What message do Palestinian Christians send by cancelling Christmas?
Celebrations are muted in the occupied territories as Israel’s war on Gaza rages. Usually bustling with visitors from around the world this time of year, Bethlehem is empty this Christmas. Festivities are muted in the occupied West Bank as Israel shows no sign of ending its onslaught in Gaza. Israeli bombs do not discriminate. Everything and everyone in the strip is a target: from hospitals to schools, mosques to churches. So what is the significance of cancelling this year’s festivities in Bethlehem? Presenter: Dareen Abughaida Guests: Riham Jafari – ActionAid’s communications and advocacy coordinator Frank Bosman – associate professor of cultural theology at the Tilburg School of Catholic Theology Sami El-Yousef – CEO of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem Adblock test (Why?)
Indian Navy confirms drone attack on merchant ship, deploys 3 warships in Arabian Sea
The Navy’s explosive ordnance disposal team carried out a detailed inspection of the Liberian-flagged vessel on its arrival at Mumbai harbour.
ICC slammed for blocking Australian cricketer’s show of support for Gaza
Khawaja’s attempt to have message of support and peace sign on his boots was blocked by cricket’s world governing body. The International Cricket Council (ICC) has been slammed for showing a “lack of moral standing” after it refused to allow an Australian cricketer to show on-field support for Gaza where more than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks. Australia’s Usman Khawaja had “Freedom is a human right” and “All lives are equal” written on his boots in the colours of the Palestinian flag in a training session ahead of the first match against Pakistan earlier this month. In an emotional post on X, Khawaja later said the ICC “told me I can’t wear my shoes on the field because they believe it’s a political statement under their guidelines”. He was also reprimanded by the ICC for sporting a black armband, which the batter said was for a personal bereavement. The ICC. May have moved to Dubai but its disgraceful sanctioning of Usman Khawaja for daring to proclaim “ all lives matter” smacks of the haughty out of touch 19 th century views of the Long Room at Lords. — Paul Bongiorno (@PaulBongiorno) December 22, 2023 His next attempt – printing a dove and an olive branch on his bat and shoes – was also blocked by the ICC with a spokesperson for cricket’s world governing body being quoted by ESPNCricinfo as saying that “personal messages of this nature are not allowed as per Clause F of the Clothing and Equipment Regulations”. “The ICC is supportive of players using their platforms outside of the playing arena to promote human rights, peace and equality and would encourage him to continue to use alternative platforms,” the ICC spokesperson added. Khawaja said the logo, a reference to Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, was approved by Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers’ Association. “I respect the ICC and the rules and regulations they have. I will be asking them and contesting they make it fair and equitable for everyone and they have consistency in how they officiate,” Khawaja said on Friday. “That consistency hasn’t been done yet. I was very open and honest with that. I’ll deal with that with the ICC.” Simply ridiculous.https://t.co/WcKeU2sBEJ The ICC has denied Usman Khawaja’s latest attempt to raise awareness of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza by knocking back his application to display the image of a dove and an olive branch on his bat and shoes. — Sushant Singh (@SushantSin) December 24, 2023 In 2014, England all-rounder Moeen Ali was banned by the ICC from wearing wristbands featuring the slogans “Save Gaza” and “Free Palestine”. However, in 2019, Indian cricketers wore army camouflage-style caps in a match against Australia in solidarity with Indian paramilitary police killed in an attack in Indian-administered Kashmir. The ICC also allowed players to “take the knee” before international matches in support of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020 and 2021. Usman Khawaja charged by ICC for wearing a simple black armband in support of children in Gaza but the whole Indian team wearing army caps apparently had nothing to do with political/personal messages. ICC is the most spineless, coward, incompetent sports body in the world. pic.twitter.com/lwKU3kZOv1 — Hassan (@Gotoxytop2) December 21, 2023 “I have been following the Khawaja fiasco and I cannot say I’m surprised by the ICC’s stance,” said former West Indies fast bowler Michael Holding. “If it had been most other organisations that showed some semblance of consistency with their attitude and behaviour on issues I could claim surprise, but not them. Once again, they show their hypocrisy and lack of moral standing as an organisation.” “The ICC regulations say re messaging ‘approval shall not be granted for messages which relate to political, religious or racial activities or causes’, so how were people allowed to take the knee for BLM and stumps were covered with LGBTQ colours?” Whether you support Usman Khawaja’s stance or not the inconsistencies of the ICC are hard to fathom Marnus Labuschagne has an eagle & bible verse on his bat WI’s Nicholas Pooran has a cross and the word ‘believe’ on his bat Seems a scatter gun approach re what’s allowed https://t.co/h0shoJ4yke — Glenn Mitchell (@MitchellGlenn) December 24, 2023 Australian captain Pat Cummins also backed Khawaja’s stance and show of support while questioning the ICC’s lack of clarity over rules that allow players to show support for such causes. “I think he’s standing up for what he believes and I think he’s doing it really respectfully. All lives are equal and I don’t think that’s very offensive, and I’d say the same about the dove,” said Cummins. Israel launched an all-out attack on Gaza after the October 7 attack by Hamas. In addition to the 20,000 people killed in the besieged enclave, more than 54,000 have been wounded and hundreds are still reported to be buried under the rubble. Adblock test (Why?)
Sri Lanka frees more than 1,000 prisoners in Christmas amnesty
President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s amnesty includes Sri Lankans jailed for not paying fines, official says. Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe has granted an amnesty to more than 1,000 convicts and released them from jails across the country to mark Christmas, an official has said. Among the 1,004 freed on Monday were Sri Lankans jailed for not being able to pay outstanding fines, Prison Commissioner Gamini Dissanayake said. Sri Lanka is majority Buddhist, and a similar number of convicts were freed in May to mark the holiday of Vesak, which celebrates the Buddha’s birth, enlightenment and death. The latest pardon came after police arrested nearly 15,000 people during a weeklong military-backed anti-narcotics drive that was halted on the eve of Christmas. A police statement said 13,666 suspects were arrested while nearly 1,100 addicts were detained and sent for compulsory rehabilitation at a military-run facility. The island nation’s jails are chronically overcrowded. As of Friday, there were nearly 30,000 inmates in facilities designed to hold 11,000, according to official data. Adblock test (Why?)
Israel-Hamas war: List of key events, day 80
EXPLAINER A Christmas of bloodshed in Gaza amid raids in the occupied West Bank – here the are major updates. Here’s how things stand on Monday, December 25, 2023: Latest developments An air raid on central Gaza’s Maghazi refugee camp on Sunday killed at least 70 people, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health. Several homes in the area were also flattened. United States-led maritime coalition will help stabilise shipping in the Red Sea despite Houthi attacks, but Egypt will “lose 30 percent of its hard currency assets from Suez Canal transit fees as long as this is closed”, David Des Roches, from the National Defense University in Washington, DC, told Al Jazeera on Monday. Demonstrators in Rabat, Morocco, mobilised one of the largest pro-Palestine marches on Sunday, demanding an end to Morocco’s diplomatic ties with Israel, reported Reuters news agency. Human impact and fighting An Israeli military official told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday that the army’s battle to take control of Khan Younis could take months because of Hamas’s guerrilla tactics. United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, said on Sunday that “genocide is a process, not a single act”, which the world is allowing in Gaza. Overnight raids across the occupied West Bank continued, including in Bethlehem, Jenin and Nablus, according to Al Jazeera correspondent Hamdah Salhut. In Jenin, there were also heavy exchanges of fire between Israeli troops and Palestinian resistance fighters. In a statement released on Sunday, Abu Obeida, the spokesperson for Hamas’s military wing, the Qassam Brigades, claimed it killed at least 48 Israeli soldiers over the last four days. Israel’s military claimed on Sunday that it recovered the bodies of five captives from an underground tunnel network in northern Gaza. Diplomacy Pope Francis decried the “futile logic of war” in a Christmas message posted to X on Sunday. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed reports that the United States had convinced Israel not to expand its military activity during a weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, reported Reuters. Iran denied on Saturday US accusations that it was involved in planning attacks by Yemen’s Tehran-aligned Houthi movement on commercial vessels in the Red Sea, the semiofficial Mehr news agency reported. Adblock test (Why?)
President gives assent to three laws replacing IPC, CrPC, Evidence Act
The three new criminal laws will be called Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita 2023, Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita 2023, and Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam 2023.
‘Squad’ member blasted for anti-Israel message on Christmas, likening Jesus to Palestinian people
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., faced blowback for her social media post that tried to liken Jesus to the Palestinian people and criticize Israel but made no mention of Hamas or their hostages. “In the story of Christmas, Christ was born in modern-day Palestine under the threat of a government engaged in a massacre of innocents,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote, referencing Jews who lived in the land over 2,000 years ago under Roman control. “He was part of a targeted population being indiscriminately killed to protect an unjust leader’s power.” “Thousands of years later, right-wing forces are violently occupying Bethlehem as similar stories unfold for today’s Palestinians, so much so that the Christian community in Bethlehem has canceled this year’s Christmas Eve celebrations out of both [fear for their] safety and respect,” she added, although the area is currently under the control of the Palestinian Authority. “The entire story of Christmas and Christ himself is about standing with the poor and powerless, the marginalized and maligned, the refugees and immigrants, the outcast and misunderstood without exception,” she concluded. JESUS WAS BORN IN THIS VILLAGE. NOW THEY’VE CANCELED CHRISTMAS. ARE HIS FOLLOWERS NO LONGER WELCOME? Jacob Kornbluh, a senior political reporter at The Forward, responded with a post on X that called out the representative for making “no mention of Hamas terror” or “the victims of Oct. 7 attack.“ Pro-Israel activist Andrea Karshan lamented that some people are not enjoying Christmas, instead seeking to get “so social justice political about it,” The New York Post reported. NYC COUNCILWOMAN’S GLAMOROUS GOWN SENDS MESSAGE TO ‘THE SQUAD’ Ocasio-Cortez in November joined with 23 Democrats to ask President Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken for details about their plans to de-escalate violence in the region as Israel continued its invasion of the Gaza Strip. “We reaffirm our unequivocal condemnation of the Hamas attacks on Israel that took place on October 7th, in which Hamas killed over 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals, and captured over 200 hostages, who were subsequently taken to Gaza,” the Democrats wrote. “We also share dire concerns with the ongoing Israeli response, in which the Israeli Defense Forces have killed over 11,078 Palestinians, nearly half of whom have been children,” they continued, citing numbers provided by Hamas. BERNIE SANDERS OPPOSES ‘SQUAD,’ REJECTS PERMANENT CEASE-FIRE BETWEEN ISRAEL, HAMAS Bethlehem, the long-held birthplace of Jesus Christ, announced it would not hold its usual Christmas festivities in solidarity with Gaza and the ongoing violence. Regularly displayed decorations were also removed “in honor of the martyrs,” the city council wrote in a post on Facebook. Theologian Jonathan Morris told Fox News that the whole decision amounted to “a political statement overtaking something that we Christians and that Christians of Bethlehem consider to be so sacred.” However, a spokesperson for the Bethlehem city council told the Telegraph in November that celebrating “is not appropriate … while there is a massacre happening in Gaza and attacks in the West Bank.” Fox News Digital’s Megan Myers contributed to this report.
America and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Congress
Not much has gone right on Capitol Hill this year. America, it’s been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad Congress in 2023. And that’s before getting to former Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y. We knew that 2023 would be a mortifying year on Capitol Hill from the moment the First Session of the 118th Congress commenced in January. The House quickly incinerated parts of five days and 15 ballots before presenting former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., with the gavel. It was a tense, rocky period. A foreshadowing of what was to come. THE LEAST MERRY CHRISTMAS? KEVIN MCCARTHY’S ROUGH 2023 McCarthy’s election served as the longest speaker election in 164 years. By October, McCarthy’s colleagues ousted him in an extraordinary vote. McCarthy repeatedly spoke throughout the year of never quitting. Never bending. Never yielding. Well, McCarthy finally quit this month. His last day is next week. And we still haven’t even gotten to Santos. The public often derides lawmakers for being part of a “do nothing Congress.” That refrain sometimes rings hollow, but voters certainly have a case after 2023. Congress approved a meager 30 bills this year which President Biden signed into law. Two were bills to avert government shutdowns. Another was to suspend the debt ceiling. But Congress doesn’t have much to show for its work this year. “Sometimes it takes us weeks, months, even a year around here to getting nothing done,” opined Sen. John Kennedy, R-La. Kennedy’s criticism isn’t lost on Democrats. “This do nothing Republican Congress right now is the least productive in modern American history,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. But don’t take Jeffries’ word for it. Listen to Rep. Chip Roy, R-Tex. “I want my Republican colleagues to give me one thing – one — that I can go campaign on and say we did!” thundered Roy on the House floor. DEMS, GOP BOTH WON BIG VICTORIES AND SUFFERED DEFEATS IN 2023. HERE ARE THE YEAR’S TOP ELECTION TAKEAWAYS In fact, Roy’s speech epitomizes of the First Session of the 118th Congress. “To anybody sitting in the complex, if you want to come down to the floor and come explain to me one material meaningful, significant thing the Republican majority has done besides ‘Well, I guess it’s not as bad as the Democrats!” hollered Roy. The vote to strip McCarthy of his gavel could have defined the year. But it was only rivaled by an exasperating, 22-day, political odyssey where House Republicans churned through three nominees to serve as McCarthy’s successor before finally settling on House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. And we still haven’t even gotten to Santos. “We have horrible Congresses and wonderful Congresses. You have meaningful policymaking and then you have the utter depths of stupidity,” observed House Financial Services Committee Chairman Patrick McHenry, R-N.C. But this truly is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad year in Congress. In the children’s book “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day,” author Judith Viorist ushers us through all of the things which go wrong for a young schoolboy. There are parallels between Alexander’s frustrating, quotidian sojourn and what’s happened this year on Capitol Hill. In art class, the teacher chastises Alexander for turning in a blank sheet of paper. Alexander protests that he drew an “invisible castle.” 2023’S BIGGEST LOSERS IN POLITICS That might be kind of like Congress producing 12 appropriations bills to fund the government. Lawmakers have all touted various spending proposals all year. The next deadline for a shutdown is January 19. And like Alexander’s castle, a funding program appears to be invisible. In math, the teacher upbraids Alexander for always skipping 16 when counting. In the House, Republicans sometimes do the same thing. Only the number they sometimes miss is 218. That’s the magic number in the House to pass most pieces of legislation. The coup de grâce in 2023 may have been an aide recording themselves having sex in a Senate room of the Hart Senate Office Building. In fact, we’ll take practically any of the other abominable events in Congress this year over whatever unfolded in the Hart hearing room. “Certainly anything like that defiles the room, and it certainly is not what the room was ever intended for,” said former Senate Historian Don Ritchie. “These rooms are used for historical purposes. For major events in history. And they’re going to be recorded and remembered that way.” The Hart hearing room has hosted multiple Supreme Court nominee confirmation hearings. Inquiries into 9/11. Whitewater. The war in Iraq. Russiagate. Major Congressional events. So it’s only fitting that this illicit sexual romp was 2023’s contribution to the long and storied history of that room. It was unclear this year if lawmakers may soon start to use hearing rooms for dual purposes. Say MMA fights. Such was the case when Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., challenged a witness at a hearing to a fight. Mullin even started to take off his wedding ring to prevent swelling, should he land a few blows. OUTGOING HOUSE LAWMAKERS LAMENT CHAOS IN CONGRESS: ‘A BIT OF A CARNIVAL’ Of course, Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., one of the eight Republicans who voted to extract McCarthy from the speakership, accused the California Republican of elbowing him in the kidneys after he strolled by in a Capitol basement. Burchett then chased McCarthy and his security detail down a Congressional tunnel. Burchett ultimately called the former speaker “a jerk.” And we still haven’t even gotten to Santos yet. There was other zaniness in Congress this year. Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., pulled a false fire alarm. The House then censured Bowman after he pleaded guilty in Washington, D.C., court and had to write an apology to the U.S. Capitol Police. Bowman is a former elementary school principal and teacher. Perhaps as punishment, the judge could have required Bowman to write “sentences” on the Congressional chalkboard, Bart Simpson style. “I will not pull a fire alarm while the House is taking a quorum call
Grounded plane with 275 Indians leaves France, to reach Mumbai tomorrow
The flight that took off from Dubai carrying 303 passengers was grounded at the Vatry airport, France, on Thursday over suspected ‘human trafficking’.
Amid uptick in kidnappings, Colombian family receives ‘biggest gift of all’
Chia, Colombia – Decnis Diaz was at home in Chia, Colombia, on November 18 when she received a call from her siblings: Her beloved younger brother, Jhon Jairo Diaz, had been kidnapped. A 34-year-old store manager, Jhon Jairo was ending his shift at a meat market in Cucuta, a border town near Venezuela, when four masked men held him at gunpoint and dragged him inside a black sedan. Security cameras captured the vehicle speeding away. “I couldn’t believe it. It always seemed to me that kidnappings were a terrible crime, but I never thought that our family would be a victim of it,” said Diaz. Jhon Jairo was the latest victim in an unexpected crime trend: The number of kidnappings has shot up recently in Colombia. Between January and October, a total of 287 people were abducted, a 73-percent increase over the same period the previous year, according to the Defence Ministry. Once a widespread tactic in Colombia’s decades-long internal conflict, kidnapping has long been a source of income for the country’s armed groups, who charge an extortion fee in exchange for the hostage’s safe return. The ransom, in some cases, can amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars. But the rate of kidnapping had plunged following a 2016 peace deal between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the country’s largest rebel group at the time. The practice is once again on the rise, though. The number of abductions this year — expected to be the highest since 2016 — has shocked many Colombians, some of whom believed the crime had all but died out. “We thought that kidnappings were something from our parents’ generation,” said Ana de la Peña, whose husband Fabián Arias was kidnapped on October 2 outside his mother’s house in Ocaña. “But the dark past that we didn’t want to remember has returned.” A cellphone, perched atop a pile of missing persons posters, displays a photo of Jhon Jairo Diaz, dressed in white, together with family members [Christina Noriega/Al Jazeera] A dip and a rise in cases For decades, the FARC had been the primary perpetrator of kidnappings in Colombia, responsible for an estimated 40 percent of the abductions between 1990 and 2018. But the 2016 peace deal resulted in the FARC disbanding as an armed force. Immediately afterwards, kidnappings started to dip, reaching a low of 92 in 2019. That downward trend, however, reversed as Colombia experienced renewed violence. Rival armed groups and criminal networks rushed to fill the power vacuum the FARC had left behind, capitalising on the opportunity to take over its illegal drug and mining ventures. Kidnapping, experts say, became an important tool to finance their growing ranks. Critics have also blamed the increase on President Gustavo Petro, who took office in 2022 as Colombia’s first left-wing leader. A former rebel fighter himself, Petro pledged to improve security through peace talks, a strategy he calls “Total Peace”. To participate, armed groups had to agree not to murder, torture or “disappear” civilians during the negotiations. But the agreement does not explicitly ban kidnapping — a loophole that critics say groups may be exploiting to maintain control over populations and turf. “What we’ve seen in a lot of cases is that [armed groups] have traded that overt, visible violence for much more silent and invisible social control,” said Elizabeth Dickinson, a senior analyst for the think tank Crisis Group. Kidnappings are “extremely powerful in silencing the population because you create an atmosphere of fear and of compliance”, she added. Many abductions unfold without much public pushback because they are often kept out of the news, said Tatiana Prada, a researcher at the Ideas for Peace Foundation. Relatives are usually afraid to speak out, for fear their words could endanger the hostage’s life. The mother of Liverpool football star Luis Diaz, Cilenis Marulanda, protests on November 5 for the release of her kidnapped husband, Luis Manuel Diaz [Ivan Valencia/AP Photo] Lobbying for a loved one’s freedom But one high-profile case catapulted the issue to national attention. In late October, the National Liberation Army (ELN) — Colombia’s largest remaining rebel group — kidnapped the parents of Liverpool FC striker Luis Diaz, a popular Colombian football player. While his mother was found within hours, his father remained missing for 12 days, sparking a nationwide manhunt. Public outrage reached such a fever pitch that the ELN released Diaz’s father, calling the abduction a mistake. “It brought to light what was already the reality, which is that kidnappings had continued unabated despite negotiations,” said Dickinson. “The question that comes up is: ‘Why are we negotiating with these groups if they’re not changing their behaviour?’” Fearing government inaction, families have since taken it upon themselves to organise grassroots campaigns to bring their loved ones home. Diaz, for instance, spoke about her brother Jhon Jairo on the Senate floor, calling on politicians to act faster to save her brother. If public pressure could help secure the release of a football player’s father, she figured it could work for her brother, too. “With all my heart and tears in my eyes, I beg you to help me,” Diaz told a room full of senators. “Do not leave us alone.” Jhon Jairo’s family and friends also hosted a vigil in his hometown Cucuta, using hundreds of candles to spell a message: “Liberate him.” The local priest even held a mass in his name. De la Peña, whose husband Arias was kidnapped, likewise launched a campaign to push for her spouse’s freedom. On the social media platform X, de la Peña shared photos of their five-month-old daughter wearing a white onesie stamped with a picture of Arias and a message: “Free my dad. We want him home.” The Office of the High Commissioner for Peace confirmed in November that Arias was being held by the ELN — the same group that kidnapped the football player’s parents. Antonio Garcia, a leader in the National Liberation Army (ELN), has said his