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Category: Human rights

U.S. to revoke legal status of more than a half-million migrants, urges them to self deport

U.S. to revoke legal status of more than a half-million migrants, urges them to self deport

CBS News reports: The Trump administration will be revoking the legal status of hundreds of thousands of Latin American and Haitian migrants welcomed into the U.S. under a Biden-era sponsorship process, urging them to self-deport or face arrest and removal by deportation agents. The termination of their work permits and deportation protections under an immigration authority known as parole will take effect in late April, 30 days after March 25, according to a notice posted by the federal government. The…

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I negotiated for Israeli prime ministers. Netanyahu is lying

I negotiated for Israeli prime ministers. Netanyahu is lying

Daniel Levy writes: It has taken less than two months for normal service to be resumed – a White House that is the plaything of the prime minister of a client state, Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu. Having briefly flirted with leading the ‘ceasefire over war’ camp, the US is back to bombing Yemen, threatening Iran with military action, and undermining its own negotiations in the service of greenlighting Israel’s resumed bombing of Gaza. Trump has apparently been reminded who is the…

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Venezuelan migrant deportations based on conjecture instead of hard evidence

Venezuelan migrant deportations based on conjecture instead of hard evidence

Slate reports: After the Trump administration rounded up hundreds of Venezuelan migrants around the country—without notice or court hearings—and sent them off to a prison in El Salvador, we’re finally getting details on who was deported and why. And the more we learn, the more obvious it becomes why the government is so eager to expel these individuals without any semblance of due process. It claims that these men are terrorists by virtue of their alleged membership in the Tren…

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Israel’s return to war is a prelude to mass expulsion

Israel’s return to war is a prelude to mass expulsion

Ben Reiff writes: Two months after agreeing to a ceasefire deal that should have ended the war, Israel has resumed its bombardment of the Gaza Strip with an intensity that recalls the earliest days of the onslaught. Israeli airstrikes have killed over 400 Palestinians and wounded hundreds more since the early hours of this morning, and the army has ordered thousands of residents of the towns and neighborhoods spanning the perimeter of the Strip to flee their homes. Israel has again fully sealed off Rafah…

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Arrest of immigrant-rights advocate is a ‘Putin-style persecution of political dissidents’

Arrest of immigrant-rights advocate is a ‘Putin-style persecution of political dissidents’

The New York Times reports: An undocumented woman in Denver who became a symbol of immigrant resistance during President Trump’s first term as she evaded deportation was arrested at work on Monday by federal immigration agents, her family and immigrant activists said. Jeanette Vizguerra, 53, had been on her break at a Target store near Denver when immigration agents took her into custody, said Jordan Garcia, an immigrant-rights advocate with the American Friends Service Committee who has known Ms. Vizguerra…

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Trump said to ‘green-light’ renewal of Gaza strikes, killing over 400 Palestinians

Trump said to ‘green-light’ renewal of Gaza strikes, killing over 400 Palestinians

The Times of Israel reports: US President Donald Trump gave Israel a “green light” to renew military operations against Hamas in Gaza, US media reported Tuesday, as the international community lamented the collapse of the hostage-ceasefire deal. Trump made the decision after Hamas refused to release more hostages, an Israeli official was quoted as telling The Wall Street Journal. Israel let the US know that it was resuming strikes on Gaza before carrying them out, the official added, echoing other…

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‘I am a political prisoner’: Mahmoud Khalil says he’s being targeted for political beliefs

‘I am a political prisoner’: Mahmoud Khalil says he’s being targeted for political beliefs

The Guardian reports: In his first public remarks since being detained by federal immigration authorities, Palestinian activist and recent Columbia graduate, Mahmoud Khalil, spoke out against the conditions facing immigrants in US detention and said he was being targeted by the Trump administration for his political beliefs. “I am a political prisoner,” he said in a statement provided exclusively to the Guardian. “I am writing to you from a detention facility in Louisiana where I wake to cold mornings and…

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Trump has made ‘a huge gift to America’s enemies’ by silencing pro-democracy media

Trump has made ‘a huge gift to America’s enemies’ by silencing pro-democracy media

Politico reports: U.S. President Donald Trump’s move to stop financing U.S.-funded media including Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is stirring anger and indignation. On Saturday, journalists from VOA, RFE/RL and other U.S.-funded media outlets were put on leave or otherwise told to stop work after Trump moved to effectively freeze funding to media that have correspondents all over the world and provide coverage of regions including Eastern Europe and Central Asia. “These media outlets have…

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Starvation is not a negotiating tactic

Starvation is not a negotiating tactic

Megan Stack writes: “You do whatever you want,” President Trump said he told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. Mr. Netanyahu, it seems, took Mr. Trump at his word. Israel has clamped Gaza back under near-total siege, barring desperately needed humanitarian aid and other goods from entering the hungry and bomb-decimated enclave. Food, medicine, tents, fuel — for the past week and a half, supplies have not been permitted into Gaza, where some two million Palestinians are trying to survive in the wreckage….

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White House oversaw arrest of Mahmoud Khalil. Now another Palestinian has been arrested

White House oversaw arrest of Mahmoud Khalil. Now another Palestinian has been arrested

The Associated Press reports: On Thursday, Khalil’s lawyers filed new court documents describing how he was rushed from New York to Louisiana last weekend in a manner that left the outspoken Columbia University graduate student feeling like he was being kidnapped. The experience reminded Khalil of when he left Syria shortly after the forced disappearance of his friends there during a period of arbitrary detention in 2013, the lawyers wrote. According to the lawsuit, Khalil repeatedly asked to speak to…

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Ukrainian journalist, Victoria Roshchyna, died exposing Russia’s hidden crimes

Ukrainian journalist, Victoria Roshchyna, died exposing Russia’s hidden crimes

Slidstvo.Info reports: Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna, who was captured by Russian forces in the summer of 2023, endured brutal torture in captivity, according to an investigation by Slidstvo.Info. Investigators found she suffered knife wounds, electric shocks, and became so emaciated her weight dropped to just 30 kilograms. Russian prison staff reportedly hid her from inspections to conceal her deteriorating condition. Roshchyna was taken prisoner in August 2023 while reporting from Russian-occupied territories. For months, her whereabouts were unknown. It wasn’t…

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U.S. added to international watchlist for rapid decline in civic freedoms

U.S. added to international watchlist for rapid decline in civic freedoms

The Guardian reports: The United States has been added to the Civicus Monitor Watchlist, which identifies countries that the global civil rights watchdog believes are currently experiencing a rapid decline in civic freedoms. Civicus, an international non-profit organization dedicated to “strengthening citizen action and civil society around the world”, announced the inclusion of the US on the non-profit’s first watchlist of 2025 on Monday, alongside the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Italy, Pakistan and Serbia. The watchlist is part of…

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Facing Trump’s threats, Columbia inquisition targets students critical of Israel

Facing Trump’s threats, Columbia inquisition targets students critical of Israel

The Associated Press reports: Columbia University senior Maryam Alwan was visiting family in Jordan over winter break when she received an email from the school accusing her of harassment. Her supposed top offense: writing an op-ed in the student newspaper calling for divestment from Israel. The probe is part of a flurry of recent cases brought by a new university disciplinary committee — the Office of Institutional Equity — against Columbia students who have expressed criticism of Israel, according to…

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DOGE’s foreign aid cuts spark ‘total chaos’ around the world

DOGE’s foreign aid cuts spark ‘total chaos’ around the world

Wired reports: Representatives from dozens of nonprofit organizations attending a major human rights conference in Taipei, Taiwan, last week woke up Thursday to devastating news. Over the previous night in Asia, the Donald Trump administration had abruptly announced it would end nearly 10,000 contracts and grants from the US State Department, including the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL) as well as the US Agency for International Development, representing about 90 percent of USAID’s contracts overall. The announcement…

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USAID cuts to foreign aid will bring disease and death to millions

USAID cuts to foreign aid will bring disease and death to millions

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration’s decision to withdraw foreign aid and dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development is likely to cause enormous human suffering, according to estimates by the agency itself. Among them: up to 18 million additional cases of malaria per year, and as many as 166,000 additional deaths; 200,000 children paralyzed with polio annually, and hundreds of millions of infections; one million children not treated for severe acute malnutrition, which is often fatal, each…

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Israel cuts off humanitarian supplies to Gaza as it tries to upend ceasefire deal

Israel cuts off humanitarian supplies to Gaza as it tries to upend ceasefire deal

The Guardian reports: Israel has cut off humanitarian supplies to Gaza in an effort to pressure Hamas into accepting a change in the ceasefire agreement to allow for the release of hostages without an Israeli troop withdrawal. The office of the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said on Sunday it was imposing a blockade on Gaza because Hamas would not accept a plan which it claimed had been put forward by the US special envoy, Steve Witkoff, to extend phase one…

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