Reporting under genocide: Six months in Gaza
With international reporters locked out, Palestinian journalists have made huge sacrifices to keep the world informed of the unprecedented killing and destruction in Gaza. More media workers have been killed by Israel since October 7 than in any other conflict in modern history. Like the rest of the population, Gaza’s journalists have also been maimed, arrested or threatened, have seen their homes and offices destroyed and are grieving over the loss of those close to them. The Listening Post spent time with three Al Jazeera journalists between February and March 2024. Contributors:Anas al-Sharif – Reporter, Al Jazeera ArabicHind Khoudary – Reporter, Al Jazeera EnglishMarah Elwadiya – Journalist, Al Jazeera Digital A Listening Post/Ain Media co-production. Videography by Mahmoud Sarraj, Ibrahim Nofal and Sari Hennawi. Tariq Nafi – Senior ProducerShrouq Aila – Gaza-based ProducerAhmed Madi – ProducerKit Harwood – EditorMeenakshi Ravi – Executive Producer Adblock test (Why?)
Palestinians mark last days of Ramadan on the eve of six months of war
Palestinian Muslims are marking a tense and sombre last weekend in Ramadan, as Israel’s war on Gaza approaches the six-month mark. Some 120,000 people descended on the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, which dominates the Old City in Jerusalem, officials said on Friday. There were minor scuffles between worshippers and Israeli police controlling the entrance to the mosque, which is the third holiest site in Islam. Adli al-Agha, 53, from Jerusalem, told the AFP news agency that many people “had to flee dawn prayers” after Israeli police deployed a mini-drone spraying tear gas to disperse worshippers. Friday marked Laylat al-Qadr (“The Night of Power”), considered the holiest night of Ramadan, which commemorates the moment the Quran was first revealed to the Prophet Muhammad. It is the night when Muslims believe their prayers are most likely to be granted, a festive moment while children stay up late and shops stay open till the small hours. But many Palestinians are not in the mood to celebrate and are praying for an end to the war in Gaza after almost six months of bloodshed. Sameeha al-Qadi, 55, who had come from near Bethlehem, said Jerusalem “is sad and has lost its light – we all feel what is going on in Gaza. We can’t escape it for a minute”. This year there are few Ramadan decorations or lights in the Holy City, with Palestinians instead having a bitter coffee and a date – traditionally to mark mourning – on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, when feasts are usually held. “There is sweet nothing about the feast this year. People are not celebrating,” said Sabah, 54, some of whose relatives have been killed in Gaza. “Everything is bitter in my mouth. It is so painful at this time which is all about family.” In Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, Palestinians gathered on Laylat al-Qadr, praying in and outside a tent they had built near the debris of al-Faruq Mosque – now reduced to ruins by Israeli air strikes. People also gathered to pray within the surviving section of the Great Omari Mosque in Gaza City. Also known as the Great Mosque of Gaza, the largest and oldest mosque in the strip was destroyed by Israeli military bombardments. Despite its destruction, the mosque remains a favoured venue for residents of the region to gather for prayers. Palestinians displaced from their homes in Gaza for almost six months by Israeli attacks have observed Ramadan in makeshift tents, under limited means and difficult conditions. Many are spending the last days reading the Quran or decorating their tents for Eid. Adblock test (Why?)
Palestinians and the world must not lose hope
When in early October we, Palestinians, laid out to the world what was going to happen, our testimonies and foresight were seen as an exaggeration. Our warnings of Israel’s terrifying enthusiasm for using excessive violence were not taken seriously. Worse, our warnings that Israel was going to commit killings of Palestinians on a massive scale were dubbed “anti-Semitic”. Today, the official statistics say 33,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli air strikes with US-made bombs, shelling and field executions in Gaza and the West Bank. This number does not account for all those “missing” under the rubble, shot dead in the streets or in their homes by the occupation soldiers, or buried under the sand by their bulldozers. And while Gaza is bearing the brunt of Israel’s tormenting violence, Palestinians in the West Bank are being arrested by the thousands, including children, most of whom are denied trial. They are held under torturous and abusive conditions that have resulted in the killing of at least 13 Palestinian captives in the last six months. Meanwhile, Palestinians with Israeli citizenship as well as Palestinians in Jerusalem suffer under Israel’s draconian apartheid laws while being policed, detained, tortured and attacked by Israeli mobs for simply sharing social media posts or consuming what Israel calls “terrorist media”. If I were to describe the past 26 weeks, it would be one hour after another of just barely pulling through. I have asked myself, what is the point of writing another piece about Israel’s remorseless sadism? Between pitching this article and finding the strength to actually write it, more than 3,000 Palestinian children, women and men were killed. Al-Shifa Medical Complex was completely destroyed and the extrajudicial killings in the West Bank have only intensified. The feeling of numbness, of paralysis among Palestinians is one of the aims of the Israeli “attrition” strategy. A war of attrition is meant to create the conditions to drain, exhaust and weaken an opponent. It is meant to diminish the capacity to fight back. Israel’s goal is the emotional, moral and mental depletion of those resisting its occupation and colonisation so they lose motivation and commitment to engage and mobilise in the face of brute repression. It has applied this strategy in “peacetime” as well. Following in the footsteps of European colonialists and their logic of pacification, Israel has sought to wear down the Palestinian population into full submission by making life impossible at all levels. While feeding the world the false narrative of “self-defence”, it has tried to create the moribund Palestinian: not necessarily dead, but always on the edge, constantly facing the choice between death and torment. I do not think I will ever be able to fully explain what it is like to be a Palestinian – in all the shades of bruises we come in. It is not for the lack of words as much it is for the recognition that if I were to speak of the horrors, I am not confident that those who listen would bear to hear all the pain embedded in the Palestinian experience. For the past 182 days, Palestinians have been plunged into waves of deep grief, penetrating pain, and a crippling fear of anticipated loss. Quivers of terror remain stuck in our spine unable to escape, just like us. One of the most testing parts of this aggression is having to manage this grief. So many people we know are either killed, arrested or displaced. Palestinians have suffered not only physical displacement but psychological displacement as well; our mental and emotional anchors have been dislodged. It is an excruciating type of pain to keep witnessing the different ways in which Palestinian bodies can be turned lifeless. There is no capacity to bury the slain bodies, no ability to collectively mourn our losses, not just the material but also the emotional: the destroyed homes, the destroyed memories, and the destroyed hope we mustered to have. With continued exposure to Israel’s unyielding psychopathy, comes a collective feeling of burnout not only among the population still trying to survive Israel’s slaughter, but also among those mobilising to stop a genocide still being committed as I write these words. The burnout is real. Too many of us are too exhausted to say anything, to resist succumbing to the delusion that our voices do not matter and will achieve nothing. As we sit with those uncomfortable and hopeless feelings, the war persists and the scale of the horrors increases. And it is not just us, Palestinians in Palestine. This extends to those in the world who rose up against the genocide. Israel has responded to global resistance with more slaughter – like the killing of international humanitarian workers – and more lobbying for its critics to be punished. As governments refuse to take action to end the slaughter, those mobilising against the genocide are slowly and strategically pushed towards incapacitation, despair, and the conviction that the Israeli onslaught cannot be stopped. In May of 2021, when Palestinians were in the midst of the largest uprisings of the past decades, when they showed true unity across Gaza, the West Bank, the 1948 territories and the diaspora, I wrote a piece for the Guardian titled, Why are Palestinians protesting? Because we want to live. I wrote the piece on my phone in between running from tear gas fired by Israeli soldiers and barely escaping the brutal beatings at the hands of the Palestinian Authority’s security forces. Those were brutal times, terrifying times, and defining times. In that piece, I tried to capture the strategy of colonialism: “This is what colonialism does: it suffocates every part of your life, and then it finishes by burying you.” I was not trying to draw a silhouette of a killer. I was trying to capture the moment of defiance and renewed unity among Palestinians from the river to the sea and in the diaspora. “It is a strategic, deliberate process, and it is only obstructed or delayed because oppressors are
Lakhimpur constituency Assam Lok Sabha elections 2024: Know candidates, polling date and other
Elections for the Lok Sabha are expected to take place in April or May of this year. In the Lakhimpur Lok Sabha election, the Election Commission of India has released the official voting schedule and results.
Former Army colonel seeking to flip North Carolina House seat says Dem opponent is ‘beholden’ to Biden
A former Army colonel who’s looking to flip a House seat from blue to red in North Carolina says her Democratic opponent, whom she accused of being a “career politician,” is “beholden” to President Biden and the Democratic policies that continue to wreak havoc on her district. Laurie Buckhout is the GOP nominee running against Rep. Don Davis, D-N.C., in the race to represent North Carolina’s 1st Congressional District in the House. She spoke to Fox News Digital about her candidacy in the race, which has been ranked as a “Democrat Toss Up” by the nonpartisan elections analyst Cook Political Report. “We have to admit that Davis is just Biden’s, you know, surrogate on the ground. He’s his agent, he’s his guy. He does what Biden says, he votes with Biden,” Buckhout said. “He’s beholden to guys like Hakeem Jeffries in Congress. He’s beholden to Biden.” Unlike Davis, Buckhout claimed she’s “not beholden to anyone except for the voters and the constituents of eastern North Carolina.” GOP SET TO GAIN 3 US HOUSE SEATS UNDER MAP ADVANCED IN NC SENATE Buckhout accused Davis, a U.S. Air Force veteran who served for 14 years in the North Carolina state Senate before getting elected to the House in Nov. 2022, of being a “career politician” who has “never had a day in his life where he’s run a business.” “He’s never created jobs. He’s been a career politician,” she said. “You look at everything he’s done, he goes down to the border, and all that is, is for photo ops,” she added of Davis, who previously served as the mayor of Snow Hill, North Carolina, in the early 2000s. “Has he made any changes or put forth any bills to stop the invasion? No. Has he done anything to stop illegal aliens [from] bringing fentanyl into the state or to his district? No.” Buckhout, who’s been traveling the district to speak with voters about their concerns ahead of the election, said there are a number of issues she’s hoping to tackle if elected, including poverty. “G.K. Butterfield, who hand-picked Don Davis to replace him, used to brag that this is the poorest district in North Carolina, and it is. It’s been Democrat-led for 141 years and maybe that’s the reason,” she said. Buckhout said that two issues are at the top of mind in her district: border security and the economy. “I think border security is probably number one. The economy, of course, is horrific, but even the poorest of people will tell you that they’re just terrified about the border,” she said. “We caught a man on the terrorist watch list about three weeks ago in the county adjacent to mine, and we still haven’t heard back from Biden about why this guy is here. So, border security is huge. And then, of course, the economy, boosting the economy, creating jobs is number two. And frankly, they’re tied. We have to attack those issues head-on right away.” Buckhout also noted that residents in the district are “extremely concerned” about crime and opioid use in their neighborhoods. GOING, GOING, GONE: COULD THE REPUBLICANS’ SLIM HOUSE MAJORITY SLIP AWAY BEFORE NOVEMBER? “They’re concerned about the lack of accountability of these folks coming in. They don’t know who they are [or] where they came from,” she said. “I got a call from a couple who are very concerned about illegal aliens living next to them. They had rented out a house, and [there’s] drug activity, all sorts of activity all day and night. They’re concerned about drug dealers coming into the area, concerned about fentanyl, concerned about their children. So I would say crime and fentanyl are big issues.” “Those of us who are adults now grew up in an America that’s very different from what Joe Biden’s trying to shape, and we have to stop the progress that he’s trying to make in ruining our country. Don Davis is a part of that,” Buckhout added. Prior to running for Congress, Buckhout served for 26 years in the U.S. Army and reached the rank of Colonel before she retired in 2010. Buckhout, a graduate of James Madison University who went on to earn master’s degrees in national military strategy and information management, began her career with the Army in 1984 and later commanded an 800-person battalion attack task force as part of the initial spearhead attack into Iraq in 2003. “I was blessed to come from a lineup of Army combat veterans and Army Air Corps. My mother was Army Air Corps World War II, my dad was World War II, Korea and Vietnam,” she said. “I grew up with that sort of military ethic. My father used to say, ‘You guys have gotta look yourself in the eye at the end of the day and know that you did the right thing.’ So, serving your country and the idea of duty is really important to me.” “The sense of standing up when you feel your country is in danger, that’s never really gone away,” Buckhout added. “That’s part of what made me decide to run for office was, as a mom and a citizen, as maybe a soldier for life, I guess, I can’t step away and just watch our country burn. I feel compelled to stand up and, you know, try to change it.” Following her tenure in the military, Buckhout, started a strategic consulting and services group specializing in electronic warfare and cyberspace operations. “We worked on some wonderful programs when I came back from Iraq, stopping our soldiers from getting blown up with IEDs,” she said. “When I retired from the Army in 2010, after being assigned to the Pentagon after going to Iraq, I did the same thing as a business, because it still needed to be done. Soldiers were still getting maimed and killed by improvised explosive devices in Iraq and Afghanistan. And, of course, now they’ve spread all over the world, and we’ve even found them
Biden-appointed judge torches DOJ for defying subpoenas after prosecuting Trump advisor
A President Biden-appointed judge slammed the Justice Department’s apparent hypocrisy on Friday for allowing attorneys involved in the Biden family investigation to defy subpoenas — even though former Trump advisor Peter Navarro is sitting in prison for doing the same thing. District Judge Ana Reyes ripped the DOJ at a status conference for not letting DOJ lawyers Mark Daly and Jack Morgan provide testimony as part of the House Judiciary Committee’s investigation into the Biden family and the impeachment inquiry into the president. “There’s a person in jail right now because you all brought a criminal lawsuit against him because he did not appear for a House subpoena,” Reyes said during a hearing on the Judiciary Committee’s lawsuit, according to Politico, seemingly referring to Navarro. HUNTER BIDEN CLAIMED HE DIDN’T ‘STAND TO GAIN ANYTHING’ IN CONTROVERSIAL BURISMA ROLE DESPITE MAKING MILLIONS Navarro was sent to prison in March for four months, charged and convicted with contempt of Congress after he refused to comply with a congressional subpoena demanding his testimony and documents relating to the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Navarro said he could not cooperate with the committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack because Trump had invoked executive privilege, an argument that lower courts have rejected. Former White House adviser Steve Bannon also received a four-month sentence for similar contempt of Congress charges but was allowed to stay free pending appeal. “I think it’s quite rich you guys pursue criminal investigations and put people in jail for not showing up,” but then direct current executive branch employees to take the same approach, Reyes blasted. “You all are making a bunch of arguments that you would never accept from any other litigant.” “And now you guys are flouting those subpoenas. . . . And you don’t have to show up?” Reyes continued. She said that the DOJ’s position would delight defense attorneys up and down the country. “I imagine that there are hundreds, if not thousands of defense attorneys . . . who would be happy to hear that DOJ’s position is, if you don’t agree with a subpoena, if you believe it’s unconstitutional or unlawful, you can unilaterally not show up,” Reyes said. HUNTER BIDEN ATTORNEY SLAMS ‘ABNORMAL WAY’ SPECIAL COUNSEL WEISS HANDLED CASE AFTER JUDGE DENIES DISMISSAL Daly and Morgan, two attorneys with the Justice Department’s tax division, were subpoenaed for their “firsthand knowledge of the irregularities in DOJ’s investigation that appear to have benefited Hunter Biden,” according to Courthouse News Service. The committee says the pair were members of a team that recommended what charges to bring against Hunter Biden for suspected tax crimes in 2014 and 2015 when he served on the board of Ukrainian company Burisma. That team initially agreed Hunter Biden should be charged but then reversed course and suggested he should not be charged. Following the reversal, the Justice Department allowed the statute of limitations for those charges to lapse. The committee argues looking into this timeline is crucial to its investigation. Justice Department attorney James Gilligan tried to argue that the decision to defy the subpoena came after lengthy deliberations “at a high level.” He also argued that Daly and Morgan are current government employees, whereas Navarro and Bannon were no longer part of the government when their testimony was demanded, but Reyes seemed unimpressed by that reasoning. But her criticism wasn’t all directed at Biden’s DOJ. Reyes scoffed at a Trump-era Office of Legal Counsel opinion contending that executive branch employees could defy such subpoenas if Justice Department lawyers were not allowed to be present. She was also astonished that Gilligan wouldn’t commit to instructing Daly and Morgan to testify if the committee were to drop its insistence that government counsel not be in the room for their depositions. “I cannot answer that now,” he said. To which Reyes responded, “Are you kidding me?” Fox News’ Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.
IMD issues heatwave alert in several parts of India for next 2 days, check state-wise forecast here
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has issued heatwave alert in parts of the east and peninsular India for the next two days.
‘Will women sit back if…’ CM Mamata accuses NIA officials of attacking villagers in Bengal
The NIA on Saturday arrested two key conspirators in a 2022 blast case amid an attack on the probe agency’s team by a crowd in East Medinipore district, an official said.
Biden raises more than $90 million in March, over $187 million in first quarter of 2024
President Biden’s re-election campaign announced Saturday that it raised more than $187 million in the first quarter of 2024. In March, the campaign raked in over $90 million, up from $53 million the month before. Additionally, his campaign announced it had $192 million in cash on hand, which it touted as “the highest total amassed by any Democratic candidate in history at this point in the cycle.” In the first quarter, 96% of donations were under $200, with more than 1.1 million donors making over 1.9 million contributions, according to the campaign. TRUMP AIMS TO SHATTER BIDEN’S FUNDRAISING RECORD WITH TOP-DOLLAR PALM BEACH GATHERING The campaign said it now has more than 212,000 sustaining donors — more than double the amount at this point in the 2020 cycle — who have pledged more than $5.2 million in monthly contributions. The totals provided Saturday by the campaign came through all fundraising streams, which, in the past, have included Biden’s campaign, the Democratic National Committee and joint fundraising committees. In March alone, the campaign said it received 864,000 contributions from 704,000 unique donors. “The money we are raising is historic, and it’s going to the critical work of building a winning operation, focused solely on the voters who will decide this election – offices across the country, staff in our battleground states, and a paid media program meeting voters where they are,” Julie Chavez Rodriguez, the Biden-Harris 2024 campaign manager, said in a statement. TRUMP RAKES IN HEFTY MARCH FUNDRAISING HAUL AS CAMPAIGN AIMS TO CLOSE CASH GAP WITH BIDEN “It’s a stark contrast to Trump’s cash-strapped operation that is funneling the limited and billionaire-reliant funds it has to pay off his various legal fees,” she added. The total haul for the Biden campaign in March is roughly $25 million more than that raised by former President Donald Trump’s campaign in the same month. Earlier this week, Fox News Digital confirmed Trump and the RNC brought in $65.6 million in March and ended the month with $93.1 million in cash on hand. The figures include money raised by a number of fundraising committees. The Trump campaign’s March fundraising figure, which was first reported by Politico, is significantly more than the $62 million that Trump raised in March 2020 when he was running for re-election.
Paris Hilton teams up with California lawmaker to stop abuse in teen facilities
Media personality and fashion icon Paris Hilton is taking her advocacy against institutional child abuse to the California Capitol. Hilton — who alleged that she was a victim of sexual abuse as a teenager in the ‘90s at a boarding school in Utah — is sponsoring California Republican lawmaker Shannon Grove’s bill, the Accountability in Children’s Treatment (ACT), which seeks to provide more transparency for parents about the whereabouts of their children during their stay in troubled youth programs. Any serious injuries or incidents of death will be required to be disclosed on the state’s social services website. Under the bill, facilities licensed by the California Department of Social Services are required to release information pertaining to the use of restraints and solitary confinement-style rooms. “These facilities systematically silence youth, and I am dedicated to ensuring there are greater transparency mechanisms in place to ensure those who are evaluating these facilities, and the families who are placing youth in them, have access to updated and accurate information on the often abusive and traumatizing practices that occur,” Hilton told Fox News Digital on Friday. “Transparency not only holds facilities accountable for their actions but also helps survivors like myself feel validated and heard.” PARIS HILTON PRAISES GOP LAWMAKERS FOR SPONSORING BIPARTISAN STOP INSTITUTIONAL CHILD ABUSE ACT Hilton added, “I also hope to inspire a more compassionate understanding of how to treat youth with mental health or behavioral needs, as I know from lived experience that sending them far away from everyone they know and love is not a sustainable answer.” The state already took steps to protect children — many of whom are in foster care — from abuse in out-of-state facilities several years ago after passing legislation that de-certified non-California facilities and ordered all youth to return by Jan. 2023. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, allocated $8 million for the immediate return of children in out of state facilities and to bolster behavioral treatment programs. Grove said she’s “grateful” to have Hilton’s support for her bill, SB 1043, and said the extra layer of transparency will help eliminate a decades-long problem of child abuse if signed into law. “The out-of-state programs would keep them sometimes 20 hours in isolation in an empty room,” Grove told Fox News Digital on Friday. “We want to make sure that these kids don’t cause harm to themselves or others, and that’s what those specific places are supposed to be used for, but we want to make sure these kids aren’t being traumatized or harmed as well.” PARIS HILTON DETAILS TRAUMA, ABUSE AT ‘TROUBLED TEEN’ FACILITY Grove said many of the youth facilities are meant to be a camp-like environment where kids are on a regiment to wake up early, eat breakfast, complete chores and have classes. But in reality, she said, many children — who are now adults — have come forward in recent years detailing alleged abuse that would take place in some of these facilities. Many of those cases of abuse were shown in a recent Netflix docuseries “The Program: Cons, Cults and Kidnapping,” which chronicled abuse of troubled teens at the hands of New York’s Academy at Ivy Ridge. The former students claim they underwent abuse ranging from abduction from their homes, strip searches, starvation, sleep deprivation, corporal punishment and solitary confinement. Meanwhile, they said, they received no formal education. Hilton alleged she experienced something similar in her youth. PARIS HILTON SPOTTED AT WHITE HOUSE FOR MEETING ON CHILD ABUSE LAW In a New York Times video op-ed series in 2022, Hilton said she was the victim of a “parent-approved kidnapping” when she was a misbehaving 16-year-old, with two men dragging her out of her home and into a congregate-care facility. “Very late at night, this would be around like three or four in the morning, they would take myself and other girls into this room and they would perform medical exams,” Hilton said in the interview. “It wasn’t even with a doctor, it was a couple of different staff members, where they would have us lay on the table and put their fingers inside of us.” Last year, Hilton stood alongside U.S. lawmakers co-sponsoring the bipartisan Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act. The bicameral bill, authored by Cornyn, Tuberville, Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Rep. Earl Carter, R-Ga., was introduced last April and aims to provide stronger oversight for residential youth treatment programs to identify and prevent child abuse. Hilton and Grove will present their bill during a press conference in Sacramento on Monday.