Atheist Ireland granted special UN status in bid to promote ‘secular government’

Irish organisation is believed to be the first national atheist campaign group to gain such status

Michael Nugent and Jane Donnelly of Atheist Ireland. They said they would be highlighting religious discrimination in Irish schools at a meeting of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child next month. Photograph Nick Bradshaw

Patsy McGarry
Sat Dec 31 2022 - 

Atheist Ireland has been granted special consultative status at the United Nations in what is believed to be a first for a national campaign group of its type.

“It means we can engage with the UN Economic and Social Council, Human Rights Council, General Assembly, and Secretariat, in order to advance our aims,” said the group’s chair Michael Nugent and human rights officer Jane Donnelly in a joint statement.

“On January 24th and 25th, we will attend our first UN session with special consultative status, when the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child will be questioning Ireland in Geneva. We will be highlighting religious discrimination in Irish schools including the lack of objective sex education,” they said.

While there is at least one international atheist group with consultative status at the UN, it is understood Atheist Ireland is the first national-level atheist organisation to secure such status.

Atheist Ireland was founded in November 2008 to to promote secularism, rationality, pluralism and human rights in Ireland. It advocates for atheism and reason over superstition and supernaturalism, and an ethical, secular society where the State does not support or finance or give special treatment to any religion.

In recent years it has made over 20 submissions to various international bodies on such as the elimination of racial discrimination, of discrimination against women and to UN special rapporteurs on freedom of religion and minority issues.

In Ireland the group has worked together with the Evangelical Alliance and the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Ireland on secular issues.

“We at Atheist Ireland are proud to be the first national-level atheist organisation to be granted special consultative status at the United Nations. It reflects the hard work of many Atheist Ireland members and supporters over the past 14 years. We will use this opportunity to continue to advance our goal of promoting ethical, secular government based on human rights, where states treat everybody equally regardless of their religious or nonreligious philosophical beliefs,” Mr Nugent and Ms Donnelly said.

UK

‘Radio silence’ from government on ending strikes, says RMT’s Mick Lynch

Story by Adam Forrest • The Independent

There has been “radio silence” from the government on preventing a fresh wave of strikes, according to rail union leader Mick Lynch – who accused ministers of “sitting on their hands”.

Mick Lynch accuses BBC Radio 4 presenter of 'parroting' Network Rail 'propaganda'
View on Watch

Union chiefs have said that only a change in stance will end the rail dispute, as passengers prepare for five days of disruption this week because of fresh strikes by tens of thousands of workers.

Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) at Network Rail and 14 train operators will stage two 48-hour walkouts from Tuesday and Friday while drivers in the Aslef union will strike on Thursday.

“We don’t want disruption, we want a settlement,” said Mr Lynch, RMT general secretary, who claimed on Monday that railway bosses were “in despair” at the government’s position.

“The executives who run the industry day on day are in despair at what the government is making them say in these talks,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

It comes as union leaders expressed defiance over an anti-strike “crackdown”, with Rishi Sunak said to be preparing to put legislation to curb industrial action before MPs as soon as this month.

The prime minister could push for a vote on proposals for minimum staffing levels during public sector strikes within weeks, according to reports – though he could wait up to six months for more far-reaching proposals.

The “slimmed-down” version of the bill that No 10 is considering bringing forward is not thought to include an outright ban on strikes by ambulance drivers and other emergency workers, according to The Telegraph.

But Dave Penman, general secretary of the FDA civil service union, said the so-called crackdown on strike rules would not stop the ongoing wave of industrial action – warning the government against “tinkering” with laws.

The union leader told Times Radio: “They might be able to have some minor restrictions around the impact of some of these strikes, but the strikes are going to continue.”

He added: “If the government want to resolve this, they need to address those issues [pay and conditions], not tinker about with what are still some of the most draconian laws around strikes in the Western world.”

A government spokesperson said that details of the legislation would emerge in “due course”, adding: “Anything we bring forward will rightfully balance the rights of workers to strike, with the rights of the public to get on with their daily lives and keep people safe.”

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) has warned it could launch legal action against the government if tries to restrict industrial action rights.



Rishi Sunak preparing anti-strike legislation (PA)

On this week’s RMT strike days, around half of the network will shut down and only about 20 per cent of normal services will run. Trains that do run will start later and finish much earlier than usual, with services typically running between 7.30am and 6.30pm.

The train drivers’ strike on 5 January will affect 15 operators and will result in even fewer services running, with some companies operating “very significantly reduced” timetables.

Mr Lynch said he had received “radio silence” since mid-December. “They keep saying that they’re facilitating a deal. And I think it’s absolutely the opposite to that,” he told Today.

He added: “The government simply will not give a mandate to the employers, Network Rail and the train operators that will allow this deal to be resolved. They’ve put a block on the deal and they’re an obstacle rather than a facilitator.”

Daniel Mann, director of industry operations at the Rail Delivery Group, said: “No one wants to see these strikes go ahead and we can only apologise to passengers and to the many businesses who will be hit by this unnecessary and damaging disruption.

He added: “This dispute will only be resolved by agreeing [to] the long overdue reforms to working arrangements needed to put the industry on a sustainable footing, rather than unions condemning their members to losing more pay in the new year.”

Aslef general secretary Mick Whelan said his union is “in it for the long haul”, adding: “We don’t want to go on strike but the companies have pushed us into this place.

“The train companies say their hands have been tied by the government while the government, which does not employ us, says it’s up to the companies to negotiate with us,” the union leader said. “The companies, or this Tory government which stands behind them, could end this dispute now by making a serious and sensible pay offer.”

A Department for Transport spokesperson said: “Passengers have rightly had enough of rail strikes and want the disruption to end. Unions should step back from this strike action so we can start 2023 by ending this damaging dispute.”

Wide UK travel disruption as rail strikes hit people returning to work

Rail passengers are being warned to expect 'significant disruption'

Paddington train station on December 24 in London. 

Getty  Soraya Ebrahimi

Jan 01, 2023


Rail strikes by tens of thousands of workers in disputes over pay, jobs and conditions will affect passengers returning to work after the festive break.

Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union at Network Rail and 14 train operators will stage two 48-hour walkouts from Tuesday and Friday, while drivers in the Aslef union will go on strike on Thursday.

Travellers returning to work after the festive break are being warned to expect “significant disruption” as only a limited number of trains will run.

READ MORE
Will Rishi Sunak break the strikes - or will the strikes break him?

The advice is to only travel if absolutely necessary, allow extra time and check when first and last trains will depart.

There may also be disruption to services on January 8 as the striking workers return to their duties

On RMT strike days, about half of the network will shut down with only about 20 per cent of normal services running.

Trains that do run will start later and finish much earlier than usual, with services typically running between 7.30am and 6.30pm on the day of the strike.

The train drivers' strike on January 5 will affect 15 operators and will result in even fewer services running, with some companies operating “very significantly reduced” timetables.

Winter strikes in Britain - in pictures















Passengers at a busy King's Cross station in London after a strike by RMT union members. PA

The RMT also has an overtime ban in place at 14 train operating companies until Monday, which will continue to affect the level of cancellations and the punctuality of some services.

“No-one wants to see these strikes go ahead and we can only apologise to passengers and to the many businesses who will be hit by this unnecessary and damaging disruption," said Daniel Mann, director of industry operations at the Rail Delivery Group.


“Passengers with tickets for between January 3 and 7 can use their ticket the day before the ticket date, or up to and including Tuesday, January 10.

“This dispute will only be resolved by agreeing the long overdue reforms to working arrangements needed to put the industry on a sustainable footing, rather than unions condemning their members to losing more pay in the new year.”

Aslef general secretary Mick Whelan said that the union was “in it for the long haul”.

“We don’t want to go on strike but the companies have pushed us into this place," Mr Whelan said.

“They have not offered our members a penny and these are people who have not had an increase since April 2019.


“That means they expect train drivers at these companies to take a real-terms pay cut, to work just as hard for considerably less, when inflation is running at north of 14 per cent.

“The train companies say their hands have been tied by the government, while the government, which does not employ us, says it’s up to the companies to negotiate with us.

“We are always happy to negotiate — we never refuse to sit down at the table and talk — but these companies have offered us nothing, and that is unacceptable.”
UK strikes – in pictures









Passengers view departure boards at Kings Cross station in London on Wednesday, during a strike by the Rail, Maritime and Transport union. PA

Mick Lynch, general secretary of the RMT, has accused the government of blocking a deal to end the long-running dispute.

Mr Lynch says he is willing to negotiate, but is calling for an offer on pay, jobs and conditions on which his members can vote.

The RMT is campaigning against plans to close ticket offices, cut jobs and move the industry to widespread driver-only operations.

UK rail strikes cause disruption for millions amid cold snap - in pictures













Closed platforms at Waterloo Station in London. A strike by the RMT union is causing major disruption. EPA

“Passengers have rightly had enough of rail strikes and want the disruption to end," said a Department for Transport representative.

“The government has demonstrated it is being reasonable and stands ready to facilitate a resolution to rail disputes. It’s time the unions came to the table and played their part as well.

“Inflation-matching pay increases for all public sector workers would cost everyone more in the long-term, worsening debt, fuelling inflation and costing every household an extra £1,000 ($1,210).

“Unions should step back from this strike action so we can start 2023 by ending this damaging dispute.”


Mr Whelan said: “We keep coming to the table but the table is bare.

"Six months after we asked for a pay rise for train drivers who have not had one for nearly four years, we have still not had an offer from the train companies which employ us.

“The ball is in their court. The companies, or this Tory government which stands behind them, could end this dispute now by making a serious and sensible pay offer. It is up to them.”
Updated: January 01, 2023, 5:01 p.m.

S.Korean president's approval rating falls to 40 pct

Xinhua, January 2, 2023

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol's approval rating fell 1.2 percentage points over the week to 40.0 percent last week, a weekly poll showed Monday.

The negative assessment on Yoon's conduct of state affairs added 0.6 percentage points to 57.2 percent, according to local pollster Realmeter.

Support for the ruling conservative People Power Party came to 39.2 percent last week, down 1.8 percentage points from a week earlier.

The main liberal opposition Democratic Party's popularity rating gained 2.6 percentage points to 45.5 percent.

The minor progressive Justice Party won 3.8 percent of support score last week, up 0.8 percentage points from the previous week.

The results were based on a poll of 2,511 voters conducted from last Monday to Friday. It had plus and minus 2.0 percentage points in margin of error with a 95-percent confidence level.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland Leads US Presidential Delegation to Brazilian President's Inauguration

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva ,
Brazil (Photo/U.S. Department of the Interior)

BY NATIVE NEWS ONLINE STAFF 

 

JANUARY 02, 2023

The first Native American to serve in a secretarial position within a presidential cabinet, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland (Laguna Pueblo)on Sunday, January 1, 2023, led the Presidential Delegation of the United States on behalf of President Joe Biden to the presidential Inauguration of His Excellency Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. 

“I was honored to represent President Biden, our administration, and the American people at President Lula's inauguration and to celebrate the longstanding and important partnership between the United States and Brazil,” Secretary Haaland said. “Our shared commitment to democracy, human rights, Indigenous peoples, equitable economic growth, environmental protection, and other core values makes us natural partners. The Biden-Harris administration intends to use every opportunity to broaden and deepen that partnership with President Lula's government in the years to come.”

This will be Lula's third term, after previously governing Brazil for two consecutive terms between 2003 and 2010.

“Our message to Brazil is one of hope and reconstruction,” Lula said in a speech in Congress’ Lower House after signing the document that formally instates him as president. “The great edifice of rights, sovereignty and development that this nation built has been systematically demolished in recent years. To re-erect this edifice, we are going to direct all our efforts.”

Secretary Haaland was joined by Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs at the National Security Council Juan Gonzalez, and Chargé d’Affaires of the U.S. Embassy and Consulates in Brazil Douglas A. Koneff. Secretary Haaland and the delegation participated in all the major inaugural events and held other meetings with counterparts and partners.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland at Brazil's Congress. (Photo/U.S. Dept of the Interior)

 

The Department of the Interior has a long history of collaboration with Brazilian counterparts on a wide range of environmental and natural resources issues. The U.S. Geological Survey and Bureau of Reclamation engage in technical exchanges with the National Water Agency, on topics such as hydrologic surveys and dam safety. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service partner with the Environment and Sustainable Natural Resources Ministry on conservation and protected area management. And the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management are in dialogue with counterparts in Brazil about offshore wind development and carbon sequestration. Most recently, in November the Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) facilitated a knowledge exchange between officials from six U.S. Tribes and representatives of Indigenous communities in the Amazon.

“My Department looks forward to continuing these important partnerships with our Brazilian colleagues,” added Secretary Haaland.

In addition to attending the inauguration, Secretary Haaland met with Joênia Wapichana (incoming President of the National Indigenous Foundation), Toya Manchineri (Coordinator of the Coordination of Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon), and other Indigenous leaders and partner institutions implementing U.S.-funded environmental programs in Brazil. In those meetings, the delegation discussed the priorities and challenges of Indigenous peoples in Brazil, opportunities to deepen collaboration between U.S. and Brazilian Indigenous communities, and partnership with the USAID to engage communities whose lives depend on the integrity and conservation of the Brazilian Amazon ecosystem.

Lula returns to power in Brazil with promise to combat inequalities

Online News EditorJanuary 1, 2023

Brasilia, Jan 1 (EFE).- Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva began his third term as president of Brazil on Sunday with a huge ceremony full of symbolism, in which he reinforced his commitment to combating the enormous social inequalities that divide the country.

The 77-year-old leftist leader, who governed between 2003 and 2010, returned to the presidency after narrowly defeating the far-right Jair Bolsonaro, who has not acknowledged his defeat and two days ago flew to the United States to avoid having to pass Lula the presidential sash, as is tradition and protocol.

The inauguration had strong international support with delegations from 68 countries, including 20 heads of state or government, as well as significant popular support with nearly 300,000 people packing the center of the capital for one of the largest ceremonies in the history of Brazil.

Lula gave two speeches and focused both on his firm commitment to combat a range of inequalities that divide the population and “hold back” the country’s development, especially the huge gap between rich and poor, but also racial and gender inequality.

The president burst into tears when talking about families forced to rummage through the garbage to find food and, from the pulpit of the Planalto presidential palace, asked the crowd gathered in the Plaza de los Tres Poderes: “Help me!”

Lula took advantage of Bolsonaro’s absence to add symbolism to the formality of receiving the presidential sash, which illustrates the transfer of power. In the absence of his predecessor, he instead received it from a group of citizens exemplifying the diversity of Brazilian society.

With them, and his dog Resistencia, Lula climbed the ramp that leads from the street to the first floor of the Planalto Palace, a gesture also highly symbolic since presidents usually enter the palace alone, walking among two rows of soldiers from the regiment of the Independence Dragoons.

A large part of Lula’s speeches were based on criticism of Bolsonaro, without naming him, whom he accused of having led a “government of national destruction.”

In particular, he promised that those responsible for the seriousness of the pandemic in Brazil, where almost 695,000 people died from Covid-19, will not go unpunished, while the country was led by a “denialist government.”

He also described the damage inflicted by the Bolsonaro government on the economy, the environment, health and education sectors and, above all, the social fabric of Brazil, which emerged from the Oct. 30 elections divided like never before.

In fact, he chose the phrase “union and reconstruction” as the motto of his new government and a few hours after being sworn in, he took the first step to revoke Bolsonaro’s most controversial measures, signing his first 13 decrees.

Among others, he ordered the creation of a new registry of all weapons purchased by civilians in the last four years, taking advantage of the release of weapons promoted by Bolsonaro.

He also revoked a decree that allowed mineral exploitation on indigenous lands and reactivated the so-called Amazon Fund, set up with donations from Germany and Norway to contribute to the protection of the rainforest and which had been suspended by Bolsonaro in 2019.

Another of the promises that Lula made was to break the “diplomatic isolation” of the last four years under a president who only maintained fluid relations with countries governed by the extreme right.

It is a task that begins on the right foot given the large representation of authorities from 68 countries who attended the inauguration, including the king of Spain and leaders of Portugal, Germany, Argentina, Colombia, Uruguay, Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay and Honduras.

The president of the National Assembly of Venezuela, Jorge Rodríguez, also attended, with whose country Lula announced that he would restore diplomatic relations as of Jan. 1, after Bolsonaro ended them four years ago.

In addition, former heads of state with whom Lula has friendships with attended, such as Uruguay’s José Mujica and Bolivia’s Evo Morales, who gave Lula a jacket similar to another that he gave him years ago and that the Brazilian leader wears frequently.

In his inauguration speech, Lula announced that Brazil is going to “retake integration” in Latin America to have “an active and proud dialogue” with the other regions of the world.

“We will resume integration from Mercosur, with the revitalization of the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) and other sovereign bodies” in Latin America, he declared before parliament

Brazil's Lula decrees extension for tax 

exemption on fuels

 

General view as Brazil's new President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva delivers a speech after being sworn in at the National Congress, in Brasilia, Brazil, January 1, 2023. 

REUTERS/Jacqueline Lisboa

 January 2, 2023 -

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil's newly sworn-in President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva signed a decree on Sunday extending for 60 days an exemption for fuels from federal taxes, a measure passed by his predecessor aimed at lowering their cost.

The decree was among the first batch of decisions taken by Lula hours after his inauguration as president, succeeding far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, and officially establishing his cabinet of 37 ministers.

The exemption from federal taxes on fuel represents a revenue waiver of 52.9 billion reais per year, and Economy Minister Fernando Haddad had said that it would not be extended, creating a division in the new cabinet.

Earlier on Sunday, Senator Jean Paul Prates, who is expected to be named chief executive of state-run oil company Petrobras, told reporters that extension of the exemption would go ahead and last 60 days.

Prates said the exemption could be resumed by the new government in a "much more comfortable" way.

He has said that one option under study was an extension for six months or until the end of the year for tax exemptions on diesel and liquefied petroleum gas.

The extension for gasoline was opposed by sectors of the economy, such as the ethanol industry, which loses ground in its tax advantage over gasoline.

(Reporting by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Nick Zieminski)

Brazil's Lula promises 'hope and

reconstruction' in inaugural speech

DPA
January 01, 2023

Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is welcomed to the National Congress by the numerous heads of state and government officials during his inauguration ceremony.

 Jens Büttner/dpa

Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is welcomed to the National Congress by the numerous heads of state and government officials during his inauguration ceremony. Jens Büttner/dpa

Veteran leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took the oath of office on Sunday as Brazil's first democratically elected president to win three terms, with more than a dozen heads of states in attendance.

"My message today is one of hope and reconstruction," Lula said in his inaugural speech. "Democracy was the big winner of this election."

In a break from custom, his predecessor, the far-right nationalist Jair Bolsonaro, did not hand over the presidential sash to Lula, after the Bolsonaro travelled to the US state of Florida with his family on Friday.

Before the ceremony, Lula drove through the capital Brasília in an open Rolls Royce with his wife Janja and new Vice President Geraldo Alckmin and his wife. A large music festival with over 40 artists was set to follow the swearing-in.

Lula led Brazil from 2003 to 2010, at a time when his government profited from the raw materials boom and was able to lift millions of people out of poverty through major social programmes.

However, there was also widespread corruption and Lula was also sentenced to a lengthy prison term for corruption and money laundering, though the sentence was later overturned.

He beat Bolsonaro in a run-off election in October.

During Bolsonaro's term in office, relations with other countries were tense, as deforestation of the rainforest increased unchecked and the government was accused of contempt for human rights.

World powers view Brazil under Lula as a potential strategic political and economic partner. Brazil's enormous natural resources and large agricultural economy make it a big power in Latin America.

Lula has announced plans to strengthen environmental and climate protection, plus measures to combat a resurgence of hunger amid the country's economic slowdown and high inflation.

But the 77-year-old faces major challenges to achieving his inclusive agenda, first and foremost of which is Brazil's highly polarized politics. Bolsonaro's allies control both chamber of Congress.


Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is welcomed to the National Congress by the numerous heads of state and government officials during his inauguration ceremony. Jens Büttner/dpa


Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (R) welcomes German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to the National Congress among numerous heads of state and other guests of honor during his inauguration ceremony. Jens Büttner/dpa

ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY
Missouri inmate may be 1st openly transgender woman executed in U.S.

There is no known case of an openly transgender inmate being executed in the U.S. before, according to the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center. 

Photo by Getty Images

By —Jim Salter, Associated Press

Published on Jan 2, 2023 

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Unless Missouri Gov. Mike Parson grants clemency, Amber McLaughlin, 49, will become the first openly transgender woman executed in the U.S. She is scheduled to die by injection Tuesday for killing a former girlfriend in 2003.

McLaughlin’s attorney, Larry Komp, said there are no court appeals pending.

READ MORE: State-level anti-transgender legislation reverberates on Day of Remembrance

The clemency request focuses on several issues, including McLaughlin’s traumatic childhood and mental health issues, which the jury never heard in her trial. According to the clemency petition, a foster parent rubbed feces in her face when she was a toddler and her adoptive father used a stun gun on her. It says she suffers from depression and has attempted suicide multiple times.

The petition also includes reports citing a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, a condition that causes anguish and other symptoms as a result of a disparity between a person’s gender identity and their assigned sex at birth.

“We think Amber has demonstrated incredible courage because I can tell you there’s a lot of hate when it comes to that issue,” her attorney, Larry Komp, said Monday. But, he said, McLaughlin’s sexual identity is “not the main focus” of the clemency request.

Parson’s spokesperson, Kelli Jones, said the review process for the clemency request is still underway.

There is no known case of an openly transgender inmate being executed in the U.S. before, according to the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center. A friend in prison says she saw McLaughlin’s personality blossom during her gender transition.

Before transitioning, McLaughlin was in a relationship with girlfriend Beverly Guenther. McLaughlin would show up at the suburban St. Louis office where the 45-year-old Guenther worked, sometimes hiding inside the building, according to court records. Guenther obtained a restraining order, and police officers occasionally escorted her to her car after work.

Guenther’s neighbors called the police the night of Nov. 20, 2003, when she failed to return home. Officers went to the office building, where they found a broken knife handle near her car and a trail of blood. A day later, McLaughlin led police to a location near the Mississippi River in St. Louis, where the body had been dumped.

McLaughlin was convicted of first-degree murder in 2006. A judge sentenced McLaughlin to death after a jury deadlocked on the sentence. A court in 2016 ordered a new sentencing hearing, but a federal appeals court panel reinstated the death penalty in 2021.

READ MORE: Virginia governor seeks to roll back transgender student accommodations

One person who knew Amber before she transitioned is Jessica Hicklin, 43, who spent 26 years in prison for a drug-related killing in western Missouri in 1995. She was 16. Because of her age when the crime occurred, she was granted release in January 2022.

Hicklin, 43, began transitioning while in prison and in 2016 sued the Missouri Department of Corrections, challenging a policy that prohibited hormone therapy for inmates who weren’t receiving it before being incarcerated. She won the lawsuit in 2018 and became a mentor to other transgender inmates, including McLaughlin.

Though imprisoned together for around a decade, Hicklin said McLaughlin was so shy they rarely interacted. But as McLaughlin began transitioning about three years ago, she turned to Hicklin for guidance on issues such as mental health counseling and getting help to ensure her safety inside a male-dominated maximum-security prison.

“There’s always paperwork and bureaucracy, so I spent time helping her learn to file the right things and talk to the right people,” Hicklin said.

In the process, a friendship developed.

“We would sit down once a week and have what I referred to as girl talk,” Hicklin said. “She always had a smile and a dad joke. If you ever talked to her, it was always with the dad jokes.”

They also discussed the challenges a transgender inmate faces in a male prison — things like obtaining feminine items, dealing with rude comments, and staying safe.

READ MORE: Report says at least 32 transgender people were killed in the U.S. in 2022

McLaughlin still had insecurities, especially about her well-being, Hicklin said.

“Definitely a vulnerable person,” Hicklin said. “Definitely afraid of being assaulted or victimized, which is more common for trans folks in Department of Corrections.”

The only woman ever executed in Missouri was Bonnie B. Heady, put to death on Dec. 18, 1953, for kidnapping and killing a 6-year-old boy. Heady was executed in the gas chamber, side by side with the other kidnapper and killer, Carl Austin Hall.

Nationally, 18 people were executed in 2022, including two in Missouri. Kevin Johnson, 37, was put to death on Nov. 29 for the ambush killing of a Kirkwood, Missouri, police officer. Carmen Deck was executed in May for killing James and Zelma Long during a robbery at their home in De Soto, Missouri.

Another Missouri inmate, Leonard Taylor, is scheduled to die on Feb. 7 for killing his girlfriend and her three young children.


Related

State-level anti-transgender legislation reverberates on Day of Remembrance
By Hannah Schoenbaum, Associated Press

Report says at least 32 transgender people were killed in the U.S. in 2022
By Hannah Schoenbaum, Associated Press

Federal appeals court says Arkansas can’t ban treatment for transgender kids
By Andrew DeMillo, Associated Press

U.S. returns looted 2,500-year-old sarcophagus to Egypt

Jan 2, 2023 


By —Associated Press

CAIRO (AP) — An ancient wooden sarcophagus that was featured at the Houston Museum of Natural Sciences was returned to Egypt after U.S. authorities determined it was looted years ago, Egyptian officials said Monday.

The repatriation is part of the Egyptian government’s efforts to stop the trafficking of its stolen antiquities. In 2021, authorities in Cairo succeeded in getting 5,300 stolen artifacts returned to Egypt from across the world.

WATCH: Museum works to repatriate artifacts looted from West Africa

Mostafa Waziri, the top official at the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said the sarcophagus dates back to the Late Dynastic Period of ancient Egypt, an era that spanned the last of the Pharaonic rulers from 664 B.C. until Alexander the Great’s campaign in 332 B.C.

The sarcophagus, almost 3 meters (9.5 feet) tall with a brightly painted top surface, may have belonged to an ancient priest named Ankhenmaat, though some of the inscriptions on it have been erased, Waziri said.

It was symbolically handed over at a ceremony Monday in Cairo by Daniel Rubinstein, the U.S. chargé d’affaires in Egypt.

READ MORE: Looted Gilgamesh tablet, one of world’s oldest surviving works of literature, returns to Iraq

The handover came more than three months after the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office determined the sarcophagus was looted from Abu Sir Necropolis, north of Cairo. It was smuggled through Germany into the United States in 2008, according to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg.

“This stunning coffin was trafficked by a well-organized network that has looted countless antiquities from the region,” Bragg said at the time. “We are pleased that this object will be returned to Egypt, where it rightfully belongs.”

Bragg said the same network had smuggled a gilded coffin out of Egypt that was featured at New York’s Metropolitan Museum. Met bought the piece from a Paris art dealer in 2017 for about $4 million. It was returned to Egypt in 2019.

With shocking bias, ‘NYT’ treats ‘deadliest year since ’05’ as a Palestinian numbers game

BY JAMES NORTH 

DECEMBER 31, 2022 

PALESTINIAN ARTISTS PAINT A MURAL IN HONOUR OF SLAIN AL-JAZEERA JOURNALIST SHIREEN ABU AKLEH IN GAZA CITY A DAY AFTER SHE WAS KILLED. MAY 12, 2022. ABU AKLEH WAS AN AMERICAN CITIZEN BUT THE NEW YORK TIMES LEFT HER OUT OF A REPORT ON THE “DEADLIEST YEAR” FOR PALESTINIANS IN THE WEST BANK SINCE 2005. PHOTO BY ASHRAF AMRA (C) APA IMAGES.

Here’s a shocking and disgusting example of how the New York Times slants its coverage of Israel’s occupation of West Bank Palestine. You only have to contrast the Times with the Washington Post to see just how offensive the New York paper is.

First, the actual news. The Washington Post headline got straight to the point:

2022 was deadliest year for West Bank Palestinians in nearly two decades

The Post continued by warning that “The surging violence . . . could escalate further as Israel’s most far-right government, which includes Jewish supremacists who have incited violence against Palestinians, is sworn in. . .”

Over to the New York Times. Even long-time observers of how the paper distorts the Israel/Palestine news will be astonished, even speechless, at how it twisted the year-end statistics of Palestinian deaths.

The article opens with a 4-paragraph anecdote about how two Palestinian militant groups tried to claim 27-year-old Muhammad Abu Naise as a member after Israeli troops had killed him. One quick paragraph summarized the year-end West Bank death statistics– “the deadliest ‌for Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank since 2005” — and then the long report promptly turned right back to its central theme:

The high Palestinian death toll has cast a fresh light on the practice of armed and political Palestinian groups claiming as members or publicly honoring all those killed by Israel, one that blurs the distinction between civilians and armed fighters. It is a tradition that some [Palestinian] families object to, saying they don’t want loved ones used for political purposes.

This is a jaw-dropper. You would think that, if anything, “the high Palestinian death toll” would be “casting a fresh light” on why Israeli soldiers are killing so many more of them, the highest number since 2005. But the Times report, by Raja Abdulrahim and Hiba Yazbek, continues in the same spirit, focusing on the Palestinian resistance organizations and their alleged questionable conduct after Israel kills Palestinians. This is a classic blaming the victim ploy.

By contrast, the Washington Post reports truthfully, and does include the point of view from the Israeli side, in the third paragraph. Post reporter Miriam Berger says,

Palestinian and Israeli human rights groups and U.N. experts have blamed the bloodshed on Israel’s excessive use of force and open-fire rules during near-daily military operations, as well as rising assaults by settlers in the West Bank. Israel said its forces are responding to fatal attacks on Israelis by Palestinian militants, which have also spiked this year.

The Post also reminds readers that Israelis this year killed 2 U.S. citizens — journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and Omar Assad. Neither appears in the Times account.

Finally, the Post warns that the West Bank violence will almost certainly get worse. “Far-right politician Itamar Ben-Gvir,” who just became Israel’s minister of national security, “has proposed giving police and soldiers wider latitude to use live ammunition and shielding them from criminal prosecution for killing or injuring Palestinians.”

The new security minister Ben-Gvir goes unmentioned in the New York Times article.

The abysmal New York Times article is more than just an accidental failure. You have to conclude that:

The Times realized it had to report the year-end casualty statistics.

So it looked for a way to shift attention away from the major perpetrators — the Israeli military and Jewish settler/colonists — and put it on the Palestinians.

LATEST BODY COUNT
Israeli army kills 2 Palestinians in West Bank confrontation
today


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Mourners carry the bodies of Samer Houshiyeh, 21, left, and Fouad Abed, 25, during their funeral in the West Bank city of Jenin, Monday, Jan. 2, 2023. The two men were killed in the village of Kafr Dan near the northern city of Jenin. The Israeli military said it entered Kafr Dan late Sunday to demolish the houses of two Palestinian gunmen who killed an Israeli soldier during a firefight in September. The military said troops came under heavy fire and fired back at the shooters. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Israeli forces killed two Palestinians, including a man claimed by an armed group as a member, during a confrontation that erupted early Monday when troops entered a Palestinian village in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said.

The two men were killed in the village of Kafr Dan near the northern city of Jenin. The Israeli military said it entered Kafr Dan late Sunday to demolish the houses of two Palestinian gunmen who killed an Israeli soldier during a firefight in September. The military said troops came under heavy fire and fired back at the shooters.

It was the latest bloodshed in the region that has seen Israeli-Palestinian tensions surge for months. On Monday, the Israeli rights group B’Tselem said 2022 was the deadliest year for Palestinians since 2004, a period of intense violence that came during a Palestinian uprising.

The Palestinian Health Ministry identified those killed as Samer Houshiyeh, 21, and Fouad Abed, 25. Houshiyeh was shot several times in the chest, according to Samer Attiyeh, the director of the Ibn Sina Hosipital in Jenin. Attiyeh initially said Abed was 17, but the ministry later gave his age as 25.

An armed group, the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, later claimed Houshiyeh as a member. The group, an offshoot of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party, published an older photo in which Houshiyeh had posed with rifles. Video on social media showed his body wrapped with the armed group’s flag as his mother and other mourners bid farewell.

It was not immediately clear whether the second Palestinian killed was also affiliated with a militant group.

Israel says it demolishes the homes of militants as a way to deter potential attackers. Critics say the tactic amounts to collective punishment.

The Israeli military has been conducting near-daily raids into Palestinian cities and towns since a spate of Palestinian attacks against Israelis killed 19 last spring.

Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and east Jerusalem last year, according to B’Tselem’s figures, making 2022 the deadliest since 2004, when 197 Palestinians were killed. A fresh wave of attacks killed at least another nine Israelis in the fall. The Israeli army says most of the Palestinians killed have been militants. But stone-throwing youths protesting the incursions and others not involved in confrontations have also been killed.

Israel says the raids are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks. The Palestinians see them as further entrenchment of Israel’s 55-year, open-ended occupation of the West Bank.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war and the Palestinians seek those territories for a future state.

With start of new year, Israel kills 2 Palestinians, demolishes 2 homes

Israel has already killed two Palestinians and demolished two homes in 2023, signaling that 'Operation Break the Wave' is far from over.

BY MARIAM BARGHOUTI

JANUARY 2, 2023 

MOURNERS ATTEND THE FUNERAL OF MOHAMMAD HOSHIEH AND FUAD ABED WHO WERE KILLED BY ISRAELI FORCES DURING A RAID, IN THE WEST BANK CITY OF JENIN ON JANUARY 2, 2023. 

(PHOTO: BY AHMED IBRAHIM/APA IMAGES)

On Monday morning, January 2, Israeli military forces invaded the town of Kufr Dan and killed Foad Mahmoud Abed, 18, and Mohammad Samer Hosheyeh, 22. Three others were injured, with one critically wounded in the chest.

Abed and Hosheyh were killed during armed confrontations with Israeli soldiers who invaded Kufr Dan with the purpose of punitively demolishing the homes of Abed al-Rahman Abed, 22, and Ahmad Abed, 23, two Palestinians who had carried out the Jalameh checkpoint operation in September of last year that killed one Israeli soldier. Three apartments were destroyed, displacing 13 people.
‘Break the Wave’ continues

Foad Abed is the first Palestinian killed in Jenin this year. Last year was one of the deadliest years in the West Bank since 2005, as Israeli forces and settlers killed 231 Palestinians through extrajudicial assassinations and home invasions.

Israeli forces invaded the town around midnight where armed confrontation with youth ensued. By 3:00 a.m, Israeli soldiers had shot and killed two Palestinians. Hosheyeh was killed with a bullet to the chest while Abed was killed with several bullets to his abdomen and thigh.

Hosheyeh’s mother made her way through a group of men just before the call for dawn prayers to carry the body of her slain son on her shoulders.

In a statement, the Israeli military spokesperson said that “the IDF is currently conducting a military activity in Kufr Dan in the district of Jenin to demolish the homes of those that clashed with soldiers near the Jalamah crossing and in which an army commander was killed on September 14, 2022.”

On September 14 of last year, Ahmad and Abed al-Rahman shot at the military checkpoint of Al-Jalameh, west of Jenin, killing the deputy commander of the Nahal Brigade’s Special Reconnaissance Unit, Major Bar Falach, 30.
Homes punitively demolished

At approximately 12:00 a.m. on January 2, Israeli jeeps raided Kufr Dan with the purpose of demolishing two Palestinian homes as a measure of collective punishment against the families of the two men who carried out the Jalameh checkpoint operation.

After killing the two martyrs at the beginning of this year, the Israeli military continued its demolition mission of the family home of Ahmad Abed, expelling the family members before the demolition.

According to local journalists in Jenin, at approximately 8:50 a.m., the second home, belonging to the family of Abed al-Rahman Abed, was also forcibly evacuated at gun-point and detonated, reducing it to a pile of rubble. The family was forced outside of the house without enough clothes for the cold.

Punitive home demolitions as a measure of collective punishment has been practiced by the Israeli state since the 1980s. Illegal under international law, this practice was first employed against Palestinians by the British during its colonial Mandate over Palestine.

New Israeli government will finally produce crisis in U.S. Jewish support

BY PHILIP WEISS

JANUARY 2, 2023 

28 OCTOBER 2022, ISRAEL, JERUSALEM: RIGHT-WING ISRAELI POLITICIAN ITAMAR BEN GVIR, INTERACTS WITH SUPPORTER DURING A CAMPAIGN AT THE JERUSALEM MARKET, AHEAD OF THE GENERAL ELECTIONS SCHEDULED FOR THE FIRST OF NOVEMBER 2022. 

(CREDIT IMAGE: ILIA YEFIMOVICH/DPA VIA ZUMA PRESS/APAIMAGES)

The news from Israel is that the job of explaining Israel to America — hasbara, Hebrew for propaganda– just got a lot harder.

That’s because Israel swore in a government filled with messianic rightwing Zionists, two of them convicted criminals, and newly-returned prime minister Netanyahu, himself on trial for taking bribes, declared the new government’s basic principle is, “The Jewish people have an exclusive and unquestionable right to all areas of the Land of Israel,” including “Judea and Samaria.” Palestinians– you’re just interlopers here.

Israel’s friends here are struggling with the hasbara job. Stay calm; Netanyahu will control the extremists, some assure us. While Haaretz reports that leading American pro-Israel groups are trying to maintain a business-as-usual approach but are worried about what will shake loose. “Our love and commitment to the Jewish state transcends any one government, any one point in time, and any particular policy or statement,” the Jewish Federations said– in expressing “concerns.” While Israel Policy Forum fretted the extremists in the government will “stress U.S.-Israel relations” and “create rifts with North American Jewry.” Today Americans for Peace Now held a protest at the Israeli embassy.

Sadly, this radical government is sure to hurt a lot of people, but the good news is that it will shake up American Jewry by exposing a terrible truth– tearing off the mask. It is not a departure from Israeli policies, it is a crystallization of them. For decades, Israeli governments have built more Jewish colonies in the West Bank in the name of the “Jewish people,” and killed Palestinians who resist that process (231 this year).

Serious people must acknowledge that the new government’s policies are no departure. Just look at former Prime Minister Yair Lapid’s farewell speech, two days ago, bragging of rightwing achievements in the last year, from refusing to allow the U.S. to reopen a consulate serving Palestinians in Jerusalem, to sending a “record number of Jews… up to the Temple Mount.”

The simple reason the tough Jewish expansionists have been replaced by fascistic Jewish expansionists is that the issue of Palestinian freedom is the most important problem in Israeli society, and no one has ever figured out a good answer, and the problem just gets worse, so Israelis demand more security. Even as its standard of living surpasses Germany, the UK, and France.

Netanyahu was able return to power on the backs of criminals because a shocking number of Israelis including many young Jews found the “nice” Bennett-Lapid government– beloved by the Biden administration as it killed 231 Palestinians– to be too soft on Palestinians. So they voted for the fascistic Religious Zionism party, giving them 14 seats, and banished the leftwing Zionist Meretz party, which lately had six seats, from the parliament.

There’s a clear logic to Israel getting more extremist. Israel is defiantly a Jewish state; and Palestinians will always demand equal rights. Even leftwingers who believe in a Jewish state are doomed to racism. As a Laborite politician (David Ben-Simon) said on i24 News two days ago, “The Palestinians are making life impossible for us.”

Marilyn Neimark explained the logic nine years ago: Israel just keeps getting worse because of its constitution: Jewish hegemony masquerading as democracy.

Maybe it’s better to ask, over these 65 years has Israel been tracing an arc that bends toward justice, speaking of Martin Luther King, of course? If the answer is No, could it be because no matter the potential merits and good will of the founding plan, the effort to establish and sustain the Jewish character of the intended Jewish democracy doomed the democratic character from the start, and it’s been spiraling downward ever since? For whatever the starting point was, I think we mostly agree that Israel has become less democratic in recent years, and every time the separation between religion and state dwindles, free speech is curtailed, or minority rights are trampled, it is … in the name of preserving the state’s Jewish character– that is, Jewish hegemony.

Neimark spoke at a progressive panel at an alternative New York synagogue in 2013, in a landmark moment in the American Jewish awakening to what Zionism has done to Israel and what it’s done to American Jews.

Today we’re at another landmark in that process. Israel’s new racist/fascistic government has soured even Tom (“Israel had me at hello”) Friedman. Jeffrey Goldberg is long gone. Eric Alterman is backing away.

Friedman and Goldberg had a serious job. They explained away apartheid and massacres by telling Americans how unreliable Palestinians are and what a bad neighborhood Israel is in. “How do you explain that the most liberal and highly educated group in America — Jews — have supported apartheid?” John Mearsheimer asked me years ago. The lies we told ourselves worked on us because of the inter-generational trauma of the Holocaust. Traumatized by the genocide of a third of our population, Jews justified any action in the name of security. Hitler’s posthumous victory was reducing Jews to one question, Is it good for the Jews? (Norman Mailer’s line).

The new Israeli government is a shock to that system. Its nakedly fascistic politics are a wakeup call to American Jews. We are enabling apartheid. We are the political lifeline for racist zealots in Israel who are going to hurt a lot more Palestinians this year. Supporting them goes against Jewish traditions. Why, J Street even said so last month. And some liberal Zionists are finally endorsing sanctions against ceaseless, illegal Israeli expansionism.

The new Israeli government will bring the U.S. Jewish community to the tipping point, and the project of explaining will fail this year. And American Jews will finally turn on Israel as an apartheid state whose indifference to human rights is actually a danger to Jews everywhere.