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Category: Human rights/civil liberties

The activists tracking ICE in Los Angeles

The activists tracking ICE in Los Angeles

Oren Peleg writes: On a crisp September morning in Los Angeles, Elijah Chiland, Victor Maldonado, and four other volunteers of the Harbor Area Peace Patrol gathered at Wilmington Waterfront Park, just outside the city’s port. “If you would have told me at the beginning of the summer that, three months into this, we would be waking up at ungodly hours to fight fascism, I wouldn’t have believed you,” Maldonado said. At 6 A.M., they piled into two cars and drove…

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Federal agents taunted Chicago woman to ‘do something, b—-’ before shooting her, attorney claims

Federal agents taunted Chicago woman to ‘do something, b—-’ before shooting her, attorney claims

Chicago Sun-Times reports: Body-camera video of a Border Patrol agent involved in the shooting of a woman who was allegedly chasing agents in Brighton Park over the weekend shows an officer saying, “Do something, b—-,” before pulling over and shooting the woman five times, the woman’s attorney said in federal court Monday. The video appears to contradict the government’s allegation that Marimar Martinez, 30, drove toward officers before one of them opened fire on her late Saturday morning on Kedzie…

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The Israeli right’s ‘time of miracles’ is over. The Palestinians are going nowhere

The Israeli right’s ‘time of miracles’ is over. The Palestinians are going nowhere

Meron Rapoport writes: We should know better than to take any so-called peace proposal presented by U.S. President Donald Trump along with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at face value. But as the world awaits Hamas’ response to Trump’s 20-point plan for ending the war in Gaza, published in conjunction with the pair’s White House press conference on Monday, it is possible to begin drawing some early conclusions about what this all means for Israel and the Palestinians. Before any…

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Federal thugs assault 84-year old couple during Portland protest

Federal thugs assault 84-year old couple during Portland protest

The Oregonian reports: An elderly couple says they were charged and knocked down by federal agents as they peacefully protested on Saturday in front of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in South Portland, just blocks from their home. Laurie Eckman, 84, said she and her husband Richard Eckman, also 84 and a Vietnam war veteran, were rushed by federal officers “for no apparent reason.” She said her husband was leaning on his walker and wearing his Vietnam veterans…

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Stephen Miller accused of ‘incitement to violence against judges’

Stephen Miller accused of ‘incitement to violence against judges’

Raw Story reports: U.S. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller Saturday was accused of “incitement to violence against judges.” Miller, who has been accused of making his subordinates cry at work, took to social media over the weekend to make several proclamations related to “leftist” judges. “The Democrat Party has filled our legal and judicial system with radicals who protect leftwing terrorists,” Miller wrote Saturday. “This is a very real and dire crisis for our Republican form of…

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Trump officials discussed sending Army’s 82nd Airborne division to Portland, text messages show

Trump officials discussed sending Army’s 82nd Airborne division to Portland, text messages show

Minnesota Star Tribune reports: Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth considered sending an elite U.S. Army strike force to Portland, Ore., to quell protests that President Donald Trump has characterized as “lawless mayhem,” according to images of messages provided to the Minnesota Star Tribune. The messages, casually exchanged last weekend in a crowded, public space, show high-level officials in the Trump administration discussing the deployment of the Army’s 82nd Airborne, an infantry division that has been deployed to combat zones in both…

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Norman Finkelstein: Trump plan has no connection to reality in Gaza

Norman Finkelstein: Trump plan has no connection to reality in Gaza

  President Trump has released a Gaza “peace” plan that would put Gaza under a Trump-chaired “Board of Peace”. While some in the international community have welcomed the move, some question the fact that it bypasses Palestinians and offers no path to statehood. So, with Netanyahu pledging not to fully withdraw from Gaza, will this deal bring genuine peace or cement the status quo? This week on an UpFront special, Marc Lamont Hill speaks with one of the world’s foremost…

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‘We have to move fast’: Jane Fonda relaunches father’s free speech group to counter Trump censorship

‘We have to move fast’: Jane Fonda relaunches father’s free speech group to counter Trump censorship

  The Oscar-winning actress and activist Jane Fonda is relaunching her father Henry Fonda’s free speech organization, the Committee for the First Amendment. First established in 1947 to combat the rise of McCarthyism, the organization brings together members of the film and television industry to push back against and refuse government censorship. Fonda’s announcement comes after the television network ABC brought back late-night host Jimmy Kimmel’s show following widespread protest. Kimmel’s show had been pulled from the air after he…

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Can the Trump regime ban apps that track ICE agents?

Can the Trump regime ban apps that track ICE agents?

BBC News reports: The US government and law enforcement agencies have hit out at developers and users of apps which track Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), arguing they threaten the lives of agents. The FBI says the man who targeted an ICE facility in Dallas – killing two detainees – had used these types of apps to track the movements of agents and their vehicles. A tracking app downloaded more than a million times that shows the movements of immigration…

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University of Southern California sold dead human bodies to the U.S. military to train IDF medical personnel

University of Southern California sold dead human bodies to the U.S. military to train IDF medical personnel

USC Annenberg Media reports: Near the end of 2017, the United States Navy filed a notice of intent to begin purchasing human cadavers from the University of Southern California. The purpose: Use dead bodies in trauma surgery training for the Israeli Defense Forces. Since that notice, the Navy has paid USC more than $860,000 for at least 89 “fresh cadaver bodies,” 32 of which were used specifically for IDF training at Los Angeles General Medical Center. One contract is still…

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The destruction of Gaza City is a crime against history

The destruction of Gaza City is a crime against history

Baker Zoubi writes: Palestinians in Gaza City are facing an impossible choice, as the Israeli army works to annihilate what remains of northern Gaza’s last bastion from the air and the ground. Hundreds of thousands of residents have already fled in recent days amid the intensification of Israel’s assault, forced to pay up to $5,000 to relocate in the knowledge that they will likely never see their homes again. Others are staying put, unable or unwilling to flee to areas…

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State terrorism: Massive immigration raid on Chicago apartment building leaves residents reeling

State terrorism: Massive immigration raid on Chicago apartment building leaves residents reeling

In a ruling he issued this week, William G. Young, a senior U.S. district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, wrote: “ICE goes masked for a single reason — to terrorize Americans into quiescence.” Terrorize — not my word, but that of a federal judge appointed by Ronald Reagan in 1985. In U.S. law (22 U.S.C. 2656f(d)(2)) terrorism is defined as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine…

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An entire generation of Americans is turning against Israel

An entire generation of Americans is turning against Israel

Felicia Schwartz writes: President Donald Trump is often at his most frank when he plays pundit, and so it went with his recent musings about Israel’s war with Hamas and the political fallout. “They had total control over Congress, and now they don’t,” Trump told the Daily Caller in an interview published earlier this month, referring to Israel. “They’re gonna have to get that war over with. … They may be winning the war, but they’re not winning the world…

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Majority of American voters oppose sending additional economic and military aid to Israel, poll finds

Majority of American voters oppose sending additional economic and military aid to Israel, poll finds

The New York Times reports: Nearly two years into the war in Gaza, American support for Israel has undergone a seismic reversal, with large shares of voters expressing starkly negative views about the Israeli government’s management of the conflict, a new poll from The New York Times and Siena University found. Disapproval of the war appears to have prompted a striking reassessment by American voters of their broader sympathies in the decades-old conflict in the region, with slightly more voters…

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Democrats in Congress are breaking with Israel like never before

Democrats in Congress are breaking with Israel like never before

Axios reports: Some of Israel’s staunchest Democratic supporters on Capitol Hill are wavering like never before as progressives grow more emboldened in their defense of the Palestinian cause. Why it matters: The humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza has soured U.S. public opinion on Israel, and while members of Congress have been something of a lagging indicator, they are now shifting as well. Centrist Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) told Axios’ Barak Ravid at an Axios event on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly on…

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These countries recognized Palestine, but are still sending arms to Israel

These countries recognized Palestine, but are still sending arms to Israel

The Intercept reports: The day before global leaders convened this week in New York City for the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, the governments of the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia joined the vast majority of the world’s nations in recognizing Palestine as a state. At the start of the U.N. session on Monday, France and Luxembourg added their nations to the list. Both the French and British heads of state said that they decided to recognize…

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