Komunitas
feddit.nu
**En åldersgräns på 15 år för sociala medier. Det föreslår regeringens utredare i det delbetänkande som överlämnas till socialminister Jakob Forssmed (KD). ** – Vi håller på att förlora en hel generation i oändligt scrollande, säger Forssmed. I höstas tillsatte regeringen en utredning, ledd av Lisa Englund Krafft, som fick i uppdrag att se över möjligheterna att införa en åldersgräns på sociala medier. Utredaren föreslår nu att regeringen inför en åldersgräns, från det år man fyller 15. Stor utmaning Barn och unga under 15 år ska inte, föreslår utredningen, ha tillgång till inloggat läge på onlineplattformar som gör det möjligt för användare att upptäcka, ansluta sig till, och kommunicera med varandra, eller där det går att dela eller upptäcka innehåll. Det blir de stora sociala plattformarnas ansvar att säkerställa att de som är inloggade i deras appar eller på deras webbsidor, har rätt ålder. – Skärmar och sociala medier och deras påverkan på barn och ungas hälsa är en av vår tids största utmaningar, säger Forssmed på en pressträff. Forskning visar att sociala medier påverkar ungas psykiska hälsa på ett negativt sätt. – Många barn och unga får ta del av fruktansvärda saker i sina mobiler, säger Forssmed och tillägger: – Att skydda barn och ungas hälsa och trygghet har varit en prioriterad uppgift för mig och regeringen. Socialminister Jakob Forssmed (KD) tar emot delbetänkandet av den särskilda utredaren Lisa Englund Krafft under en pressträff. Jessica Gow/TT Åldersgränser på sociala medier har införts på flera ställen i världen och 35 länder arbetar med frågan, enligt Unicef. Australien var först ut med förbud. Där infördes en 16-års åldersgräns på tio olika sociala medie-plattformar, däribland Instagram, Tiktok och Snapchat, i december förra året. Sedan dess har flera länder följt efter. Filippinerna, Danmark och Storbritannien är några av länderna som har planer på att införa striktare åldersgränser på sociala medier. Stort stöd i Sverige är det politiska stödet för en åldersgräns stort. Socialdemokraternas partiledare Magdalena Andersson sade i oktober förra året att hon vill se en 15-årsgräns. – Vi har tidigare reglerat andra beroendeframkallande produkter. Det behöver vi göra här också, sade hon. I Sverige finns i dag en gräns på 13 år för när barn måste ha föräldrars samtycke för att få skapa konton på sociala medier. Betänkandet ska nu skickas på remiss. Enligt förslaget ska lagen träda i kraft 1 januari 2028. – Om jag får fortsätta i min roll kommer jag att driva på för att vi ska få det här på plats snabbare än så, säger Forssmed. #tech #sociala-medier #sverige Om än det är integritetsinskränkande med ålderkontroll och dylikt så måste jag ändå hålla med om att något måste göras på den här fronten. Antingen rakt av förbud eller vad jag skulle föredra reglering av algoritmerna som används.
Komunitas
lemmy.world
In a video posted to TikTok, where Katie Whitney has 2.5 million followers, she says to camera, bluntly: “This video is for Cynthia Erivo. If you’re not Cynthia Erivo … you can keep on scrolling.” Her demeanour then shifts, her voice becomes softer; more the way a person might talk to their puppy: “Hi Cynthia. Hi baby. Hey baby. How are you?” It’s toe-curling – or, in modern parlance, cringe – to watch. “I feel traumatised,” says one commenter. Others post photos of a stunned-looking Erivo and imagine: “What if the Wicked star were to actually watch this video?” Cringe! Now 25, but having started making this kind of content – “weird skits” – at 20, Whitney is part of what is known online as CringeTok, a subsection of the internet that deals in content designed to make your toes curl. It’s in many ways a reaction to a fear of being “cringe”, which is seeping into all parts of life – from social media to classrooms to the workplace. (Couldn’t think of a better comm to post this in given there doesn’t seem to be one for opinion pieces I could find)
Komunitas
lemmy.ca
A man who beat his adversary’s mother with a baseball bat during a violent home invasion in northern B.C. was given a provincial sentence of two years less a day, as the judge found he had turned his life around dramatically since committing the crimes. Craig Brentton Durando pleaded guilty to breaking and entering, assault with a weapon and robbery following the September 2023 incident in Terrace. His sentenced was handed down in B.C. Supreme Court earlier this week. The court heard that Durando and four other friends planned to confront and assault a man named Nicolas Balatti in his home after Balatti and one of the friends got into a “verbal altercation involving mutual threats” at a house party in August of that year, and continued the argument over TikTok and Snapchat.
Komunitas
news.abolish.capital
Elías Jaua is a Venezuelan intellectual, university professor, and politician who served as vice president under Hugo Chávez in addition to several ministerial roles in the Chávez and Maduro administrations. He currently heads the Center for the Study of Socialist Democracy (CEDES). In this exclusive interview, Jaua discusses Venezuela’s post-January 3 conjuncture, the anti-imperialist struggle to reclaim sovereignty, and the role to be played by Chavismo. Venezuela’s reality changed on January 3 with the US strikes and kidnapping of President Maduro. How would you describe the current situation? And regarding the US, there is talk of “conditional sovereignty” and “tutelage,” while officials speak of a “cooperation agenda.” What is your take on this? Sovereignty is a comprehensive concept. You either have it or you don’t. Sovereignty means not depending on anyone. It is the foundation of a republic. A republic means independence from others, something distinct from liberal, individual freedom. Venezuela today is a state under tutelage, overseen by the Donald Trump administration. This was officially declared by Trump and White House officials such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio. This is also clearly reflected in oil production, which must be sold primarily to the US, and the proceeds from those exports do not enter directly into Venezuela’s coffers but instead into a US Treasury account. From there, the Venezuelan government will make requests and have certain amounts necessary for the country’s basic functioning disbursed. That is a complete loss of economic sovereignty. We have also seen how reforms to strategic laws, such as those governing hydrocarbons and mining, have been rushed through. Today, there is immense pressure on labor legislation, both from the Venezuelan business community and from transnational capital, which views labor laws as yet another obstacle to attracting investment. And finally, we have seen that Venezuela’s foreign policy – which was openly supportive of Palestine, Iran, and Cuba – has been significantly toned down. This is another clear sign that Venezuela is no longer an independent state. Its status as a republic is entirely relative. US forces recently ran a military exercise in Caracas, with aircraft flying over the city and landing at the embassy compound. Photo: EFE. In light of all this, how do you feel the government and other national political groups should respond? I view the decision made on January 3 not to respond to the US military attack as a responsible one, because the enemy clearly had military superiority and the capability to control the entire airspace using high-tech means. A response would have resulted in significant destruction of the country’s infrastructure and armed forces, as well as the killing of thousands of civilians. Now, four months later, the Venezuelan government and all political forces should clearly denounce to the international community the coercion to which we are being subjected. On the one hand, as a public denunciation, but also to have it formally recorded before international bodies such as the International Commission on Human Rights. What occurred in January were war crimes, a fact supported by United Nations rapporteurs. Next, a complaint should be filed with the International Court of Justice to restore control over national revenues to the Venezuelan state. One might argue that this is ineffective at the moment, that international law is irrelevant and international organizations are incapable of acting – and that is true. But the country must establish a legal precedent because these institutions still exist, and as a result they are a source of rights. These complaints set precedents so that the country can, in the future, claim the rights that have been damaged by the occupying power. Finally, it is important to reach out to the international community, and above all to the peoples of the world, so that they know there is a nation that refuses to be placed under tutelage and subjected to these conditions, in order to build international solidarity. An internal political stance must also be established, because this attempt to conceal the gravity of the coercion to which the country is being subjected numbs popular consciousness, undermines patriotic morale, and that is contrary to what is expected of the leadership – not only of the government, but of the entire political leadership of the nation. But what if that triggers another US military attack? I don’t think a repeat of the January 3 incident is imminent because it would have repercussions in the US domestic political landscape. The political cost for the Trump administration would no longer be zero, as it practically was on January 3, but there would be greater resistance, especially for attacking a country that has simply exercised its rights before international bodies to claim sovereignty over resources and political self-determination. Put another way, the option of not denouncing this, of not activating available mechanisms, is to accept and normalize this situation of neocolonialism, and I believe that is a very dangerous path that could even lead to Venezuela’s annexation by the US. I believe there are moments when peoples, nations, and their leaders must take a firm stand for the sake of history. Here it is no longer a matter of defending a party or a political movement, but rather the existence of a nation that was born free. We have a historic responsibility to ensure it remains that way for future generations. Jaua highlighted the importance of denouncing US neocolonial impositions and calling for international solidarity. Photo: Unión Radio. US officials repeat their “three-phase plan,” which ends with a political “transition,” on a daily basis, while the extremist opposition demands immediate elections to seize power at any cost. From your perspective, what is the path forward, and what should the priorities be? The priority is to regain independence. If we hold elections, that is with candidates for what? For governor of the colony? Anyone who truly wants to hold the presidency of the Republic of Venezuela must first raise their voice in favor of the immediate restoration of the country’s sovereign rights over its resources and revenues and the assertion of political self-determination. In any case, I argue that any eventual electoral process should be the result of a national agreement, renationalizing politics and not waiting for a call from the White House one day announcing that there will be elections in six months. That would be very shameful. I believe that Venezuelan political forces would be obligated, as part of that strategy to reclaim and demand the restoration of Venezuela’s sovereignty, to also commit to the international community and the Venezuelan people to seek a political, democratic, and electoral path forward. In a recent article, you spoke of an inability to manage the internal political conflict, which paved the way for foreign intervention. Could you elaborate on this idea? How has that situation changed since January 3? Foreign meddling began on the very first day of the Bolivarian Revolution, and there were agents that facilitated it. The first concrete example was the April 11, 2002 coup d’état, with the open participation of the US and Spanish governments, and from that point on, that interference never ceased. But there was always a degree of autonomy that allowed, especially after 2004, for the democratic resolution of the conflict through national agreements. For instance, the recall referendum that ultimately ratified Chávez’s mandate. But starting in 2014, after the right-wing insurrectionary attempt known as “La Salida” and its failure, the US began to intervene directly by declaring Venezuela an “unusual and extraordinary threat,” and from that point on, the opposition lost any capacity to make decisions. I was a member of the dialogue delegation in the Dominican Republic in 2018 and saw how an agreement signed by everyone was overturned by a phone call from the US embassy. I also believe that later, over the past five years, the Venezuelan government chose to engage in dialogue with the US and bet that the conflict would be resolved directly with Washington. Therefore, everyone put all their eggs in the White House’s basket, and the decision slipped completely out of the control of the country’s internal institutions until the game came to a standstill. And indeed, at the behest of the far-right opposition, Washington intervened and attacked on January 3. That is why I say that reclaiming internal political control in order to resolve the conflict would be an act of dignity and courage on the part of the entire Venezuelan political leadership. Conflict is not going to vanish, because today the calls for a conflict-free Venezuela come alongside a set of measures that deepen it. For example, labor deregulation, social disinvestment, political exclusion, etc. “We’re socialists and anti-imperialists!” banner in a Chavista march. Photo: Archive. In recent years, you have analyzed and debated the direction of Chavismo amid sanctions and the implementation of orthodox macroeconomic adjustment policies. Since January 3, we have seen a drastic overhaul of key pillars of the Bolivarian project, such as the Hydrocarbons Law, and critical voices growing louder, including Mario Silva and Luis Britto García. What is the current state of Chavismo, in your opinion? First of all, the revision and change of course regarding fundamental aspects of Chavismo’s historic program did not begin on January 3 but much earlier. It was formalized starting in 2018 with the Program for Economic Recovery, Growth, and Prosperity, aimed at halting the advance of the transition to socialism and restoring the private sector’s hegemony in managing the economy, with clear consequences for social rights and the fight against social inequality. This was also accompanied by increasingly undemocratic mechanisms, from the political leadership, to impose a change of course in economic and social policy. However, a fundamental core of Chavismo’s programmatic unity – the struggle for independence and national sovereignty – remained intact, and that kept Chavismo cohesive despite major differences. Today, I believe Chavismo must be situated within different spheres. There is a Chavismo within the United Socialist Party (PSUV) – no one can dispute that – but I believe there is a broader, and much larger, Chavismo, with a cultural, political, and symbolic identity rooted in a metanarrative that exists outside the PSUV and the Great Patriotic Pole. That sector currently lacks clear leadership and organizational structure, but it retains its values. It may have circumstantial views of the situation, but essentially it continues to uphold the principles that launched this process: sovereignty, participatory and protagonist democracy, democratic pluralism, freedom, political ethics, debate, speaking the truth, and social equality. It also holds a vision of a multipolar world, in solidarity with international struggles. These were, in essence, the core tenets of Chavismo from its inception and remain relevant for a significant portion of the Venezuelan population that is Chavista or was once Chavista. Former VP Elías Jaua: Venezuela Needs a New Struggle for Liberation (Interview) You have talked about building national unity at this juncture, but also about upholding Chávez and his legacy. Are these two paths compatible? This is a difficult and painful reflection because the figure and the project of Hugo Chávez have been burdened with a series of deviations. Practices that run completely contrary to the principles and values he defended, and upon which he built the Chavista project. For example, the case of Víctor Hugo Quero and his mother is deeply outrageous (1). It is a truly shameful incident, yet international news outlets report, “Chavismo admits to the disappearance of a detainee,” “Mother of prisoner killed by Chavismo dies.” Is it Chavismo or just a few individuals responsible? What about the men and women who, for over 25 years, laboriously dreamed, built, and dedicated part of their lives to creating well-being and the common good in their communities, to building a national project called “Chavismo”? It is very unfair because Chavismo, as a movement, is being accused of things it did not do. Chavismo is not this or that leader; it is the men and women who gave up the only thing they had – their time, their effort – to build community, a national project, to plant crops, to learn to read and write or to teach others to read and write, to study, and so on. I stand by Chavismo as the men and women who dreamed, who continue to dream, and who have given their all to build a more humane society. For me, that will continue to be Chavismo. And those of us who have held leadership posts in this process must assume their responsibilities for the good and the bad. But it is unethical to blame a popular movement, a popular ideal like Chavismo, for the mistakes, deviations, and vile acts that some leaders may have committed. I believe that the call for national unity, to paraphrase [revolutionary communist leader Alfredo] Maneiro, will spring from the most authentic Chavismo, but will transcend it. It will converge with other currents of the left that were not Chavista, with social democratic sectors that broke away from the extremist opposition, and with people who never took a stance on the political conflict the country has experienced in recent decades. It will be the plurality of opinions, of people, of organizations, that will provide the foundation for a necessary movement, which I see as unstoppable and already feel in the streets, in this struggle to regain independence and sovereignty. Jaua served as Chávez’s vice president from 2010 to 2012. Photo: Archive. (Venezuelanalysis) by Jessica Dos Santos From Orinoco Tribune via This RSS Feed.
Komunitas
mander.xyz
cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/8647530 cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/53372 Kareem’s father was furious when he heard the rumors circulating in Ramallah about the sexuality of his 22-year-old son. “My dad aimed his gun towards me,” Kareem recalled, “and said that if he ever finds out that I’m gay, he would ‘rest a bullet between my eyes.’” Kareem, whose name has been changed to protect his safety, had lived in the close-knit West Bank city for years, but he’d long known he would one day need to leave. It was March 2024, and the Tel Aviv Court for Administrative Affairs had recently ruled that LGBTQ+ Palestinians can petition for asylum in Israel — upending years of precedent that considered them ineligible. The following month, Kareem crossed into Israel, a country that has occupied the West Bank for more than twice as long as he’d been alive. Supporters of Israel have long pointed to the “only democracy in the Middle East” as a purported safe haven for the LGBTQ+ community. While detractors say the argument amounts to “pinkwashing,” the use of LGBTQ+ inclusion to distract from moral and legal violations in other spheres, the Israeli government has doubled down on the concept, invoking it often to distract from violations of international law. In a speech before the United States Congress on July 24, 2024, for example, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mocked protesters holding “Gays for Gaza” signs, saying they “might as well hold up signs saying ‘Chickens for KFC.’” As Netanyahu spoke, Kareem was living legally in Israel, believing his status secure while an administrative storm was brewing behind the scenes. Palestinians like Kareem might be safer by virtue of the distance from their families, but the bureaucratic process of seeking asylum imposes its own dangers. In interviews with The Intercept, Kareem and multiple advocates and lawyers for Palestinian asylum-seekers described how Israeli authorities put asylum-seekers through permit revocations, instability, and, in many cases, coerce them into sharing information with Israel’s internal intelligence agency. Kareem felt this pressure, he told The Intercept. At a processing facility at Sha’ar Ephraim, a crossing point in the separation wall west of Tulkarm in the northern West Bank, Kareem recalled, Israeli authorities repeatedly pressed him for information on friends and family still living in the West Bank, anything that might be of use. The implication was a quid pro quo: intelligence in exchange for an easier permit approval process. “When you are in such a fragile situation, you cannot be in the territories [the West Bank], and you don’t have status in Israel, the security bodies like the police … use this weakness and they try to get information or get someone’s cooperation from those people,” Kareem’s attorney, Tamir Blank, told The Intercept. “They promise them that they will not deport them or put them in jail.” Kareem didn’t have the kind of information necessary to secure such a process. He found himself, like so many Palestinian asylum-seekers in Israel, in a series of cascading double binds. After they flee, they find themselves trapped: Leaving the West Bank for Israel carries with it the stigma, true or not, of having collaborated with Israeli authorities, making it even more difficult to return, and leaving nowhere else to go. Home to about 30,000 Palestinians, Ramallah is small and insular, but it contains a space for queer Palestinians to hold conversations that aren’t always possible elsewhere in the West Bank. A loose network of activists hosts weekly community meetings that range from knitting circles to conversations dissecting the Eurocentricity of LGBTQ+ identity terminology in Arabic. During Ramadan this year, as rockets flew overhead during the Israel–U.S. war on Iran, they hosted a queer iftar in the city. Kareem was active with the group for a year before rumors made their way to his parents. They had long suspected “there was something off with me,” Kareem recalled. It also did not help that the family, as is typical of Ramallah’s upper class, is conservative and politically involved. His father works for the Palestinian Authority, just as his father before him, who was involved with the Palestine Liberation Organization before the 1993 Oslo Accords. The family home in Al-Bireh is an old stone building, “colder inside in the winter than it is outside,” according to Kareem, and adorned with a classic Palestinian metal gate. Aside from occasional Israeli military raids, Al-Bireh feels like the only true bubble inside of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank. There are upscale cafes, flower shops, and a concerted effort by all who live there to pretend they enjoy more freedom than they do. Despite the idyllic atmosphere, there are only a handful of checkpoints by which to exit the city, all manned by Israeli soldiers. [ Related With World’s Eyes on Iran, Israel Locks Down the West Bank](https://theintercept.com/2026/03/10/israel-iran-war-west-bank-lockdown/) Kareem worked in his cousin’s welding shop in the Jalazone refugee camp, where, as he would later recount to Israeli authorities, he faced years of abuse — both sexual and physical — from his cousins, who taunted him for his feminine presentation. After Kareem’s father confronted him, he recalled, “My father was sending my cousins after me to stalk my friends and me.” At first, Kareem thought he should flee to a different city in the West Bank, possibly Bethlehem. Israel had stopped issuing permits for most West Bank Palestinians after October 7, citing “security concerns,” and Kareem worried that his family’s associations with the Palestinian Authority would count against him. But the West Bank is small, so small that without checkpoints blocking the way, one could drive from Jenin at the top of the West Bank to Hebron at the bottom in about an hour and a half. As the crow flies, it is only 22 kilometers from Ramallah to Bethlehem. Families know each other, and word spreads fast. So Kareem tried to fashion a life for himself in Israel. Not only would his family follow him to Israel after he fled, but so too would Israel’s occupation. His life would turn into a series of military court hearings and attempts to solicit intelligence from him by Shin Bet, Israeli domestic intelligence, with the specter of returning home meaning likely death. Israeli forces patrol during a raid on Al-Bireh in the West Bank on Oct. 7, 2025. Photo: Rimawi Issam/Anadolu via Getty Images Kareem secured a welfare permit by April 2024 with the help of pro bono lawyers from HIAS, a Jewish humanitarian organization that provides legal support to asylum-seekers in Israel, including a small number of Palestinians fleeing persecution. He spent months sleeping on benches and couch surfing before finally moving into an emergency LGBTQ+ youth shelter in Tel Aviv called HaGag HaVarod (“The Pink Roof” in Hebrew), where he went from never having met an Israeli who wasn’t holding a rifle to living together in shared housing. “I was so confused. They had just given me the permit, so why would they take it away?” In October 2024, just six months after leaving the West Bank, Kareem woke up to an alert on his phone that his permit to stay in Israel had been invalidated. His lawyers advised him to leave the shelter immediately. It was operated under the Israeli Ministry of Welfare, putting him at risk of deportation without a permit. “I was so confused. They had just given me the permit, so why would they take it away?” Kareem recounted. His family appeared to have worked to sabotage his legal status through multiple channels. In June, they had filed a report with Israeli social services claiming Kareem was a Hamas member planning to attack civilians. When a security flag appeared in his file, triggering the revocation of his welfare permit, his lawyers raised the possibility in court that it too had been planted by his family to engineer his deportation. The Intercept attempted to reach Kareem’s father for comment but was unable to get in touch. “I had a security block on my application,” Kareem said. “There was no way to get it back without petitioning the military commander for reconsideration.” Nimrod Avigal, deputy director of HIAS Israel, has been tracking LGBTQ+ Palestinian asylum claims for more than a decade. He worked on Kareem’s case at the outset. “Everything became much more difficult after October 7,” he said. “Many more people were refused because of security issues, mostly related to a family member.” Back in his hometown, rumors were circulating that Kareem was collaborating with Israeli authorities, according to testimony submitted to the Jerusalem District Court, a justification not only for his family to track him down, but also for others to help them. His family began posting notices in Facebook groups offering a cash reward for any information leading to his whereabouts, declaring him a “missing person.” One such post appeared in a public Jerusalem Facebook group with more than 450,000 members. His phone was flooded with calls, 60 to 80 a day, mostly from unknown numbers. Eventually, as Kareem recounted to The Intercept, he threw his phone into the Mediterranean Sea in the hopes it would solve the problem. It did not. The family hired men in Ramallah to track Kareem down on the other side of the separation wall. “They said that they were hired by my family to look for me and bring me back ‘after I tarnished the family’s reputation,’” Kareem recalled, “and that they need to ‘wash their honor as soon as possible.’” A childhood friend now living in Spain sent Kareem a voice memo with a warning: “Your family has placed a bounty of 35,000 shekels on your head. It is absolutely clear that this will not end well and that your family is truly determined to catch you.” The only thing standing between Kareem and deportation back to the West Bank was his welfare permit, and now it was gone. In a court filing, Kareem’s attorney wrote that his family members wished “to obtain information about his whereabouts and bring him to the territories, dead or alive, in order to settle accounts with him, that is, to ensure he does not remain alive.” Israel contended in court that Palestinians in Kareem’s position were motivated not by genuine fear but by a desire to “enjoy the more liberal lifestyle in Israel, rather than facing an actual threat,” language drawn from a 2013 Israeli Inter-Ministerial Committee report on Palestinians claiming persecution based on sexual orientation. Israel contended that queer Palestinians were motivated by a desire to “enjoy the more liberal lifestyle in Israel, rather than facing an actual threat.” In response to a request for comment from The Intercept, COGAT, the Israeli military body that oversees civilian affairs in the occupied territories, said that permits of this kind are granted “first and foremost for the purpose of saving lives, and allow the applicant to remain in Israel until a permanent solution is found in a receiving country.” As Kareem’s lawyers and other human rights organizations in Israel have long argued, rather than being welcomed, gay Palestinians are frequently subject to blackmail by Israeli authorities, who pressure them to provide intelligence in exchange for protection, turning their vulnerability into a tool of coercion. In the 10 Years Tamir Blank has been working with Palestinians from the West Bank filing asylum claims in Israel, he has accepted that many of his clients will either willingly choose to collaborate with Israeli intelligence or be coerced into it. Many asylum-seekers feel pressured to offer intelligence to Israeli authorities in the hope that it might help them obtain a humanitarian stay permit, which entitles them to the right to work. (Even that is a relatively recent development: The permits only began allowing legal employment in 2022, after extensive litigation, before which Palestinians were often forced into grey industries like the sex trade.) In one case, a transgender Palestinian woman named Zehava who fled the West Bank in 2021 died by suicide after Israeli authorities revoked her permit. [ Related Israel Revoked Palestinians’ Work Permits — Then Launched a Deadly Crackdown on Laborers](https://theintercept.com/2025/12/04/israel-palestinians-work-permits-laborers/) “The Israeli policy is to minimize the presence of Palestinians within its borders, in the West Bank and within the 48 borders,” referring to Israel’s pre-1967 territory, said Anat Matar, an Israeli academic and head of the Israeli Committee for Palestinian Prisoners. Israeli authorities deter Palestinians from fleeing to Israel with bureaucratic hurdles, she told The Intercept, as they seek to maintain a Jewish demographic majority. Blank’s clients are often so desperate to hold onto their status, feeling pressured to offer intelligence is “not something that is unique,” he said. The authorities “use every weakness they can.” Kareem, however, was out of luck. He had no such intelligence to offer, as is often the case with LGBTQ+ Palestinians forced to flee. According to Blank, the very fact of their social exclusion means they are rarely privy to intelligence of value to Israeli authorities, regardless of who their family members might be. Because he was born in the West Bank and holds a Palestinian Authority-issued ID, Kareem is unable to ever obtain residency or citizenship in Israel. Doing so, Israeli authorities fear, would set a precedent for a broader right of return for Palestinians displaced in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The original welfare permit Israel issued required Kareem to pursue resettlement in a third country; there was no path for him to remain in Israel. Reut Ahdut, of the Aguda Israel, which until 2025 ran a program offering assistance to LGBTQ+ Palestinians fleeing the West Bank, said permits that used to be relatively stable are now often granted for only one to three months, with applicants required to regularly provide evidence that they are at risk across all Palestinian Authority territories, including the West Bank. Despite the 2024 ruling, Israel’s Population and Immigration Authority maintains that Palestinians are not subject to the United Nations Refugee Convention and therefore that it is not obligated to provide them asylum on the grounds that UNRWA, the U.N. agency mandated to provide assistance to Palestinian refugees, bears that responsibility instead. After banning UNRWA from operating on its territory in 2025, Israel demolished UNRWA’s East Jerusalem headquarters in January. After a court battle at the Jerusalem District Court, Kareem’s permit was reinstated in December 2024, and he has since been able to renew it with the permission of the military commander. In its ruling, the court acknowledged that the security intelligence used to revoke his permit may have been “based on false allegations that his family has made against him, in order to bring about his deportation.” For now, Kareem has no path out of Israel — his life suspended, renewed six months at a time. At one point, Kareem hoped he could be resettled to Canada through the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees resettlement program, but amid rising anti-immigrant sentiment even in Canada, that option has vanished. His time living in the shelter is over. With the help of the Tel Aviv Municipality, Kareem has moved into transitional housing in the Tel Aviv area. He keeps his lightheartedness, switching seamlessly from referencing TikToks he found hilarious, to drama at work, to decrying how life as a Palestinian in Israel has become all but impossible since October 7th. With the Port of Jaffa to the left and the Tel Aviv skyline looming off to the right, Kareem stared out at the Mediterranean, reflecting on the past year. “I hate the sea, I really do, and I am supposed to say at least I got to see it because of my permit. But really what I miss is my home, the West Bank,” Kareem said. “That is where I am from, but for now, the sea will do.” The post A Gay Palestinian Fled to Israel’s “Safe Haven.” Israel Tried to Exploit Him for Intelligence. appeared first on The Intercept. From The Intercept via This RSS Feed.
Komunitas
news.abolish.capital
Billionaires are trying to control the news and content that we consume. Larry Ellison’s Oracle acquired TikTok. Elon Musk has turned X into a propaganda megaphone which deliberately silences progressive voices. Amazon founder and billionaire Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post. Paramount and Warner Bros. are trying to merge their empires. And the Trump administration, never subtle, openly promotes a new constellation of far-right media outlets designed to drown out anything that challenges power. The pattern is unmistakable: the information landscape is being consolidated, bought, and weaponized – and working people are supposed to accept the result as news. This is the media environment in which BreakThrough News and Peoples Dispatch have taken the bold step to join into a single, unified text and video outlet. To BT’s million-strong social media and YouTube following, we will now be doubling in size with the addition of Peoples Dispatch writers and correspondents working across five continents to deliver original on-the-ground reporting from the West Bank to India, Kenya to Ecuador. The last few months have shown why our media institution is desperately needed. We were on the ground in Venezuela, Iran, and Lebanon during and after the lawless bombardments. We covered the uprising in Minneapolis from inside the general strike, and were the first to break the killing of immigrant rights activist Alex Pretti. We’ve been with the communities fighting the data centers in their backyards. We’ve embedded with the teachers going on strike in San Francisco against the Big Tech domination of their city. We’re interviewing people on the streets of Cuba every week about the new war threats. We are across the African continent, speaking directly to the activists and movements demanding an end to foreign military bases. In each of these places, we made the same choice: to find the people fighting back, and to tell their story in their own words. BreakThrough News and Peoples Dispatch were built on the same conviction: that the majority of people in the world have no voice in the media that shapes their reality. The outlets that reach the most people are owned by the fewest. People who attend an anti-war rally, join a union, organize their neighbors, or resist an eviction do not see themselves on the news. When they do appear, they are background – statistics, chaos, grievance – not the subjects of their own history. Both of our organizations were founded to reject that arrangement, to build something different: journalism that treats working people as protagonists, not problems. We believe in coverage that assumes readers and viewers want to understand the world, not just consume it. That requires going wherever the struggle is – not where the powerful stage their press conferences. The case for coming together is not complicated. The corporate-controlled media has reconsolidated its control in the social media era. The billionaire class is pouring limitless resources into traditional and new media projects that don’t turn a profit. The best resourced political forces are paying influencers to appear “independent.” They know in this age of extreme inequality, their control over the narrative and the world of ideas becomes even more important. As a result, truly independent media is few and far between. And the need for accurate information, for movement coverage, for journalism that tells the truth about who is responsible for the crises bearing down on ordinary people – that has never been greater. We have no illusions about how much work this will take. But we have no doubts about which side we are on. The world is in motion. We intend to cover it, and we hope you will join us. The post The billionaires are consolidating their media, now so are we. appeared first on BT News. From BT News via This RSS Feed.
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news.abolish.capital
Amid widespread and growing public opposition to the Israeli genocide of Gaza and South Lebanon, a controversial new bill seeks to formally integrate the U.S. and Israeli militaries like never before, making it difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins. Section 224 of the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) proposes to join the two forces together at the hip, laying the groundwork for extensive cooperation into “seemingly every manner of U.S.-Israeli military-industrial complex cooperation,” according to the Institute for Responsible Statecraft. This includes the research, development, and production of modern, hi-tech arms, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, drones, directed energy, cyber, and autonomous weapons systems. It would compel the United States to integrate Israeli arms and technologies into its defense supply chain, and fuse the countries’ data capturing and storage facilities together, meaning that Israel could have access to essentially all the U.S. military’s data. The bill also requires the creation of a new position within the Department of Defense: an executive agent whose role is to coordinate cooperation and integration between the two parties. In essence, then, it would dramatically change the relationship between the two states, from one where Washington supplies Tel Aviv with money, weapons, and diplomatic support, to a situation where the two are fundamentally intertwined. It would also make the relationship far less transparent, as aid to Israel currently requires an annual public debate and vote. However, by moving it away from the political realm into that of defense acquisition, oversight and accountability mechanisms will be removed, and the public will have little right to know the details going forward. Judging by its sponsors, Section 224 has strong support on Capitol Hill. It was put forward by Mike Rogers (R-AL), Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, and Adam Smith (D-WA), the panel’s highest-ranking Democrat. It is surely, therefore, a formality that it will pass the House Armed Services Committee, before being taken to Congress and the Senate. Analysts have noted that, if passed, the bill will “extraordinarily” expand Israeli influence in domestic American politics, giving Tel Aviv the opportunity to pull powerful political levers through the tried and tested method of offering jobs. As the Institute for Responsible Statecraft warn, by expanding or starting new arms production facilities like they already have in Mississippi and Arkansas, the Israeli government could use the influence of bringing jobs to districts to buy the support of American members of Congress. The news that a new bill could essentially fuse together the U.S. and Israeli militaries has been met with pushback online, but provoked little comment in Washington, D.C. One lawmaker who has spoken up in Kentucky Congressman Thomas Massie. “If the provision in the NDAA to integrate/synchronize the U.S. and Israeli militaries (section 224) makes it out of committee, I’ll offer an amendment to strip it from the bill on the floor. We are a sovereign country,” he said on Saturday. Massie, a strong critic of U.S. support for Israel, recently lost his primary to challenger Ed Gallrein, after AIPAC and other Israel Lobby groups flooded the race with tens of millions of dollars, making it the most expensive contest in American history. The U.S. already provides Israel with enormous amounts of military aid, having sent hundreds of billions of dollars worth of weapons since 1948. Since 2008, it is required by law to protect Israel’s “qualitative military edge,” by supplying it with advanced weaponry. Section 224, however, would transform and deepen this relationship, making it all-but-impossible to democratically break the U.S.-Israel special relationship. That alliance is under increased scrutiny, as support for Israel is collapsing across the United States. A new poll published by Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies found that 60% of Americans (including 75% of respondents under 30 years old) hold a negative view of the country. When asked, a large plurality says that Israel holds too much sway over American politics and politicians. A 2025 study found that half of American voters believe Israel is carrying out a genocide against its neighbors in West Asia. The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant, among others, on charges of crimes against humanity. The United States, however, has refused to accept the ICC’s actions, attempted to shut down proceedings, and imposed sanctions on the court. ICC prosecutor Karim Khan stated that Senior U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham – one of Netanyahu’s closest allies in Washington – told him that his court is only “for African thugs like [Russian president Vladimir] Putin. It is not for democracies like Israel and the United States of America.” The response from the governments of Israel and the United States to the increasing opposition to the genocide has been to crack down on dissent and to censor social media. As Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of pro-Israel pressure group, the Anti-Defamation League stated, “We really have a TikTok problem, a Gen Z problem.” The Trump administration forced through the sale of TikTok to the family of Larry Ellison, a passionately pro-Israel tech billionaire who is the largest private funder of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). Ellison, no doubt, will support Section 224. Yet the effective merger between the U.S. military and the IDF will have profound consequences for the future of America, and should provoke stiff opposition nationwide. Whether it passes will depend largely on the nature and scale of that opposition. Alan MacLeod is Senior Staff Writer for MintPress News. He completed his PhD in 2017 and has since authored two acclaimed books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent, as well as a number of academic articles. He has also contributed to FAIR.org, The Guardian, Salon, The Grayzone, Jacobin Magazine, and Common Dreams. Follow Alan on Twitter for more of his work and commentary: @AlanRMacLeod. The post NDAA: New U.S. Bill Will Fuse Israel and U.S. Militaries Into One appeared first on MintPress News. From MintPress News via This RSS Feed.
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Onder jongeren is het een rage: plastic bekers met perfect symmetrische ijsklontjes, bedoeld om drankjes gekoeld mee te kunnen nemen. Sinds kort zijn de bekers ook beschikbaar bij zowel de Albert Heijn als de Jumbo. Maar niet iedereen is blij met het nieuwe product: „We verpakken iets dat thuis gratis uit de kraan komt in plastic, en noemen dat vooruitgang.”
Komunitas
news.abolish.capital
Animo’y palaruan ng mga tropa ng imperyalismong US at mga alyado nito ang Pilipinas sa ginagawa nitong kaliwa’t kanang mga operasyong militar sa tabing ng mga wargames at “malayang paglalayag” sa teritoryong dagat ng bansa. Matapos ang Balikatan 2026, agad na ikinasa ng US ang kasunod na mga wargames na Salaknib, Kasangga, at Marine Exercise (MAREX). Kasabay ng mga ito ang panunulsol ng gera ng US sa karagatan, sa tabing ng Bilateral Maritime Cooperative Activity. Nilalahukan ng mahigit 8,000 tropa mula sa US, Japan, Australia, at Pilipinas, at may presensya ng mga tropa ng New Zealand at Canada ang mga wargames sa kalupaan. Taliwas sa sinasabing ang mga ito ay para sa “eksternal na depensa,” komun sa mga ito ang mga kontra-insurhensyang operasyon na isinagawa sa mga komunidad ng mga magsasaka at mangingisda sa kanayunan. Sa Luzon, isinasagawa ng US ang Salaknib 2026 na nilahukan ng mga hukbong pangkati ng US, Pilipinas, at New Zealand, at ng Japan Ground Self-Defense Force. Inensayo nito ang paglilipat-lipat ng mga gamit-militar sa pagitan ng mga isla sa kunwa’y “archipelagic defense.” Tumutok ang wargames sa “pag-eensayo” sa gerilyang mga taktika sa kagubatan (jungle warfare at mga small unit tactic) sa mga kundisyong “real time.” Ginamit dito ang Joint Pacific Multinational Readiness Center-Exportable (JPMRC-X) para magtayo ang mga “jungle combat training center.” Tulad sa Balikatan, malamang na isinagawa ito sa maraming tagong lokasyon, liban sa isinapublikong mga pag-eensayo sa Zambales at Northern Luzon. Umaabot nang tatlong buwan ang pagsasagawa ng Salaknib. Sa Camarines Sur, inilunsad ang Kasangga 2026-1 mula Mayo 26 na nilalahukan na mga tropa mula sa Australian Army. Pokus nito ang operasyong paniktik at kombat, at kaakibat na jungle warfare. Bago pa ito, inianunsyo ang pagsasagawa ng naturang wargame, lumapag na ang dayuhang mga tropa sa prubinsya. Ginamit ng mga ito ang mga baybayin at bulubunduking bahagi ng Pasacao, Balatan, San Fernando, Libmanan, at Ragay. Maglalagi sila dito nang isang buwan. Sa Mindanao, isinasagawa ng US ang MAREX 2026 sa Maguindanao del Norte kasama ang Philippine Marine Corps at US Marine Rotational Force-Darwin (MRF-D). Tulad ng Salaknib, tutok nito ang tulad ng jungle patrol sa labas ng Camp Iranun at pagpapaputok ng artileri malapit sa matataong lugar sa Datu Blah Sinsuat at Barira. Sa karagatan, inilunsad ng US Coast Guard ang panunulsol sa China sa tabing ng Bilateral Maritime Cooperative Activity (MCA) na nilunsad nito malapit sa Bajo de Masinloc noong Mayo 26-30. Lalo itong nagpatindi sa tensyon sa South China Sea at lantarang panunulsol sa China. Walang patid na ligalig at pinsala sa mamamayan Tulad sa naunang mga wargames, ang mga operasyong ito ay nagdudulot ng matinding perwisyo sa mga Pilipino. Pinapasok ng mga dayuhang tropa ang mga komunidad ng mga magsasaka at mangingisda, hinihigpitan ang kilos ng mga residente, at pinagbabawalan silang maghanapbuhay. Sa Bicol, napaulat ang paglipana ng dayuhang mga tropa sa Barangay Mainit, Pasacao at di bababa sa 20 pang barangay. Nagtayo ang mga sundalo ng mga tsekpoynt sa daan. Ganito rin ang kalagayan sa mga prubinsya sa Mindanao sa kung saan may presensya ng dayuhang tropa para sa MAREX. Nagdulot ng ligalig sa mga residente ang panganganyon at paghihigpit sa kanilang kilos ng mga itinayong tsekpoynt sa mga kalsada. Sa Zambales, muling ipinagkait sa mga mangingisda ang kanilang kabuhayan ng ipinataw na “no sail zone” para bigyan-daan ang wargames. Sinaklaw ng pagbabawal ang 11 bayan, kabilang ang Masinloc at Subic. Mahigit 4,840 mangingisda sa Subic pa lamang ang nawalan ng kita dahil dito. Bukod sa gutom, inirereklamo rin ng mga residente ang pagkasira ng mga koral at pagtataboy sa mga isda dulot ng ingay at polusyon mula sa mga dambuhalang barkong pandigma at kanilang mga pagpapasabog ng mga misayl. The post Mga tropa ng US, nagsasagawa ng mga kontra-insurhensyang operasyon sa tabing ng war games appeared first on PRWC | Philippine Revolution Web Central. From PRWC | Philippine Revolution Web Central via This RSS Feed.
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Cancer rates in Iowa are rising faster than anywhere else in the country. Politicians blame individual choices, but the real villain is the industrial farming covering the state. We went, tested the water, and found cancer causing levels of chemicals running through Iowa. Producer & Host: Katie Nixdorf Editor & Motion Graphics: Lewis Wilcox Videographers: Jack Davis, Jack Belisle Video Production Manager: Isabel Atalaya Video Production Coordinator: Jodi Clemens Video Production Fellow: Astrid Dong Supervising Producer: Meg Herschlein More Perfect Union is an Emmy-winning, nonprofit newsroom whose mission is to build power for working people. Here’s what that means: We report on the real struggles and challenges of the working class from a working-class perspective. We attempt to connect those problems to potential solutions. We report on the abuses and wrongdoing of corporate power. And we seek to hold accountable the ultra-rich who have too much power over America’s political and economic systems. To support our independent journalism, subscribe, donate, and follow our other pages through the links below: Help fund our reporting: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/mpu-splash Substack: https://substack.perfectunion.us/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@moreperfectunion Twitter: https://twitter.com/MorePerfectUS Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/moreperfectunion.bsky.social Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MorePerfectUS Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/perfectunion/ Threads: https://www.threads.net/@perfectunion Website: https://www.perfectunion.us/ From More Perfect Union via This RSS Feed.