Fear for future after mass die-off of fish in Poland's Oder river

By Agnieszka Pikulicka-Wilczewska and Kuba Stezycki - Yesterday

© Reuters/JAKUB STEZYCKI

Dead fish in Poland's Oder river approach to the sea

WIDUCHOWA, Poland (Reuters) - As thousands of dead fish neared the banks of the Oder River in the village of Widuchowa in western Poland on Aug. 11, local people realised an ecological disaster that started in late July in the country's south-west was heading towards the Baltic Sea.

As Widuchowa's residents searched for tools to remove the lifeless bodies from the the river, the government began crisis response that many scientists say came too late.

"It's been the hardest five days of my life," said Pawel Wrobel, the mayor of Widuchowa, which is around 400 kilometres (250 miles) from the town where dead fish had first been spotted. "I'd never imagined experiencing such a catastrophe, it is something you see in disaster movies."


© Reuters/JAKUB STEZYCKIDead fish in Poland's Oder river approach the sea

With the help of the local community, he gathered dozens of pitchforks, used to lift potatoes, to remove dead fish from the river, which marks part of the Polish-German border.

"We don't know how to do it and what tools to use, we learn from our mistakes," Wrobel said.

On Aug. 12, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki fired the head of Poland's national water management authority and the head of the general environmental inspectorate, saying that their institutions should have reacted earlier.


© Reuters/JAKUB STEZYCKIDead fish in Poland's Oder river approach the sea

Despite numerous tests of fish and water samples conducted by Polish and foreign laboratories, and a 1-million-zloty ($211,775) reward for information on the source of contamination, it is still unclear what poisoned the Oder, Poland's second largest river.

"We are focused on, on the one hand, stopping what is happening, and on the other hand, finding the reason for this situation," said climate ministry spokesman Aleksander Brzozka.

Researchers in Germany and Poland's climate ministry have pointed to a large overgrowth of toxic algae as a possible cause for the mass die-off.

Related video: Mysterious mass fish deaths in Oder River

"The most likely hypothesis is that it was a combination of various natural factors," said Brzozka.

'SOMETHING IS WRONG'

Local people told Reuters that firefighters and territorial defence forces deployed by the government to remove tonnes of dead fish were not prepared for what awaited them in the river.

The stench around the waters was so bad that most of them vomited during their work, according to residents of the village.


© Reuters/JAKUB STEZYCKI

Dead fish in Poland's Oder river approach the sea

Local businesses have also been hit.

When Piotr Bugaj, a passionate angler and owner of boats, a slip and rooms to rent on the Oder heard what was coming, he knew that it was time to put his business on hold.

He asked his guests from the Czech Republic to leave the water and cancelled all future reservations from clients, who flock to Widuchowa from around Europe for its wilderness and diverse population of large fish such as catfish and pike-perch.

"If it's possible with such a tragedy, I would really like to learn that only what was on the surface died out and not more. But for the moment, no one has checked what is currently at the river bottom," he said.

The government has promised support for those affected by the crisis.

Piotr Piznal, a local activist, has dedicated his life to photographing wildlife around the Oder. For the past week he has been documenting the disaster.


© Reuters/JAKUB STEZYCKI

Dead fish in Poland's Oder river approach the sea

"It is hard because in fact, the world we've observed and photographed with my friend for the past few years is disappearing," he says. "I think that after what has happened in the Oder it will take years to rebuild the ecosystem... It will all have to be reborn to function the way it has until now."

Meanwhile, among Widuchowa's residents fear and uncertainly prevail.

"The dead fish have warned us that something is wrong," said Sylwia Palasz-Wrobel, wife of Widuchowa's mayor, standing next to her husband at the foul Oder shore. "When the fish are gone, who will inform us next time when a disaster happens? We would like to know who is responsible for this." ($1 = 4.7220 zlotys)




(Reporting by Agnieszka Pikulicka-Wilczewska and Kuba Stezycki, Editing by Alan Charlish and Alex Richardson)

NDR 2022: Tuas Port will be the largest fully automated port in the world in 20 years

By Canada Express News
-August 21, 2022

SINGAPORE: Tuas Port will be the world’s largest fully automated port when fully completed in about 20 years, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said on Sunday (Aug. 21).

During this year’s National Day Rally, the Prime Minister shared an update on progress at Tuas Port, 10 years after it was first announced.

Phase 1 of Tuas Port has just been completed, Mr Lee said, with phases 2, 3 and 4 to follow.

“When fully completed in 20 years, Tuas Port will handle 65 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units) annually, almost double the current volumes,” he added.

“We will have the largest fully automated port in the world, and that should make us a leading global player in the maritime space.”

Land reclamation works for Phase 1 of Tuas Port began in February 2015 and will be completed by November 2021, the Ministry of Transport (MOT) said in a separate media factsheet on Sunday.

Land reclamation works for Phase 2 began in March 2018 and the Maritime and Port Authority (MPA) has begun planning for Phase 3, the ministry said.

The shift to Tuas Port will gradually free up prime waterfront land from Shenton Way to Pasir Panjang for the future Greater Southern Waterfront, the prime minister said during his speech on Sunday.

“The move to Tuas has already started. If you drive past the Tanjong Pagar terminal on the AYE, you can see that it is no longer used for container operations,” he added.

“It is almost empty and therefore we could place isolation and recovery facilities for COVID-19 patients at the container park during the pandemic.”

When phase 1 of the port activities at Tuas Port is fully operational in 2027, the port will have 21 deep-water berths capable of handling 20 million TEU annually, MOT said in the factsheet.

The first two berths are scheduled to be commissioned in December 2021 and three more berths will be operational by December this year, the fact sheet states.

Container port operator PSA expects to move all its operations at the Tanjong Pagar, Keppel and Brani terminals to Tuas Port by 2027, and the operations at Pasir Panjang Terminal will be consolidated into Tuas Port by 2040, MOT said in the factsheet.

Ships from all over the world call at the port of Tuas, Mr Lee said in his speech.

“Because we planned ahead, our port was able to handle additional volumes during the pandemic, while ports in other countries faced closures, severe congestion and long delays. But PSA, our gate remained open 24/7 all the time,” he added.

“And we’ve strengthened Singapore’s position as a ‘catch-up port’, as ships can make up time here for delays elsewhere.”

Singapore handled a record high of 37.5 million TEU in 2021 and maintained its position as the world’s busiest transhipment hub, he noted.

The move to Tuas has modernized and improved the port operations, said Mr. Lee.

Automated and digitized, the new port uses artificial intelligence to seamlessly coordinate operations such as vessel traffic management and port releases. Instead of trucks with drivers, the new port will deploy a fleet of self-driving, automated guided vehicles, Lee says.

PSA will deploy a private 5G network to support 5G-enabled automated guided vehicles and automated cranes at Tuas Port and the current Pasir Panjang Terminal, MOT said in the factsheet.

PSA is also investigating the future use of 5G in freight handling, the fact sheet says. The container port operator aims for Tuas Port to have net zero emissions by 2050, according to the Ministry of Transport.

“This smooth transition owes a lot to our dock workers, unions, PSA and MPA. Management and unions worked hand in hand to retrain workers and help them adapt to new work environments,” the prime minister said.

“And for their part, employees learned new skills, improved themselves and became more productive.”

Trip Advisors: Group Promotes 5-MeO-DMT Harm Reduction By Exposing Shamanic Hustlers

By Canada Express News
-August 21, 2022

5-MeO-DMT is becoming increasingly sought after
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Psychoactive drugs, by their very nature, can place people in exceptionally vulnerable positions. Combine that state with a penchant that some psychedelic facilitators have to assume a guru or cult-like leader role and you have a recipe for rampant abuse.

As the growing popularity of mind-manifesting drugs — including psilocybin, 5-MeO-DMT, ayahuasca, and MDMA — sweeps the mainstream worldwide in legal, gray, and underground markets, harm reduction is an important aspect to sort out.

Arguably one of the most potent psychoactive drugs available, the substance 5-MeO-DMT is becoming increasingly sought after (and more and more accessible) across North America and the globe. In fact, there’s so much interest in the compound that a clinical stage pharma company is focused on 5-MeO-DMT as a therapy for treatment-resistant depression, listing on Nasdaq with $315 million in capitalization.

Derived from the defense secretions of Incilius alvarius toads — and also manufactured synthetically — the compound is not considered a controlled substance in some countries, including Canada and Mexico. For that reason 5-MeO-DMT is readily obtainable for any adult to sample on holiday trips to locales like Tulum, providing a mind-blowing experience in 20 minutes or less. Effects of the drug tend to be within seconds of ingestion, producing ego loss, or a sense of dying, and a melding with the infinite essence of the universe. The consequences of such a stark expansion of consciousness can be massive and long lasting — some very positive and some positively terrifying. Harmful effects, which can be unpredictable, have been known to last for weeks, months, or sometimes years (called “reactivations”) and can include feelings of anxiety, depression, and paranoia, resulting in insomnia, loss of appetite and panic.

That’s not to say that there aren’t truly blissful and mystical experiences happening with 5-MeO-DMT that can change people’s lives for the better. Still, the complete detonation of one’s world view isn’t always the best idea to casually experience between rum & cokes at a foreign seaside party resort. It is wise to give some forethought to the kind of person providing the medicine, as well as consideration to a safe physical space and a “container” from which to experience it. Placing your psyche into the hands of someone you haven’t thoroughly evaluated can be like randomly hiring a surgeon to dice into your brain in your living room. Particularly for the psychedelic inexperienced, it’s wise to think about careful vetting of a potential caregiver. That said, it isn’t always easy to find a good guide. While there are an increasing number of good resources available online for diligent seekers of psychedelics, there isn’t yet a time-tested, psychedelic TripAdvisor providing detailed assessments of practitioners and how to go about finding a good one. Or more importantly, how to steer clear of a bad one.

A group called “5-MeO Harm Reduction Discussion,” which has over 6,000 engaged members, is the nearest thing available for those looking to understand the terrain and lessen the chances of a harmful 5-MeO-DMT experience. The primary focus of the group, says one of its admins, Ethereal Hope, is to “share information that will assist others in avoiding some of the more notorious bad actors in the community. Unfortunately, that means attention must be given to the less than positive experiences.”

The following is a discussion with Hope, who worked as a facilitator of 5-MeO-DMT at the Crossroads Treatment Center in Baja California, Mexico, and is currently a psychedelic integration practitioner, specializing in post 5-MeO integration emergencies. She explains how and why members of the group are encouraged to share their encounters with any facilitator that does not meet their needs.

David E. Carpenter: You had an experience working at Crossroads addiction clinic that helped you evolve as a 5-MeO-DMT caregiver. Can you describe that?

Hope: Crossroads was launching a weekend psycho-spiritual program for non-addicted individuals, and they were looking for outside facilitators with a spiritual approach to come in and run that program. When I went to tour the facility it was the day they served 5-MeO to the detox patients. While there I noticed that a patient had just had their 5-MeO-DMT experience and afterwards had no one to talk to. Patients and staff were walking around, but there was no one to receive and support the patient immediately after the experience. The person serving her had moved on to the next person and when they finished serving all of the patients they left for the day without offering any immediate integration support, or aftercare. From a caregiver standpoint, I found that really distressing. I met with the owner of the clinic and said, “I noticed that there really needs to be some on-site aftercare for all clients and patients, not just for the spiritual clients, especially on the day 5MeO is served.” I was at that time hired to run both programs, detox and spiritual, to be the on-site psychedelic educator and 5-MeO-DMT facilitator.

So those moments coming back from a 5-MeO-DMT experience are an important period to help people sort out what just happened?

Absolutely. In the clinic I recognized that just because someone popped up and said, “Oh my God, oh my God, that was so great!” and hugged everybody, they weren’t really “back”. They weren’t rooted and grounded or integrated yet. They left this reality, traveled far away and returned, so a lot happened that they’ll need to integrate. I would say, “Okay, lay back down and close your eyes and take a deep breath.” Because they could reactivate, and start to consciously receive information and messages that are imperative to their integration process. When that extra time and support is not given, I have found it is one of the many contributing factors to people having challenging integration periods, and long term reactivations, which can be distressing for weeks, months, or even years.

When people seek integration help from you, it’s generally because of something like a reactivation that’s troubling them?

There are a multitude of reasons why someone would seek out a Psychedelic Integration Specialist for aftercare. A very common reason is a “reactivation,” which is the sense of being back in the experience partially or fully. It can manifest in a multitude of ways, but most typically it’s loss of sleep, general anxiety, panic, loss of appetite, listlessness and a fear that they may potentially be “stuck” with these intense sensations. These individuals are commonly not getting the aftercare that they need from their facilitator, and may have the feeling of being alone, and clueless about how to move on and heal from the experience itself.

Have you had people who come back to consciousness and feel off or out of place?

Yes. If they weren’t properly educated or informed on what they were consuming, along with all of the potential outcomes, as well as the real possibility for lingering after effects, which could disrupt their daily life. It’s really important that the individual who is entering into this space understands ALL of the potential physical reactions associated with 5MeO. One such reaction that is often not discussed is nudity. Typically, those individuals — when they return to themselves — have no awareness that they themselves disrobed, and can feel a flood of confusion, shame or remorse. If an individual was not informed that nudity is a potential outcome ahead of time, we can really see them suffer a severe trauma. I have worked with several people to whom this has happened. One client expressed that they weren’t informed that they could potentially disrobe, and when they came to awareness, they just didn’t feel that their body was respected. They were in shock at how they got naked, and suffered greatly with reactivations. It’s important that a person knows this could happen, and that they express their wishes should it happen. Who should leave the room? Do they want to be covered for modesty, or if a blanket would cause the feeling of shame? They may want their nudity embraced. Everyone views their body differently and we need to know the conscious person’s wishes, so that when they “come to awareness” they are not surprised, since a protocol was discussed.

You highlight in your group the need to expose “spiritual hustlers,” which I think was also the impetus for founding the group, right?

Yes, our group was originally founded to warn others about devious and harmful individuals traveling and causing harm. I joined as an administrator in its early stages, as I had seen these harms first hand and knew somehow we needed to get the word out. Now that the original mission of awareness has been somewhat accomplished, the group focus has shifted to share information that could help people avoid being the victim of criminal activities like theft, coercion, over-pricing for services, over-dosing, failure to offer aftercare or other frauds associated with anyone who claims to be a shaman, facilitator or practitioner. As well as to answer questions, providing education and integration support in an effort to minimize harm to the community.

Can you give a case of a practitioner who you felt was negligent?

One situation involved a woman new to psychedelics, who had signed up with a friend that was hosting a traveling 5-MeO-DMT facilitator. Her friend told her that the experience was the most amazing thing in the world. So that’s a common situation where a friend encourages someone to do it, but they aren’t sure they’re ready, or even what it really is. That’s a red flag. Then within less than a month before the ceremony her sibling passed away and she was also diagnosed with a serious terminal illness. She initially wanted to back out, she called her friend and said, “I’m sorry, I am dealing with a lot and I’m not in a good place.” She was essentially coerced into going forward, told she would lose her deposit, and was further guilted by the host, saying that the facilitator would back out on all the other people who paid their deposits if all 10 people weren’t attending.

She went through with it, was massively over-served a huge dose twice, woke up alone in a room, was very confused about her body position, and really unsure of what transpired during the session. She felt really unsupported by the facilitator who took no responsibility for over-serving her, and accused her of doing something wrong, essentially victim blaming. She was unable to sleep or eat, suffering severe reactivations, and days later was discovered in a store parking lot without any identifying information, wandering around aimlessly. She had no idea who, or where, she was. The facilitator had left town, never to be heard from again. She found me through the Facebook group.

How did you help her?

I just talked to her for several hours. The most important role of an integration specialist is to help the person feel seen, heard, felt, and just, you know, that human connection of you’re not alone, and sometimes validating that “Yeah, that shouldn’t have happened to you.” I help them analyze their experience, looking at where they feel unsettled and potential causes. I help them to shift their focus to the present moment, and ease their anxiety feedback loop. Then I offer tools to help them feel grounded, and become a lifeline to the hope that they will one day feel normal again.

With regard to choosing a facilitator, how do you advise people to move through this?

First, I say, “Stay away from YouTube.” Because often what you’re seeing on YouTube, specifically with 5-MeO-DMT, is not what we would necessarily consider to be safe ceremonies. Most safe facilitators are not filming what should be a sacred and private ceremony. You have to ask yourself if what you are watching is actually a promo video. Second, traveling facilitators who are serving hundreds of people in a city and then leaving town tend to not offer sufficient aftercare, which is an ethics breach in my opinion. They are typically trying to serve as many people as they can. Next is to educate yourself. Read, ask questions, and learn about what it is you are about to partake in. You should be able to interview the actual facilitator who will be serving you. If you are told only amazing things and not told about potential side effects or outcomes, be very concerned. A safe facilitator will be honest about potential less than pleasant outcomes, and provide a commitment to ongoing aftercare should you need it. If it feels like a too good to be true sales pitch, that’s something to consider.

I’ve seen those videos, unfortunately.

Yeah, I don’t recommend watching them because you can’t unsee it.

Also, if somebody is coming to psychedelics and they’re new to them, they shouldn’t start with 5-MeO-DMT. Unless they’ve been meditating with Buddhist monks for the last three years. It’s just not the place to start. I recommend starting with low dose mushrooms, just to see if they even like the feeling of psychedelics. Society and media have way over-sensationalized this one medicine and people have gravitated towards it because it’s often viewed as a low commitment, which is not true. It is THE most powerful psychedelic we know of on the planet. Even though it’s fast acting, it’s intense and could be life altering.

What do you say to people who are attracted to 5-MeO-DMT because it seems like a low commitment at 20 to 30 minutes long?

Well it’s just that, it “seems” low commitment, but that 20 minutes could potentially disrupt your life. People think it’s a quick and easy in-and-out by comparison to something like ayahuasca, where you’ve got to go on a special diet, it’s a 6 hour experience, and you’ve got to commit for two to three days or travel for a week to the jungle. People gravitate towards 5-MeO-DMT because the short duration doesn’t feel like a big obligation on the surface. It could be the most beautiful experience of your life, or the most terrifying; set and setting absolutely effect outcomes.

What are some questions people should ask of facilitators to vet them?

How long has the facilitator been serving? Where is the ceremony going to be held? Who am I going to be with? How many people will be there? Is the ceremony gender balanced? How long is my session? What medicine is being served, what’s the source and at what dose? Do they screen people for possible contraindications like pharmaceuticals or mental health concerns? What is their emergency plan? Are they trained in CPR? Will paramedics be called if there is extreme physical distress? What kind of aftercare is provided? Are they directly available for calls after the experience? Do they work with a mental health professional should more specialized aftercare be needed?

I remember a doctor, who I had assisted at one time early in my career, who ultimately ended up having many complaints from his clients. He asked for my help years later with a “difficult case.” I sat him down and said, “Listen, you need to raise your rates and hire a mental health professional, because I’m getting phone calls from your clients.” If a practitioner can’t provide that aftercare, they need to raise their rates and hire an integration specialist because it’s irresponsible to not provide quality aftercare. I shouldn’t be repeatedly getting calls from your client population.

Just because someone says they’ve served a lot of people doesn’t mean they’re following safe protocols.

Are there any other red flags you’d look for?

Not having a really personal pre-screening call with the actual medicine server and one size fits all dosing, or super high doses, are huge red flags. Large group ceremonies by traveling facilitators. Lack of gender balance, or men serving women alone. Coercion is another huge red flag. If the person serving you — and I mean this right up through to the moment before you inhale the 5-MeO-DMT — if the person serving you is not willing to release you from agreeing to do it, don’t do it with them! You need to be able to back out at the last minute. If you are sitting in front of the substance and you get this feeling of, ‘I don’t think this is right,’ then it’s not, DON’T DO IT! There’s no rush. Really the best thing you can do is to step away and find another way to seek that healing you’re looking for. If it’s not a resounding YES, then it’s a hell NO! There’s no middle ground here. It has to be in your soul, in your body, in your knowingness a 100 percent yes.

How can someone get help if they feel they have been harmed by an experience, or get more information?

Fortunately for society there has been a real renaissance in the psychedelic space, with an amazing array of integration support systems that have been developed, along with a variety of online groups.

If someone is in need of support they can reach out to: www.5meohelp.com and they will be connected with integration tools and support.

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When will their churches condemn the Christian nationalism of MAGA politicians?

Religion News Service - Yesterday 

(RNS) — “He who would do good to another must do it in Minute Particulars.” This is a helpful and handy adage from the poet William Blake. It’s also a deeply moral summons to particularity in the doing of attempted good, a call to specificity. Go granular or go home, he might say, because “Generalized Good is the plea of the scoundrel, hypocrite. And flatterer.”

Generalization, in politics and religion, might work in accruing cred, coin, clicks and book sales, but particularity is where the righteousness — the heavy moral lifting — is.

In recent weeks, as elected officials who once tweeted “Back the Blue!” now target federal law enforcement while also tweeting Bible verses, my mind has turned to some of the public arrangements that make this publicly abusive behavior possible. There are of course political parties, donors, voters, but there are other institutions just as essential (if not more so) to successfully winning and wielding office. I refer here to churches. It’s time to think and speak more specifically about the behaviors they normalize.

After Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene publicly called upon her Republican colleagues to embrace Christian nationalism as their core value, Religion News Service reached out to more than 50 congressional Republicans for comment. Only two responded. This got me wondering over three related questions.

Where were they radicalized?

Where were they catechized?

Where were they baptized?

I don’t think it’s at all unreasonable to ask the churches that claim (or once claimed) abusive elected officials as members what they owe both the public in terms of public safety and those members themselves in terms of moral clarity.

Related video: Church leaders address hate vandalism incidents

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In my context, both of my United States Senators (Marsha Blackburn of Christ Presbyterian Church and Bill Hagerty of St. George’s Episcopal) have used their government Twitter accounts to suggest that Attorney General Merrick Garland and our FBI are corrupt. When efforts to reach them and ask them to delete, retract and apologize for these incitements to violence fail, is it appropriate to request that their churches offer a public statement condemning, or at least distancing themselves from, these abusive behaviors? I think so.

I think church organizations that house repeatedly abusive public figures, especially those who’ve been accorded public trust, are responsible for answering the question of where their witness stops and the abuser’s begins. Otherwise, their organization merely serves as free political capital for bad faith actors. And if Christian nationalism is a violation of the core values of the churches themselves, they owe it to their congregants, including their famous ones, to say so loud and clear.

We’ve been here before. In Germany, the Barmen Declaration (1934) addressed the Führer Principle as heresy (as well as terror). In South Africa, the Belhar Confession (1982) addressed white supremacist ideology as sin. And more recently, the Council of Bishops of the African Methodist Episcopal Church issued an Episcopal Statement (2017) that invites “people who are committed to justice and righteousness, equality and truth” to help them in the effort “to thwart what are clearly demonic acts (of the Trump administration).”

These aren’t instances of churches suddenly becoming political. These are instances of communities of baptism demonstrating moral courage, making their witness clear in the face of state violence. Church organizations in America owe it to the American public to hold their publicly abusive congregants to standards of baseline moral seriousness, especially in our season of insurrection, whispers of civil war, and the strategic erosion of every form of common, public good.


© Provided by Religion News ServiceRep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., waves while former President Donald Trump points to her while they look over the 16th tee during the second round of the Bedminster Invitational LIV Golf tournament in Bedminster, N.J., July 30, 2022. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)

In the case of Marjorie Taylor Greene, we have an elected official who spreads myriad forms of disinformation and who was also baptized at North Point Community Church in 2011. Most interestingly, North Point pastor Andy Stanley has been outspoken concerning Christian nationalism and polarization (see his recent talks on religion and politics, including “Nothing Divides Like Politics”). If baptism is to have meaning as a moral or communal commitment, I think North Point would be right to draw a line between what its public witness is, and is meant to be, and Marjorie Taylor Greene’s violent antics.

This isn’t to say that North Point has a Marjorie Taylor Greene problem. I mean to say that Greene, like Blackburn and Hagerty and other elected officials partnering with the Big Lie, have a church problem. They’ve been encouraged to believe they are part of a moral community. But if, in fact, they’ve been given, by their churches, a free pass to terrorize, I’d argue they have yet to be properly catechized. Like their constituents, they have been very poorly served.

“Are not Religion & Politics the Same Thing?” That’s Blake again, challenging, as poets and prophets do, the reigning dichotomies. In our discourse, there’s something of a firewall between “faith” and “politics” that makes it hard to remember that Mitch McConnell’s a Southern Baptist and Al Gore’s a Christian. It’s easy to fall for these divisions. It’s also the case that these divisions often obscure the threats, as well as the righteous possibilities, in front of us.

Sometimes the free-for-all that is Twitter can focus a conversation and facilitate insights that are easy to miss when we try to confine public behavior (and public abuse) to particular lanes in our understanding. Here’s special ed advocate and educator Anna Caudill weighing in on the question of whether or not churches need to speak up on famous, insurrectionist congregants: “Is it that difficult for a tax-exempt corporation to distance itself from the publicly destructive behavior of a member bent on dismantling our system of government?”

That is an amazing way of framing the story. It’s also rhetorically unassailable. An American church organization is an arrangement within and in relation to other arrangements that make up cities, states and the whole of American culture. In the heady days ahead, we need to think harder and perhaps speak more candidly about what we’re abiding — what we’re normalizing — in these arrangements. We become what we normalize.

(David Dark is the author of several books, including The Possibility of America: How the Gospel Can Mend our God-Blessed, God-Forsaken Land. He teaches at the Tennessee Prison for Women and Belmont University. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.)

50 years ago, NASA's Copernicus set the bar for space astronomy

by Francis Reddy, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

Illustration of NASA's Copernicus satellite. Credit: NASA

At 6:28 a.m. EDT on Aug. 21, 1972, NASA's Copernicus satellite, the heaviest and most complex space telescope of its time, lit up the sky as it ascended into orbit from Launch Complex 36B at what is now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida.

Initially known as Orbiting Astronomical Observatory (OAO) C, it became OAO 3 once in orbit in the fashion of the time. But it was also renamed to honor the 500th anniversary of the birth of Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543). The Polish astronomer formulated a model of the solar system with the Sun in the central position instead of Earth, breaking with 1,300 years of tradition and triggering a scientific revolution.

Fitted with the largest ultraviolet telescope ever orbited at the time as well as four co-aligned X-ray instruments, Copernicus was arguably NASA's first dedicated multiwavelength astronomy observatory. This makes it a forebear of operating satellites like NASA's Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, which watches the sky in visible, ultraviolet, and X-ray light.

"The two spacecraft share institutional connections, too," notes Swift Principal Investigator S. Bradley Cenko at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. "Goddard managed both missions, and the X-ray experiment on Copernicus was provided by the Mullard Space Science Laboratory at University College London, which also contributed Swift's Ultraviolet/Optical Telescope."

Learning to point and hold an orbiting telescope on a star long enough for the detectors to capture its light proved much more difficult than expected. Satellites designed to study the Sun at the time had a built-in advantage—they targeted the solar system's brightest object. Copernicus flew with a new inertial reference unit (IRU) developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Gyroscopes in the IRU sped up the process of acquiring targets, while other systems kept the satellite locked on. In a study of the mission's first 500 days, one engineer summed it up by noting that the IRU had made flying Copernicus "a boring operation."

In NASA's early days, astronomers emphasized the need for ultraviolet (UV) studies, which could not be made from the ground, and this became the primary focus of the OAO program. Of four satellites launched, one failed after three days in space, and another failed to reach orbit at all. OAO 2, launched in 1968 and named Stargazer, provided years of observations, including low-resolution stellar spectra, which spread out wavelengths much like a rainbow to reveal the UV fingerprints of specific molecules and atoms. Copernicus went deeper still, capturing spectra with up to 200 times better detail in some wavelengths.

Orbiting Astronomical Observatory C – named Copernicus in orbit – stands in the
Hangar AE clean room at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, following the mounting of its stationary solar panels. Copernicus was the only member of the series sporting the large
cylindrical structures at the top of the spacecraft, which kept stray light from reaching the
instruments. Credit: NASA

"This mission obtained high-resolution spectra of many stars in the UV and provided information at the shortest wavelengths reached for many years," wrote Nancy Grace Roman, the first chief of astronomy in the Office of Space Science at NASA Headquarters, Washington, and the program scientist for Copernicus. During the mission, Roman became one of the driving forces behind the Large Space Telescope project, now known as NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. She is also the namesake of NASA's Roman Space Telescope, which is expected to take flight in a few years.

The primary instrument aboard Copernicus was the Princeton Experiment Package, which captured UV light using a 32-inch (0.8-meter) mirror about a third the size of Hubble's. Led by Lyman Spitzer Jr. at Princeton University in New Jersey, the instrument produced a treasure trove of information about interstellar gas and the ionized outflows of hot stars. Its first target, a star named Zeta Ophiuchi that is partly veiled by an interstellar cloud, showed strong absorption from hydrogen molecules. Measurements from dozens of other stars confirmed a theory predicting that most of the hydrogen in gas clouds existed in this form.

In 1946, Spitzer began speculating about the kinds of science that might be possible with a large orbiting telescope, later becoming the catalyst for the development of Hubble. NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, which operated from 2003 to 2020 and explored, among other sources, the cold clouds where stars are born, was named in his honor.

At the time when NASA was considering instrument proposals for Copernicus, only one celestial object, the Sun, was known to emit X-rays. That changed in 1962. Flying new X-ray detectors on a suborbital rocket, a research team led by Riccardo Giacconi at American Science and Engineering Inc., then in Cambridge, Massachusetts, discovered the first X-ray source beyond the solar system, named Scorpius X-1. Additional flights uncovered more cosmic sources, including Cygnus X-1, long suspected and now known to host a stellar-mass black hole.

With this breakthrough, Giaconni proposed the first satellite dedicated to mapping the X-ray sky. Launched in 1970 and operating for three years, NASA's Uhuru satellite mapped more than 300 sources, showed that many are neutron stars or black holes fueled by gas streaming from stellar companions, and discovered X-rays from the hot gas in galaxy clusters. Giaconni would go on to propose more powerful X-ray satellites—NASA's Einstein Observatory, which operated from 1978 to 198, and NASA's current X-ray flagship, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, launched in 1999.

The X-ray experiment aboard Copernicus was led by Robert Boyd at University College London, and the three X-ray telescopes experienced significant challenges. Longer-wavelength detectors were swamped by an unexpectedly high level of background radiation. It proved to come from a vast comet-shaped cloud of hydrogen atoms surrounding Earth, called the geocorona, that scatters far-ultraviolet sunlight. Later instruments added a filter tuned to absorb the UV but let X-rays pass through.

In June 1973, scientists at Goddard noticed a problem with a shutter in the X-ray telescopes. The device was used to periodically block X-rays from reaching the detector so scientists could track the changing background radiation from charged particles in different parts of the orbit. Now its operation had become hesitant. Concerned that the shutter might remain permanently in the closed position, the instrument team had decided to stop using it. But a final command made it through—and the sticky shutter stuck closed, blinding the instruments.

A fourth detector unattached to a telescope continued working for the duration of the mission. This X-ray counter measured radiation from 1 to 3 angstroms over a wide field of view—2.5 by 3.5 degrees, about 40 times the apparent area of a full Moon.

The X-ray experiment discovered several long-period pulsars, including X Persei. Pulsars—typically, spinning neutron stars—had been discovered five years before Copernicus launched. These objects swing a beam of radiation in our direction each time they rotate, usually at tens to thousands of times a second. Oddly, the X Persei pulsar takes a leisurely 14 minutes per spin.

Copernicus performed long-term monitoring of pulsars and other bright sources, and observed Nova Cygni 1975, an explosion on the white dwarf in a close binary system. The experiment discovered curious dips in X-ray absorption at Cygnus X-1, likely caused by cool, dense clumps in the gas flowing away from the star. And the satellite recorded varying X-rays from the black-hole-powered galaxy Centaurus A, located about 12 million light-years away.

Copernicus returned UV and X-ray observations for 8.5 years before its retirement in 1981, and it still orbits Earth today. It departed space astronomy's center stage as more advanced observatories appeared, notably Einstein and the International Ultraviolet Explorer, which launched in 1978 and operated for nearly 19 years. Copernicus observations appear in more than 650 scientific papers. Its instruments studied some 450 unique objects targeted by more than 160 investigators in the United States and 13 other countries.

Hubble gazes at a star-studded skyfield

Provided by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center 

Over 5000 dolphins perish in Black Sea, biologists say

Ukrainska Pravda
Sun, August 21, 2022 
Viktoriia Andrieieva
Journalist of Ukrainska Pravda.Life

Due to the ongoing Russian aggression against Ukraine, animals continue to die in the Black Sea. At least 5,000 dolphins have already died.

Sources: Open Cages organisation; Ivan Rusiev, a biologist and employee of the Tuzlivski Lymany park

Quote: "The sea washes up no more than 5% of all dead animals ashore."

Details: And the rest, 95 percent, sink to the bottom of the sea.

However, as it is impossible to count all the dead animals, the death toll in ecosystems may be much higher.

"They cannot be detected or counted from the shore, so we believe that during the war of the Russian barbarians against Ukraine, probably tens of thousands of dolphins have already died," the scientist believes.

Background: In late June, Rusiev estimated that more than 3,000 dolphins had died in the Black Sea due to Russia's full-scale aggression against Ukraine.

In early July, four more marine mammals were washed ashore. According to the biologist, the cause of their death is the use of surface vessels and submarines with sonars.

Read also: It will take dozens of years to restore Ukrainian nature after hostilities - ecologists

Journalists fight on their own frontline.

Support Ukrainska Pravda or become our patron.

'Starbucks has a problem': Labor experts evaluate increasingly messy union fight

Dani Romero
·Reporter
Sun, August 21, 2022 

Asked about Starbucks (SBUX) accusing the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) of unfairly rigging union elections and seeking a pause in votes, a legal expert stressed that the coffee giant is still dealing with a larger issue at hand: The rapid unionization itself.

"Starbucks has a problem," Rachel Demarest Gold, an employer-side attorney at Abrams Fensterman, LLP, told Yahoo Finance in a phone interview. "By the time a workforce gets to the point where it's in an election for union representation, the company already has a problem and probably has had a problem for a long time with its employees because satisfied workers don't turn to unions."

The union drive at Starbucks stores nationwide began in December 2021 at a store in Buffalo, New York, and more than 310 stores in 36 states have filed for election petitions. Starbucks Workers United, a subsidiary of the Workers United labor union, is leading organization efforts.

According to records from the NLRB, an independent federal labor agency with leaders appointed by President Biden, more than 220 stores have voted in favor of unionization so far.

Starbucks Workers United organizer Richard Bensinger poses for portrait outside a Starbucks in Buffalo, New York, U.S., December 8, 2021. 

REUTERS/Lindsay DeDario

Starbucks has strongly opposed unionization, with CEO Howard Schultz denouncing the "threat of unionization" and rolling out pay increases for store employees that exclude those at unionized stores.

NLRB regional offices have issued nearly 20 unfair labor practice complaints against Starbucks. The agency has also asked a court to halt the company's alleged union-busting campaign.

The coffee giant is now accusing the NLRB of impropriety: On Monday, Starbucks sent a 16-page letter to NLRB officials accusing the agency of managing union elections in a way that unfairly helped workers unionize.

"It's tit for tat," Gold said. "It's an adversarial process. So if I find that you have done something wrong and it helps my case, I'm gonna bring it up."
Starbucks's letter to the NLRB

In the letter, Starbucks alleged that the agency's regional staff repeatedly crossed the line of neutrality during an election in the Kansas City area by secretly coordinating "in-person" voting at the NLRB offices during a "mail-ballot" election, giving union representatives confidential election information, disenfranchising voters that did not cast in-person votes, and mishandling ballots.

“The purpose of this misconduct was to tip-the-scale in order to deliver the outcome sought by the Union," Starbucks general counsel stated in the letter. "The result of the misconduct was to ignore — and bypass — the actual sentiments that Starbucks partners may have expressed in properly conducted elections.”

Starbucks Coffee CEO Howard Schultz watches the New York Yankees take batting practice before a game against the Seattle Mariners at T-Mobile Park on Aug 9, 2022, in Seattle, Washington. (Photo: Joe Nicholson-USA TODAY Sports)

NLRB press secretary Kayla Blado told Yahoo Finance in a statement that while the NLRB "does not comment on open cases," the agency has "well-established processes to raise challenges regarding the handling of both election matters and unfair labor practice cases."

Starbucks Workers United called the letter "absurd" and the allegations an attempt "to distract attention away from their unprecedented anti-union campaign."

The letter from Starbucks counsel requested that the NLRB immediately suspend all Starbucks mail-ballot elections nationwide and asked the board to stay a judgment that ordered Starbucks to reinstate seven workers in Memphis, Tennessee, who were fired earlier this year during an attempt to unionize a store.

The Starbucks letter is not without precedent: After an historic union election victory at a Staten Island warehouse, Amazon (AMZN) by accused the NLRB of inappropriately leading the union to victory by coercing and misleading voters.

According to Matthew Bodie, a former lawyer for the labor board who teaches law at St. Louis University, Starbucks's public letter against the NLRB stands out for the intensity of its rhetoric.

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders speaks during a unionization rally held by Starbucks Workers United, in Richmond, Virginia, U.S. April 24, 2022. 

REUTERS/Julia Rendleman

The company is "politicizing this by calling for a nationwide moratorium on these elections," Bodie told Yahoo Finance in a phone interview. "I think what they're angling for is to get some Republican lawmakers on board with questioning the integrity of the NLRB."

Bodie added that the ideal scenario for Starbucks "would be if the Republicans would take it either the House and or the Senate, then there'll be hearings about NLRB election integrity and the Republicans will try and make the NLRB seem like a biased organization that can't be trusted."

Hearings based on the accusations are ongoing, with both sides presenting evidence. At some point, Bodie explained, the Hearing Officer "will make her recommendation to the Regional Director of Region 29-Brooklyn, who is handling the case, on whether there should be a new election. The Regional Director will then make a decision on whether there will be a new election or if the results of the election will be certified."

Dani Romero is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @daniromerotv

Howard Schultz once spoke of the ‘reservoir of trust’ he had with Starbucks employees–but his war on unions risks destroying that bond

BY ARON SOLOMON
August 15, 2022 

Starbucks returning CEO Howard Schultz is shutting down 16 chain locations across the U.S. after workers reported incidents of drug use at certain locations.
LEIGH VOGEL—GETTY IMAGES/THE NEW YORK TIMES

When, four short months ago, I wrote an op-ed about the uncertain future of Starbucks, I honestly would not have predicted that things would implode this quickly.

I imagined that Howard Schultz would return to the company as a faithful caretaker who would do what he historically did best: be a likable leader with a fantastic ability to relate to people.

However, in a mid-July letter to employees, interim CEO Howard Schultz set forth his bold vision of the future. Part of his plan for Starbucks to re-imagine its business is to close locations. Last week, videos of employee walkouts went viral–a massive blow to the company’s reputation.

While Starbucks claims that stores are being closed for safety and security reasons, there is another reality at play: The company is locked in a fight to the finish with a surprisingly resilient nascent employee union movement.

The narrative being woven by Starbucks is one of employee safety. As The Wall Street Journal reported, Starbucks was responding to employee reports of drug use in bathrooms by customers and the general public. Initially, Starbucks informed workers that they could deny bathroom access or reduce store operations for safety in these locations.

The same week that Schultz proclaimed the future, Starbucks announced that 16 locations would be shuttered this month. The company is closing six locations in Seattle, another six in Los Angeles, two in Portland, and one each in Washington and Philadelphia. These stores were not unprofitable–and Starbucks has made it clear that this won’t be the end of the closures.

To a critical eye, Starbucks’ positioning is difficult to believe. While workplace safety needs to always be front of mind, many less-than-deal Starbucks locations haven’t been entirely safe for employees for years. What is new is the intersection of some of these locations and a burgeoning union movement.

It’s a little too convenient to craft a new narrative when these very cities are forming part of the foundation of the Starbucks unionization movement. Two of the stores that will be closing recently voted to unionize. At the same time, in the quaint college town of Ithaca, NY, the Starbucks union claims a store is being closed in retaliation for employees voting to unionize.

As Charlie Cartwright, a lawyer who represents employees injured in the workplace, puts it: “Workplace safety is critically important and should drive corporate decision-making where employees are at risk. At the same time, union-busting takes various forms, including closing business locations where employees have chosen to unionize.”

This also needs to be viewed within the totality of the labor battles at Starbucks over the past few months. Issues range from a complaint alleging that the company threatened to stop gender-affirming health benefits to the NLRB having to urge Starbucks to reinstate three Phoenix workers subjected to unfair labor practices relating to union membership. What started as a series of small battles between Starbucks and employees has escalated into a full-scale war.

To navigate these troubled waters, Starbucks needs the reflective Howard Schultz of this iconic 2010 Harvard Business Review interview. Asked what the most significant challenge he faced after returning to the helm in 2008, Schultz shared this prescient view: “The challenge was how to preserve and enhance the integrity of the only assets we have as a company: our values, our culture and guiding principles, and the reservoir of trust with our people.”

Today, this is Starbucks’ greatest failure. The complete absence of trust between Starbucks employees and management has taken all meaning out of one of Schultz’s most beloved terms: “partners.” That’s what Starbucks’s massive PR machine calls their workers.

Even if Starbucks eventually “wins” by shuttering locations and using every union-busting technique, the company will ultimately lose. The Starbucks culture is irrevocably broken–and for many workers, the greatest irony is that the person in charge of fixing it today is the one who actually broke it.

For those who have watched the company closely for years, this is one of the most incredible failed opportunities in American business history. Culture-building is unbelievably hard, but in building the brand, Starbucks had found ways to build the culture.

The same Starbucks stories that are hollow today were once part of its foundation. The ability for their employees to work their way up the ranks of the business to transform what might have started as a part-time job into a career was part of the neo-American dream. Throw in the opportunity to earn a degree, and Starbucks was on to something.

Until they couldn’t help getting in their own way. One day all of this will be required reading in business schools–but today, it’s a cold brew for Starbucks employees to swallow.

In his HBR interview, Schultz shared a personal and professional revelation he hoped would allow Starbucks to avoid the kind of situation it faces today:

“The decisions we had to make were very difficult, but first there had to be a time when we stood up in front of the entire company as leaders and made almost a confession–that the leadership had failed the 180,000 Starbucks people and their families.”

This would be an excellent idea for the latest incarnation of a Schultz-led Starbucks to re-visit. There never needed to be such a profoundly adversarial relationship between the company and its workers.

Aron Solomon, JD, is the chief legal analyst for Esquire Digital, the editor of Today’s Esquire, and a Pulitzer Prize-nominated writer. He has taught entrepreneurship at McGill University and the University of Pennsylvania and was elected to Fastcase 50, recognizing the top 50 legal innovators in the world.


The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

Stop calling them ‘job creators’
BYJOHN BENJAMIN
August 11, 2022 

Like matter, jobs are neither created nor destroyed. 

They evolve with the creative destruction of markets.
SCOTT OLSON—GETTY IMAGES

You can tell “job creator” is a loaded term because it’s only used in political debates.

Yes, some business owners say it, not in boardrooms or internal memos, but rather when defending their role to the public. For years, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has invoked the concept against public scrutiny.

Bernie Marcus, the founder of The Home Depot, is the chief popularizer of the phrase. His Job Creators Network purports to “hold politicians accountable to job creators.”

Over the last decade, the term has also exploded in popularity among politicians. Senator John Cornyn recently blasted the Inflation Reduction Act with the opening line, “raising taxes on job creators… will only make this recession worse.” His colleagues John Thune and Jim Inhofe echoed these critiques.

A cartoon piece of business jargon

The term hasn’t been popular for long. Born under Reagan, “job creator” remained fairly obscure until the mid-2000s, when the media revived it to defend the role of finance in the Great Recession. Now it’s a common piece of rhetoric in arguments about taxes and regulation, unemployment and labor organizing, and many topics in between.

The phrase has obvious power. We defer to those who make things for us. “Job creator” takes this for granted. If the investor class really is the source of jobs, then labor policy should cater to their needs. Higher taxes and union drives, for instance, should be treated skeptically, because they’ll threaten job creators and hence job-doers downstream.

But this dynamic isn’t true. Jobs are not disbursed by powerful people–a bizarrely Soviet idea. They’re governed by market forces, including new technology, inflation, and healthy consumer demand from good wages. By using the phrase we give capital undue credit for creating opportunity, and falsely conflate the interests of owners and workers. In the wake of the recent Senate reconciliation bill and renewed unionizing, it’s worth exploring the reasons to abandon this cartoon piece of business jargon.

Creating jobs isn’t the goal of business formation

Often, companies win by doing the opposite: automating away or outsourcing work. This is because labor is a cost, not just an engine of production. Properly understood, workers sell their labor in a labor market like suppliers sell raw materials in wholesale markets. Companies buy this labor and material to churn out things that customers, in turn, want to buy. Creating jobs is thus a neutral and often secondary consequence of business operations: hiring an extra worker is like buying two tons of steel when one would need to.

“Job creator” is also a dubious concept because many firms which seem to be “making” jobs are really doing something more complicated.

Consider Marcus’s company as an example. The Home Depot has about 500,000 employees in the U.S., making it our sixth largest private employer. With 2,300 locations, that’s about 220 employees per store. Should a new Home Depot move into your town, these new jobs will become available–along with jobs in construction, shipping, food services, and other symbiotic industries that keep the mega-store running.

But in what sense were these jobs “created”? We can easily see how this new superstore will replace the local hardware shop and lumberyard, but we don’t notice the jobs it also displaces from these defunct competitors.

A recent study shows that e-commerce, one of the hottest categories of employment today, has actually eliminated over 670,000 net U.S. jobs since 2008. This isn’t hard for the average worker to compute, as he shuffles from in-house sales at a mom-and-pop shop to picking in an e-retailer’s warehouse. Jobs don’t arise in a vacuum; they evolve with the creative destruction of markets. In many local contexts, jobs, like matter, are neither created nor destroyed.

A complex relationship

That is perhaps what gives “job creator” such potency: Not only does it assume generosity, but it also implies a job that was “created” can be taken away.

In political debates, this is the most common function of the phrase. When politicians use it to warn us how new red tape will crush investors, they’re not asking us to worry about hurting people who can tell the difference between caviars. They’re asking us to believe that, in hurting them, workers will feel pain too.

In reality, the interests of workers and owners don’t automatically align. The relationship is more complex. Just see how, spurred by employees’ new organizing push, Starbucks recently paused stock buybacks to divert funds to people operations.

Jobs–and perhaps better jobs–can come at the expense of shareholders. Markets create the opportunities–and people do the work. The concept of “job creators” is one of the emptiest ideas in business.




John Benjamin works in developing career training pathways for America’s frontline workers. He’s based in New York City and lectures as part of Columbia Business School’s course on Bridging the American Divide.

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

Palestinian activist defies Israeli interrogation order


 Shawan Jabarin, director of the al-Haq Human rights organization, talks to reporters at his office that was raided by Israeli forces, in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Aug. 18, 2022. Israel on Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022, attempted to summon Jabarin, a leading Palestinian rights campaigner, for questioning, pressing ahead with a crackdown on West Bank advocacy groups purportedly linked to terrorism, despite tough European and American pushback against the claims.

 (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser, File) 

SAM MCNEIL
Sun, August 21, 2022 

JERUSALEM (AP) — A Palestinian rights campaigner said that Israel tried to summon him for questioning on Sunday, as it pressed ahead with a crackdown on Palestinian rights groups based in the West Bank.

European and U.S. diplomats have pushed back against the claim by Israeli officials that the targeted groups are linked with terrorism.

The apparent Israeli order for Shawan Jabarin to report to a military prison followed a widely criticized raid last week on six Palestinian civil society organizations in the occupied West Bank. Nine European countries, using uncharacteristically blunt language, called the raid “not acceptable,” while the U.S. expressed concern.

Jabarin, who is director of one of the targeted groups, Al-Haq, said on Sunday that he received a five-minute “threatening call” from Israel’s Shin Bet security service ordering him to go to the Ofer military prison in the occupied West Bank. He said an officer threatened arrest, interrogation and “other things” if he did not comply.

“I will not change my mind, but if he wants to arrest me then he can surely do it as an occupying power,” Jabarin said. He said he invited the officer to the Al-Haq office and that he demanded the summons to be sent officially through lawyers, not over the phone.

The Shin Bet did not respond to a request for comment.

Israel last year outlawed six rights groups, including Al-Haq, claiming they have ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The PFLP is a secular, left-wing movement with a political party as well as an armed wing that has carried out deadly attacks against Israelis. Israel and the U.S. have labeled the PFLP a terrorist organization.

The rights groups deny the Israeli allegations. Jabarin called the claims of PFLP ties “utter nonsense and complete lies.” Nine European countries have also rejected the Israeli charges, citing a lack of evidence.

Despite the criticism, Israeli soldiers last Thursday entered the West Bank city of Ramallah in an armored convoy and blew up the front doors of the Palestinian groups' offices. Soldiers seized documents, computers, and broke furniture and appliances before sealing the entrances.

The nine European countries — Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden — stepped up their criticism of Israel over the weekend, saying the latest raids are “part of a worrying reduction of space for civil society” for Palestinians.

“These actions are not acceptable,” they said in a joint statement, adding they have seen no evidence of extremist links.

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price last week said Washington was “concerned” about the raids and closures but Israel had pledged to provide additional information. Western diplomats visited one of the offices hours later in a show of support for the outlawed groups.

The groups raided include Al-Haq, a veteran, internationally respected Palestinian rights group; Addameer, which advocates for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel; Defense for Children International-Palestine; the Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees; the Union of Agricultural Work Committees, and the Bisan Center for Research and Development.

On Sunday, some 45 Israeli and Jewish advocacy groups issued a statement in solidarity with the targeted Palestinian groups.

“Defense of human rights is not terrorism,” the statement said. “We repudiate these baseless declarations and call on the international community to pressure Israel to revoke its decision.”

Major Israeli human rights groups, including B’Tselem and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, as well as the liberal pro-Israel group J Street, were among the signatories.

Rights defenders have described the raid as part of a decades-long crackdown in the occupied territories on political activism.

“We know that there is a price to defend rights and citizens, and we are moving forward,” Jabarin said.

Factbox-Who is Alexander Dugin, Russian nationalist whose daughter died in car bomb attack?


Russian politologist Alexander Dugin addresses a rally in Moscow


Sun, August 21, 2022 

(Reuters) - Darya Dugina, the daughter of ultra-nationalist Russian ideologue Alexander Dugin, was killed in a suspected car bomb attack outside Moscow on Saturday evening. Acquaintances of Dugina said the car she was driving belonged to her father and that he was probably the intended target.

Who is Alexander Dugin?

- Dugin, 60, has long advocated the unification of Russian-speaking and other territories in a vast new Russian empire, which he wants to include Ukraine.

- In his 1997 book, "The Foundations of Geopolitics: The Geopolitical Future of Russia", Dugin was fiercely critical of U.S. influence in Eurasia and called for Russia to rebuild its own authority in the region and advocated breaking up the territory of other nations.


- That book featured on army reading lists, but there is no indication that Dugin has ever had direct influence on Russian foreign policy.

- Dugin's influence over President Vladimir Putin has been a subject for speculation, with some Russia watchers asserting that his sway is significant and many calling it minimal. He has no official ties to the Kremlin.

- The United States imposed sanctions on Dugin in 2015 for being "responsible for or complicit in actions or policies that threaten the peace, security, stability, or sovereignty or territorial integrity of Ukraine".

- In a statement in March, the U.S. Treasury said his Eurasian Youth Union actively recruited individuals with military and combat experience to fight on behalf of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic in eastern Ukraine.

- "Dugin controls Geopolitica, a website that serves as a platform for Russian ultra-nationalists to spread disinformation and propaganda targeting Western and other audiences," the U.S. Treasury said.

- In 2015, Dugin was quoted as saying by gazeta.ru that his being added to the U.S. sanctions list was "unprecedented" and that sanctions were being imposed for "intellectual activity that breaks no laws".

- Dugin did not immediately respond to questions emailed to him on Sunday at an address listed on the website of the International Eurasian Movement that he founded.

POLITICAL MOVEMENTS

- Dugin's 1997 book increased his prominence. In the early 1990s, he co-founded the National Bolshevik Party (NBP), which espoused vehemently anti-centrist views and whose largely red flag featured a black hammer and sickle at its centre.

- Dugin left the NBP around a decade before it was declared an "extremist organisation" in 2007 and its activities banned in Russia.

- He went on to found political and social movements centred on staunchly anti-Western ideas for the future of Eurasia.

- Dugin worked a brief stint as chief editor of Tsargrad TV, a pro-Kremlin, Christian Orthodox channel owned by businessman Konstantin Malofeev. Malofeev was sanctioned by the United States and European Union in 2014 over accusations that he funded pro-Moscow separatists fighting in Ukraine, something he denies.

- Writing on Tsargrad's website in May, Dugin said Russia's "special military operation" in Ukraine required immediate, "patriotic reforms".

- He wrote that a "new, eternal, true and profound Russia" needed to be established to attract the people of Ukraine.

- "Ukraine can become an integral, organic part of this," he wrote. "Ukrainians must understand that we are inviting them to create this new, great power. As well as Belarusians, Kazakhs, Armenians, but also Azerbaijanis and Georgians, and all those who not only were and are with us, but also will be."

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Nick Macfie)