Largest Palestinian displacement in decades looms after Israeli court ruling

2022/6/12 
© Reuters


By Henriette Chacar

MASAFER YATTA, West Bank (Reuters) - Some 1,200 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank region of Masafer Yatta face the risk of forced removal to make way for an army firing zone after a decades-long legal battle that ended last month in Israel's highest court.

The ruling opened the way for one of the largest displacements since Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Middle East war. But residents are refusing to leave, hoping their resilience and international pressure will keep Israel from carrying out the evictions.

"They want to take this land from us to build settlements," said Wadha Ayoub Abu Sabha, a resident of al-Fakheit, one of a group of hamlets where Palestinian shepherds and farmers claim a historic connection to the land.

"We're not leaving," she said.

In the 1980s, Israel declared the area a closed military zone known as "Firing Zone 918". It argued in court that these 3,000 hectares (7,400 acres) along the Israel-West Bank boundary were "highly crucial" for training purposes and that the Palestinians living there were only seasonal dwellers.

"It has been a year of immense grief," said Abu Sabha, her voice breaking as she sat in one of the few tents left standing, lit by a single light bulb.

The communities in this part of the South Hebron Hills traditionally lived in underground caves. Over the past two decades, they have also started building tin shacks and small rooms above ground.

Israeli forces have been demolishing these new constructions for years, Abu Sabha said, but now that they have the court's backing, the evictions are likely to pick up.

Steps away, her family's belongings were reduced to a pile of rubble after soldiers arrived with bulldozers to raze some of the structures. She lamented the significant losses - the dwindling livestock even more than the destroyed furniture.

Much of the argument during the protracted case centered on whether the Palestinians who live across the area are permanent residents or seasonal occupants.

The Supreme Court concluded that the residents "failed to prove their claim of permanent habitation" before the area was declared a firing zone. It relied on aerial photos and excerpts from a 1985 book that both sides cited as evidence.

The book, titled "Life in the Caves of Mount Hebron", was authored by Israeli anthropologist Yaacov Havakook, who spent three years studying the lives of Palestinian farmers and shepherds in Masafer Yatta.

Havakook declined to comment and instead referred Reuters to his book. But he said he had tried to submit an expert opinion on behalf of the residents following a request from one of their lawyers, and was prevented from doing so by the Israeli defence ministry, where he was employed at the time.

INTERNATIONAL CRITICISM

The United Nations and European Union condemned the court ruling and urged Israel to stop the demolitions and evictions.

"The establishment of a firing zone cannot be considered an 'imperative military reason' to transfer the population under occupation," the EU spokesperson said in a statement.

In a transcript 

https://www.akevot.org.il/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/1981-07-12-%D7%95%D7%A2%D7%93%D7%AA-%D7%A9%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%9C%D7%94%D7%AA%D7%99%D7%A9%D7%91%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%A7%D7%98%D7%A2%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%9E%D7%A1%D7%98%D7%A0%D7%95%D7%92%D7%A8%D7%9E%D7%94.pdf 

of a 1981 ministerial meeting on settlements uncovered by Israeli researchers, then-Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon, who later became prime minister, suggested the Israeli military expand training zones in the South Hebron Hills to dispossess the Palestinian residents of their land.

"We want to offer you more training zones," Sharon said, given "the spread of Arab villagers from the hills toward the desert".

The Israeli military told Reuters the area was declared a firing zone for "a variety of relevant operational considerations" and that Palestinians violated the closure order by building without permits over the years.

According to the United Nations, the Israeli authorities reject most Palestinian applications for building permits in "Area C", a swathe of land making up two-thirds of the West Bank where Israel has full control and where most Jewish settlements are located. In other areas of the West Bank, Palestinians exercise limited self-rule.

U.N. data also showed that Israel has marked nearly 30% of Area C as military firing zones. The designations have put 38 of the most vulnerable Palestinian communities at increased risk of forced displacement.

Meanwhile, settlements in the area have continued to expand, further restricting Palestinian movement and the space available for residents to farm and graze their sheep and goats.

"All of these olives are mine," said Mahmoud Ali Najajreh of al-Markez, another hamlet at risk, pointing to a grove in the near distance. "How can we leave?"

The 3,500 olive trees he planted two years ago - he counted each one - were beginning to bud.

"We will wait for the dust to settle, then build again," Najajreh told Reuters. "We would rather die than leave here."

(Reporting by Henriette Chacar; Editing by James Mackenzie and Mark Heinrich)

Puerto Rico at a crossroads as Congress mulls vote to decide statehood or independence

2022/6/12 
© New York Daily News

Parade attendees wave Puerto Rican flags on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan during the annual Puerto Rico Day Parade in 2019.. - Luiz C. Ribeiro/TNS

NEW YORK — As more than 1 million Puerto Ricans return to Fifth Avenue on Sunday for the pageantry and pride of their annual parade, their beloved homeland could soon face a grave choice about its future relationship with the United States.

The swirling celebration comes as the Caribbean island where the revelers trace their roots could soon face a once-in-a-lifetime choice between becoming the 51st state or an independent nation — or something in between.

A recent breakthrough agreement has united both supporters and opponents of Puerto Rico statehood in the U.S. Congress behind a push by a Democratic-led House of Representatives vote to authorize a binding referendum on Puerto Rico’s status.

The three choices would be statehood, independence or a hybrid known as independence with free association, whose terms would be negotiated.

Puerto Rican legislators in the U.S. Congress, and particularly New York City, are deeply divided about which option is best for the U.S. territory and the 5-million-strong diaspora on the mainland.

“This must be a decision coming from the people,” Rep. Nydia Velazquez, D-N.Y., said this month during a fact-finding mission to the island with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. “We are here to listen.”

Velazquez, the dean of the Puerto Rican caucus, is a staunch opponent of statehood, which she fears would dilute the island’s fiercely unique culture and dependence on the Spanish language. Ocasio-Cortez agrees.

But Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., whose South Bronx district includes the most Puerto Ricans in the nation, says statehood is a must if Puerto Ricans are to have a real voice in their future.

One option that would not be on the ballot: keeping the current territorial status. It gives Puerto Rico’s more than 3 million residents U.S. citizenship but does not allow them to vote in presidential elections, denies them many federal benefits and allows them one representative in Congress with limited voting powers. Puerto Rico became a commonwealth in 1952.

From Brooklyn and El Barrio to the South Bronx, New Yorkers with roots in Puerto Rico appear equally split on the island’s future status.

Charles Gonzalez, who hawks Puerto Rican flags, masks and T-shirts emblazoned with the motto “One Proud Rican” from a makeshift market on a Williamsburg, Brooklyn street corner, doesn’t believe the island will ever become the 51st state.

“That’s talking, talking, talking,” Gonzalez said. “The Congress is never going to do that with Puerto Rico.”

Even though Yari Ortin lives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, she considers herself “solely Puerto Rican” and steadfastly wants the island to be an independent nation.

“We are unique, we have our own culture,” said Ortin, 35. “I know many people say it will be bad if the island becomes independent. But things are bad right now.”

Soon-to-be high school graduate Christopher Velez, 18, likes the idea of a hybrid independence with an association agreement with the U.S.

“With independence we won’t survive on our own,” said Velez, of Jamaica, Queens, who was shopping with his dad for a giant Puerto Rican flag ahead of the weekend’s festivities.

Despite the hunger for change, it’s very possible that nothing will happen any time soon. If the House does pass the measure it will go to the Senate where it faces a very uncertain future.

Some Republicans, including Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., support statehood, but GOP leaders fear the political impact of admitting Puerto Rico as a state.

Puerto Rico would have two senators and four House representatives. Although the island’s political parties don’t completely align with the two major ones on the mainland, Republicans fear Democrats would have a big edge, potentially shifting the balance of an evenly split Congress.

During their recent trip to the island, Velazquez and Ocasio-Cortez participated in a public forum in San Juan where speaker after speaker denounced the status quo.

The next step is hearings in the House, followed by a vote possibly this summer. Democrats want to move before the midterm elections that could hand power back to the GOP.

“The visit reminded us just how big the stakes are for so many,” Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., chair of the House committee with jurisdiction over Puerto Rico’s status, told The News.

———

(With Matthew Euzarraga, Ellen Moynihan and Chris Sommerfeldt)

Saudi officials seize rainbow toys in 'homosexuality' crackdown

Agence France-Presse
June 15, 2022

Saudi Arabia is known for its strict interpretation of Islamic law FAYEZ NURELDINE AFP/File

Saudi officials are seizing rainbow-colored toys and articles of clothing from shops in the capital as part of a crackdown on homosexuality, state media reported.

Targeted items include rainbow-colored bows, skirts, hats and pencil cases, most of them apparently manufactured for young children, according to a report broadcast Tuesday evening by the state-run Al-Ekhbariya news channel.

"We are giving a tour of the items that contradict the Islamic faith and public morals and promote homosexual colors targeting the younger generation," says an official from the commerce ministry, which is involved in the campaign.

Gesturing towards a rainbow flag, a journalist says: "The homosexuality flag is present in one of the Riyadh markets."

The colors send a "poisoned message" to children, the report says.

Homosexuality is a potential capital offense in Saudi Arabia, known for its strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law which forms the basis of its entire judicial system.

In April, the kingdom said it had asked Disney to cut "LGBTQ references" from "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness", the latest Marvel movie, but that Disney had refused.

The film ultimately did not screen in Saudi cinemas.

Disney's latest animation "Lightyear," which features a same-sex kiss, has also been banned in Saudi Arabia and more than a dozen other countries, a source close to Disney told AFP Tuesday, though Riyadh has not commented on that film.

Tuesday's Al-Ekhbariya report also showed stills of Benedict Cumberbatch in "Doctor Strange" and of apparently foreign children waving rainbow flags.

The report did not detail how many establishments were targeted or items seized in the commerce ministry operation, and Saudi officials did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment Wednesday.



© 2022 AFP

How progressives lost the 'woke' narrative – and what they can do to reclaim it from the right-wing

Joshua Adams
June 11, 2022

Donald Trump Speaks at CPAC Orlando, Fla. 2022 (CHANDAN KHANNA AFP)



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The first novel in recorded history was published in Japan. It was called The Tale of Genji. It was completed in the early 11th-century by a woman who was later given the name of Murasaki Shikibu. A few years ago, I found out that printing existed in Asia hundreds of years before Johannes Gutenberg assembled his printing press in Europe.

These are facts I never learned in college, let alone K-12. All tended to focus on the Gutenberg story when the history of reading and printing came up. If I suggested that we should teach this in school, many today would call me “woke.” And it wouldn’t only be folks on the right

Many on the left who embrace it’s-class-not-race politics, and who say they value historicism and material reality, would assert that merely broaching these facts (whether true or not) can only be, in essence, about representation, “political correctness” and “identity politic

It’s interesting how these folks say woke, often with a scoff.

Though without the right’s disgust, the overlap on the left is “this argument is unserious and you don’t have to engage with it.”

In an article for The Nation, I explained the Black communal origin of woke in a time before it became a catchall anti-progressive buzzword:

“Woke” was used in the Black community to convey the need to be socially aware of anti-Black oppressive systems, ideas, etc. in order to at least safely navigate through them — and at most dismantle them. A simple analogy would be the code in The Matrix — just knowing it’s there can help a character survive. Woke could range from James Baldwin in “If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is?” or Laurence Fishburne’s character yelling Wake up! in Spike Lee’s School Daze, or Georgia Anne Muldrow saying “Woke is definitely a Black experience.”

Black people have also used woke in (often, but not exclusively) Afro-centric spiritual, cosmological or metaphysical discourse. The topics could be anything from “opening your third eye,” staying attuned to the energy of the people around you, or more charged discussions like not praying to white Jesus or what is the “correct” religion for pan-African people to have.

Now woke can mean anything.

Calling a person by their chosen pronouns? Woke.


A history teacher teaching the truth about slavery? Woke.

Critical of Dave Chappelle’s comedy or Joe Rogan’s podcast? Woke.

An interracial couple in a Pepsi commercial? Woke.

A Black character in Jurassic Park? Woke.

Asking why you can’t make a Black character in Elden Ring? Woke.

According to US Senator Ron Johnson, wokeness is responsible for the Uvalde massacre. This absurdity comes from the right, but some on the left have been just as reactionary toward “wokeness.”

Many on the right and left argue that progressives have been poisoned by the ideology of group essentialism. They say progressive are rejecting individualism and forcing identity politics on the masses.

A more sophisticated leftist critique argues that “wokeness” is another formulation of consumer capitalism preventing class solidarity.

You’d think the anti-woke left would spot the right’s game. You’d think they’d have the tools to disentangle what is good faith and bad faith.

The right often reduces everything on the left to “Marxism.” I hope most folks know that’s silly. However, when the right says everything progressive is “woke,” many on the left, who argue against reductionism and essentialism, end up becoming reductionist and essentialist.

There’s a part of the left that offhandedly dismisses the historical processes and material reality that spur people to galvanize democratic political power through groups that are not solely based on class.


When it comes to politics, there are good reasons why groups (for example African Americans) have had to wield power collectively. When it comes to education, this part of the left often reduces progressive historicism to feeble diversity and inclusion initiatives.

In doing this, they dismiss the possibility that to a teacher (progressive or otherwise), the operating principle underlying the best teaching is teaching the best obtainable version of the truth — something well in keeping with the left’s propensity to historicize and contextualize.

Progressivism has excesses. It can become akin to a cultural bureaucracy. The phrase “cancel culture” makes me want to sigh for an hour. But to the extent that it exists, progressives have their share of responsibility.

But in an effort to distance themselves from “liberals” and “progressives,” too many of the left uncritically accept the right’s castigation of “wokeness” and are often blind to the reactionary logic they would disavow in a different context.

Republicans' stunning misogyny is getting in the way yet again

Amanda Marcotte, Salon
June 15, 2022

John Cornyn (Shutterstock)

Mea culpa time. In the latest edition of my newsletter, Standing Room Only, I was quite sour about reports about the bipartisan gun bill being negotiated by Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. The reporting I'd read suggested the bill was primarily focused on funding for "red flag" laws and mental health spending, both of which are nice but will do little to actually stem the problem of gun violence, especially in red states. But more fleshed-out details since show that one under-discussed aspect of the bill may end up being the most important: A proposal to finally close the "boyfriend loophole" in the federal background check law.

This is something that both feminists and gun control activists have been demanding for decades, only to have Republicans — no fans of either preventing gendered violence or gun deaths — get in the way.

Republican opponents to closing the boyfriend loophole simply see hitting a girlfriend as a lesser crime than hitting a wife.

It's doubly frustrating for how nonsensical the allowance is. Under the current background check system, a person with a domestic violence conviction should be flagged and prevented from purchasing a gun — but only if they married or lived with the person they assaulted. Someone who attacked a dating partner they hadn't moved in with yet can buy all the guns they want. Half of domestic violence murders, however, are at the hands of someone who hasn't lived with their victim. So it's not like this is a minor problem. The ugly implication has been that the Republican opponents to closing the boyfriend loophole simply see hitting a girlfriend as a lesser crime than hitting a wife.

And, well, most still do.

RELATED: Can we stop domestic violence before it turns to murder?

The Republicans who are ever-so-tentatively signed onto Murphy's compromise bill — and who, let's face it, may bolt the first time an NRA lobbyist clears his throat — are a distinct minority in the GOP. Indeed, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Tex., is already indicating that Republicans still refuse to believe beating your girlfriend is as bad as beating your wife.

The other issue: "Well, the other issue has to do with the way that nontraditional relationships are handled in terms of domestic violence and misdemeanors. We got to come up with a good definition of what that actually means."
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) June 15, 2022

If for some reason Republicans relent on this, it could save some lives, because it remains very true that people who commit domestic murders usually committed quite a bit of domestic violence beforehand — just not the lives of women who were able to leave their abuser before marrying them. That's why this provision, if it remains intact, could go a long way toward preventing mass shootings.

Want more Amanda Marcotte on politics? Subscribe to her newsletter Standing Room Only.

The media loves to focus on age, race, motive, and other such factors when looking at commonalities between mass shooters. But ultimately, the biggest one is gender: Nearly all of them are male.

The second most common factor shared by mass shooters is domestic violence.

Statistics compiled by Everytown for Gun Safety show that, in more than half of mass shootings, the shooter killed a member of his family. Further research shows that in nearly 70% of mass shootings, the killer had a history of domestic violence or was targeting a family member in the shooting. And while there are outliers like the Uvalde shooting or the Sandy Hook shooting — where the very young perpetrators shot an older female relative — most of these shooters fit the typical pattern of a man who lashes out at a wife, girlfriend or dating partner.

Indeed, the most deadly mass shooting in Texas — the 2017 church shooting in Sutherland Springs — was a direct result of an angry man seeking to hurt his ex-wife by shooting her family as they worshipped. America's original school shooting, the infamous sniper attack at the University of Texas at Austin in 1966, started when the killer murdered his mother and his wife at home.

RELATED: Texas church shooting and domestic violence: A large and disturbing pattern

It remains hard to get a domestic violence conviction, even when an abuser is guilty. Still, over 300,000 people have been denied the chance to buy a gun because of a domestic violence conviction, despite the boyfriend loophole. If that were closed, not only will thousands of domestic murders be prevented, but some mass shootings will probably be prevented, as well.

There's a point where things get so bad that even the tuned-out must tune back in.

That is, of course, if the law survives the Supreme Court.

On that front, there is reason to worry. As Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a recent dissent, this is a "restless and newly constituted Court." With three Donald Trump appointees, this court is prepared to push through a fascist wishlist of decisions, unchecked by anything resembling a good faith reading of the Constitution. We know this not just by the leaked majority opinion in a recent Mississippi abortion case that indicates the court is about to overturn Roe v. Wade. The decision Sotomayor was rightfully complaining about — which has gotten very little press attention — amounts to the court simply deciding the protections of the Fourth Amendment don't apply to the nearly two-thirds of Americans who live within 100 miles of a border.

60% of the population of the United States just lost any constitutional protections against warrantless assault or home invasion by armed agents. https://t.co/9raxif09hP pic.twitter.com/T0AeoY3eR6

— anildash (@anildash) June 8, 2022

Among the many decisions where the court will likely go full Infowars is New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, a challenge to New York's law requiring people seeking a concealed carry license to demonstrate "proper cause." Unsurprisingly, the much-ballyhooed conservative commitment to "states' rights" only applies when states pass laws that the far-right likes. State legislatures controlled by Democrats have no rights, it seems, to pass laws. It is widely expected that the court will lay waste to New York's right to regulate guns more stringently than, say, Texas.

Unfortunately for those committed to the prevention of mass murder, it's already easy to see how the federal ban on convicted girlfriend-beaters getting guns could face a legal challenge leading directly to an overturn at the Supreme Court. As the Kansas City Star reported on Tuesday, Missouri just passed a law in 2021 preventing "local and state law enforcement from enforcing certain federal gun laws." And Missouri wants to make sure every man who beats women can collect as much lady-killing firepower as he desires: "[S]tate legislators in 2016 voted to allow convicted domestic abusers to carry firearms."

RELATED: Sotomayor: SCOTUS just "immunized" feds from liability "no matter how egregious the misconduct"

Never let anyone bamboozle you into thinking that GOP enthusiasm for abortion bans is about anything but hating women. It certainly isn't about "life."

While it's still a little unclear how this could end up in litigation, one should have little doubt about the dangers ahead. Regardless of who sues who, Missouri has set up a showdown over whose law-making power around guns matters more: Congress or the states? And they have a Supreme Court whose answer will likely be, "depends on which government makes it easier to shoot up a grocery store or elementary school."

Not that the situation is totally hopeless.

Right now, the biggest problem in American politics is too many voters are unaware of how far-right Republicans are or how corrupt the Supreme Court is. The main cure for our crumbling democracy would be for people to wake up already, and stop assuming Donald Trump was an anomaly. Already that process is happening with the Supreme Court, as increasing numbers of Americans are starting to realize how corrupt the court is. The Roe overturn will help speed up that waking up. A decision throwing out the right of Congress to pass even minimum gun laws would help slap people awake, as well. Unfortunately, many innocent people, including little kids, will die in the painfully slow waking-up process. But this situation should be rated as "bleak, but not hopeless." There's a point where things get so bad that even the tuned-out must tune back in. And gun violence is one of those issues where the public seems to be getting very fed up with the far-right minority that has unjust power over the rest of our lives.

'Jesus, guns, babies': Religious violence is now at the core of the Republican Party
Thomas Lecaque, Alternet
June 14, 2022

Gage Skidmore

At the tail end of last week, Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado took the stage at the Charis Christian Center's Family Camp Meeting. The event claims that, "you will hear God's Word shared through speakers who have proven God's Word," and follows the speakers' list with Acts 2:17-18:

And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; even on my male servants and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.

The apocalyptic context notwithstanding, Boebert's talk made quite a splash because of her invocation of Psalm 109:8 in the context of praying for President Biden — "May his days be few and another take his office" — before laughing at the cheers of the crowd. This is certainly not a new use of that text by the GOP — Sen. David Perdue of Georgia invoked it against Obama in 2016, and it became an anti-Obama slogan featured on bumper stickers. With the passage divorced from its full context, people can laugh — but Psalm 109 is a war psalm, calling for the death of the man in question, with 109:9 reading "Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow." And that's the point: As with so many aspects of contemporary Christian nationalism, give the line people can nod along to, and hold back the violent context. This is a prayer for the death of the president, and it is one we can honestly say has become normal for Republicans to use about Democratic presidents.

Maybe that's a big enough problem that we should acknowledge it not just as a fringe phenomenon, but as part of the core problem of the contemporary, MAGA-infused GOP.

Of course, Boebert has gone much further than prayers against the president. She met with organizers of the Jan. 6 coup attempt beforehand. She tweeted the locations of lawmakers, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi, as insurrectionists were breaking into the Capitol. Like Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Boebert and her family have posed for Christmas cards with AR-15-style weapons, with all of the problematic associations of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth with weapons designed for combat. These things — Jesus, guns and, with family photos, babies — are in fact pillars of the Christian nationalist branch of the GOP.

Georgia candidate Kandiss Taylor called fellow Republican Brian Kemp "Luciferian" and defined the First Amendment as "our right to worship Jesus freely — that's why we have a country."

Kandiss Taylor's failed Republican gubernatorial primary campaign in Georgia was incredibly instructive on where the GOP now stands. Her campaign bus, which literally had "Jesus, Guns, Babies" emblazoned on the side, was just the most overt aspect of her Christian nationalist campaign. She told followers to pray for good sheriffs and said that corrupt ones would be executed for treason, strongly implying her belief in the extremist "constitutional sheriff" doctrine, which holds sheriffs are arbiters of what the law is in their counties, not enforcers of it. She said at one campaign rally, "We're gonna do a political rally and we're gonna honor Jesus. They're not gonna tell us 'separation of church and state.' We are the church! We run this state!" — an aggressively Christian nationalist idea. Taylor called Gov. Brian Kemp's administration a "Luciferian regime," andsaid that as governor she would release an executive order against the "Satanic elites," and vowed to tear down the "Satanic" Ge orgia Guidestones.

Taylor even championed Native genocide, saying, "The First Amendment right, which is our right to worship Jesus freely — that's why we have a country. That's why we have Georgia. That's why we had our Founding Fathers come over here and destroy American Indians' homes and their land. They took it." And, of course, she champions the Big Lie, saying on Twitter, "We are in a spiritual war ... it's God versus Satan. If GA goes down, if we let them steal the election from us .. we're gonna steal it back if we have to." That carried over to her own loss — despite losing the primary by 70 points, she refused to concede.

We might well ask: So what? Taylor was defeated by a staggering margin, as were numerous other Christian nationalist candidates. Rep. Madison Cawthorn, for example, lost his primary race in North Carolina after the Republican establishment turned on him. Idaho Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin embraced extremism, appearing with militia members in photo ops, administering oaths to them reserved for the state military, and appeared on video at the America First PAC meeting, saying, "God calls us to pick up the sword and fight, and Christ will reign in the state of Idaho." She lost by 20 points. The Republican candidate for secretary of state in California, Rachel Hamm, said she decided to run for office because she was a prophetic dreamer, and because her youngest son, "a seer," had found Jesus in the closet where she prays, holding a scroll telling her to run. She also lost and then claimed fraud, tweeting, "When you've fought the good fight, had an honest contest & lost, that's when you concede. So, in my case, there will be no concession. Stolen elections=stolen Republic."

And then there those who are still running. Greg Lopez, a GOP gubernatorial candidate in Colorado, believes in a blanket ban on abortion, rejects climate change, has said that the "educational system has now been converted into state indoctrination centers" and is a proponent of the Big Lie. He appeared, alongside a range of conspiracy theorists and far right figures, at the Western Conservative Summit at the beginning of the month. And he is not shy about his negative views of the LGBTQ community, a common theme among GOP candidates.

Mark Burns in South Carolina, for example, was an early Trump supporter in 2016. He's an evangelical minister, a conspiracy theorist and pastor at the Harvest Praise & Worship Center. He's running for Congress in the state's 4th congressional district, and his platform reads like a grab bag of right-wing ideas:

Our right to bear arms is INHERENT, given to us by God almighty -- NOT by any man;
If we don't fix these elections NOW, America will be lost. Without open, honest, transparent elections, no other issue matters;
Life begins at conception;
Marriage is defined as between one man and one woman;
Critical Race Theory is Communist, anti-white Racism;
Vaccine and mask mandates are medical tyranny, and have no place in America;
The Pelosi budget opens the door wide open to full-blown communism.

And while these may sound like wild ideas, they're nothing compared to what Burns says. He has called for reviving the House Un-American Activities Committee — yes, the infamous Red-hunters of the 1940s — to investigate LGBTQ "indoctrination," which he calls a national security threat, saying that anyone engaged in it (or in gun control) should be tried for treason, and executed. Burns is literally calling for reviving the "lavender scare," which has a certain evil logic because that, in essence, is where Christian nationalists have settled in the culture wars: anti-trans legislation, anti-LGBTQ rallies and attacks, and pushing to re-criminalize sexual minorities.

The Jesus part is obvious. The guns have been covered, be it Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano's links to the apocalyptic Rod of Iron Ministries or the marketing of AR-15-style guns as sacred weapons. But babies may be the most important part of it. Attacks on the LGBTQ community must be understood in the context of right-wing ideas about sexual purity and a full-blown mania for forced birth legislation. Anti-abortion laws, attacks on contraception and attacks on sexual minorities are all part of a Christian nationalist assault on the nation. Movements like Quiverfull, taken from Psalm 127, have a number of political aspects alongside a belief system that shuns birth control and believes God will give them the right number of children. They literally believe that whoever has the most babies wins, and see that as the fundamental political and spiritual battle. One Quiverfull-affiliated author has said:

It is the womb that conceives and nourishes the "godly seed" who will come forth to be the light in the darkness and who will destroy the works of Satan in this world. God is looking for an army. ... The womb is a powerful weapon against Satan. Some women fear to bring babies into this evil world, but this is one of the greatest reasons for having children — to be the light in this dark world!

Quiverfull is a Christian patriarchy movement, not only pushing female submission to husbands and fathers, and eschewing education and contraception to win the culture war — as Salon reporter Kathryn Joyce has detailed in her book "Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement" — but also contributing to the protection of sexual predators in church communities and vigorously promoting the anti-abortion and forced birth laws being passed around the country.

I would also suggest, rather forcefully, that Christian patriarchy and Christian nationalism are linked to the "great replacement" theory, the deeply racist and xenophobic notion that nonwhite people are being brought into Western countries to "replace" white voters, in order to further a specific political agenda, leading to the supposed extinction of white people. As is well understood, this delusional ideology has fueled multiple massacres, including the mass shooting in Buffalo in May and earlier mass shootings in El Paso, Pittsburgh and Christchurch, New Zealand. Forced-birth laws and abortion bans are also part of this perceived demographic war, part and parcel with the spiritual battles Christian nationalists believe they are fighting and the very real stockpiling of arms, association with militia groups and opposition to government. PRRI's August 2021 survey shows that "great replacement" ideas are growing in evangelical circles, and have only become more mainstream since then.

Religious violence is the bedrock of Christian nationalism, and Christian nationalism is becoming the bedrock of the contemporary Republican Party. Forced birth laws, anti-LGBTQ legislation and the "great replacement" theory are all forms of violence, and all but certain to fuel the spread of more lethal violence. "Jesus, Guns and Babies" may seem like a laughable slogan, stripped of context. But it isn't funny at all.

Patriarchy and purity culture combine to silence women in the Southern Baptist Convention

The Conversation
June 14, 2022

Sad woman (Shutterstock)

A devastating yearlong investigation into the executive committee of the largest conservative evangelical denomination in the U.S., the Southern Baptist Convention, has documented widespread claims of sex abuse including accusations of rape, cover-ups and gross mistreatment of women seeking justice.

In 2019 the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News partnered on a series of investigative reports on sexual misconduct by Southern Baptists with formal church roles. Subsequently, the annual meeting of the SBC held in June 2021 voted to authorize an investigations firm, Guidepost Solutions, to conduct an independent probe of its executive committee and its handling of sex abuse. The report and the list of alleged offenders has recently been made public.

I am a scholar of evangelicalism, gender and American culture, and over several years of my research I have seen how deeply ingrained aspects of conservative white evangelicalism force women to stay silent. In researching my two books, “Evangelical Christian Women” and “Building God’s Kingdom,” I found how structures of patriarchy force women to stay silent.

These deeply ingrained aspects of conservative white evangelicalism include “complementarianism,” or the patriarchal view that God gives authority to men and requires submission from women, and purity culture, an extreme version of sexual abstinence.
Purity culture

The SBC’s “True Love Waits,” a premarital abstinence campaign for teens launched in 1992, was an important component of the rise of purity culture. It was best known for the purity rings that girls wore as part of a pledge to their virginity to God and family.

More than merely the value of forgoing sex until marriage, purity culture centers sexual purity as a primary measure of the value of young women, who need to remain “pure” to attract a godly man in marriage. Sex education is virtually nonexistent, and dating is traded for “courtship” leading to marriage, under the authority of the girl’s father.

As author Linda Kay Klein writes in her book “Pure,” women are taught that they are responsible not only for their own purity, but for the purity of the males around them. Women are also made to believe that they are responsible if men are led to sin by what women wear. Additionally, they can be blamed for being inadequately submissive and for speaking up when they should be quiet. Women raised with these teachings also report experiencing tremendous fear and shame around issues of gender, sex and marriage.

The rhetoric of purity culture can be traced directly to the racist origins of the Southern Baptist Convention. The defense of slavery was the very foundation upon which the denomination was built, and the protection of the “purity of white womanhood” was a the justification for the perpetuation of white supremacy that outlived slavery.

How survivors described the abuse

Credibly accused men were protected by the SBC, while the women who dared to speak up were called sluts, adulteresses, Jezebels and even agents of Satan. For example, the report details the story of one woman whose abuse was mischaracterized by the SBC’s Baptist Press as a consensual affair and she was harassed online and called an adulteress. She ultimately lost her job at a Southern Baptist organization.

The report, which the former SBC leader Russell Moore calls “apocalyptic,” details harassment, insults and attacks on social media, some of which came from Baptist leaders to whom the women had been taught God required them to revere and submit. For example, the executive staff member at the center of handling abuse accusations, Augie Boto, characterized the survivors seeking justice as doing the work of Satan.



Survivor after survivor described their treatment at the hands of their own leaders as worse than their initial assaults. One survivor told investigators that when she provided details of her sexual abuse as a child among other things, one Executive Committee (EC) member “turn(ed) his back to her while she was speaking … and another EC member chortl(ed).”

“I ask you to try to imagine what it’s like to speak about something so painful to a room in which men disrespect you in such a way. … to speak about this horrific trauma of having my pastor repeatedly rape me as a child, only to have religious leaders behave in this way,” she said.
Shaming and silencing women

When victims are permitted to tell their stories to people in authority, it is likely to be an all-male committee including perhaps friends of the accused.

In such a hearing women – who because of purity culture practices have often been taught to always be modest and quiet in mixed company and may have had little to no sex education – are asked to detail what they often say is the most painful experience of their lives. Purity culture creates in women a strong sense of shame surrounding their bodies, their own sexuality, and sex in general. When they exhibit evidence of that shame it is taken as an admission that they share responsibility for the abuse.

Like their forebears before them who mobilized the mythic purity of white womanhood to shore up their power, today’s leaders at the center of this report remain male and overwhelmingly white. They use the language of purity culture to shame and silence women seeking justice while, at the same time, leading the charge in the fight against coming to terms with racism.

Can there be real reform?

The chairman of the SBC executive committee, Rolland Slade, and interim President and CEO Willie McLaurin said in a statement, in response to the report: “We are grieved by the findings of this investigation. We are committed to doing all we can to prevent future instances of sexual abuse in churches, to improve our response and our care, to remove reporting roadblocks.” Other Baptists too have expressed shock and anger at the revelations.

The Guidepost Solutions report concludes with a series of strategies such as forming an independent committee to oversee reforms, including providing resources for prevention and reporting of abuse. As helpful as these strategies may be, they don’t address how the underlying culture of the SBC continues to maintain the structures of white patriarchy.


By Julie Ingersoll, Professor of Religious Studies, University of North Florida

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

'So much for being deprogrammed': The View questions if Ginni Thomas has been pulled into QAnon after being in a cult

Sarah K. Burris
June 15, 2022

Gage Skimore

The wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is continuing to be exposed for her pro-Trump activism, but a recent report revealed that she was once part of a cult. After being "deprogrammed," as she described, Thomas became an advocate against such groups.

Associates of Mrs. Thomas are concerned, however, that in the past few years, she has been sucked in once more after she's been linked to QAnon, which some are also describing as a kind of right-wing cult.

Co-hosts of "The View" on Wednesday conveyed their concern that Thomas is part of such movements and influencing her husband when it comes to the Supreme Court. In the past, Thomas has spoken about the "enemies of America" which she defines as the left. She has alleged that the left is trying to "kill" people like her and that's why it's important for her and others to have guns.

"So much for the deprogramming," quipped Joy Behar.

The cult she belong to was a kind of self-help multi-level marketing scheme where people would attend self-help seminars then if they brought people into the group they would rise in status. It wasn't specifically focused on a particular religion, which is how Sara Haines said that it was able to fly under the radar.

"That makes so much sense to me now that she was susceptible to these QAnon sort of base conspiracy theories of the election fraud and the 'big lie' and 'this was stolen.' She had — let's face it — weekly sometimes lunch meetings with this narcissistic or perhaps narcissistic president. I mean, you knew him and worked for him," Sunny Hostin said to former White House aide Alyssa Farah.

Farah noted that those with narcissistic personalities have a tendency to be more susceptible to cults because they place their own beliefs over that of others who might be fact-checking.

"This one is particularly irritating because, A: this is a sitting Supreme Court justice's wife," said Whoopi Goldberg. "That means he's listening to cases being argued in front of him while his wife is pushing a lie, and nothing's been done thus far. So, I don't know if she's in one of the weeks that they (the House Select Committee) have planned out to break it down. I hope so, because this does not make any sense to me, and, you know, if this is -- listen. I have a lot of friends who found themselves in the midst of couple cults. Some really, deep, deep, deep, and some who said, 'Oh. That's not for me.' And they find themselves because everybody is looking to connect. Especially after being in lockdown. But the idea that she is actively still working to push this lie stuns me, and that no one—- because you've said to us, there's nothing you can do to the justice."

READ MORE: Dem Capitol Hill staffer highlights the most 'chilling' parts of newly released 'reconnaissance tour' video

Sunny Hostin said that no one fully understands other people's relationships, "but the two of them together, considering that he is such a renowned legal mind and now she's a former cult member, I'm really surprised at this."

Goldberg noted that sometimes people get married and they're laying in bed together when the partner says, "you know, one time, I was married to a fish. And you're like, what?"

Hostin read a legal note that Mrs. Thomas continues to deny that there is any conflict of interest between her activism and her husband's position on the court.

Goldberg cut in after the legal disclaimer to assert, "we all know that's not true."


See the conversation below or at this link.

Nearly one in three children in north-east England on free school meals

Figures shows 10% rise in FSM across England and school leaders say real child poverty level is even higher

Students eating their school dinner. Department for Education figures show that 22.5% of state school pupils in England are on free school meals. 

Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA Media


Richard Adams 

THE GUARDIAN

Education editorThu 9 Jun 2022 

Nearly one in three children in the north-east of England are receiving free school meals (FSM), according to figures that reveal a 10% rise across England, as school leaders say the real level of child poverty is even higher.

The figures released in the Department for Education (DfE) annual school census show that 22.5% of state school pupils are on FSM, up from 20.8% last year, reflecting the increasing number of households receiving universal credit and earning less than £7,400 a year after tax.


Four years ago 13.6% of children were on FSM. That meant fewer than one in seven pupils were eligible. The current rate is one in 4.4.

Paul Whiteman, the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), said: “Our members have described the rise in poverty in their schools’ communities over the past year as shocking and stark. It is clear that the combined pressures of Covid-19 and the cost of living crisis have driven more families and children into poverty.”

Poor families skipping meals and unable to afford heating, charity says

While the proportion of children on FSM increased across England, the north-east of England had the highest rate, with 29.1% of pupils eligible, while the north-west, the West Midlands, London, and Yorkshire and the Humber had about 25% of pupils eligible.

The south-east of England had the lowest rate, with 17.6%.

Anna Turley, the chair of the North East Child Poverty Commission, said: “It’s clear that the current threshold for free school meals – which hasn’t changed since 2018 – is totally inadequate, with many thousands of north-east pupils growing up in poverty but unable to receive this vital support.

“That picture is only going to get even worse in the coming months, as families grapple with soaring household bills and even more children face going hungry, with all the obvious consequences for their health and ability to learn.”

The Child Poverty Action Group said based on the latest figures, a further 800,000 children were living in poverty but did not qualify for FSM.

Julie McCulloch, director of policy at the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), said it was even more shocking that current eligibility “does not even capture all the children who need help. Free school meal eligibility now applies to 22.5% of pupils but we know that the level of child poverty is about 30%.”

ASCL, the NAHT and other groups have been lobbying the government to widen FSM eligibility to include children from all households receiving universal credit, not just those earning less than £7,400 a year.

More than 50% of Gypsy and Roma pupils were eligible for FSM, as were more than 40% of children from Black Caribbean backgrounds. More than 21% of white British pupils were eligible.

Labour’s Stephen Morgan, the shadow schools minister, said: “The alarming rise in children eligible for free school meals is symptomatic of a cost of living crisis made worse by Downing Street. Unchecked inflation and Conservative choices to increase taxes are piling the pressure on families and school budgets.”

The DfE said: “We communicate regularly with schools and councils so they know what is available for these children. We know millions of families are struggling with the rising cost of living, which is why we are providing over £37bn to target those with the greatest need.”

ZIONIST SHOW TRIAL FOR PALESTINIAN POLITICAL PRISONER


Israeli court convicts Palestinian aid worker after six years in detention


By Henriette Chacar

BEERSHEBA, Israel (Reuters) - An Israeli court on Wednesday convicted a Palestinian aid worker who has been detained for six years on Israeli charges he funneled tens of millions of dollars in relief funds to the militant group Hamas.

The Beersheba District Court found El Halabi guilty of supporting a terror organisation but acquitted him of treason, judges reading out the verdict said. They set a sentencing hearing for July.

Mohammad El Halabi, head of Gaza operations for World Vision, an international Christian non-governmental organisation, was arrested in June 2016. Israel accused him of siphoning off up to $50 million to pay Hamas fighters, buy arms and fund the group's activities.

El Halabi has consistently denied the charges against him and has refused several plea deal offers.

World Vision, which focuses on helping children, said an independent audit found no evidence of wrongdoing or of funds missing. It said that in the 10-year period El Halabi was employed, it budgeted around $22.5 million for operations in Gaza, making the amount El Halabi allegedly diverted "hard to reconcile".

"World Vision acknowledges with disappointment the decision issued by the Beersheva District Court convicting Mr. Mohammad El Halabi," Sharon Marshall, senior director of public engagement for the organisation, said in a statement outside the court after the verdict was delivered.

"We're going to support Mohammad through whatever appeal process he has left in front of him because we believe, based on what we've seen in the court and in investigations, that he is innocent of the charges," Marshall told Reuters.

International human rights organisations have criticised El Halabi's prolonged detention and trial. Human Rights Watch said the guilty verdict against him "compounds a miscarriage of justice. Holding al-Halabi for six years based largely on secret evidence has made a mockery of due process and the most basic fair trial provisions."

On Tuesday, ahead of the verdict, the head of the United Nations Human Rights Office in Palestine, James Heenan, also expressed concern over whether El Halabi's trial had met international fair trial standards.

Widespread use of secret evidence, reliance on closed proceedings and credible allegations of ill-treatment in detention "paint a picture of enormous pressure on Mr el-Halabi to confess in the absence of evidence,” Heenan said.

In Gaza, dozens of Palestinians gathered with posters of El Halabi to show their support.

"This is a grave mistake and an injustice," his father, Khalil El Halabi, told Reuters. "My son is innocent."

(Reporting by Henriette Chacar in Beersheba; Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel)

Israeli court STAR CHAMBER finds Gaza aid worker guilty on terror charges

BEERSHEBA, Israel (AP) — An Israeli court on Wednesday found a Gaza aid worker guilty of several terrorism charges in a high-profile case in which his employer, independent auditors and the Australian government say they have found no evidence of wrongdoing.

Mohammed el-Halabi, the Gaza director for the international Christian charity World Vision, was arrested in 2016 and accused of diverting tens of millions of dollars to the Islamic militant group Hamas that rules the territory. The trial, and his prolonged detention, have further strained relations between Israel and humanitarian organizations that provide aid to Palestinians.

Both he and World Vision have denied the allegations and an independent audit in 2017 also found no evidence of support for Hamas. His lawyer, Maher Hanna, has said el-Halabi turned down several plea bargain offers on principle that would have allowed him to walk free.

El-Halabi has not yet been sentenced. World Vision said he would appeal the ruling, which was largely based on classified information that has not been made public but was shared with the defense.

The district court in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba said el-Halabi was guilty of several charges, including membership in a terror organization, providing information to a terror group, taking part in militant exercises and carrying a weapon.

It said he diverted “millions” of dollars every year, as well as equipment, from World Vision and its donors to Hamas. It said Hamas used the funds for militant activities, as well as children's counseling, food aid and Quran memorization contests for its supporters. Pipes and nylon diverted to Hamas were used for military purposes, it said.

The court said it was not convinced by World Vision's testimony that it had firm controls in place that would have prevented the diversion of such aid. The court said the full 254-page decision is “confidential and cannot be made public.”

It appeared to rely heavily on a confession by el-Halabi that has not been made public. His lawyer has said the confession was given under duress to an informant and should not have been admitted as evidence.

The court said the confession was “given in various ways," and "is detailed, coherent, truthful and has many unique details,” including the names and ranks of Hamas operatives, and descriptions of strategic locations in Gaza.

Speaking to reporters immediately after the verdict, Hanna said he had not yet read the full decision. But he accused the judge of siding with Israeli security forces and relying on evidence that has not been made public — and which he has previously described as unreliable.

"All the judge said, if I want to summarize it in one sentence: ‘The security forces cannot be wrong, they are probably right,'” he told reporters.


Sharon Marshall, a spokeswoman for World Vision who has closely followed the case, said there had been “irregularities in the trial process and a lack of substantive and publicly available evidence.” She said the charity supports el-Halabi's intent to appeal and called for a “fair and transparent" process.

“We strongly condemn any act of terrorism or support of such activities, and reject any attempts to divert humanitarian resources or exploit the work of humanitarian organizations operating anywhere,” she said.

The Christian charity operates in nearly 100 countries and annually distributes some $2.5 billion in aid.

Israeli authorities have repeatedly said they have proof that Hamas had infiltrated the aid group and was diverting funds from needy Gazans. Then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu trumpeted the charges in an online video shortly after el-Halabi’s arrest.

Critics say Israel often relies on questionable informants. They allege that Israel smears groups that provide aid or other support to Palestinians in order to shore up its nearly 55-year military occupation of lands the Palestinians want for a future state.

Israel says it supports the work of aid organizations but must prevent donor funds from falling into the hands of armed groups like Hamas that do not recognize it and attack its citizens.

In a statement, the Israeli Foreign Ministry acknowledged the verdict while saying it “continues to support international efforts to provide assistance to the Gazan population."

Israel “remains committed to cooperating with, and facilitating, the continued operations of humanitarian organizations, including World Vision, in a manner consistent with security considerations and applicable standards,” it said.

After el-Halabi’s arrest, World Vision suspended its activities in Gaza, where over 2 million Palestinians live under an Israeli-Egyptian blockade imposed when Hamas seized power nearly 15 years ago. Israel says the restrictions are needed to contain Hamas, while critics view them as a form of collective punishment.

World Vision worked with several Western donor countries to construct an independent audit of its activities in Gaza. It declined to name the auditors because of a non-disclosure agreement, but last year the Guardian newspaper identified them as the international accounting firm Deloitte and DLA Piper, a global law firm.

A team of around a dozen lawyers, including several former assistant U.S. attorneys, reviewed nearly 300,000 emails and conducted over 180 interviews. Forensic auditors scoured nearly every financial transaction at World Vision from 2010 until 2016.

In July 2017, they submitted an over 400-page report of their findings to World Vision, which shared it with donor governments. World Vision said it offered the report to Israel, but Israeli authorities refused to sign the non-disclosure agreement.

Brett Ingerman, a lawyer with DLA Piper who headed the investigation, confirmed its involvement and told The Associated Press earlier this year that the report found no evidence that el-Halabi was affiliated with Hamas or had diverted any funds. Instead, he said it found that el-Halabi had enforced internal controls and ordered employees to avoid anyone suspected of Hamas ties.

The Australian government conducted its own review, reaching similar conclusions. Australia was the biggest single donor to World Vision’s humanitarian work in Gaza, providing some $4.4 million in the previous three fiscal years before el-Halabi's arrest. There was no immediate comment on the verdict from Australian officials.

___

Krauss reported from Jerusalem. Associated Press reporter Isaac Scharf in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Emily Rose And Joseph Krauss, The Associated Press