Monthly Archives: July 2016

Bahamas to Its Citizens Traveling to the US: Beware of out of Control Cops

By Clarice Palmer. Published 7-9-2016 by The Anti-Media

The International Arrivals Hall at Boston Logan International Airport’s Terminal E. Photi: hildgrim/flickr/CC

It appears even foreigners are scared of United States law enforcement.

The Bahamian government is warning its citizens to use extreme caution when traveling to the United States. The recommendation follows the “extrajudicial killings” of blacks, Caribbean outlet Antillean Media Group (AMG) reports, “which have spurred increased unrest across America.” Continue reading →

“Why Do You Have to Make These Shootings About Race?” Because They Are

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By PM Beers. Published 7-9-2016 by The Anti-Media

#BlackLivesMatter protest in St. Paul – September 2015. Photo: Fibonacci Blue from Minnesota, USA [CC BY 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Baton Rouge, LA — “Why do you always have to make it about race?”

“Because it IS about race.”

This is a common, growing conversation in the United States.

Continue reading →

Legal Experts Raise Alarm over Shocking Use of ‘Killer Robot’ in Dallas

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‘The fact that the police have a weapon like this…is an example of the militarization of the police and law enforcement—and goes in the wrong direction’

By Nadia Prupis, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 7-8-2016

Dallas Police Chief David Brown giving a press conference on Friday morning. (Screenshot)

As news emerges that police officers in Dallas, Texas used an armed robot to kill the suspected shooter in Thursday night’s ambush, experts are warning that it represents a sea change in police militarization that only heightens risks to human and constitutional rights.

Dallas Police Chief David Brown said Friday morning during a press conference that police “saw no other option but to use our bomb robot and place a device on its extension for it to detonate” where the suspect had taken refuge in a parking garage as police tried to negotiate with him, adding that he was “deceased as a result of detonating the bomb.” Continue reading →

‘Horrific Human Rights Crime’: Another Environmental Activist Slain in Honduras

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Lesbia Yaneth Urquía Urquía, a compatriot of two other recently murdered campaigners, was found dead beside a municipal landfill on Wednesday

By Nika Knight, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 7-7-2016

Members of COPINH hold a rally in Honduras during an international day of action for Berta Cáceres in June. (Photo: COPINH)

Another Indigenous environmental activist has been killed in Honduras, teleSUR reports.

The activist, identified as Lesbia Yaneth Urquía Urquía, was abducted and found dead near a municipal dump with severe head trauma on Wednesday.

Urquía was a member of the Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), the Indigenous rights group founded by slain activist Berta Cáceres. Urquía “fought against the building of hydroelectric power plants on Indigenous land,” according to teleSUR. Continue reading →

Obama’s Civilian Drone Death Count up to 500% Higher Than US Mass Shootings

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By Claire Bernish. Published 7-6-2016 by The Anti-Media

An MQ-1 Predator at Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan. Photo: Maj. David Kurle [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

United States — Obama’s drones have ‘officially’ killed more innocent people than mass shooters — despite paranoia surrounding gun control and propaganda about unhinged loose cannons shooting civilians en masse.

According to President Obama’s administration — in a years-in-the-making report — drones used in military combat overseas killed between 64 and 116 civilians between 2009 and the close of 2015 — almost certainly a paltry representation of the true total, considering accurate record-keeping remains a near impossibility. Continue reading →

Israel’s New Open-Fire Rule Authorizes ‘Extra-Judicial Execution’ of Palestinian Youths

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Israeli police regulations, previously kept classified, permit preemptive and fatal recourse against suspected stone-throwers

By Lauren McCauley, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 7-5-2016

Palestinian teens protesting the murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir. Photo: Flash 90

Israeli police are officially permitted to use deadly force against stone-throwing Palestinian teenagers, according to updated regulations made public on Tuesday by an Israel-based human rights organization.

The new open-fire regulations, revealed by Adalah, a rights organization and legal center that defends Palestinians living in Israel as well as the occupied territories, state that “an officer is permitted to open fire [with live ammunition] directly on an individual who clearly appears to be throwing or is about to throw a firebomb, or who is shooting or is about to shoot fireworks, in order to prevent endangerment.” Continue reading →

What If We Could No Longer Celebrate Freedom on the 4th of July?

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By Claire Bernish. Published 7-4-2016 by The Anti-Media

Photo via Pinterest

United States — What if people, sickened by tyrannical control, threw off the shackles of bloated governance in favor of leading themselves? What if the erosion of fundamental freedoms — guaranteed not by a document, but by being human — were actually intolerable as so much grumbling intimated? What if government intrusion into people’s bedrooms, communications, sovereign corporeal decisions — of vice, health, and more — means of subsistence, financial choices, business, education, and innumerable other aspects, were utterly unacceptable?

What if even the revolutionary roots, the foundation, of the nation were soaked in the blood of countless individuals and peoples — a likely sign no tangible freedom would last beyond lip service? Continue reading →

Why I’m not discussing genocide in Jerusalem

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Jerusalem is not just a site of ‘conflict’, as the INOGS conference programme says. It is a site in which questions of ‘genocide’, the deliberate destruction of communities, are all too live.

By Martin Shaw. Published 6-25-2016 by openDemocracy

Photo: @BDSmovement/Twitter

The International Network of Genocide Scholars (INOGS) is holding a conference in Jerusalem this weekend. The initiative has attracted an attack by Israel Charny in the Jerusalem Post under the lurid heading, ‘Genocide scholars who minimize the Holocaust – and some who are coming to town’. This summarised his article published in the pseudo-academic Journal for the Study of Antisemitism, reporting a flawed survey of his friends and acquaintances interested in genocide about their attitudes to the Journal of Genocide Research (JGR), the premier journal in the field which is sponsored by INOGS. Continue reading →

As World Burns, Richest Nations Can’t Decide When to End Fossil Fuel Handouts

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Despite ambitious pledges, global energy ministers could not agree on a target date to phase out billions in subsidies to dirty energy

By Nadia Prupis, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 7-1-2016

“The world is in a deep hole with climate change, and the first thing to do in a hole is stop digging,” said Stephen Kretzmann of Oil Change International. (Photo: ribarnica/flickr/cc)

The world’s richest nations have failed to agree on a deadline to phase out fossil fuels subsidies—a commitment energy ministers made in 2009—stirring new fears over the impact of the hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars that go toward keeping dirty energy afloat every year.

Energy ministers from the Group of 20 (G20) met in Beijing on Wednesday and Thursday to discuss bringing those subsidies to a close after the Group of 7 (G7), the world’s seven wealthiest economies, last month committed to eliminate “inefficient” fossil fuel handouts by 2025. A report published in 2015 by the climate group Oil Change International found that the combined G20 subsidies for oil, gas, and coal production amounts to roughly $444 billion a year. Continue reading →

‘Quite Disturbing’: Leaked Docs Reveal How Easily FBI Can Spy on Journalists

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‘The other major question here is: why are these rules secret in the first place?’

By Deirdre Fulton, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 7-1-2016

Leaked document shows the FBI does not have to jump through a lot of hoops to get access to journalists’ call data. (Photo: Roger H. Goun/flickr/cc)

Newly leaked documents published by The Intercept expose just how easy it is for the FBI to spy on journalists using so-called National Security Letters (NSLs).

The classified rules, which had previously been released only in heavily redacted form, “show that the FBI imposes few constraints on itself when it bypasses the requirement to go to court and obtain subpoenas or search warrants before accessing journalists’ information,” The Intercept‘s Cora Currier wrote on Thursday. Continue reading →

Occupy World Writes

The Movement Continues – Globally

Monthly Archives: July 2016

Obama’s Civilian Drone Death Count up to 500% Higher Than US Mass Shootings

Israel’s New Open-Fire Rule Authorizes ‘Extra-Judicial Execution’ of Palestinian Youths

Israeli police regulations, previously kept classified, permit preemptive and fatal recourse against suspected stone-throwers

As World Burns, Richest Nations Can’t Decide When to End Fossil Fuel Handouts

Despite ambitious pledges, global energy ministers could not agree on a target date to phase out billions in subsidies to dirty energy

‘Quite Disturbing’: Leaked Docs Reveal How Easily FBI Can Spy on Journalists

‘The other major question here is: why are these rules secret in the first place?’