracy and non-violence.

In an interview with two German members of parliament, Puigdemont said: "We are not criminals. We won the elections twice." An audio recording of the interview was published on Monday by weltnetz.de.

Last week, Puigdemont was arrested in Germany on foot of a European warrant issued by Spanish authorities. Spain accuses the 55-year old of organizing a rebellion in the form of an unauthorized referendum. Puigdemont responded to the charges by saying: "The crime of rebellion demands the use of violence, and there is no violence so there is no rebellion."

The former president faces up to 30 years in prison for the October 2017 referendum, which has been declared illegal by Madrid. German authorities are still considering Spain's request to extradite him.

Raqqa residents launch resistance against US-backed SDF occupation?

Sputnik
Mon, 02 Apr 2018 18:36 UTC

Local residents have been expressing their discontent with the policy conducted in Raqqa by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the US coalition-appointed authorities. They took their protest to the streets on March 27 and organized a resistance militia.

The press service of the Popular Resistance of Raqqa (PRoR) announced earlier today that it had fired several mortar shells at a US-occupied military base near the city, where he 93rd Brigade was deployed. PRoR also claimed that it will not tolerate "the occupation forces" on the Syrian territory, like the US and Turkey.

The Telegram channel Directorate 4, which monitors the situation in Syria and Iraq, posted an alleged video of the shelling on its YouTube channel. According to it, this was the first operation conducted by the group. The channel cites PRoR, who announced they will continue their fight until SDF and the US are expelled from Syria.

The first reports of PRoR appeared early in March, saying that they covertly recruit locals, who are opposed to the US appointed government's policies and the US-backed SDF. News about a full scale uprising in Raqqa appeared on March 30, allegedly due to the inability of the appointed government to deal with the humanitarian situation in the city and the forced mobilization. So far, no other information on the group's activity has been reported.

Comment: If the U.S. military plans for an extended stay in Syria, their occupation will be a difficult one - surrounded on all sides by people who want them gone - people with 7 years of non-stop experience at urban warfare. Their choice, but they'd probably be wise to follow Trump's wishes and get out alive while they still can.

Supreme Court backs cop who shot Arizona woman in front yard

RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 11:02 UTC

The US Supreme Court has ruled in favor of an Arizona police officer who shot a woman four times in her driveway while she held a knife. The officer enjoys qualified immunity in the case, the justices said.

Officer Andrew Kisela shot Amy Hughes in 2010. Hughes was in her driveway and was approaching her roommate, Sharon Chadwick, while holding a kitchen knife. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in 2016 that Hughes could file a civil rights lawsuit seeking $150,000 in damages, but the Supreme Court threw out that case on Monday.

Hughes, who has a history of bipolar disorder, had accused Kisela of using excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and arrests.

The court ruled 7-2 in favor of Kisela, with liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg as the two dissenting voices. In her dissent, Sotomayor wrote that Kisela's actions were unreasonable and that he should not be shielded from liability.

Comment: See also:

New Lt. Governor of Virginia Winsome Sears: "We're going to have safer neighborhoods, safer communities, and our children are going to get a good...

parzival

Bill Gates is going to be the one with the uncertain future,,, * New Lt. Governor of Virginia Winsome Sears: "We're going to have safer...

parzival

The more we hear about adverse affects the more we will merely shrug. It's a catch 22. Is that an asteroid trail in the photo?

sass

Welcome to the new normal. The more sensory exposure we have about such things, the less it is an issue.

sass

more misbehaving phuqqin' jewzskies starring on the sott; speaks for itself

Jibrish

Society's Child

Recent protests in Gaza - another example how the Israeli right is immune to criticism

Harvard investigation: Doctors paid big to prescribe addictive opioids

Discourse shifting? Killing of unarmed Palestinian protesters has turned into a public relations nightmare for Israel

Moscow home-buying has boosted demand as Britain spooks wealthy Russians

US Air Force will deploy Ospreys to Tokyo base early despite Japanese requests to ground aircraft

Proposal for visa applicants to surrender 5 years of social media history will have 'huge impact' on travel to US

Assange is working for the people, and now we need to help him

Puigdemont breaks his silence in prison interview - 'I am not a criminal, we won the elections twice'

Raqqa residents launch resistance against US-backed SDF occupation?

Supreme Court backs cop who shot Arizona woman in front yard

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