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British forensic researchers challenge IDF denial over shooting of child with live fire


International Solidarity Movement
Tue, 22 Oct 2019 23:40 UTC
IDF bullet weapon rubber bullet
© Forensic Architecture
Images from Forensic Architecture report show difference in soldiers firing live ammunition to rubber-coated metal bullets
Evidence is stacking up against the Israeli Army over the near-fatal shooting of a Palestinian child by a soldier in July, with the release of a damning report from a British research group.

Nine-year-old Abd el-Rahman Yasir Shatawi, was shot in the head on July 12 while sitting outside his friend's house during a protest in the West Bank village of Kafr Qaddum. He sustained severe brain damage and remains hospitalized more than three months after the attack.

Since then Abd's parents have been left in the dark as to why their son, who was not even participating in the protest, was shot by Israeli soldiers from a hill opposite.

Comment: 100 bullet fragments in brain of Palestinian child shot by Israeli soldiers in northern West Bank

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Star of David

Israel destroys record number of Palestinian homes in Jerusalem in 2019

Yumna Patel
Mondoweiss
Sat, 26 Oct 2019 21:44 UTC
israel demolish house jerusalem demolition
© Activestills
Palestinian man watching his house being demolished by Israeli authorities in East Jerusalem on January 27, 2014.
Israel has demolished a record number of homes in occupied East Jerusalem in 2019, the most in the past 15 years, Israeli rights group B'Tselem reported on Thursday.

More than 140 Palestinian homes, were demolished resulting in the displacement of 238 Palestinians, 127 of them minors.

Of the homes that were destroyed, 39 were destroyed by the owners themselves after they received demolition orders from Israel, in order to avoid incurring the municipality's demolition fees.

This year's demolitions far surpassed the second highest number of demolitions, which occurred in 2016 when 92 homes were destroyed.
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Attention

Freed gun activist's lawyer: Butina's case was 'prosecutorial overreach', 'harsh sentence' for nothing illegal


RT
Sat, 26 Oct 2019 00:36 UTC
Maria Butina
© File/Wikimedia Commons/Pavel Starikov
Maria Butina
Russian gun activist Maria Butina, who has spent over a year behind bars in the US on charges of being an unregistered Russian lobbyist, was essentially innocent but was caught up in anti-Russian witch hunts, her lawyer told RT.

Butina came to the US on a student visa in 2016 and was actively involved in pro-gun circles, namely the National Rifle Association (NRA) with a stated goal of expanding gun laws in Russia, which are quite restrictive. Yet, she was detained by the FBI in July 2018 on suspicion of conspiring to infiltrate the lobby group to promote Russian interests in the US.

The American media immediately snatched the opportunity to label her a spy and also reported that she allegedly traded sex for political favors. Both allegations later proved false. Now, her lawyer, Robert Driscoll, says she was in fact innocent but became a victim of anti-Russian hysteria and had to live in "totally inappropriate" conditions for some nine months.


Comment: Additional coverage from RT:

RT, 26/10/2019: "It was hard to bear. Everybody hated me there [in the US]."
One of the things that gave her strength, she recalled, was news of support that was brought by Russian diplomats. They were "a breath of fresh air amidst the horrors."

Butina release prison
RT, 26/10/2019: Butina speaks upon arrival in Moscow
'I did not give up because I simply could not do that, thanks to all who helped me.' She has arrived in Sheremetyevo airport after a long flight from Miami, Florida on Saturday. Not holding back emotions, Butina told reporters she feels "well" and is very happy to finally "return home."
Butina airport
© Reuters/Tatyana Makeyeva
Butina's arrival at Sheremetyevo Intl. Airport outside Moscow, Russia, Oct. 26, 2019.
Maria's father, Valery Butin, has flown from Siberia to meet her at the airport. He praised the diplomats, human rights groups, and "ordinary people" for supporting his daughter and not letting the story die down. He also thanked the US lawyers for their fight against the "Russophobic" charges against his daughter in court.
Maria/Dad
© Vitaly Belousov/Sputnik
Maria Butina hugs her father in Moscow airport.
On her way out of the airport, Butina revealed that receiving news of her "strong support" at home was "a breath of fresh air amidst the horrors" she experienced while being held in the US. "Absolutely everyone hated me there," she said.

It was especially frightening when I was sitting in prison and seeing how they chose the scariest photos of me to air on the news. And they made shows on TV about it. I couldn't even turn it off. I was forced to watch that. And the guards gathered and watched along. It was very hard to bear.


RT, 26, 10/2019: Terrifying solitary confinement
"Now that I have world recognition, I feel obligated, I feel responsible, to fight for those who are humiliated, who are unjustly accused, who are today forgotten, here in Russia and especially there in the United States."


See also: Russian gun activist Maria Butina released from prison, to return to Moscow

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TV

The elite control what you watch to control what you think

Michael Snyder
The Economic Collapse
Thu, 24 Oct 2019 00:00 UTC
woman in red
© The Matrix
The woman in red...
Why do you believe what you believe? Some people have a really solid answer to that question, but much of the population never thinks much about deeper questions such as this. In fact, for most Americans it is simply easier to let others do their thinking for them. Today, most of us spend multiple hours each day absorbing information through a screen, and most of the content that is fed to us through our televisions, phones, tablets and computers is controlled by the elite. And if you allow anyone to feed information into your mind for several hours every day, it is going to have a dramatic impact on how you view the world.

When I was younger, one of my favorite movies was The Matrix, and I think that it is a really good metaphor for what is going on in our society today. In the film, nearly the entire human population was plugged into a system which continuously fed a computer-generated reality into their minds that wasn't real at all. Later on, I eventually came to realize that we are willingly doing the same thing to ourselves. Our personal interactions with one another are extremely limited, but we willingly "plug in" to the enormous matrix of news, information and entertainment that the elite have constructed for many hours each day.

According to numbers that were released earlier this year, the average American spends more than three hours watching television and more than three hours on mobile devices every single day...
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Yellow Vest

1.5 million people flood Santiago, Chile to protest against corrupt government


RT
Sat, 26 Oct 2019 05:35 UTC
Protesters/Lithium
© Reuters/Ivan Alvarado
Protesters in Santiago, Chile • Brine pools at SQM lithium mine
Indigenous activists in Chile have shut down lithium mining operations for some of the world's largest producers, as the country is gripped by protests over widespread perceptions of inequality.

Chile's capital saw its biggest rally yet on Friday, following seven straight days of demonstrations sparked by a hike in public transportation fees, in which at least 18 people have been killed, over 200 injured and thousands arrested. As things heated up in Santiago, however, protesters nearly 700 miles north locked down roadways in the Atacama salt flats, blocking access routes to some of the region's abundant lithium mines.

Chile is home to the world's largest lithium reserves, as well as one of the top producers of the lightweight metal - used in cell phone batteries and other electronics - the Chemical and Mining Society (SQM).

The effort to close the roads has been underway since Wednesday, Sergio Cubillos, president of the Atacama Indigenous Council, told Reuters, adding that SQM's operations were "completely shut down" by Friday. The roads are closed.

Comment: Truly extraordinary how this is happening in so many places at the same time. But then, govt is being extraordinarily corrupt in so many places at the same time...

See also:

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Eye 1

US not bad but justice system broken: Butina talks about 'terrifying' solitary confinement, vows to fight for inmates' rights


RT
Sat, 26 Oct 2019 12:03 UTC
Maria Butina
© Reuters / Tatyana Makeyeva
In an exclusive interview with RT, Russian gun activist Maria Butina recalled the ordeals of her prison term in the US. While not rubber stamping the country as bad, she argued the justice system is broken.

Describing the conditions she faced during her months-long detention, Butina said that being placed in solitary confinement was "the most terrifying experience" of her life.

"It's very difficult when you have this little cell, very cold, just concrete and iron... Later I learned that by the United Nations, this is considered to be torture. Because it is torture... I still don't understand why it was necessary. I guess they were trying to break my will."

However, that did not make any sense, Butina explained, sinсe she "didn't have any secrets."
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Bullseye

Orwell & Huxley were BOTH right, Roger Waters tells RT


RT
Sat, 26 Oct 2019 17:19 UTC
Roger Waters
© Reuters / Mario Anzuoni
Roger Waters performing at the Staples Center in Los Angeles
With the mainstream media largely content to ignore the plight of Julian Assange, did George Orwell or Aldous Huxley better predict the world of today? Both did, former Pink Floyd frontman Roger Waters told RT.

"Orwell and Huxley were always arguing about who had the closest view of what dystopia might look like in the future," said Waters, adding "I think we got a lot of both."

"We have the 'Big Brother' Orwellian dystopian nightmare, it happened two days ago in that magistrate's court," he explained, referring to a UK judge's decision on Monday to deny the WikiLeaks founder a delay in US extradition proceedings. Assange's lawyers have argued that they need more time to prepare a defense, and some of Assange's supporters have made the case that British law forbids extradition in the first place, if the charges can be seen as political.

Comment: See also: Punishing Assange sends 'we will get you' warning to other journalists, Roger Waters tells RT

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Cross

Kanye West doesn't want young daughter wearing makeup and crop tops now that he's Christian

Paulina Dedaj
Fox News
Fri, 25 Oct 2019 18:01 UTC
US recording artist Kanye West
© Rob Kim/Getty Images/AFP / Reuters
Kanye West
Kanye West won't let daughter North wear makeup or crop tops anymore, claiming his life as a Christian has made him "think and feel differently."

The "Jesus is King" rapper said in an interview Thursday that Christianity has allowed him to "pivot" on previous beliefs — and that includes his parenting style.

"I don't think North should wear crop tops just because I had her wearing a slip dress when she was 2 years old," he said. "I think and feel differently now, now that I'm Christian, now that I'm [the] founder of a $3 billion organization and married for five years," he told Apple Music Beats 1.

Comment: It's a strange world where Kanye West turns out to be a voice of reason, modeling some responsible parenting decisions. There's no reason for little girls to dress like adults and sexualize themselves at such a young age.

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Bullseye

DeVos held in contempt of court in loan forgiveness dispute

Collin Binkley
ABC News
Fri, 25 Oct 2019 03:40 UTC
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos was held in contempt of court after a federal judge said she violated an earlier order to stop collecting loans from former students of a defunct for-profit college chain.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Sallie Kim issued the ruling Thursday in San Francisco, saying DeVos and the department made "only minimal efforts" to comply with a 2018 court order. Kim also fined the Education Department $100,000 and required the agency to make monthly reports to prove it is complying with the order.

The dispute stems from a lawsuit filed by thousands of former Corinthian Colleges students who say they were defrauded by the chain before it collapsed in 2015. The suit says the students are owed full forgiveness of their federal student loans under a rule created by the Obama administration, and it challenges DeVos' 2017 decision to provide only partial relief based on borrowers' incomes.

In a May 2018 decision, Kim ruled that the partial-relief formula was unlawful. She ordered the department to stop using the formula and to stop collecting student loans from former Corinthian students.
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Gem

$1.84 million diamond stolen from Japan jewelry fair


ABC News
Sat, 26 Oct 2019 05:30 UTC
Diamond
Japanese police are investigating a 200 million yen ($1.84 million) diamond allegedly stolen from an international jewelry trade show near Tokyo.

The 50-carat diamond was last seen sitting inside a glass showcase at 5 p.m. Thursday. An hour later, just after closing time, the diamond was gone and the jewelry case was unlocked, according to police.
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