Harris and Walz are showing their support for organized labor with appearance at Detroit union hall

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign rally Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2024, in Romulus, Mich. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris and running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz raise their arms at a campaign rally Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2024, in Romulus, Mich. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)

United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain speaks during an interview with The Associated Press on Friday, Aug. 2, 2024, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Mike Householder)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris greets supporters at a campaign rally Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2024, in Romulus, Mich. (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris greets supporters at a campaign rally Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2024, in Romulus, Mich. (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson)

BY DARLENE SUPERVILLE AND JOEY CAPPELLETTI
August 8, 2024

DETROIT (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, are set to play up their support for organized labor during an appearance at a Detroit-area union hall as the new Democratic ticket lavishes attention on a crucial base of support.

Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, and Walz, who joined the ticket on Tuesday, plan to speak on Thursday to several dozen United Auto Workers members.

After President Joe Biden ended his reelection campaign last month and endorsed his vice president, organized labor quickly rallied around Harris. The AFL-CIO endorsed her after having first backed Biden. The UAW formally backed her last week.

Harris and Walz have been highlighting their support for working people during their first joint appearances this week in some of the most closely contested states that will help decide whether she becomes the first female U.S. president or whether Republican Donald Trump returns to the White House and brings along Sen. JD Vance of Ohio as his vice president.

The Democrats visited Wisconsin and Michigan on Wednesday, hoping to shore up support among the younger, diverse, labor-friendly voters who were instrumental in helping Biden get elected in 2020.


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Two new polls of likely voters in Wisconsin and Georgia, another key state, show close races in both. Several Georgiapolls conducted earlier in the summer found Trump slightly ahead in the state, which Biden won narrowly in 2020.

UAW President Shawn Fain told The Associated Press last week that Harris’ leading the Democratic ticket boosts the party’s chances of winning Michigan and keeping the White House in November. Fain also spoke Wednesday at Harris’ campaign rally at a Detroit-area airport hangar.

Fain said in the interview that Trump is beholden to billionaires, knows nothing about the auto industry and would send the labor movement into reverse in a second term.

The UAW leader has become a top nemesis of the Republican presidential nominee, who frequently rails against Fain at rallies and in speeches.

Vance made his own stops in Michigan and Wisconsin on Wednesday, intent on showing that Republicans will compete in the “blue wall” of Midwestern states. He called Walz a “crazy radical” and said that Harris’ decision to pick him as a running mate shows that she “bends the knee to the far left of the Democratic Party.”

As Harris spoke to an estimated 15,000-person crowd at the airport, she was interrupted by protesters opposed to Israel’s war in Gaza with Hamas. At first, Harris said to those trying to disrupt her, “I am here because I believe in democracy, and everybody’s voice matters.”

But Harris lost patience as the shouting continued, with protesters accusing her of supporting genocide in Gaza. That led her to deliver a sharper rejoinder.

“If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that,” she said, talking over the protesters. “Otherwise, I’m speaking.”

Metro Detroit, home to one of the largest Arab American populations in the United States, has become a focal point of tension and unrest due to the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Shortly after her remarks Wednesday, Harris won the backing of Assad I. Turfe, the deputy Wayne County executive, who is the highest ranking Arab American official in Michigan’s largest county. Turfe told The Associated Press that he spoke with Harris backstage at the event before his endorsement.

“Kamala Harris embodies the America we deserve –- an America that stands for strength, inclusivity and unwavering commitment to justice,” Turfe said in a statement. “I wholeheartedly endorse Kamala Harris, as she represents the true spirit of our nation and the values we hold dear.”

Turfe also pressed the need for a cease-fire in Gaza, but said that Harris “gives us the best chance of achieving peace in that region moving forward.”

Union members attending the rally said they supported Harris.

Jeanne Ruff of Livonia, Michigan, whose husband is a longtime UAW member, said she hoped Harris would visit a union shop in Michigan to show her support.
“I want her to make sure skill trades are back in schools so that the next generation can understand what unions are about. What solidarity is and how strong we can be together, working as one,” Ruff said.
___

Cappelletti reported from Lansing, Michigan. AP Auto Writer Tom Krisher contributed to this report.

DARLENE SUPERVILLE
Darlene Superville covers The White House

JOEY CAPPELLETTI
Cappelletti covers politics and state government for The Associated Press in Michigan. He is based in Lansing.

In 60-year-old Tim Walz, Kamala Harris found a partner to advocate for reproductive rights

WALZ SAYS MIND YOUR OWN DAMN BUSINESS (MYOB)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris and running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz arrive at a campaign rally Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2024, in Romulus, Mich. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)

BY AMANDA SEITZ
August 8, 2024

WASHINGTON (AP) — The makings of a presidential ticket began in an unusual spot six months ago: a Minnesota abortion clinic.

At the time, it was a historic visit for Vice President Kamala Harris — no president or vice president had ever made a public stop at one. But the visit laid the groundwork for Harris to connect with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and learn about his interest in reproductive health, an issue Harris has taken the lead on during her White House term.

At first glance, the 60-year-old governor might not seem the most likely of political surrogates to talk about abortion and pregnancy. But Harris found a partner who has a track record of increasing abortion access in his state and can speak comfortably about his own family’s struggles with infertility.

Already, Walz has captivated crowds in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan with the story of his daughter’s birth, made possible through in vitro fertilization treatments. The procedure involves retrieving a woman’s eggs and combining them in a lab dish with sperm to create a fertilized embryo that is transferred into the woman’s uterus in hopes of creating a pregnancy.

His wife, Gwen, went through seven years of fertility treatments before their daughter arrived. Phone calls in those years from Gwen often led to heartbreak, he’s said, until one day when she called crying with the good news that she was pregnant.


Harris and Walz are showing their support for organized labor with appearance at Detroit union hall

“It’s not by chance that we named our daughter Hope,” he told crowds in Philadelphia and again Wednesday in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

The couple also has a son, Gus.

Walz fired up the arena in Philadelphia on Tuesday, his first appearance as Harris’ vice presidential pick, with a warning to Republicans.

“Even if we wouldn’t make the same choice for ourselves, there’s a golden rule: mind your own damn business,” Walz said to a crowd that roared in response. Harris smiled, clapping behind him. “Look, that includes IVF. And this gets personal for me and family.”

Democrats have warned that access to birth control and fertility treatments could be on the line if Republicans win big in this election. The concern grew more frantic after an Alabama Supreme Court ruled in February that frozen embryos could be considered children, throwing fertility treatment for people in the state into question. Democrats and Republicans alike, including former President Donald Trump, condemned the ruling, although some conservatives have said they support it.

Most Americans — around 6 in 10 — favor protecting access to IVF, according to an AP-NORC poll conducted in June. However, opinion is less developed on whether the destruction of embryos created through IVF should be banned. About 4 in 10 neither favor nor oppose a ban on the destruction of embryos created through IVF, while one-third are in favor and one-quarter are opposed.

Walz’s experience on reproductive issues isn’t just personal.

After the U.S. Supreme Court removed the constitutional right to an abortion, Walz signed a state law declaring that Minnesotans have a “fundamental right” to abortion and contraception.

LIBERTARIAN DEMOCRAT SAYS MYOB 

OVER REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS

Thai court dissolves progressive Move Forward Party, which won election but was blocked from power

A court in Thailand on Wednesday ordered the dissolution of the progressive Move Forward Party, which finished first in last year’s general election, saying it violated the constitution by proposing an amendment of a law against defaming the country’s royal family. (AP video shot by Jerry Harmer)

BY JINTAMAS SAKSORNCHAI
August 7, 2024

BANGKOK (AP) — A court in Thailand on Wednesday ordered the dissolution of the progressive Move Forward Party, which finished first in last year’s general election, saying it violated the constitution by proposing an amendment of a law against defaming the country’s royal family.

The Constitutional Court said it voted unanimously to dissolve the party because its campaign proposal to amend the law amounted to an attempt to overthrow the nation’s constitutional monarchy.

The Move Forward Party was unable to form a government after topping the polls because members of the Senate, at that time a conservative military-appointed body, refused to endorse its candidate for prime minister.

The Election Commission had filed a petition against the party after the Constitutional Court ruled in January that it must stop advocating changes to the law, known as Article 112, which protects the monarchy from criticism with penalties of up to 15 years in jail per offense. Move Forward has insisted that it wants to keep the monarchy above politics and not be exploited as a political tool.

The court on Wednesday also imposed a 10-year ban on political activity for those who held the party’s executive positions while it campaigned for the proposed amendment. Among them are its charismatic former leader, Pita Limjaroenrat, and current chief Chaithawat Tulathon.


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Speaking to followers and the media Wednesday evening, Pita said although he had to say goodbye as a politician, he looks forward to continuing his work as an active citizen. He said people may be frustrated today, but he would like to ask them to vent their frustration at the ballot box in every election from now on.

He declared that he was “absolutely proud” of what he had achieved and had no regrets.

“I have left my dent in the universe. And I’ll make sure that I pass the baton to the next-generation leaders,” he said.

Lawmakers of a dissolved political party who are not banned from politics can keep their seats in Parliament if they move to a new party within 60 days.

Pita said party members will carry on “in a new vehicle” to be introduced Friday, although he will not be a part of it. The party declined to announce details of the changeover.

Move Forward had 148 lawmakers in Parliament. If they all move together, they will lose five seats belonging to the now-banned party executives.

“We’re going to stick to the same path. A political party is only a vehicle, so let’s wait and see the new party to which the MPs will be going,” said Attaphon Buaphat, who gathered with other party supporters at its headquarters in Bangkok.

“You can get rid of the agents, the representatives for these people’s beliefs, but you are not going to be able to get rid of the beliefs,” Attaphon, a 34-year-old political activist, told The Reporters, an online news service.

The court’s action was one of many that have drawn widespread criticism and are seen as part of a yearslong attack on the country’s progressive movement by conservative forces trying to keep their grip on power.

The party was denied power after the Senate refused to approve its then-leader Pita’s nomination as prime minister. Non-elected senators, who were given power to vote on prime ministerial candidates by the constitution adopted in 2017 under a military government, said they opposed Pita because of his intention to reform the royal defamation law. Move Forward was later removed from a coalition formed with the now-governing Pheu Thai party and became head of the opposition.

The court rejected Move Forward’s argument that it did not have jurisdiction to rule on the case and the petition filed by the Election Commission did not follow due process because Move Forward was not given an opportunity to defend itself before it was submitted to the court.

Human rights organizations and other advocacy groups expressed concern about the court’s ruling.

“The decision is not a surprise, and is unlikely to spur large-scale protests given that Move Forward MPs will remain a force in Parliament, albeit under a different banner,” Matthew Wheeler, a regional analyst for the Brussels-based Crisis Group, said in an email. “But the decision is a further illustration that the 2017 constitution, drafted at the behest of coupmakers and approved in a flawed referendum, was designed to curb the popular will rather than facilitate its expression.”

Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin has maintained that the Thai justice system is fair and impartial, and that the government cannot interfere with the judicial process.

Thailand’s courts, especially the Constitutional Court, are considered a bulwark of the country’s royalist establishment, which has used them and nominally independent state agencies such as the Election Commission to issue rulings to cripple or sink political opponents.

Move Forward’s predecessor, the Future Forward party, was dissolved by the Constitutional Court in 2020 on charges of violating election laws on donations to political parties. The dissolution of Future Forward, whose promises of reforms were particularly attractive for younger people disillusioned after years of military rule, further highlighted the struggle between the progressive movement and conservative forces.

It was also one of the triggers for youth-led pro-democracy protests that sprang up across the country in 2020. The protests openly criticized the monarchy, an institution previously considered untouchable and a linchpin of Thai society.

The protests led to vigorous prosecutions under Article 112, which previously had been relatively rarely employed. Critics say the law is often wielded as a tool to quash political dissent.

Move Forward, formed as a new home for lawmakers from the dissolved Future Forward party, campaigned for an amendment of the article and other democratic reforms in the 2023 elections. Its first-place finish suggested many voters were ready for change.  

Heir apparent to Sri Lanka’s powerful Rajapaksa family will run in September’s presidential election


Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa sits for photographs, with his lawmaker son Namal by his side, following his election victory in the general election at his residence in Tangalle, Sri Lanka, Aug. 7, 2020

. T (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena, File)

BY BHARATHA MALLAWARACHI
, August 7, 2024

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — The man who is considered the heir apparent to the powerful Rajapaksa family in Sri Lanka will contest the presidential election in September, his political party said Wednesday, in an apparent bid to regain his family’s lost power after a humiliating setback two years ago during an unprecedented economic crisis in the Indian ocean island nation.

The Sri Lanka People’s Front said the 38-year-old lawyer Namal Rajapaksa, the eldest son of former strongman president Mahinda Rajapaksa, will be its candidate in the Sept. 21 election, the first since the nation plunged into its worst economic crisis.

The election is seen as key to Sri Lanka’s efforts to conclude a critical debt restructuring program and completing the financial reforms agreed to under a bailout program by the International Monetary Fund.

The nominations for polling will be accepted on Aug. 15.

The Rajapaksa family has dominated Sri Lankan politics since the country gained independence from Britain in 1948, producing a dozen lawmakers from three generations spanning seven decades. Mahinda Rajapaksa ruled as president from 2005 to 2015, appealing to the nationalist sentiment of the island’s Buddhist-Sinhalese majority.

Rajapaksa is revered by that majority for leading Sri Lanka to victory over ethnic Tamil rebels in 2009, ending a 26-year civil war.

In 2015, he lost to the opposition led by his former aide. But the family made a comeback in 2019, when Rajapaksa’s younger brother, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, won the presidential election on a promise to restore security in the wake of the Easter Sunday suicide bombings that killed 290 people.

But the Rajapaksa family lost power unexpectedly in 2022 when Sri Lanka was engulfed in its worst economic crisis that was largely caused by mismanagement and lack of accountability.

The resulting shortages of essential goods sparked riots in 2022, leading to a political crisis that forced four Rajapaksa siblings and two of their sons, including Namal, to resign from their posts as president, prime minister and cabinet ministers. Namal Rajapaksa had been minister of youth and sports. But they remained as lawmakers.

Parliament elected then-Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe as president.

The economic situation has improved under Wickremesinghe. But public dissatisfaction has grown over the government’s effort to increase revenue by raising electricity bills and imposing heavy new income taxes on professionals and businesses as part of efforts to meet the conditions of the IMF, which approved a four-year bailout program in March.

Wickremesinghe has announced he will run in the September election, while main rivals will be opposition leader Sajith Premadasa and Anura Dissanayake, the leader of a leftist political party that has gained popularity after the economic debacle.

It’s not clear whether Rajapaksa would be able to win the election, as his Sri Lanka People’s Front is already split with some lawmakers having pledged support to Wickremesinghe.

Wickremesinghe’s party has only one seat in the 225-majority parliament, and he has been ruling with the support of lawmakers from the Rajapaksas’ party.

FAA has doubled its enforcement cases against Boeing since a door plug blew off a 737 Max


 This image taken Sunday, Jan. 7, 2024, and released by the National Transportation Safety Board, shows the section of a a Boeing 737 Max where a door plug fell while Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 was in flight. (NTSB via AP, File)

 This photo released by the National Transportation Safety Board shows the door plug that fell from Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 on Jan. 8, 2024, in Portland, Ore. (National Transportation Safety Board via AP, file)

BY DAVID KOENIG
August 7, 2024

A federal Aviation Administration official said Wednesday that the agency has 16 pending enforcement cases against Boeing, half of which have been opened since a door plug blew off a 737 Max in midflight.

The increase in cases was disclosed Wednesday during a National Transportation Safety Board hearing into the accident, which happened during an Alaska Airlines flight on Jan. 5.

Brian Knaup, who helps manage the FAA’s oversight of Boeing, said one of the open cases involves the removal of parts that have already been installed on airplanes in production.

That is apparently what caused the mistake that led to the Alaska Airlines accident: Bolts that were removed to open the door plug for maintenance workers were not replaced when the panel was closed and the plane left a Boeing factory near Seattle.

Knaup’s comment came near the end of a two-day hearing that included discussion of Boeing’s poor tracking of parts-removal jobs. The company failed to document who opened the door plug, and the missing bolts were never found.

Another FAA official overseeing Boeing, Bryan Kilgroe, said he is kept awake at night wondering “especially considering all that has happened since Jan. 5, is why is it so difficult to sustain a corrective action for the long term?”


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Boeing said it had no comment.

The safety board released released testimony by Boeing employees who said they were pressured to build planes too quickly and not raise safety concerns.

NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy cited two employees who worked on aircraft doors where the Alaska Airlines plane was assembled and claimed they were moved to other areas — “Boeing prison” and “a cage” — after the door-plug blowout.

“What sort of impression does that give your employees if you sideline them ...? It is retaliation,” Homendy said. She said “sidelining” the two workers runs against Boeing’s policy, which is not to retaliate against workers for unintentional mistakes.

Homendy said the NTSB will survey workers at Boeing’s factory in Renton, Washington, where the Alaska Airlines plane was produced, about the company’s safety culture.

Representatives from Boeing and key supplier Spirit AeroSystems described their “safety management systems,” which encourage employees to voluntarily report safety concerns without fear of punishment. Boeing officials touted their “Speak Up” program for reporting concerns about quality and safety.

However, the president of the machinists’ union local said Boeing often ignores safety concerns raised by the union until he lodges a complaint with federal regulators.

“It really sounds great,” the official, Lloyd Catlin, said of Boeing’s safety plan. “In action on the factory floor, it is not.”

The FAA has been roundly criticized for lax regulation of Boeing ever since two deadly Max crashes in 2018 and 2019 killed 346 people. Those charges gained new momentum after the Alaska Airlines accident.

The agency’s new chief, Mike Whitaker, told Congress in June that FAA oversight “was too hands-off” but is improving. Knaup, a California-based FAA manager, said inspections have increased since the blowout.

FAA safety inspectors “can talk to anyone that’s on the (Boeing factory) floor at any time when they are doing an audit, and we do that,” he told the NTSB.

Door plugs are installed on some 737s to seal a cutout left for an extra exit that was not required on the Alaska jet. The plug on the Alaska plane was opened at a Boeing factory to let workers fix damaged rivets, but bolts that help secure the panel were not replaced when the plug was closed.

The accident on Alaska Airlines flight 1282 occurred minutes after takeoff from Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 5. The blowout left a hole in the plane, oxygen masks dropped and the cockpit door flew open. Miraculously there were no major injuries, and pilots were able to return to Portland and land the plane safely.

A Boeing official said Tuesday that the company is redesigning door plugs so they cannot be closed until they are properly secured. Elizabeth Lund, who was named Boeing’s senior vice president of quality shortly after the blowout, said the company hopes to complete the fix within about a year, and that 737s already in service will be retrofitted.

Mystery Paris street artist ‘Invader’ glues up new work to celebrate Olympics and delight fans

The mystery French street artist known only as “Invader” has struck again – this time to celebrate the Paris Olympics. Invader has been cementing mosaics to Paris walls since the 1990s, usually at night and without permission. His works now dot all corners of the City of Light and his fans have a lot of fun hunting them down.

 (AP video: John Leicester)Photos

BY JOHN LEICESTER
 August 7, 2024

PARIS (AP) — The mystery French street artist known only as “Invader” has struck Paris again — this time to celebrate the Olympics.

Invader has been cementing his quirky mosaics to Paris walls since the 1990s, usually at night and without permission. He’s become France’s most international, invasive and intriguing contemporary street artist. His works dot all corners of the City of Light and his fans have a lot of fun hunting them down.

And now there’s a new, Olympic-themed one for them to find.

Invader cemented it to a wall on one of the River Seine’s embankments sometime between Tuesday and Wednesday. Using tiles to create the mosaic, it shows one of his signature Space Invader figures running. The work’s colors evoke the shades of blue that Paris Games organizers have used to decorate the city for the Olympics.

A representative for artist — who, like him, maintains anonymity — said by email to The Associated Press that “Invader told me to say that he wanted to celebrate the Olympics in Paris with this mosaic. The space invader is running and he wears some of the colors of the Olympics signage.”

The artist’s admirers can download his app, called “Flash Invaders,” and then use it to take photos of any of his works that they find.

When they do, the app awards them points. The more works they find and “flash,” the more points they get.

It’s addictive: The app has nearly 400,000 players.

The new mosaic is the 1,512th that Invader has glued up in Paris. Players get 50 points when they flash it with his app. Since the first catalogued mosaic of a blue Space Invader went up on a Paris street in 1998, numbered PA_01, Invader has colonized the world. There are now more than 4,000 of his mosaics in cities and towns on all continents except Antartica.

On Instagram, the artist posted a photo Wednesday of the new work and the words “Special Olympic Games Paris 2024,” with a jogger running past.

Catch up on the latest from Day 13 of the 2024 Paris Olympics:
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Keep up: Follow along with our Olympics medal tracker and list of winners. Check out the Olympic schedule of events.

That and a video post by the artist alerted admirers that there was a new work for them to find.

A small group of them quickly tracked it down, took its photo with the app, got their points, and spent time together admiring the work.

Super fan André Lavigne, a 64-year-old retired chemical engineer, was among the first to find and flash it. He is currently ranked in the top 100 players on the app, having tracked down 2,718 of the artist’s works in France and overseas.

In just the first few hours, the work was already generated buzz.

“I’ve seen many people coming and flashing and asking, ‘It’s a new one?’ And I say, ‘Yes, it has been put (up) last night.’ (They reply) ‘Oh, well, that’s extraordinary,” Lavigne said.

Another admirer, Gema Calero, rolled up on her bike and celebrated with a fist pump when she got her 50 points.

“It’s all fresh, it still smells of glue,” she said.

She says searching high and low across Paris for the works has taught her lots about the city and the value of looking around.

OLYMPIC PHOTOS: See AP’s top photos from the 2024 Paris games

“It allows you to look at life differently. You hunt around. You look up a little bit. Because normally when we walk we look at what’s in front of us,” she said. “It’s super.”

Like Banksy, the British street artist he is sometimes likened to, Invader is elusive, fiercely protective of his anonymity and operating on the margins of illegality. He comes, glues, and disappears into the night, leaving behind his signature pixelated mosaics made mostly with small ceramic and glass tiles.

Most resemble the aliens from the Space Invaders arcade game. Others are wonderfully elaborate, such as still lives of fruit or, in New York, portraits of Lou Reed and Andy Warhol. Some reference pop culture — Spiderman, Star Wars, Bugs Bunny, Ninja Turtles, pizza and the like.

Israel court hears bid to close prison where soldiers are accused of sexually assaulting Palestinians


Israeli soldiers gather at the gate to the Sde Teiman military base, as people protest in support of soldiers being questioned for detainee abuse, July 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov, File)

Protesters wave Israeli national flags in support of soldiers being questioned for detainee abuse, outside of the Sde Teiman military base, Monday, July 29, 2024. The Israeli military said Monday it was holding nine soldiers for questioning following allegations of “substantial abuse” of a detainee at a shadowy facility where Israel has held Palestinian prisoners throughout the war in Gaza. (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov)

BY JULIA FRANKEL
 August 7, 2024

JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli Supreme Court considered a petition Wednesday to shutter a desert military prison where soldiers have been accused of abusing Palestinians, as a new video emerged purporting to show the sexual assault of a Palestinian detainee.

Rights groups have been engaged in a legal battle since June to shut down the detention facility, known as Sde Teiman, where Israel has held many Palestinians detained in Gaza during the 10-month war with Hamas. The groups claim that conditions at the facility are grave and that abuse by Israeli soldiers is common, basing their claims on testimony from released detainees and Israeli whistleblowers.

Calls for the prison’s closure ramped up in late July, when Israeli military police arrested 10 soldiers from Sde Teiman on suspicion of their involvement in the alleged sexual assault of a Palestinian detainee at the facility. Five of the soldiers are no longer under investigation. A physician who identified himself as the person who reported the attack said last week that the detainee appeared to have been seriously sexually abused.

The soldiers’ detention triggered angry protests by supporters, and at least two government ministers demanded their release. The response underscored tensions between the military command and hard-line nationalists in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government who advocate even harsher treatment of Palestinians detained from Gaza.



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Defense lawyer Nati Rom told The Associated Press that the soldiers were arrested about a month after the alleged attack and are accused of performing acts of sodomy on the detainee. He said the soldiers used force to defend themselves against a detainee who attacked them during a search, but did not sexually abuse him

A video purporting to reveal the assault shows a group of masked soldiers wresting a detainee from the ground, where he and other Palestinians appear to be lying face down in a fenced-in pen, their arms cuffed above their heads. The soldiers take the detainee to an area of the pen they appear to cordon off using shields. Footage then shows about eight soldiers and a dog with the detainee, largely hidden from view by shields held up by some of the soldiers. Israel’s Channel 12 news, which broadcast the video, said it captures the moment of the attack.

Two soldiers who formerly worked at the facility and requested anonymity for fear of retribution told the AP they believed the video had been taken at Sde Teiman. The room in which the detainees appear, a corral topped by barbed wire, matches photos of the facility shared with the AP and the description of incarceration conditions that whistleblowers have previously described.

Military prosecutors stated that evidence brought forth in the case indicates “a reasonable suspicion of the commission of the acts,” the Israeli military said Tuesday. The military did not comment on the video.

U.S. officials have seen the video, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Wednesday. He called the reports of sexual abuse “horrific.”

“Prisoners’ human rights need to be respected in all cases and when there are alleged violations, the government of Israel needs to take steps to investigate those who are alleged to have committed abuses and, if appropriate, hold them accountable,” Miller said.

Meanwhile, more information about the case has come to light from a doctor who treated the detainee in question.

Dr. Yoel Donchin, an Israeli anesthesiologist at the field hospital for Palestinian detainees at Sde Teiman, came forward Friday as the person who reported the case to the military authorities.

In an interview with Israeli public broadcaster Kan, Donchin said the detainee’s life was in danger and that he was in need of emergency surgery after the attack.

During the interview, Donchin confirmed information attributed to an unidentified medical official who said the detainee had fractured ribs, showed signs of beating and bore evidence of being sodomized, leading to a tear in the lower part of the intestines.

Donchin said the detainee’s case was the most extreme he had witnessed since working at the facility.

Naji Abbas, a case manager with Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, said the detainee was transferred to a civilian hospital outside Sde Teiman about a month ago because his injuries were too severe for treatment at the military facility. Abbas received his information from a medical source with knowledge of the case.

In a written submission to the Israeli Supreme Court in advance of Wednesday’s hearing, state attorneys did not mention the military’s sexual assault investigation, but insisted the rights groups’ claims of deplorable conditions were inaccurate.

The Israeli organization arguing in court for the military prison’s closure, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, had alleged that detainees at the facility are punished with severe violence, including with attack dogs and sexual assault; made to sit on the ground blindfolded and handcuffed 24 hours a day; forbidden from moving or speaking and rarely shower or change clothes.

An investigation by the AP into the facility documented how detainees are blindfolded, handcuffed and diapered during medical treatment.

The state, in a written response, said detainees were given sufficient food and water, showered regularly, accessed medical treatment as needed, and were blindfolded and handcuffed because of concerns that they could harm staff. The state said a new wing of Sde Teiman set to open Sept. 5 would improve conditions, including adding a walking area for detainees. Additional improvements are expected to be made later this year, it said.

Following Wednesday’s hearing, the court gave the state a week and a half to provide more information about conditions at the prison.

Sde Teiman was the main military prison holding Palestinians captured in large-scale raids on the Gaza Strip. Israel began moving detainees out of the facility following the rights groups’ petition to shut it down. State filings show 28 detainees remain.

Under Israeli law, Palestinians from Gaza can be held at the facility, and other military detention camps, without a detention order, trial or charge for over a month. Many Palestinian detainees have spent weeks in the facility before being released back to Gaza after Israeli authorities deemed them unaffiliated with militant groups.
___

This story has been edited to correct the name of the organization Physicians for Human Rights-Israel. ___

Associated Press reporters Tia Goldenberg and Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel; and Jack Jeffery in Ramallah, West Bank, contributed to this report.

JULIA FRANKEL
Frankel is an Associated Press reporter in Jerusalem.

Majority of US adults say democracy is on the ballot but they differ on the threat: AP-NORC poll

- Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz arrive at a campaign rally in Philadelphia, Aug. 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

BY ALI SWENSON AND LINLEY SANDERS
August 8, 2024S


NEW YORK (AP) — Roughly 3 in 4 American adults believe the upcoming presidential election is vital to the future of U.S. democracy, although which candidate they think poses the greater threat depends on their political leanings, according to a poll.

The survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that most Democrats, Republicans and independents see the election as “very important” or “extremely important” to democracy, while Democrats have a higher level of intensity about the issue. More than half of Democrats say the November election is “extremely important” to the future of U.S. democracy, compared to about 4 in 10 independents and Republicans.

Democrat Pamela Hanson, 67, of Amery, Wisconsin, said she has grave concerns for the future of democracy in the country if Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump gets elected.
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“His statements tend towards him being a king or a dictator, a person in charge by himself,” Hanson said. “I mean, the man is unhinged in my opinion.”

But Republican Ernie Wagner from Liberty, New York, said it’s President Joe Biden’s administration — of which Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, is a part — that has abused the power of the executive branch.

“Biden has tried to erase the student loans, and he’s been told by the courts that it’s unconstitutional to do that,” said Wagner, 85. “He’s weaponized the FBI to get at his political opponents.”

The poll findings suggest that many Democrats continue to view Trump as a threat to democracy after he tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election, embraced the rioters who attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and threatened to seek retribution against his opponents if he wins reelection.

But they also indicate that many of Trump’s supporters agree with him that Biden is the real threat to democracy. Trump and his allies have accused Biden of weaponizing the Justice Department as it has pursued charges against the former president over his effort to halt certification of the 2020 election and keeping classified documents, though there is no evidence Biden has had any involvement or influence in the cases.

Trump has framed himself as a defender of American values and portrayed Biden as a “destroyer” of democracy. He said multiple times after he survived an assassination attempt last month that he “took a bullet for democracy.”

The poll, conducted in the days after Biden dropped out of the race and Harris announced her campaign, is an early glimpse of Americans’ views of a reshaped contest.

What to know about the 2024 Election

Democracy: American democracy has overcome big stress tests since 2020. More challenges lie ahead in 2024.

AP’s Role: The Associated Press is the most trusted source of information on election night, with a history of accuracy dating to 1848. Learn more.

Majorities of both Democrats and Republicans say democracy could be at risk in this election depending on who wins the presidency, responses generally in line with the findings when the question was last asked in an AP-NORC poll in December 2023.

Hanson, the Wisconsin Democrat, said she worries Trump in a second term would use the conservative-dominated U.S. Supreme Court to overrule important freedoms. She also is concerned that he would fill his Cabinet with loyalists who don’t care about the well-being of everyone in the country and defund agencies that regulate key functions of society.

But Wagner, the New York Republican, brushed off those concerns and pointed to Trump’s time in office.

“When he was in the White House, we had peace, we had prosperity, we had energy independence,” he said. “What’s undemocratic about that?”

He said he didn’t think Trump’s intentions leading up to and on Jan. 6 were criminal.

“I just think he was misguided,” Wagner said.

Some independents also are carefully considering the stakes of the upcoming election on the country’s democratic future.

“I believe that this is the most important election of my lifetime,” said 53-year-old Patricia Seliga-Williams of LaVale, Maryland, an independent who is leaning toward voting for Harris.

Seliga-Williams said she’s barely scraping by on $15 an hour as a hotel breakfast attendant and remembers Trump handling the economy and immigration well. But she didn’t like it when he recently quipped that he plans to be a “dictator” on day one in office.

“We all know Donald Trump could run the country,” she said. “But he’s just too aggressive anymore, and I don’t think I can trust that as a voter.”

Not everyone agrees that this year’s presidential election will be an inflection point for the country’s democracy, offering starkly different reasons, according to the AP-NORC poll. About 2 in 10 Americans say democracy in the U.S. is strong enough to withstand the outcome of the election no matter who wins, while another 2 in 10 believe democracy is already so seriously broken that the outcome doesn’t matter.

The poll also shows the stakes of democracy in the election are felt more by older adults rather than younger ones. About half of adults 45 and older say the outcome of the election is extremely important for the future of democracy, compared to about 4 in 10 adults under 45.

“Making the claim that the other candidate is trying to destroy democracy, it doesn’t really land for me,” said Daniel Oliver, 26, an independent from suburban Detroit. “I think that we have things in place that should safeguard against when you kind of play at destroying democracy. We have other branches of government. We have people that believe in voting. So, it would be hard for a candidate to take over and become some kind of dictator.”

He said he’ll be looking for candidates to talk about issues he’s more interested in, such as reducing inflation and investing in clean energy sources.

Biden and Trump spent months sparring over whose second term would be worse for democracy. The president nodded to the consequences when he ended his campaign last month, saying in his Oval Office address that “the defense of democracy is more important than any title.”

Harris has focused more on the concept of “freedom” in the early days of her campaign. She has said Trump’s reelection could result in Americans losing the freedom to vote, the freedom to be safe from gun violence and the freedom for women to make decisions about their own bodies. Her debut campaign ad last month was set to Beyoncé’s 2016 track “Freedom,” and it has become a campaign anthem for her at rallies ever since.

Harris didn’t mention democracy in her first two presidential campaign rallies, but she returned to the topic in remarks to Sigma Gamma Rho sorority members in Houston last week, saying “our fundamental freedoms are on the ballot, and so is our democracy.”
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The poll of 1,143 adults was conducted July 25-29, 2024, using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.
___

The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

ALI SWENSON
Swenson reports on election-related misinformation, disinformation and extremism for The Associated Press.
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LINLEY SANDERS
Sanders is a polls and surveys reporter for The Associated Press. She develops and writes about polls conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, and works on AP VoteCast.
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Fossils suggest even smaller ‘hobbits’ roamed an Indonesian island 700,000 years ago



This photo provided by Yousuke Kaifu shows an arm bone fragment excavated on the Indonesia island of Flores. New research suggests ancestors of an early human species nicknamed “hobbits” were even shorter. (Yousuke Kaifu via AP)


This image provided by the University of Tokyo shows the Mata Menge humerus fragment, left, at the same scale as the humerus of Homo floresiensis from the Liang Bua cave on the island of Flores, Indonesia. (Yousuke Kaifu/University of Tokyo via AP)


This photo provided by Gerrit van den Bergh shows the Mata Menge excavation site on the Indonesia island of Flores on Oct. 15, 2014. Researchers uncovered fossils at the site that suggest ancestors of the “hobbits” were even smaller and lived around 700,000 years ago. (Gerrit van den Bergh via AP)


This photo provided by Gerrit van den Bergh shows the Mata Menge excavation site on the Indonesia island of Flores on Sept. 9, 2019. Researchers uncovered fossils at the site that suggest ancestors of the “hobbits” were even smaller and lived around 700,000 years ago. (Gerrit van den Bergh via AP)


BY ADITHI RAMAKRISHNAN
August 6, 2024

WASHINGTON (AP) — Twenty years ago on an Indonesian island, scientists discovered fossils of an early human species that stood at about 3 1/2 feet (1.07 meters) tall — earning them the nickname “hobbits.”

Now a new study suggests ancestors of the hobbits were even slightly shorter.

“We did not expect that we would find smaller individuals from such an old site,” study co-author Yousuke Kaifu of the University of Tokyo said in an email.


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The original hobbit fossils — named by the discoverers after characters in “The Lord of the Rings” — date back to between 60,000 and 100,000 years ago. The new fossils were excavated at a site called Mata Menge, about 45 miles from the cave where the first hobbit remains were uncovered.

In 2016, researchers suspected the earlier relatives could be shorter than the hobbits after studying a jawbone and teeth collected from the new site. Further analysis of a tiny arm bone fragment and teeth suggests the ancestors were a mere 2.4 inches (6 centimeters) shorter and existed 700,000 years ago.

“They’ve convincingly shown that these were very small individuals,” said Dean Falk, an evolutionary anthropologist at Florida State University who was not involved with the research.

The findings were published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications.

Researchers have debated how the hobbits – named Homo floresiensis after the remote Indonesian island of Flores – evolved to be so small and where they fall in the human evolutionary story. They’re thought to be among the last early human species to go extinct.

Scientists don’t yet know whether the hobbits shrank from an earlier, taller human species called Homo erectus that lived in the area, or from an even more primitive human predecessor. More research – and fossils – are needed to pin down the hobbits’ place in human evolution, said Matt Tocheri, an anthropologist at Canada’s Lakehead University.

“This question remains unanswered and will continue to be a focus of research for some time to come,” Tocheri, who was not involved with the research, said in an email.
___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Miscarriages in horses offer insights to help prevent pregnancy loss in humans

By Ernie Mundell, HealthDay News


Researchers are gleaning important insights into miscarriages in women from a longtime four-legged friend: horses. Photo by Adobe Stock/HealthDay News

Researchers are gleaning important insights into miscarriages in women from a longtime four-legged friend: horses.

It shouldn't come as a surprise, since female horses have long pregnancies (11 months) and embryos of both species grow at similar rates, said a team overseen by Mandi de Mestre, a professor of equine medicine at Cornell University in New York.

Their new research found that almost half (42%) of miscarriages and spontaneous abortions that occurred in horses during the first two months of pregnancy were linked to a chromosomal condition called triploidy.

With triploidy, the fetus contains an extra set of chromosomes that can cause complications leading to pregnancy loss, the researchers explained.

So, horses make a good model for human pregnancies because, "over that embryonic period [up to eight weeks from conception], triploidy had rarely been reported in mammals outside of women," de Mestre noted in a Cornell news release.

"The study tells us that over the first six weeks of gestation, this will likely be the primary cause of pregnancy loss following natural conception," she added.

Her team published its findings Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

According to the research team, about 10% to 20% of human pregnancies will end in miscarriage, and chromosomal aberrations are thought to be a major cause.

But until now, scientists haven't had an adequate animal model for human miscarriages. In the new study, they analyzed 256 fetus and placenta samples from veterinarians who had treated horses with failed pregnancies over a period of 10 years.

"We were able to study the impact of chromosome errors across the entire pregnancy in the horse," de Mestre said. "We found that triploidy is only associated with losses in early pregnancy."

Chromosomal errors occurred in 57.9% of pregnancy losses up to day 55 of gestation and in 57.2% of losses between days 56 and 110.

In contrast, only 1.4% of losses between days 111 and the end of pregnancy were associated with chromosomal errors like triploidy.

Aneuploidy -- the gain or loss of a chromosome -- was tied to miscarriages in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, de Mestre's group reported, while deletions or duplications of a segment of a chromosome were largely detected in miscarriages after 110 days.

That mirrored similar findings among women who had miscarried. Most human miscarriages occur at home, the research team noted, so there's little for researchers to work with if they hope to uncover why miscarriages occur.

Using the horse as a model might rectify that situation, they said. Horses' owners typically provide a high level of care and monitoring to their animals during a pregnancy, offering much data that's useful for research.

The new research can certainly help horses.

For example, if it's determined that a major chromosomal error is present early in an equine pregnancy, veterinarians can move to end the pregnancy, de Mestre's team said.

"This research has provided a foundation for understanding the genetic causes of pregnancy loss in horses, often referred to as pregnancy loss of unknown cause," said study co-first author Shebl Salem, a postdoctoral researcher in de Mestre's Equine Pregnancy Lab.

SHE WROTE OF HORSES AND WOMEN 

Book Review: Walk to the End of the World, Suzy McKee Charnas (1974)

July 30, 2015/ Joachim Boaz

Gene Szafran’s cover for the 1st edition

5/5 (Masterpiece)

“The men heard, and they rejoiced to find an enemy they could conquer at last. One night, as planned, they pulled all the women from sleep, herded them together, and harangued them, saying, remember, you caused the Wasting” (3).

Suzy McKee Charnas’ Walk to the End of the World (1974) is the first of four novels in The Holdfast Chronicles sequence (1974-1999) that charts the slow forces of change in a post-apocalyptical future where women (“fems”) are chattel. Kate Macdonald, in her wonderful review of Ammonite (1993) characterized Nicola Griffith’s novel as “instantly […] feminist: not stealth, or muted, or sub-conscious.” Walk to the End of the World falls squarely, and powerfully into this category. Told with intensity and vigor, Charnas brands the reader with her vision, a searing and festering landscape where white men have either exterminated the remaining “unmen” (the “Dirties”) or subjugated them (the “fems”) after a manmade cataclysm. Complex societal institutions maintain control in a mostly illiterate world via appeals to collective memory, intensive drug facilitated indoctrination, and the deconstruction of the family unit in favor of exclusively homosocial relationships.

Walk to the End of the World does not hold back its punches—this is a serious and disturbing novel. “Fems” are subjected to horrific violence as slaves to man and are forced to great extremes to survive.

Brief Plot Summary/Analysis

In the grand historical narrative espoused by the men who control the community of Holdfast, a past rebellion facilitated by “fems” and other unmen overthrew the Ancients, already weakened by the betrayal of their own sons. The survivors blamed the cataclysmic and vaguely understood Wasting that created an impoverished, polluted, and devastated world on the surviving “fems”. The community the emerges is highly regimented and authoritarian. They espouse a “heroic” and “pioneering” tradition—Holdfast is an “anchoring tendril” that holds back the forces of destruction (4). The position of men vs. women is reinforced by this narrative: men must hold back the destructive power of women embodied by the destroyed world and the wastelands that surround Holdfast.

Walk to the End of the World is comprised of five sections placed in chronological order. The first three are from the perspectives of the male characters—Captain Kelmz, Servan D Layo, Eykar Bek. The fourth, is from the perspective of the “fem” Alldera. The fifth and final section is a composite that shifts between the surviving characters and ends, again, with Alldera. The carefully planned structure is wedded to the narratological and ideological aims of the novel. None of the characters fit neatly into the post-Wasting world where rigid binaries—between man vs. woman, Senior vs. Junior, white vs. non-white, man vs. animal—dominate the society in which they restlessly inhabit.

The first character Captain Kelmz, blurs the position between Seniors and Juniors by retaining his position into old age over a band of Rovers, “the powerful defenders of the Seniors and their interests” (10). More dangerously, Kelmz sees other men in “beast shapes.” More than simply a flight of imagination, “to think of the beast was like willfully calling up the ghosts of dead enemies” (8). Man conquers beasts. Men are not beasts. Kelmz’s visions violate this central tenet profoundly troubling his sense of the world.

The second, d Layo the DarkDreamer, “has no company, no order, and no legitimate use to his fellows” (7). He also encourages and facilitates drug induced dreams outside of those taught in the Boyhouse (where all boys are taught to develop their manly souls and survive in the regimented world). Rather than “dreams of victorious battles against monsters” (45), the dreamer is free to dream what his soul desires. Under d Layo’s guidance, Kelmz dreams that he is emasculated and is but a pathetic perversion of other men (46).

The third, Eykar Bek is the Endtendant at Endpath. At Endpath Seniors—and Juniors manipulated by Seniors—end their lives when their “souls [are] ripe for departure” (17). To dream a drug induced dream was to “assure the life of one’s name among younger generations” (17). However, Eykar Bek has other interests—he seeks to uncover the reason why he knows his fathers name. In Holdfast, the “mass-divison of Seniors and Juniors” is more important than blood-ties. All men are brothers, some older, some younger…. In the grand narrative, the Ancients were overthrown by their sons: In a perversion of the Biblical story, “even God’s own Son, in the old story, had earned punishment from his Father” (22). Eykar and d Layo were friends at the Boyhouse. d Layo was thrown out into the Wild while Eykar was condemned to serve at Endpath after the scandal caused by his father. The quest for Eykar’s father forms the thrust of the narrative.

The final character Alldera, although perceived because of her gender by the male characters as a beast suitable for bearing sons and working the fields (56), is highly intelligent and an important cog in the communication networks between groups of desperate women. She leaves her world where woman are forced to be self-sustaining after drastic reductions of food after previous famines blamed on the fems. In an era of incredible deprivation, “fems” build up their numbers due to ingenious methods of preserving their own milk and consuming their own dead (59). The men who see the process declare that “it was too beautiful, too efficient to be a product of the fems’ own thinking” (65). Alldera has ulterior motives for joining the three male main characters in their trek to discover Eykar’s father.

Final Thoughts

Despite the lack of popular awareness of the novel in comparison to later feminist masterpieces such as Russ’ The Female Man (1975*) and Margaret Attwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale (1984), analysis of Walk to the End of the World does appear in some scholarly circles—for example, Bill Clemente’s article, “Apprehending Identity in the Alldera Novels of Suzy McKee Charnas” in The Utopian Fantastic ed. Martha Bartter (2004).

Feminist importance aside, I will focus on a handful of ideas that really resonated with me and elevate Charnas’ novel to its great heights: the role of songs + chants reinforcing/challenging collective memory and the focus on the ideological underpinnings of the society.

Charnas explores a variety of ways of reinforcing the master values in a mostly illiterate society. One of more prevalent is the notion of a collective memory (at least propagated by men) that reinforces a grand narrative of the past and thus the position of the present in relation to the past. For example, in the Boyhouse the boys recite the three categories of people (“unmen”) defeated in the post-Wasting world by white man: the “Dirties” i.e. “Gooks, Dagos, Chinks” etc., the “Freaks,” which includes “Faggas, Hibbies, Famlies, Kids; Junkies, Skinheads, Collegeists: Ef-eet Iron-mentalists” and finally “fems” known by “beasts’ names,” “Bird, Cat, Chick, Sow; Filly, Tigress, Bitch, Cow […]” The chant ends with a warning about the dreadful weapons of the unmen, “Cancer, raybees, deedeetee” (112). Man in the present holds back these forces of destruction.

Each social group has their own chants that play into this narrative. Captain Kelmz in order to fight off his visions silently recites the “Chant Protective” that starts with “a reckoning of the size and reach of the Holdfast and of all the fellowship of men living in it” in order to “remind a man of his brothers and of what they expected from him” (8). The ferrymen keep a “Chants Celebratory” which includes the names of the men who dare enter the empty lands to obtain wood for the ferries, “part of a fabric of custom intended to hold ferrycrews together in manly order” (33).

The songs of women fall into different patterns although they serve similar functions in creating collective cohesion. For the women who still have tongues— “muteness in fems was a fashion in demand among masters” (141)—songs, spoken in obfuscated “fem speak,” serve to transmit news. Work songs are more than entertainment, they tell of the hell wrought by the “wonderful knowledge” of men (158). They posit historical narratives counter to those of men: “Those of the unmen who realized what was happening and rose up to fight, the Ancient men slaughtered” (159). Other work songs directly mock the songs of men and the heroic founding of Holdfast, “Heroes […] The unmen are not gone; you are more predictable than the thoughtless beasts, though not as beautiful” (159). Although the chattel of man, songs sung working for their masters are a powerful medium for rebellion.

Charnas also weaves ancient theories of generation and matter into the ideological underpinnings of her society. This creates an unnerving familiarity of thought between ancient Western Thought and this dystopic future. The male soul is a “fragment of eternal energy” that is fixed inside a woman’s body by “the act of intercourse.” As the soul is alien to the woman, her body surrounds it with a physical form in order for the soul to be expelled. Thus, “a man’s life” is a struggle between the “flesh-caged soul” not to be seduced by the concerns of the fem generated “brute-body” (103). Historical narrative combines with pseudo-scientific theories of matter to generate the iron-clad boundaries, enforced by the victors, between genders.

I recommend Walk to the End of the World to all fans of feminist fiction. I fervently hope a more mainstream SF audience will be open to Charnas’ brilliantly conceived world filled with interesting characters, biting prose, and disturbing social systems with twisted philosophical underpinnings. But after reading online reviews and engaging in debates with readers over the years, I cannot help reiterate that a double standard exists when readers approach feminist SF from this era—most readers seem to be fine with other polemical male 60s/70s science fiction authors from across the political spectrum (Robert A. Heinlein, Norman Spinrad, R. A. Lafferty, John Brunner, etc). However, when a woman author takes a dystopic future scenario and weaves a poignant and harrowing experience with a powerful feminist message suddenly it is best avoided. Alas.

Walk to the End of the World is firmly among my top ten 70s SF novels.*

*note: Russ wrote The Female Man earlier but was unable to find a publisher.

*David Pringle placed it in his top 100 SF novels written between 1949 and 1984 [list].

For more book reviews consult the INDEX

OBIT

Suzy McKee Charnas, Writer of Feminist Science Fiction, Dies at 83

She was best known for the Holdfast Chronicles, a series about a dystopic world in which once-enslaved women conquer their former male masters.

Suzy McKee Charnas in an undated photo. One reviewer wrote that her four-novel series “reflects 25 years of the development of feminism.”

Credit...Tachyon Publications

By Richard Sandomir
Published March 10, 2023

Suzy McKee Charnas, an award-winning feminist science fiction writer who in a four-novel series created a post-holocaust, male-dominated society called the Holdfast that is liberated by an army of women, died on Jan. 2 at her home in Albuquerque. She was 83.

Her cousin David Szanton said the cause was a heart attack. Her death was not widely reported at the time.

Ms. Charnas, whose books were well regarded but who by her account did not make a living from her writing, was best known for her science fiction. But she also wrote vampire fiction, young-adult fantasy novels with women as central characters, and a memoir about taking care of her father in his later years after a long period of estrangement.

In an epic that began with “Walk to the End of the World” (1974) and concluded 25 years later with “The Conqueror’s Child,” Ms. Charnas conceived a dystopic world in which an escaped female slave, Alldera, leads the rebellious Free Fems to brutally conquer and enslave their former male masters. The men had faulted women for the near-destruction of humanity, called the Wasting.

Image

“The Slave and the Free,” encompassed the first two books in Ms. Charnas’s series “The Holdfast Chronicles.”

Credit...Macmillan

The Holdfast Chronicles, as the series is called, is unique in feminist science fiction “in that it reflects 25 years of the development of feminism,” Dunja M. Mohr wrote in the journal Science Fiction Studies in 1999.

“Investigating the raging war of the sexes,” she added, “Charnas does not shy away from describing the slow — and sometimes grim — process of change leading from dystopia to utopia, the painful purging of psychological and physical violence involved.”

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The fantasy novelist Polly Shulman wrote in Salon in 2000 that the Holdfast Chronicles “fall squarely in the tradition of feminist utopias/dystopias that produced Joanna Russ’s ‘The Female Man’ or Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale,’ nourishing writers like Ursula K. Le Guin and Sheri S. Tepper.”

Ms. Charnas did not set out to write a feminist novel. In an interview with SnackReads, a digital publisher of short fiction, she said “Walk to the End of the World” began as a satire about how top political leaders in Washington would behave while confined to bunkers during a nuclear war and “waiting,” as she put it, “for the results of their stupidity to wipe out the rest of the world so they could come out and repopulate it with the assistants they were sleeping with.”

While the book was in progress, she described the story to a women’s consciousness-raising group in New Mexico, explaining that “everybody in the foreground is male” and all the women were slaves.

Then she had an epiphany.

“What are you doing sitting in this room, full of women, talking about women as half the population and writing this story that’s only about the guys?” she recalled saying to herself. “The women in your story are there, but they don’t have a word to say. Not one of them. So I went back and rewrote the whole thing, and this time I gave one of the women, Alldera, a voice, and she told part of the story, and the book changed completely. It became a feminist text.”

The other books in the Holdfast series are “Motherlines” (1978) and “The Furies” (1994). “The Conqueror’s Child” won the 1999 James Tiptree Jr. Award (now called the Otherwise), a literary prize for works of science fiction or fantasy that explore gender.

She also won two other science fiction and fantasy awards: a Nebula for a novella, “Unicorn Tapestry,” which is a chapter in her 1980 novel, “The Vampire Tapestry,” and the basis for her play, “Vampire Dreams”; and a Hugo for “Boobs,” a short story.

Image

“The Vampire Tapestry” (1980) was the wellspring for a play by Ms. Charnas, “Vampire Dreams.”Credit...Macmillan

“Suzy, to me, was a lot like David Bowie,” said Jane Lindskold, a science fiction and fantasy writer who knew Ms. Charnas from a writers’ group in Albuquerque. “She followed her own muse. She could have just written only vampire books, but she did what she wanted to do.”

Suzy McKee was born on Oct. 22, 1939, in Manhattan. Her parents, Robin and Maxine (Szanton) McKee, were commercial artists who worked at home but divorced when Suzy was 8 years old. Suzy was a voracious reader who also wrote and illustrated stories, often about cowboys.

“It wasn’t that much of a step from that to making up and writing down stories intended for unfolding in other people’s heads — the first true magic I can remember encountering in my life,” Ms. Charnas said in an interview with the journal Science Fiction Studies in 1999.

After graduating from Barnard College in 1961 with a bachelor’s degree in economics and history — subjects she believed would help her build convincing fictional societies in her novels — she joined the Peace Corps and taught in Nigeria for two years before earning a master’s in teaching from New York University in 1965.

She taught at a private school in Manhattan for a few years before joining Flower-Fifth Avenue Hospital as a curriculum writer for a drug-treatment program in secondary schools. She married Stephen Charnas, a lawyer, in 1968, and soon after moved to Albuquerque.

Ms. Charnas had been an occasional fan of science fiction but began writing in the genre only after reading Ursula Le Guin’s 1969 novel, “The Left Hand of Darkness,” which explored gender themes.

“The book was a mindblower,” Ms. Charnas told SnackReads, “not just for me, but for a lot of women, who said, ‘Holy crap, look what this woman did! Look what she’s talking about!’”

Science fiction was not the only genre Ms. Charnas explored. In “The Vampire Tapestry,” she created Dr. Edward Weyland, a vampire posing as an anthropology professor.

Writing in The Washington Post, the fantasy writer Elizabeth A. Lynn praised the novel, saying it “works on many levels — as pure adventure, as social description, as psychological drama and as a passionate exploration of the web that links instinct, morality and culture. It is a serious, startling and revolutionary work.”

The director Guillermo del Toro, who is known for his science fiction and horror films, was an admirer of “The Vampire Tapestry.” He called it “flawless” on Twitter in 2015 and, after Ms. Charnas’s death, said, “It may be her masterpiece.”

“Stagestruck Vampires and Other Phantasms” (2004), a collection of her short work, includes a story that rethinks “The Phantom of the Opera” and “Beauty and the Beast.” In another, an astronaut at a concert on a faraway planet listens to two lizards discussing the music.

Ms. Charnas is survived by her sisters, Liza McKee and Patricia Powers. Her husband died in 2018.

Her last book was “My Father’s Ghost: The Return of My Old Man and Other Second Chances” (2002), about how she and her husband brought her long-absent father — he had left her family when she was a child — to live on their property in Albuquerque, and her struggle to get to know him over nearly 20 years.

“The person who came to live next door to me was less my father than my father’s ghost: the ghost of my father as I had known him and imagined him all my life,” she wrote. “He was also, I suspect, the ghost of the man he himself had set out to be but never became.”

She added, “Well, I’m a lucky devil: He was a good ghost, an instructive ghost.”

Richard Sandomir is an obituaries writer. He previously wrote about sports media and sports business. He is also the author of several books, including “The Pride of the Yankees: Lou Gehrig, Gary Cooper and the Making of a Classic.” More about Richard Sandomir