47 Americans Who Decided To Post Really, Really, Really Stupid Stuff Online And Make Us All Look Bad


BuzzFeed
Sun, 10 December 2023 

1.This person forgot everyone on the internet isn't American.

u/intheflowergarden / Via reddit.com

2.This person accused Italians of "jumping the border" into America.

u/3ish / Via reddit.com

3.This person refused to believe that Georgia is the name of a country as well as a US state.

u/lazarushelsinki / Via reddit.com

4.This person thought the US was "the only capitalist nation on Earth."

u/shocking-science / Via reddit.com

5.This person's first thought at the words "Notre Dame" was the US college football team.

u/Statsomatic / Via reddit.com

6.This was posted on r/NoStupidQuestions, but I gotta be honest...this may be a stupid question.

u/Maseca2319 / Via reddit.com

7.This question actually made me lose IQ points.

u/uranonfraand / Via reddit.com

8.I, too, hope this person is kidding.

u/MagicCards_youtube / Via reddit.com

9.This person realllyyyyy didn't understand Celsius.

u/Plastic-Thanks7293 / Via reddit.com

10.And this person complained that someone on TikTok was using Celsius, even though people worldwide use TikTok and it's not even an American company.

u/stupidlyboredtho / Via reddit.com

11.This person forgot there were other languages than English.

u/Practical_Shock6362 / Via reddit.com

12.Kevin McCarthy posted one of the stupidest things I've ever read about American history.

u/Visqo / Via reddit.com

13.Seriously — American education has failed us all.

u/rSLASHwooosh / Via reddit.com

14.And this person specifically forgot about Spanish, one of the most commonly spoken languages in the world.

u/TastyTwix / Via reddit.com

15.This person forgot about the country of Spain.

u/camp-cope / Via reddit.com

16.This person argued that a Black man from the UK was "African American."

[deleted] / Via reddit.com

17.As did this person.

u/TheTopSnek / Via reddit.com

18.And this dum-dum suggested that only Americans can be white.

[deleted] / Via reddit.com

19.This idiot claimed that "most history is US history." The US is under 300 years old.

u/Redditvagabond0127 / Via reddit.com

20.There's no proof this person is American, but based on the fact that the train guy mentions the US (and also because of the stupidity of the question), I'm willing to bet they are.

u/Choice-Ad-4019 / Via reddit.com

21.This person assumed the other person was American just because they spoke English and had an online name spelled in English.

u/SomeJokeTeeth / Via reddit.com

22.This American refused to believe they had an accent.

u/YellowParenti72 / Via reddit.com

23.This American decided Reddit was only for Americans, and that even subreddits about different countries, for people in those countries, should be in English.

u/Daaaaaaaavidmit8a / Via reddit.com

24.This American had some trouble with military time.

u/absentlyBlow / Via reddit.com

25.This American thought we were the only country to use the dollar sign.

u/KittyboiYT2 / Via reddit.com

26.This person thought Americans wrote the dictionary.

u/Non-Binary-Boomer / Via reddit.com

27.This idiot called American English "the original."

u/mjonesky / Via reddit.com

28.And this person suggested Americans invented the English language.

u/Alessio3002 / Via reddit.com

29.This person forgot that other countries list the day before the month, as it should be.

u/themaninthesea / Via reddit.com

30.This person called a Mexican person a "troll" for disagreeing on what Mexican food should be.

u/gothlaw / Via reddit.com

31.This person took issue with the spelling and pronunciation of aluminum, based entirely on the false claim that it was invented by an American.

u/Jareththegoblinking0 / Via reddit.com

32.This person suggested Europeans don't text, and provided a totally logical and 100% true reason why not.

u/MORaHo04 / Via reddit.com

33.This person decided that any US law applied worldwide.

u/samusongoyy / Via reddit.com

34.This may be one of the stupidest things I've seen posted on the internet.

u/Layla_CC / Via reddit.com

35.This person suggested the US is the oldest country on Earth, then thought Iran and Japan were continents.

u/lol62056 / Via reddit.com

36.This person posted a comment on a video of a British person asking them to sound less British.

u/RedDirtNurse / Via reddit.com

37.This person vastly unrepresented Europe's size.

u/someonecool_official / Via reddit.com

38.And this person also falsely claimed the US is larger than Europe.

u/Cheeseburjer / Via reddit.com

39.This American took issue with Bonfire Night because it reminded them of the KKK, despite the fact that it was established long before the KKK...then also claimed most people on TikTok were American. Again, TikTok isn't even an American company.

u/Swim_Spadey / Via reddit.com

40.This person forgot that the drinking age isn't 21 everywhere.

u/WanderingDoe62 / Via reddit.com

41.This person really tried — and really, really failed — to make a point.

u/sotcik / Via reddit.com

42.This person accused someone else of being "exactly the problem," forgetting that Amber alerts are only called that in the US.

u/Impressive-Fun-364 / Via reddit.com

43.This person clearly didn't realize that 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. are Arabic numerals.

u/serac145 / Via reddit.com

44.This person complained about visiting Niagara Falls on the Canadian side, accusing Canadian businesses of trying to "rip [them] off" by charging them in Canadian dollars. In Canada.

u/jtgibggdt / Via reddit.com

45.This person got angry an Armenian band was raising money for (checks notes) Armenia.

u/WarPigs1970 / Via reddit.com

46.This person claimed pizza was invented in the US.

u/DumbFish94 / Via reddit.com

47.And finally, this person complained about there not being an American flag emoji, despite the fact that A) there is one, and B) it's not on the first screen because they're done by alphabetical order.

u/Guarantee-Popular / Via reddit.com

Quarter of world’s freshwater fish at risk of extinction, according to assessment


Patrick Greenfield
Mon, 11 December 2023 

Photograph: Zeb Hogan/EPA

Nearly a quarter of the world’s freshwater fish are at risk of extinction due to global heating, overfishing and pollution, according to an expert assessment.

From the large-toothed Lake Turkana robber in Kenya to the Mekong giant catfish in south-east Asia, many of the world’s freshwater fish are at risk of disappearing, the first International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list assessment of the category has found.

Nearly a fifth of all threatened freshwater species are affected by climate change, from impacts such as falling water levels, shifting seasons and seawater moving up rivers. Of the assessed species, 3,086 out of 14,898 were at risk of vanishing.


The latest assessment also found that mahogany, Atlantic salmon and green turtles were increasingly threatened, according to scientific assessments, but there was good news about the saiga antelope, which has moved up from the critically endangered category to near threatened after the population increased by 1,100% in just seven years, mainly in Kazakhstan.

The reintroduction of the scimitar-horned oryx in Chad is another success story. The world’s fourth largest mammal was once common across the Sahel but disappeared in the 1990s after it was overhunted. Reintroduction efforts from captivity have led to the population growing to 140 mature animals in the Ouadi Rimé-Ouadi Achim faunal reserve in Chad. It is classified as vulnerable to extinction and scientists say it is threatened by the climate crisis.

“Today’s update to the IUCN red list shows the power of coordinated local, national and international conservation efforts. Success stories such as that of the scimitar horned oryx show that conversation works. To ensure the results of conservation action are durable, we need to decisively tackle the interlinked climate and biodiversity crises,” said the IUCN president, Razan Al Mubarak.

Big leaf mahogany, among the most commercially sought-after plants on the planet, is now classified as endangered after its numbers fell by 60% over the past 180 years due to unsustainable harvesting. Mahogany wood remains valuable for furniture, musical instruments and decorations, which has driven illegal logging of the tree across central and South America.

The Atlantic salmon, previously common and classified as a species of least concern, is now near threatened on the IUCN red list after its global population fell by 23%, having vanished from many rivers in the UK. The fish, which lives in both fresh and saltwater, has been affected by widespread habitat loss, global heating and dams that block access to breeding sites. Breeding with farmed salmon has also weakened their ability to adapt from global heating while invasive Pacific pink salmon is spreading across northern Europe.

“Freshwater fishes make up more than half of the world’s known fish species, an incomprehensible diversity given that freshwater ecosystems comprise only 1% of aquatic habitat. These diverse species are integral to the ecosystem, and vital to its resilience. This is essential to the billions of people who rely upon freshwater ecosystems, and the millions of people who rely on their fisheries,” said Kathy Hughes, co-chair of the IUCN species survival commission freshwater fish specialist group.

“Ensuring freshwater ecosystems are well managed, remain free-flowing with sufficient water, and good water quality is essential to stop species declines and maintain food security, livelihoods and economies in a climate resilient world,” she said.

Central south Pacific and east Pacific green turtles are also at risk of vanishing, according to scientists. They are a major bycatch in industrial and artisanal fishing while their eggs are a delicacy in some countries. Rising global temperatures are also affecting their hatching success and rising sea temperatures are flooding nests.

Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow biodiversity reporters Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield on X for all the latest news and features

‘Like unscrambling an egg’: scientists alter DNA to save Scottish wildcats

Robin McKie
Sat, 9 December 2023 

Photograph: PB Images/Alamy

Scientists are preparing plans to restore the fortunes of Scotland’s threatened Highland wildcats – by identifying and removing DNA they have acquired from domestic cats.

Researchers have warned that the Highland tiger, as the wildcat is also known, is critically endangered because it has bred so much with domestic moggies. All animals now bear evidence of interbreeding, and many have little “wild” left in them.

But by using modern genomics, scientists hope to reverse this process. Precise DNA maps of individual animals would be created to pinpoint those with high levels of wildcat genes. These will be bred with similarly endowed felines to create a new population, unaffected by domestic cat hybridisation, that can then be returned to the Scottish countryside.

“The process is known as de-introgression and it is the scientific equivalent of trying to unscramble an egg,” said Dan Lawson of Bristol University, who is the genomics leader for the project.

“We have animals with a mix of two sets of genes. Now we want to separate those sets and recreate Scotland’s original wildcat population.

“It won’t be easy but the benefits will be considerable, not just for wildcats but for other endangered species that are being swamped, genetically, by similar animals.”

British moggies are derived from the African wildcat Felix lybica and tend to be smaller – and friendlier - than Felis silvestris, the European wildcat, from which the Scottish version is descended. Domestic cats moved into Europe as agriculture spread to the continent from the Middle East, and by Roman times they were established in Britain.

The two species kept apart with little interbreeding for centuries, research has indicated. Wildcats have an aversion to humans while domestic cats find us moderately tolerable and occasionally useful. But that separation was eroded as the effects of loss of habitat, road accidents and spreading domestic cat populations accumulated, leading to a slump in wildcat numbers in the 20th century.

“There were few places for the wildcat to hide, and survivors began to interbreed with domestic cats that had gone feral, producing hybrid offspring,” said Jo Howard-McCombe, a conservation geneticist at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland in Edinburgh.

“However, that interbreeding only happened in earnest in the 1960s, after we’d established captive populations of wildcats in Scotland. So animals that had been taken to zoos and sanctuaries were not too badly affected by hybridisation. Conservationists got there just in time.”

Using the descendants of these animals, a wildcat restoration programme, Saving Wildcats, was set up and this summer arranged for the release of 19 animals into a 600 sq km section of the Cairngorms national park known as Cairngorms Connect.

Fitted with GPS collars, each animal is tracked to study how it copes with life in the wild, and the onset of winter in Scotland. A further 40 animals are set to be released over the next three years.

“Wildcats survive on rabbits, mice, voles and occasional birds and hares. So far, our cats are doing well, though one has died from an abdominal infection,” said Helena Parsons, a manager for Saving Wildcats.

Wildcats breed in December and January, with litters born in spring or early summer. “We are not expecting our cats to have kittens next year – they need time to get used to life in the wild. On the other hand, it would be fantastic if we did get a litter or two,” said Parsons. “GPS data shows some of the cats have met up over the past few months.”

A critical feature of Saving Wildcats is to keep feral and domestic cats away from their release area, said Parsons. “We have over 100 camera traps out there, and every time we spot a cat we try to find out if it is a domestic one. If it is, we try to trace its owner and ask if it has been neutered. If it’s feral, we try to find it and get it sterilised.”

The animals used for the Saving Wildcats programme were bred at a special centre, at the Highland Wildlife Park near Kingussie, using wildcats from zoos and wildlife parks across Britain. Stud book records and genetic tests suggest these have high levels of wildcat genes. Nevertheless, all are affected to some degree by hybridisation with domestic cats.

It is the goal of the de-introgression programme – for increasing wildcat gene levels – to add an extra boost by exploiting the power of modern genomics. However, the project will not be a quick or an easy one, said programme scientist Prof Mark Beaumont of Bristol University. “The idea would be to have funds to monitor what is happening in the kittens as you progress, and that costs money. A whole genome of an individual cat sets you back about $200.”

This point was backed by Lawson. “It will take 10 to 20 generations of careful breeding and genetic analysis to recover the complete wildcat genome,” he told the Observer. “That poses all sorts of problems, not least financial. But we’re applying for money to start. We should be clear: the breeding programme is our last chance to save the Scottish wildcat.”

Spanish police say they nabbed leader of one of the world’s biggest hacking groups

Arrestee linked to Kelvin Security, which over last 3 years carried out more than 300 high-level attacks around the world

Alyssa Mcmurtry |11.12.2023 -


OVIEDO, Spain

Spanish police have said they arrested one of the alleged leaders of hacktivist group Kelvin Security in the coastal city of Alicante.

Spanish police say Kelvin Security has hacked more than 300 organizations in over 90 countries over the last three years, extracting sensitive information and selling it on the dark web.

The individual arrested in Alicante is believed to be the head of finances, responsible for laundering the money obtained from the hacking activity.

Police say the detainee mainly laundered money through trading cryptocurrencies.

The detainee is from Venezuela and is charged with crimes including belonging to a criminal organization, revealing secrets, and money laundering.

Spanish police say the group’s most recent attack was on an energy company last month. In that case, they managed to carry out a massive extraction of confidential information from more than 85,000 of the company’s clients.

​​​​​​​In Spain, the investigation began in 2021 after Kelvin Security hacked the computer systems of the Spanish cities of Getafe, Camas, La Haba and the regional government of Castille-La Mancha. ​​​​​​​

Opinion
The Guardian view on stalemate in Ukraine: a more realistic approach is no bad thing

Editorial
Mon, 11 December 2023 

Photograph: Ukrainian Presidential Press SER/AFP/Getty Images

A year ago, Volodymyr Zelenskiy arrived in Washington as not merely the respected leader of a courageous nation, but as a global star. His address to Congress was greeted with thunderous cheers. As he returns for a third trip on Tuesday, he is seeking to win over key legislators, and the public, after Republican senators blocked $106bn in aid, primarily for Ukraine and also Israel. They have tied the spending to US immigration measures. The administration has warned that funding could run out by the end of the year. Kyiv is also trying to shore up support from its other main ally, the EU. In talks this week, Viktor Orbán, the Hungarian prime minister, is threatening to veto €50bn of support and is blocking progress on accession.

The failure of Ukraine’s counteroffensive has hit morale at home and enthusiasm for the cause abroad. Last month the commander in chief, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, acknowledged the stalemate and warned that “there will most likely be no deep and beautiful breakthrough”. This is now, more than ever, a war of attrition. Gen Zaluzhnyi’s words demonstrated not only frustration but also the growing evidence of friction between political and military leaders. The US is also more openly discussing differences, primarily over military tactics, but also over issues such as corruption.

Whether or not divisions have increased, there is more willingness to air them. In a recent Time article, a close aide complained of the president: “He deludes himself … We’re not winning.” Amid the exhaustion and despondence, ordinary Ukrainians too are beginning to question his stubborn optimism. Gen Zaluzhnyi is seen as a potential future political rival to Mr Zelenskiy; another, Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, has claimed that Ukraine is “sliding into authoritarianism”. Politics is no longer frozen by the conflict. Yet the grumbling should not be overstated. There is little appetite for elections in Ukraine, or for seeking a ceasefire.

For all the high-flown rhetoric heard in 2022, and while people were genuinely moved by Mr Zelenskiy’s performance and the valour – and success – of Ukrainians in fighting back, international support was never chiefly about altruistic support for a heroic nation. Those ideals shored up public support, and encouraged countries to bear the costs of backing Kyiv, but shared values coexisted with a hard-headed recognition of shared interests. The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, was right to observe that Russia “won’t stop in Ukraine”.

Russia has no interest in a ceasefire at present. The west’s oil sanctions are no longer working. Vladimir Putin is eagerly anticipating – and, presumably, working towards – a second Trump presidency, while relishing existing signs of “Ukraine fatigue”. He can muster personnel via mobilisation – though there may be some cost if he cannot produce victories to show for many more Russian deaths.

The reality is that the enthusiasm of 2022 was never going to be maintained indefinitely. War drains not only resources but also spirits. A more realistic acknowledgment of the likely length and costs of this war, and the potential range of outcomes, was always inevitable. It should not mean abandoning Kyiv. Ukrainians must decide if and when it is time for negotiations. Right now, Ukraine needs aid, and to begin accession negotiations with the EU. A year ago, Mr Zelenskiy told Congress: “Your money is not charity. It’s an investment in … global security and democracy.” Whatever else has changed, that message stands.

PUTIN'S PUPPET IN THE EU
Foreign ministers close ranks to slam Hungary's 'deplorable' threats to block EU support for Ukraine

Jorge Liboreiro
Mon, 11 December 2023 

Ahead of a high-stakes EU summit later this week, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has drastically ratcheted up his opposition campaign to prevent the opening of accession negotiations with the war-torn nation, derail a proposed €50-billion special fund in financial support and hinder further provisions of military aid.

All three decisions require unanimity, allowing one single country to paralyse the plans.

"We should refrain from discussing the issue of Ukraine's EU accession during the December (summit), as there is no unity among member states on this matter," Orbán said last week after a phone conversation with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

Orbán's increasingly emboldened and defiant attitude has put Brussels on alert, fuelling fears that the political unity forged in the aftermath of Russia's invasion might be about to collapse, just when American support is deeply stuck in a legislative battle.

In a bid to twist Hungary's arm and avoid what is shaping to be a calamitous summit, foreign affairs ministers barely minced their words of intense displeasure over Orbán's filibustering during a meeting in Brussels on Monday.

"The only way I can read the Hungarian position, not just on Ukraine but on many other issues, is that they are against Europe and everything that Europe stands for," said Lithuania's Gabrielius Landsbergis, describing the standoff as a "clash of ideologies."

"If we can get rational and find rational solutions, I won't go deeper in this, but pragmatic, let's call them. Maybe this step can be solved. If not, dark times can lie ahead."

Speaking of a "crucial week for Europe," his Latvian counterpart, Krišjānis Kariņš, said ministers and leaders had to look at all options available to break the deadlock and ensure accession talks receive the political green light.

"Hungary's position right now is, shall we say, a challenge," Kariņš told reporters. "It also underscores the interesting way by which we (make) decisions: by unanimity. Sometimes this is a very good model, and sometimes, as it's now, we see it can have its downsides."

Romania's Luminița Odobescu argued maintaining EU support for Ukraine was of "critical importance" and a "matter of responsibility" and "credibility."

"We have to show there is no fatigue and the EU can deliver when the security in its immediate neighbourhood is at stake," Odobescu said.

Estonia's Margus Tsahkna said Hungary had "no reason" and "no arguments" to block nor the opening of accession talks nor the provision of financial and military support for Ukraine. Doing so, he warned, would be a "bad mistake."

"I really do hope that at the end of this week, we can say that we're using this historical window of opportunity of enlargement and that there will be no country who will block it," Tsahkna said.

'We can't show any sign of weakness'

Orbán's opposition has been often linked to an issue completely unrelated to Russia's war: the billions in EU funds that Brussels has frozen over rule-of-law concerns.

Since late last year, the European Commission has withheld almost €22 billion in cohesion funds as well as the €10.4 billion that make up Hungary's recovery and resilience plan.

Budapest introduced in the spring a reform to strengthen judicial independence and curtail political influence over the courts, in line with the "super milestones" that the Commission had imposed.

The overture led the executive to disburse €920 in pre-financing from the recovery and resilience plan and begin preparations to pay out €10 billion from the cohesion funds. But Orbán, who often refers to the dispute as "financial blackmail," has demanded the release of the entire pot of cash.

"This shouldn't be a game of bargaining. But of course, in this situation we need to find all channels possible which can aid in finding a solution," said Finland's Elina Valtonen, when asked about a possible quid-pro-quo to change Orbán's mind.

"I'm not worried but the position of Hungary has been very, very deplorable over the course of the past months," Valtonen said. "There have to be decisions on Ukraine," she added. "We can't show any sign of weakness."

The entreaties have so far fallen on deaf ears.

Speaking to Hungarian media in Brussels, Foreign Affairs Minister Péter Szijjártó insisted his country would opt for a veto.

"Our position is clear: at the moment, the situation is not right, the situation is not ready for the European Union to start accession negotiations. This is not a tactical move on our part, but it is a well-founded position," the minister said.

Szijjártó denounced as "false" the European Commission's assessment of Ukraine's membership application, which concluded Kyiv had met four of the seven pre-conditions for opening negotiations, with some work still to be done in the field of anti-corruption, de-oligarchisation and the rights of minorities.

The minister said the EU should focus on a strategy of "closer cooperation" with Ukraine without entering into the enlargement territory.

"We don't know the implications of what accession negotiations or accession itself would mean for the European Union," Szijjártó said. "It would be simply irresponsible to open accession negotiations now, not only from a national point of view but also from the point of view of the European Union."

Ukraine's Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, who travelled to Brussels to take part in Monday's meeting, tried to counteract the Hungarian narrative, saying Kyiv had done its "homework," including by changing the legislation on the use of minority languages "in the way Hungary wanted it to be changed."

Kuleba described the opening of accession talks as "the mother of all decisions" and predicted a negative outcome during the summit would reverberate across Europe.

"I can even not imagine – I don't even want to talk about the devastating consequences that will occur (should) the Council fail to make this decision. Not only with regard to Ukraine but in a broader sense, on the issue of enlargement as a whole," Kuleba said.

"The stakes are very high."

Under the current €18-billion programme of macro-financial assistance, the EU has only one payment left for Ukraine, worth €1.5 billion and scheduled for the end of December. If leaders do not approve a budget top-up, the European Commission will be unable to raise fresh money on the market, bringing the support to an abrupt end.

Rabbis form human shield to protect Palestinian olive harvest in West Bank

Melanie Swan
Sun, 10 December 2023

Rabbi Arik Ascherman, a member of Rabbis for Human Rights, helps Palestinians during the olive harvest outside Ramallah in the West Bank 

- Aris Messinis/AFP via Getty Images

A group of rabbis and Israeli volunteers are risking life and limb to protect this year’s olive harvest in the West Bank, amid soaring tensions over the war in Gaza.

Rabbis for Human Rights, an organisation set up in 1990 during the first intifada, has been working for decades to build ties with Palestinian communities threatened by violent Israeli settlers.

As the war in Gaza rages, there has been a surge in violence in the West Bank, making the job of collecting olives, a cornerstone of the territory’s economy, riskier than ever.


Rabbi Avi Dabush heads the charity and has continued his work despite being displaced from his home at Kibbutz Nirim, one of the communities that was hit hardest during the Hamas massacres on Oct 7.

“We won’t go home for at least another year,” Mr Dabush told The Telegraph.

The war and the tensions it has sparked makes him and the organisation even more determined to continue its work in spite of the new challenges the war has brought, he said.

Before Oct 7 there was an average of three incidents of settler violence per day, according to the UN. But that has risen to seven.

Palestinian women work at an olive grove outside Ramallah in the occupied West Bank - Aris Messinis/AFP via Getty Images

“We too are victims of their violence,” Mr Dabush said. “A year and a half ago when we were planting, 15 masked settlers came from Givat Ronen, attacked volunteers, set the cars on fire.

“The volunteers are really putting themselves at risk. In this case we are trying to protect the farmers but they are also at risk,” he said.

“Four years ago we had a rabbi, 80 years old, and the settlers came from Yitzhar, set the field on fire and hit him with iron bars. He was hospitalised for a few days.”

Other volunteers have had arms and legs broken and suffered head injuries.

The charity works near some of the most radical and dangerous settlements.

The Bedouin village of Burim, near Nablus, is surrounded on one side by the settler community of Itzhar, and on the other Givat Ronen, considered a violent outpost.

Instead of 100 volunteers a day going to help Bedouin communities with the olive harvest, only about 10 can reach them, with the rest either displaced, at home taking care of children whose schools have closed, or too afraid of the rising tide of violence.

A UN report claimed “more than one in every three settler-related incidents since October 7 involved settlers using firearms to threaten Palestinians, including by opening fire”.

Palestinian farmers in the West Bank have come under attack from Israeli settlers - Issam Rimawi/Anadolu via Getty Images

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have imposed a series of roadblocks and curfews to limit movement around the occupied West Bank as flare-ups continue, meaning the group could only access the farmers it helps for around seven days of the month-long harvest period this year.

“From Hawara to the north now, it is pretty closed by the army so it’s hard to reach these areas,” Mr Dabush said.

While there are some in Israel who do not understand why Mr Dabush and his volunteers put themselves in the firing line to protect the Palestinians and Bedouin communities, there are many who are determined that humanitarian work should continue.

“As an Israeli, there are people who really think this is important. And yes, there are people who really think that it’s helping the enemy. We are faith based and based on human rights principles, the Jewish morality, so we are determined in that.”

Rabbis for Human Rights also works with shepherds in the Jordan valley, who are increasingly need food and medical supplies.

“We started humanitarian work which we don’t usually do. Farmers and mayors from these villages like Burin and Kusra told us they need help in medical goods and also with food, so we started every week to bring food support and first aid.”

With road closures for security operations a frequent occurrence, moving from village to village is harder and more dangerous than ever.
‘Our work is even more urgent’

Recently, a Bedouin farmer was killed by a settler while tending his olive trees. “We feel that our work is even more urgent, though it’s always urgent, so we are even more driven,” Mr Dabush said.

This week, Israeli rights group Yesh Din, said “settler violence has intensified in the past month under the cover of war”. It has “manifested primarily in the armed invasions of settlers into Palestinian villages and preventing Palestinians from harvesting their olive crop through violence and intimidation”.

Another of the rabbis, Anton Goodman, spoke about the graffiti he had witnessed in the West Bank including “death to Arabs”. He said: “There are violent settlers trying to abuse this [time] to create more hatred and violence and we are here to do the opposite.”

The IDF said the uptick in violence was coming from both sides. “Since the October 7th massacre, there has been a significant increase in terrorist attacks in Judea and Samaria, with over 550 attempted attacks occurring since the beginning of the war,” a spokesman told The Sunday Telegraph.

“The IDF conducts nightly counterterrorism operations to apprehend suspects, many of them are part of the Hamas terrorist organisation. In addition, as part of the security operations in the area, dynamic checkpoints have been put up over different places.”

What is settled status? Home Office U-turn after French grandmother who has lived in UK for 42 years faced deportation

Leonarda Zarcone, 74, risked being deported from the UK because an email from the Home Office went to her junk inbox.


James Hockaday

THE GUARDIAN
Sun, 10 December 2023

Leonarda Zarcone said she had the 'shock of her life' when she was threatened with deportation. (SWNS)

A grandmother with French citizenship who has lived in the UK for 42 years was nearly forced to leave the country after failing to spot a Home Office email in her junk folder.

Leonarda Zarcone, 74, was told she missed the deadline to apply for settled status despite living and working in Britain since 1981. The Home Office demanded more evidence of her UK residency in an email, but it landed in her junk folder, which she never checked.

Zarcone faced weeks of uncertainty when the government sent her a letter last month warning she'd be prosecuted unless she left the country. However, the Home Office has now made a U-turn after her family pleaded with the department to reconsider.


Much to her relief, Zarcone has now been granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK, but her son David Brunetto, 51, said that it "should never have got to this point". He added: "My mum has had so many sleepless nights about being arrested because technically she was an illegal immigrant.

"It shows just how precarious the system is if you can be ordered to leave the country on the basis of an email being sent to a junk folder. I really hope the Home Office will learn lessons from this. The way my mum was treated was just not right."

Zarcone, 74, has lived in the UK for 42 years and has settled in Leicester. (SWNS)
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Italy-born Zarcone moved to the UK as a child before living in France, where she was granted French citizenship. She and her husband Marcel Brunetto, 77, moved to Britain in 1981 and settled in Leicester, where they ran a fish and chip shop and raised three children.

After Britain left the EU in 2020 following the 2016 Brexit referendum, Zarcone and her family applied for settled status to continue living in the country. The settled status scheme grants EU nationals and their families who have spent five years in the UK the same rights as British citizens.

Her family qualified but Zarcone missed the deadline as the Home Office's email demanding more financial information landed in her spam inbox. Brunetto said: "She had never used an email before and she is cautious about talking to people on the phone in case she's being scammed."

Zarcone was eventually allowed into the UK for 28 days after being stopped by immigration at East Midlands Airport. (SWNS)

He suggested that all of this trouble could have been avoided had his mother been sent a letter, but that phone and email were the only options for contact listed on the application form. "When I opened the letter it was the shock of my life," said Zarcone, who has three grown-up children and four grandchildren.

"All my family and my roots are here. It was really frightening. I had nowhere to go," she added. "My mum and dad moved to England and lived her their whole lives. After they died we buried them here. I have paid National Insurance, taxes and lived an honest life. My family have made their lives here and my youngest daughter was born in the UK. We even support Leicester City football team, this is our home."

Brunetto submitted EU settlement claims for his parents along with his own online application. Zarcone found out her application had failed when an immigration officer stopped her when she returned from a family wedding in France in September.
Home Office 'had plenty of proof already'

"I was an illegal immigrant and all because of an email which was sent to my junk folder," Zarcone said, adding that she cried thinking she could be deported due to such a simple mistake.

Her son, who also lives in Leicester, said: "My mum's records prove that she has been living here for decades. She's received a state pension for seven years so clearly she's lived here continually and she's paid into the system. She's paid her taxes. She's paying council tax. There's lots of proof."

On Friday, the Home Office emailed Brunetto to confirm his mother had been granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK. It said: "I am pleased to inform you that your application under the EU settlement scheme has been successful."

A spokesperson said: "All EU settlement scheme applications are carefully considered on their individual merits, on the basis of the evidence provided and in accordance with the immigration rules. A wide range of support remains available for applicants, including vulnerable people. This includes support through a Grant Funded Network of third party organisations dedicated to assisting vulnerable people with their applications."

Boris Johnson was a key figurehead of the Vote Leave campaign to depart the EU. 

What is settled status?

After the UK voted to leave the European Union on 23 June 2016, new immigration rules had to be drawn up for the EU citizens already living in the country. Any EU citizens and family members staying in the UK by 31 December 2020 were given a deadline of 30 June 2021 to register for settled status.

If this was approved, it would mean they'd have a guaranteed right to stay in the UK indefinitely, as well as to work or study in the country. Those with settled status also have full rights to healthcare and public funds such as state benefits and pensions.

A common way to become eligible to apply for indefinite leave to remain is to live continuously in the country, on a legal visa, for five or more years. However, special arrangements were made under the EU settlement scheme for citizens from the bloc who had been in the UK before 31 December 2020 but had not reached this benchmark.

They were granted "pre-settled status", which initially gave them five years in the country before applying for full settled status, law firm Davidson Morris explains. Those who failed to make an application risked losing their right to remain in the UK.

However, a landmark High Court judgment in December 2022 ruled that this policy was unlawful, meaning EU, EEA and Swiss nationals no longer have to make a second application, provided they can prove they've been living in the UK continuously.