The trials of Julian Assange: A death sentence for democracy
In June 2022, when Russia’s foreign ministry announced that it was considering “stringent measures” against United States media outlets in response to US restrictions on Russian media, the US Department of State huffily complained that the Kremlin was “engaged in a full assault on media freedom, access to information, and the truth”. This sort of hypocrisy was nothing new; after all, the world’s self-appointed greatest democracy has long made it clear that basic rights and freedoms are things that only its enemies must abide by. The shameless double standard enables the US to do stuff like make a ruckus over Cuba’s political prisoners while simultaneously operating an illegal US prison on occupied Cuban territory – or call out China for an alleged “spy balloon” while simultaneously spying on China and everyone else on the planet. And on Wednesday, February 21, as WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange completed one last legal attempt to avoid extradition to the US, the country’s own “full assault on media freedom, access to information, and the truth” was once again on full display. If extradited, the Australian-born Assange faces up to 175 years in prison on spying charges – which again is pretty rich coming from a nation with an extensive history of illegally spying on its own citizens. In reality, Assange’s only “crime” was to utilise WikiLeaks to expose the truth of US military crimes, as in the notorious “Collateral Murder” video that was released in 2010. The video footage, which dates from 2007, shows a massacre of a dozen people in Baghdad by upbeat helicopter-borne US military personnel, who did not find it necessary to conceal the extent to which they were getting off on the slaughter. Among the murdered Iraqis were two staffers for the Reuters news agency. Talk about assaults on media freedom. The US insists that, by publishing such content, Assange actively endangered the lives of innocent people in Iraq, Afghanistan, and beyond. But as I have pointed out before, it would seem that one surefire way to not endanger innocent lives in such places would be to refrain from blowing them up in the first place. To be sure, it is common knowledge that the US has killed a whole lot of civilians in a whole lot of countries, although the official narrative still maintains that all killing is ultimately done in the name of freedom, democracy, and other noble goals – rather than for sport or fun, as might be suggested by the “Collateral Murder” production. So why, then, the need for such over-the-top pretences to secrecy and the super-vilification of the person of Julian Assange? In the end, the US can’t afford to have its global do-gooder disguise too relentlessly or thoroughly challenged – since too much “access to information and the truth” would relieve the nation of its alibi for wreaking havoc across the world. Regardless of the final outcome, the protracted US war on Assange has already set a chilling precedent in terms of press freedom and other essential liberties. Indeed, the calculated physical and mental destruction of Assange is meant to deter other publishers and journalists from the crime of pursuing the truth, as the US has effectively undertaken to classify reality itself. To that end, pending his extradition to the US, Assange has been held for the past five years in Belmarsh prison in southeast London, where the British government has proved faithfully complicit in the protracted efforts to bring about his demise. Shortly after Assange’s arrest and incarceration in 2019, the United Nations special rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer warned that the man’s life was at risk, and that he exhibited “all the symptoms typical for prolonged exposure to psychological torture”. Melzer, who is now a professor of international law at the University of Glasgow, also remarked at the time that, “while the US Government prosecutes Mr. Assange for publishing information about serious human rights violations, including torture and murder, the officials responsible for these crimes continue to enjoy impunity.” Maybe Melzer should have been jailed, too? And as Assange’s extradition battle now comes to a close, it seems the US may at long last get to definitively kill the messenger – and not just metaphorically. As his wife Stella Assange recently told reporters, “If he’s extradited, he will die.” But Julian Assange’s persecution and torment also constitute a death sentence for any approximation of democracy and justice in the United States of America, a country whose constitution supposedly enshrines freedom of speech and the press. At any rate, injustice has already scored a major victory with the chronic underreporting in US corporate media of Assange’s trials, which National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden has described as “the most important press freedom case in the world”. In other words, this should be major news for the news industry itself. But disappearing the truth is another way to kill it – and in that respect, Julian Assange is already dead. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance. Adblock test (Why?)
Ship crash causes bridge collapse in China
NewsFeed Two people have been killed after a cargo ship crashed into a bridge in the Chinese city of Guangzhou. Vehicles, including a bus, fell off the Lixinsha Bridge as it collapsed into the river below. Published On 22 Feb 202422 Feb 2024 Adblock test (Why?)
Deadly collapse at illegal Venezuela gold mine
NewsFeed Video shows the moment part of an illegal gold mine collapsed in central Venezuela, where dozens of people are feared dead. Published On 22 Feb 202422 Feb 2024 Adblock test (Why?)
More than 14 million people fled homes in Ukraine since Russia invasion: UN
As second anniversary of conflict nears, millions remain displaced at home and abroad, with ‘no end in sight’ to war. The United Nations has said that more than 14 million Ukrainians were forced to flee their homes at some point in the two years since Russia’s invasion, as UN rights chief Volker Turk spoke of the “horrific human cost” of the conflict. As Russia’s war in Ukraine grinds into its third year, the UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Thursday that nearly 6.5 million people are now living outside the country as refugees. It said an estimated 3.7 million people are still displaced within Ukraine. Reflecting on the toll of the war, which started when Russia invaded its neighbour on February 24, 2022, IOM director general Amy Pope said: “The destruction is widespread, loss of life and suffering continues.” While a total of more than 14 million people – nearly one-third of Ukraine’s population – fled their homes at some point during the war, the agency said that more than 4.5 million people returned home to date, from either abroad or displacement within the country. The war has been devastating for the people of #Ukraine, but IOM staff have been tirelessly working to address urgent needs, build resilience, and enable recovery. Read more 👉https://t.co/ePsafhCKUG pic.twitter.com/MesDKBgPi0 — IOM – UN Migration News (@UNMigrationNews) February 22, 2024 Volker Turk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, warned on Thursday that there was “no end in sight” to the war, which had inflicted “immense suffering on millions of civilians”. “[It] continues to cause serious and widespread human rights violations, destroying lives and livelihoods,” he said in a statement, as he renewed his call for Russia to end the conflict. “The long-term impact of this war in Ukraine will be felt for generations,” he said. In its latest report, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine said it been able to corroborate the conflict-related deaths of 10,582 civilians since February 2022. It had verified that 19,875 civilians had been wounded. “The actual numbers are likely significantly higher,” it said. Russia’s full-scale armed attack on #Ukraine enters its 3rd year with no end in sight, causing widespread human rights violations, & destroying lives & livelihoods.@volker_turk calls to immediately cease the attack & for all human rights violations to be investigated. — UN Human Rights (@UNHumanRights) February 22, 2024 Resources low The IOM reported it had supported 6.5 million people in Ukraine and across 11 countries in Eastern Europe that were hosting refugees. But, it pointed out, needs were continuing to grow, outpacing resources. Some 14.6 million people remain in need of some form of humanitarian assistance in 2024, IOM said. For those who return home, the challenges are immense. Federico Soda, director of the IOM’s humanitarian response and recovery department, said returnees faced “insecurity, loss of livelihoods, damaged housing and infrastructure, and strained services”. Since the start of the war, the agency has received $957m in donations. Overall, the UN says it needs $4.2bn this year to provide humanitarian aid in Ukraine and to refugees who have fled. Adblock test (Why?)
Former Barcelona star Alves sentenced to four and a half years for rape
Former Brazil footballer Dani Alves found guilty of 2022 nightclub assault in Catalan capital. Brazilian footballer Dani Alves has been found guilty and sentenced to four and a half years in prison for sexually assaulting a woman in a Barcelona nightclub in 2022. The top court in Spain’s Catalonia region on Thursday also ordered Alves, who had maintained throughout that the sex was consensual, to pay 150,000 euros ($163,000) to the victim. “The sentence considers that it has been proven that the victim did not consent and that there is evidence, in addition to the testimony of the plaintiff, to consider the rape proven,” the Provincial Court of Barcelona said in a statement. The prosecutor had sought a nine-year prison term for Alves. The verdict may be appealed. The 40-year-old former Barcelona defender was arrested in January last year and has been held on remand since then. The case has attracted significant attention not only because of Alves’s profile but because gender violence has become an increasingly dominant topic in Spain’s public discourse. It has been one of the most high-profile trials in Spain since a law was passed in 2022 that made consent a key element in sexual assault cases and increased the minimum prison time for assaults involving violence. Alves’s lawyers were not immediately reachable for comment. “We are satisfied as the sentence recognises what we’ve been saying all along: that the victim was telling the truth and that she suffered,” lawyer David Saenz told reporters outside the courthouse, adding that his team would still analyse whether the sentence corresponds to the gravity of the crime. Alves won more than 40 trophies for Brazil and clubs that included Barcelona, Sevilla, Juventus and Paris St Germain. After his arrest, he was fired by his then-employers, the Mexican club Pumas UNAM. Adblock test (Why?)
Israel bombards Gaza’s Rafah as ground offensive looms
The Israeli military has launched air raids on Rafah in southern Gaza after warning of an imminent ground offensive in the border city where an estimated 1.4 million Palestinians have sought shelter since fleeing attacks across the enclave. More than four months of relentless attacks by land, air and sea have flattened much of the Gaza Strip, pushing its population of 2.3 million to the brink of famine, according to the United Nations. International concern has in recent weeks centred on Rafah, where a ground invasion could displace hundreds of thousands of Palestinians across the frontier with Egypt. The last city untouched by Israeli ground troops, Rafah also serves as the main entry point of humanitarian aid via neighbouring Egypt for desperately needed relief supplies. Israel has warned it will expand its ground operations into Rafah if Palestinian armed group Hamas does not free the remaining captives held in Gaza by the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in March. The Ministry of Health in Gaza said on Thursday that 99 people had been killed across the strip overnight, most of them women, children and elderly people. The death toll from Israel’s war on Gaza has increased to 29,410 since October 7, the ministry said, adding that at least 69,465 people have been wounded. Brett McGurk, the White House coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, was expected to arrive in Israel on Thursday – his second stop in the region after Egypt as part of efforts by the United States to advance a deal that would see the captives exchanged for Palestinian prisoners and to broker a truce. Matthew Miller, spokesperson of the US Department of State, said Washington was hoping for an “agreement that secures a temporary ceasefire where we can get the hostages out and get humanitarian assistance”, but declined to give details on the ongoing negotiations. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted the army will keep fighting until it has destroyed Hamas and freed the remaining captives. Adblock test (Why?)
‘They could have done more’: Zimbabweans slam gov’t anti-cholera campaign
Harare, Zimbabwe – When Priscilla Moyo’s husband Brian returned home to Harare from Mvurwi, about 100km north of the capital on Sunday night, he seemed well. By 11pm, he was battling diarrhoea. When his situation was still the same on Tuesday morning, 39-year-old Moyo took him to a nearby clinic in Budiriro, the city suburb where they live. On arrival, she was told that her husband had cholera. “He is being treated right now in there,” she said dejectedly pointing in the direction of a grey tent, a makeshift treatment ward at the clinic. “He is on an intravenous drip and they say he might go home today.” Across Zimbabwe’s 10 provinces, a deluge of cases of cholera infections is crippling health facilities in the Southern African country. Some patients like Brian, have recovered. Others have not been as lucky. Jessica Muzambezi, a young mother in the same suburb, lost her two-year-old son to cholera. “A burst sewer in my area caused the death of my son. The authorities did not attend to the sewer for two weeks,” she told Al Jazeera. As of Tuesday, 25,780 cases of cholera have been recorded in Zimbabwe since the epidemic began last year. While the official government death toll stands at 470, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), which is coordinating the mobilisation of resources for the anti-cholera campaign in conjunction with Zimbabwean authorities, put the number at 528. Children remain the most vulnerable, with a third of all cases affecting youngsters aged 15 and below. And many Zimbabweans say the government is to blame. A persistent problem Zimbabwe’s sewage system, part of its inherited colonial infrastructure, has been overwhelmed as the population grew from about 3.7 million in 1960 to 17 million today. And potable water remains unavailable in many parts of the country, as the struggling economy is yet to update that infrastructure. That, experts say, has made it easy for cholera, an infectious disease primarily transmitted through contaminated water or food, to spread rapidly. In 2008, as many as 4,000 people died from cholera in the country during what is regarded as one of the worst episodes of the epidemic on the continent. Then, like now, the public health crisis was caused by poor sanitation and a lack of clean water. It was worsened by a crumbling healthcare system that deteriorated as the world’s worst hyperinflation crisis – peaking at 79.6 billion percent on a month-to-month basis – surged in Zimbabwe, rendering the local currency useless. The government of then-president Robert Mugabe blamed Western governments for the disease outbreak. Senior officials in his administration said the cholera epidemic was the outcome of a “serious biological chemical war” and a “calculated racist terrorist attack” being waged against Zimbabweans. More than 15 years later, the city is facing another public health crisis, with the capital being the hot spot again. While infections are rising nationwide, Harare, the country’s most populous province, has the highest concentration of new cases, accounting for a third of the total. A quick drive around southern suburbs of the city like Budiriro, Glen View, and Highfield reveals dozens of tents donated by the World Health Organization (WHO) being manned by local health professionals. Zimbabwean authorities have also been distributing vaccines to minimise the impact of the epidemic. The country has received 97 per cent of the 2.3 million doses approved by the International Coordinating Group on Vaccine Provision( ICG) as of February 12, with more to come later in the month. According to UNICEF, 1.5 million people (67 percent of the target population) had received an oral cholera vaccine (OCV) dose as of February 14. In January, the health ministry launched Operation Chenesa Harare – a campaign named after the Shona word for “clean up” – after residents resorted to using undesignated dumping sites to cope with piling rubbish. Some say the garbage was left to pile up in the first place because not enough resources had been allocated on time. ‘It’s only fiction’ But there are fears that the mitigation efforts are coming too late and just as importantly, do not tackle the root of the problem. Some experts and activists also argue that the authorities have yet to learn lessons from the past. Joyleen Nyachuru, a resident of Glen View and a community water alliance leader, is one of them. She blames local and central governments for the latest epidemic. “They could have done more to minimise the impact of cholera on residents by coming together to contain raw sewer leaks and should have worked together to upgrade the old sewer infrastructure that continues to break down,” Nyachuru told Al Jazeera. “In Glen View, we have 12,800 houses and each house has four to five households. This means each house houses 15 to 20 people using the same house and the same toilet,” she said, adding that the authorities need to provide clean potable water to every resident of the city to curb cholera. For years, the city has not pumped water to many Harare households. Now, water flows through the taps once a week in most southern suburbs. Rubbish is still a common presence on street corners in the city despite government intervention. This, according to Nyachuru, has also compounded the cholera situation. Precious Shumba, director of the nonprofit Harare Residents’ Trust agrees. “The major problem is that underground water and sewerage pipes are aged and sand blocked, resulting in numerous leakages along the water and sewerage infrastructure network,” Shumba told Al Jazeera, adding that sewer bursts in industrial areas of the city also stay unfixed for long periods. But Harare Mayor Jacob Mafume said in addition to the vaccination programme, city authorities have intensified sewer repairs and are working on improving potable water supply to the city. Things would change for the better soon, he told Al Jazeera. “The numbers have gone down significantly and we are confident we will turn the cholera tide,” Mafume said. But his comments have not pacified most residents
Israeli siege turns Gaza’s Nasser Hospital into ‘a place of death’
Officials from the United Nations who conducted evacuation missions from Gaza’s Nasser Hospital have described “appalling” conditions at the enclave’s second-largest medical facility, saying an Israeli military operation there has transformed a “place of healing” into a “place of death”. The comments, in videos posted online on Wednesday, came amid growing concern for the dozens of patients and staff who remain trapped inside the hospital amid intensified Israeli bombardment of the area. The hospital, in Gaza’s Khan Younis city, stopped functioning last week after a week-long Israeli siege followed by a raid, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The global health agency, along with the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS), has so far managed to evacuate some 32 critical patients, including injured children and those with paralysis. Jonathan Whittal, an OCHA official who took part in the evacuation missions on February 18 and 19, said patients at the hospital were in a “desperate situation” and were trapped without food, water and electricity. “The conditions are appalling. There are dead bodies in the corridors,” he said. “This has become a place of death, not a place of healing.” The rescue mission has previously said they had to navigate through pitch-black corridors with flashlights to find patients against a backdrop of gunfire. They had to arrive on foot because a deep, muddy ditch near the hospital has made roads near the site impassable. “You can think about the worst situation ever. You multiply that by 10 and this is the worst situation I have seen in my life,” said Julio Martinez, a WHO staff. “It’s the debris, it’s the light – working in the darkness. Patients everywhere.” According to Palestinian health authorities, at least eight patients have already died at the facility, mostly due to fuel a lack of fuel and oxygen. They say the lives of those remaining were directly threatened and accused Israeli forces of effectively converting the site into “military barracks”. Chris Black, a WHO communications officer, said the entire neighbourhood around the hospital has been “damaged and destroyed”. “The hospital itself has no electricity, has no food, has no water,” he added. The WHO said some 130 severely injured patients and 15 medics remain at the site. Despite the desperate situation, doctors and nurses at the hospital were pleading not for evacuation, but for the functions of the hospital to be restored, according to a former colleague of theirs. “The last week has been miserable. It’s been a nightmare [for workers in the hospital]. The things they’re seeing are traumatising and they’re asking for some sort of help,” said Dr Thaer Ahmad, a United States-based emergency physician who spent several weeks volunteering at the Nasser Hospital in January. “They’re asking, actually, not to be evacuated from the hospital but for the hospital to function. For the lights to be turned back on, for the medicine they need to treat the patients that remain,” he said. “I spoke to one of the last surgeons remaining there, who sent a message to a group of physicians here in the US, and he asked us to advocate for the patients who are there. He told us, ‘I’m staring at patients, and they need my help, they need my care, and there’s nothing that I can do’,” added Ahmad. The WHO said it was continuing efforts to evacuate further patients. The agency, in a statement earlier this week, described the dismantling and degradation of the Nasser Hospital – the latest medical facility to become a theatre of war in the conflict between Israel and Hamas – as a “massive blow” to Gaza’s health system. It said the remaining facilities in the south were “already operating well beyond maximum capacity” and barely able to receive additional patients. According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, at least 29,092 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed in Israeli assaults since October 7, when Hamas launched a surprise attack inside southern Israel. Some 1,139 people were killed in the Hamas attacks in Israel. Adblock test (Why?)
At least 23 dead after open-pit gold mine collapses in Venezuela
Rescuers retrieve 23 bodies after a wall of earth collapses upon workers at an illegally operated mine in Bolivar state. At least 23 people have died in central Venezuela after a wall of earth collapsed at an illegally operated gold mine while dozens of people were at work. Yorgi Arciniega, a local official, told the AFP news agency on Wednesday that about 23 bodies had been recovered from the open-pit mine known as Bulla Loca in the jungles of the state of Bolivar. The accident happened on Tuesday. Deputy Minister of Civil Protection Carlos Perez Ampueda published a video of the incident on X, and referred to “a massive” toll, though he provided no numbers. The video showed a wall of earth slowly collapsing upon people at work in the shallow waters of an open-pit mine. Some managed to flee while others were engulfed. Some 200 people were thought to have been working in the mine, which is a seven-hour boat ride from the nearest town, La Paragua, according to officials. #21Feb | Cumpliendo instrucciones del Vicepdte. Sectorial AJ. @ceballosichaso1 y en coordinación con el Gob. del Edo. Bolívar Ángel Marcano, funcionarios del SNGR junto a Organismos de Seguridad ciudadana y efectivos de la ZODI Bolívar, realizan Operaciones de Salvamento… pic.twitter.com/6FWE5SiE22 — cperezampueda (@cperezampueda) February 21, 2024 Edgar Colina Reyes, the Bolivar state’s secretary of citizen security, said the injured were being transported to a hospital in the regional capital Ciudad Bolivar, four hours from La Paragua, which lies 750 kilometres (460 miles) southeast of the capital Caracas. In La Paragua, desolate relatives waited on the shores for news of the miners. “My brother, my brother, my brother,” cried one as he saw a body being taken off a boat. “We ask that they support us with helicopters to remove the injured,” a woman waiting for news on her brother-in-law – a father of three – told AFP. Reyes said the military, firefighters and other organisations were “moving to the area by air” to evaluate the situation. Rescue teams were also being flown in from Caracas to aid in the search, he said. The Bolivar region is rich in gold, diamonds, iron, bauxite, quartz and coltan. Aside from state mines, there is also a booming industry of illegal extraction. “This was bound to happen,” resident Robinson Basanta told AFP of the unsafe working conditions of the miners, most of whom live in extreme poverty. “This mine has yielded a lot of gold … People go there out of necessity, to make ends meet,” he said. In December last year, at least 12 people were killed when a mine in the Indigenous community of Ikabaru, in the same region, collapsed. Adblock test (Why?)
US congressman Andy Ogles stirs outrage with Gaza comment: ‘Kill them all’
Muslims, Democrats and social media users expressed their displeasure on Wednesday with remarks made by Republican Representative Andy Ogles of Tennessee, who responded to an activist’s question about the deaths of Palestinian children in Gaza by asserting that “we should kill ‘em all”. In a statement released Wednesday, the American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC) “unequivocally” denounced Ogles and wrote that his remarks were tantamount to advocating for “the extermination of the Palestinian people”. Noting an increase in anti-Muslim attacks across Tennessee since Israel began its indiscriminate bombing and blockade of Gaza in October, AMAC wrote: “Such rhetoric is not only abhorrent but also antithetical to our values as a state. It is such rhetoric that has continued to foster a political climate where extremist ideologies flourish, empowering neo-Nazis to openly parade through our streets and allowing genocidal sentiments to go unchallenged. This cannot be tolerated any longer. As citizens of Tennessee, we deserve better representation from those elected to office.” On the social media platform known as X, the opprobrium directed at Ogles was even worse, with one user writing Wednesday: “Name em and shame em! Say hi to Andrew ‘I think we should kill em all’ Ogles. This extraordinary piece of feces is a USA congressman.” Another user, posting as Saira Rao, wrote: “Andrew Ogles, a sitting member of Congress, says the quiet part out loud. ‘I think we should kill ‘em all.’ He states WE [America] are responsible for killing all Palestinians [genocide]. Congress + Biden + Entire Cabinet are ALL WAR CRIMINALS Palestine will be free.” Noting that Palestinians are also Semitic people, Susan Jones posted on X: “‘I think we should kill ‘em all.’ @AndrewOgles #SenatorofTennessee Has NO Shame in his admission of #USIsraeliINTENT to commit #USIsraeliGenocide of #IndigenousSEMITICPalestinians and the IRONY is completely lost on the ignorant that #KillingPalestiniansISANTISEMITISM!!!” Ogles’s comments were in response to a pro-Palestinian activist who peppered him with questions as the two walked through a corridor in the United States Capitol. “I’ve seen the footage of shredded children’s bodies,” the activist told Ogles. “That’s my taxpayer dollars that are going to bomb those kids.” Ogles responded bluntly: “You know what? So, I think we should kill ’em all if that makes you feel better. Hamas and the Palestinians have been attacking Israel for 20 years. It’s time to pay the piper.” Finally, Ogles turned towards a camera and uttered a final comment before walking away: “Death to Hamas!” In an email to the congressman’s hometown newspaper, The Tennessean, Ogles’s spokesperson Emma Settle wrote: “The Congressman was not referring to Palestinians, he was clearly referring to the Hamas terrorist group.” They cant even fake it anymore. #AndrewOgles you are a war criminal #SaveRafah https://t.co/Q4NW6koKwo — Lea (@LeaOrtizRivera) February 20, 2024 The exchange between Ogles and the activist occurred on February 15, but video footage of Ogles’s remarks was posted to social media hours after the administration of President Joe Biden vetoed a ceasefire resolution at the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday, representing the third time since Israel’s assault began that the US has voted against a suspension of hostilities in Gaza. A first-term congressman, Ogles represents Tennessee’s gerrymandered 5th district, which was created in 2022 to favour Republican candidates and includes a swath of the state capital of Nashville. Hours before the US exercised its veto, a spokesman for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned that Gaza is “poised to witness an explosion in preventable child deaths” as malnutrition and disease spread rapidly across the enclave. Israeli forces have killed more than 12,400 children in Gaza since October 7, according to Palestinian health authorities. More than 600,000 children are currently trapped in the city of Rafah on the Egyptian border, with Israeli forces preparing to invade. Additionally, officials with the charity organisation Save the Children say that nearly 10 Palestinian children in Gaza per day have lost one or both of their legs since October. “After four months of relentless violence, we are running out of words to describe what children and families in Gaza are going through, as well as the tools to respond in any adequate way,” Jason Lee, Save the Children’s country director for the occupied Palestinian territory, said in a statement Tuesday. “The scale of death and destruction is astronomical.” “Children are being failed by the adults who should be protecting them,” Lee added. “It’s beyond time for the adults in the room to step up their responsibilities and legal obligations to children caught up in a conflict they played no part in, who just want to be able to live.” A Nashville Metro Council member, Zulfat Suara, told The Tennessean that she learned about Ogles’s comments while at a council meeting Tuesday night. Coincidentally, on the agenda that evening was a resolution condemning the public display of Nazi symbols, chants and hate speech in downtown Nashville during a rally last weekend. Born in Nigeria, Suara, a Democrat, is the first Muslim person elected to the metropolitan government of Nashville and Davidson County. She said that rhetoric like Ogles’s encourages people “to march and preach hate”. She told The Tennessean: “In the conflict overseas, I have been very mindful of what I say and how I say it because I want to make sure that my Jewish friends are not hurt in what I say and to make sure that my Palestinian families are taken care of. But when legislators at the federal level and the state level continue to demonize people, continue to only look at one side and not the other, that’s the result that we see on the streets. And I hope that we will continue to do better. “This otherization, this demonization, this ‘Kill them all’ is only breaking us apart.” Adblock test (Why?)