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Rebel at the Heart
Politics Dump - 🇪🇭 Free Palestine
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To give more context as to who MOVE were: in 1972, MOVE emerged as a radical Black liberation and environmentalist collective within the heart of Philadelphia.
Committed to communal living and advocating for causes such as animal rights, environmental preservation, and the liberation of Black people, MOVE posed a challenge to societal norms and power structures.
This is NINETEEN-SEVENTY-TWO. I don't know if people realise the implications, but for that era, they were incredibly ahead of their time: true progressives, as they transcended conventional activism by championing environmental causes alongside their quest for social justice.
Embracing a holistic approach to liberation, MOVE members fervently advocated for environmental preservation and sustainability within their communal lifestyle.
Their initiatives included cultivating urban gardens, promoting composting and recycling practices, and raising awareness about the interconnectedness of ecological health and social equity.
By intertwining environmentalism with their broader struggle for liberation, MOVE challenged the prevailing narratives of environmentalism as a privileged pursuit, highlighting its intrinsic relevance to marginalised communities.
In doing so, MOVE demonstrated a profound understanding of the intersectionality between environmental justice and racial liberation, forging a path towards a more equitable and sustainable future.
Then on May 13, 1985, the Philadelphia Police Department unleashed a devastating assault on MOVE's headquarters, marking a harrowing episode in the annals of human rights violations: they destroyed everything.
The confrontation culminated in the deaths of eleven MOVE members, including five adults and six children, and left a trail of destruction, with 61 homes razed to the ground and an entire city block consumed by flames. The aftermath saw approximately 250 individuals displaced and rendered homeless, their lives shattered by the indiscriminate brutality of state-sanctioned violence.
All because they challenged the status quo and because of their ethnicity.
This egregious act of state aggression stands as a sickening testament to the unchecked power wielded by law enforcement, illustrating the depths of racial bias and systemic oppression ingrained within the fabric of society.
The bombing of MOVE's headquarters exemplifies the disproportionate use of force and the blatant disregard for human life exhibited by those entrusted with upholding the law.
Philadelphia's history is marred by this tragic chapter, underscoring the urgent need for reckoning, activism, and the relentless pursuit of truth and redress. Until justice is served and the voices of the oppressed are heard, the legacy of MOVE's sacrifice will endure as a rallying cry for change.
On this day, 13 May 1985, Philadelphia police & the anti-Black police state attacked the home of Black liberation and environmentalist group MOVE with automatic weapons, then dropped a bomb on it, killing five adults and six children, destroying 61 homes in the predominantly Black neighbourhood, and making 250 people homeless.
Almost 500 police officers fired over 10,000 rounds of ammunition into the house, which was filled with women and children, while other officers blew holes in the walls with explosives. The police commissioner then ordered the house to be bombed, which they did using an improvised device made from C4 given to them by the FBI.
Only two people survived the blast and ensuing fire: Ramona Africa, and Michael Ward, aged 13. While no officials were prosecuted, Ramona Africa was subsequently jailed for seven years on riot and conspiracy charges. The incident occurred during the tenure of Philadelphia's first Black mayor, a Democrat named Wilson Goode.
The children killed were named Katricia Dotson (Tree), Netta, Delitia, Phil, and Tomasa Africa and the adults were Rhonda, Teresa, Frank, CP, Conrad, and John Africa.
In April 2021, it was revealed that non-Black anthropologists at Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania had the bones of one of the children, unbeknownst to the families.
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Holy shit. The Israeli whistleblower story CNN just broke is insane. I cannot believe what I’m reading
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“The more than seven million Jewish human beings who live in the gap between the river and the sea will not simply vanish because you think that they should.” Who has called for seven million Jews to vanish? It is not a demand of any Palestinian political party, of the BDS movement, of pro-Palestine student organizations, of the vast Palestinian intellectual tradition, or of any Palestine solidarity community around the world. Not a single spokesperson in any of the student encampments has even hinted at replacing or eliminating Israeli Jews. To interpret Palestinian demands for freedom as inherently malicious is nothing more than crude racism dressed in humanistic affectations. Smith, like too many of her Western contemporaries, believes herself capable of discussing Palestine without apparently having read a single Palestinian writer.
Our (Your) Pitiful Ethics!: A Response to Zadie Smith’s “Shibboleth”
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Video
flickr
THE LONG HAIRED WOMEN OF OSHIMA ISLAND, JAPAN by Okinawa Soba
<br /><i>Via Flickr:</i> <br />Finding a good website for information on the special Kimono styles and interesting long hair culture of Oshima Island is like looking for a piece of salt on a stick pretzel after you ate it.
In any case, their Kimono’s were different than the “standard” forms you’d see in Tokyo, Yokohama, and etc., and long hair to the ground was their “thing”…..among other interesting things.
In the above photo, notice the narrow black OBI with no tie in the back. It is tied in the FRONT, out of sight behind her arms. Notice the “apron like” covering in the front as well.
Here’s a link to the local traditional style as it has evolved in 2007. In some of these pictures you will notice the narrow black OBI tied in the FRONT, with the “apron” hanging down from just under the tie – as opposed to a MAIKO style that would have a long “tail” in the rear.
I will be very happy if a flickr expert signed on with a comment to explain it better !
Miss Oshima 2007 : www.izu-oshima.or.jp/work/osanpo/osanpo.html.html
Here’s a pic of an Oshima Kimono and front-tied Obi in Pre-WW2 days : www.flickr.com/photos/24443965@N08/2569213059/
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Neutrality amidst the throes of injustice invariably serves as a cloak for the perpetrators of oppression, affording them impunity and unbridled freedom to perpetuate their egregious acts unopposed. By abstaining from active resistance and failing to unequivocally denounce injustice, society inadvertently furnishes oppressors with an unchecked path to propagate their malevolent agendas. Thus, when confronted with the specter of injustice, it becomes not merely a moral imperative, but an ethical obligation of the highest order to intercede and thwart its insidious advance.
Drawing upon the profound insights elucidated in Hannah Arendt's seminal treatise, "The Banality of Evil," one discerns a cogent explication of this pivotal concept. Arendt's incisive analysis pierces through the veneer of banality to expose the sinister underpinnings of evil, revealing how ordinary individuals, through their complicity or apathy, can become unwitting accomplices in the perpetuation of systemic injustices. In this vein, her work impels us to transcend the inertia of passive observance and embrace the mantle of active resistance as guardians of societal conscience.
Indeed, the gravity of moral responsibility beckons all parties who are witness to atrocities to confront injustice with unwavering resolve, for to acquiesce to its insidious march is to abdicate our collective humanity and consign future generations to the annals of moral bankruptcy.
#Hannah Arendt#The Banality of Evil#Neutrality in the face of injustice#Social injustice#Persephone's thoughts
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Yall when I found out rich people have special therapists to help them cope with the guilt of hoarding money I literally considered throwing away all the morals I never had to become a psych major for like an entire day like I would have emotionally damaged them so badly
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"It is glaring hypocrisy when you have Republicans on the other side of the aisle trying to create definitions and saying 'Rashida wants to annihilate people' when Max Miller himself went on TV and said 'we're turning Gaza into a parking lot and we want to annihilate Palestinians.' Nobody condemned him on that side of the aisle. What is true here is that every single one of them [Republicans] has not acknowledged the fact that Palestinians are dying in their tens of thousands but will continue to say it is us who are not acknowledging humanity. Rashida will stand strong and the Palestinian movement will continue for liberation until every single Palestinian has the right to live in liberty."
Somali-American representative, Ilhan Omar's responding to Palestinian-American representative, Rashida Tlaib's censuring in congress. November 9, 2023.
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One of the things that pisses me off most about this genocide and overall occupation is how many people say it's so complicated and there's so much nuance and there isn't one easy solution. This is one of the simplest things I have ever seen. Zionists invaded palestine in 1947-48. They have occupied it for 76 years while taking more and more land. They kidnap and torture and massacre Palestinians day in day out for those 76 years. They control every aspect of Palestinian life, including their water and medical care. And now they are committing another genocide against them. Where is the complication? What is hard to understand? "Well, Jewish people need a place where they won't be discriminated against" I absolutely agree. So make every country in the world safe for Jewish people. Fight against anti Semitism across the world. Don't commit a genocide and set up an ethnostate.
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Meet the Nigerian women spearheading solar projects
32-year-old green energy entrepreneur Yetunde Fadeyi will never forget what inspired her to start a clean energy company in Nigeria.
As a six-year-old, Fadeyi’s best friend, Fatima, was killed by carbon monoxide poisoning in her Lagos home, along with her father and pregnant mother.
“She often came over for sleepovers. But that day she didn’t,” says Fadeyi. “It was the time that they were stealing people’s generators, so they kept [the generator] in an enclosed area and by the time it was morning they were dead.”
After a childhood in Lagos plagued by intermittent electricity, a degree in chemistry and training in solar panel installation, Fadeyi started Renewable Energy and Environmental Sustainability (REES). The non-profit is dedicated to climate advocacy and providing clean energy to poor communities in rural Nigeria.
Bringing solar energy to Nigeria’s poorest homes
Since its inception in 2017, REES Africa has provided solar energy to over 6,000 people in the poorest parts of Nigeria, funded by grants and philanthropic donations.
It supplies solar microgrids, which generate energy through solar panels and store them in battery banks for distribution. The small grids bring high quality, cheap and constant power to up to 100 homes each, powering light bulbs, radios, sockets and other low energy appliances.
Fadeyi says that energy companies don’t see any potential for profit in poor and marginalised communities. With around 40 per cent of Nigerians living below the national poverty line, it’s up to companies like Fadeyi’s to fill the gap for now.
Professor Yinka Omoregbe is hoping to bridge this energy gap as CEO of Etin Power, providing energy to offgrid communities using mini solar grids. She brings a wealth of experience to the role as a former national advisor on the reform of Nigeria’s petroleum sector and a former state attorney general.
In its first year, Etin Power provided electricity to over 5,200 people in three neglected coastal communities in Edo State, southern Nigeria. While the results so far are small, Omoregbe’s ambitions are far bigger.
We will have proven that it is possible to profitably give green energy to vulnerable communities.”
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a poem from gazan writer nadine murtaja featured in an edition of WAWOG’s “new york war crimes” in march. she dreams of becoming a dentist, though her schooling was interrupted by the current aggression and genocide.
please donate and share nadine’s campaign to evacuate herself and her family.
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#If twilight and Harry potter are on this list it means it's relatively recent#I've yet to be demonically possessed unfortunately
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In Dili, Indonesia’s future means trying to forget about Timor-Leste’s past
Indonesian President-elect Prabowo Subianto, a former military officer, has been linked to alleged atrocities in Timor-Leste.
At Timor-Leste’s museum of memory, Hugo Fernandes supervises exhibits chronicling resistance and oppression during the Indonesian occupation – an era when Prabowo Subianto, now Indonesia’s president-elect, is alleged to have overseen atrocities.
Fernandes runs the Centro Nacional Chega! museum, a former prison in the capital Dili that dates to when Timor-Leste was a Portuguese colony. Faded photographs of Timorese resistance fighters and messages scrawled on the walls by prisoners who languished here during Indonesia’s brutal 24-year rule line its galleries.
Despite the shadows cast by history, the impending ascent to power of Prabowo, a former army special forces commander who was declared the winner of the Feb. 14 Indonesian general election, has been greeted with diplomatic decorum in this tiny young nation of 1.3 million people also known as East Timor.
“Prabowo’s specific actions remain unclear due to limited information,” Fernandes, the museum’s director, told BenarNews. “Accusations of human rights violations have persisted, but concrete evidence and verification are difficult to obtain.”
“Chega!,” which means “enough! in Portuguese, stands as a testament to Timor-Leste’s efforts to navigate the delicate path between preserving the memories of its dark past and promoting reconciliation with its giant neighbor next-door.
“There are differing voices within the nation,” Fernandes says. “Some activists advocate for answers regarding past atrocities, while others emphasize the importance of moving forward with Indonesia.”
In 1999, East Timor voted overwhelmingly to break away from Indonesian rule, through a United Nations-sponsored referendum. Before and after the vote, pro-Jakarta militias engaged in widespread violence and destruction. East Timor gained formal independence in 2002 after a period of U.N. administration.
The occupation, which followed after Indonesia invaded East Timor in December 1975, was marked by famine and conflict. The number of deaths attributed to that era ranges from from 90,000 to 200,000, the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation in East Timor reported.
This figure includes nearly 20,000 cases of violent deaths or disappearances. The commission’s findings indicate that Indonesian forces were responsible for about 70% of these violent incidents, set against the backdrop of East Timor’s population of around 900,000 in 1999.
And according to the Genocide Studies Program at Yale University, “up to a fifth of the East Timorese population perished during the Indonesia’s 24-year occupation … a similar proportion to the Cambodians who died under the Khmer Rouge regime of Pol Pot (1975-1979).”
Since 1999, the relationship between Timor-Leste and Indonesia has evolved, with Jakarta acknowledging its former province as a “close brother” and supporting Dili’s bid to join the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Timor-Leste President José Ramos-Horta welcomed Prabowo’s election win and expressed readiness to collaborate with Indonesia’s upcoming new leader.
“Very pleased, very pleased,” Ramos-Horta told BenarNews when asked about Prabowo’s victory.
As a young man, Ramos-Horta, now 74, was a founder and leader of Fretilin, the armed resistance movement that fought to liberate East Timor from the Portuguese first and then the Indonesians.
He said he had personally called Prabowo, now Indonesia’s defense minister, to congratulate him, and that the ex-general planned to visit Timor-Leste before his inauguration on Oct. 20.
Prime Minister Xanana Gusmão, a former guerilla leader who spent years in an Indonesian prison, was also happy with the news, Ramos-Horta said.
“President-elect Prabowo will contribute a lot, first to Indonesia, continuing stability and prosperity in Indonesia, and then in the region, as well as strengthen relations with Timor-Leste,” he said, adding Prabowo had “many friends” in his country, including his own brother, Arsenio.
When asked about Prabowo’s human rights record in Timor-Leste, Ramos-Horta said, “That is past. It’s already almost three decades, and we do not think of the past.”
Prabowo was a key figure in the military operations that crushed the East Timorese resistance.
The Timor-Leste National Alliance for an International Tribunal (ANTI), a coalition of civil society organizations, survivors, and families of victims, said reports had implicated Prabowo in a 1983 massacre in Kraras.
Some estimates said that 200 people were killed there, earning the area the nickname the “town of widows.”
In a statement released in November, the alliance said that as the head of the Indonesian army’s special forces command, Prabowo had directed actions resulting in severe human rights abuses and crimes, including the establishment of pro-Indonesian militias blamed for post-referendum violence in 1999.
In addition, Prabowo is linked to a 1991 massacre at the Santa Cruz cemetery in Dili, where some 250 peaceful demonstrators were killed, the alliance said.
In 1998, Prabowo was discharged from the military after a council of honor officers found him guilty of several violations, including involvement in the abduction and disappearance of pro-democracy activists during the 1998 student protests that led to the downfall of Indonesian dictator Suharto.
Prabowo, 72, has denied any wrongdoing and said he was only following orders from his superiors. He has never been tried in a civilian court for the alleged crimes.
Prabowo’s presidential campaign team said that witnesses, including religious figures in Timor-Leste, had denied his connection to the Krakas killings.
For many Timorese, the memories of Indonesian occupation are hard to erase.
Naldo Rei, 50, a former child guerrilla-fighter who was repeatedly imprisoned during that period, said he could not overlook Prabowo’s human rights record.
“While I don’t want to meddle in Indonesia’s internal matters, when it comes to human rights issues, Prabowo has a very distressing track record,” Rei told BenarNews, his soft-spoken and gentle demeanor belying his resistance years.
Rei spent his youth evading capture in the Los Palos jungle after the loss of six family members, including his father, to Indonesian military action.
In the early 1990s, he sought refuge first in Jakarta, then in Australia, before settling in an independent East Timor.
Rei, who is the author of “Resistance,” a memoir detailing his experiences, voices apprehension about the trajectory of Indonesian democracy.
“Prabowo’s victory, from my perspective, squanders the democracy that the people have fought for,” he said. “How many lives have been lost? He and other generals have blood on their hands.”
Januario Soares, a second-year medical student at the National University of Timor Lorosae, represents a growing sentiment focused on the future.
“Indonesia has chosen its leader. We need to focus on the future,” Soares said as he sat in the shade of a mahogany tree outside his campus in Dili.
He believes strengthening relations between the two countries is vital.
“The civil war left us divided, and in that division, we inadvertently opened our doors to Indonesia,” Soares said. “What followed was a period of violence against our people, a scar in our history.”
Yet, when it comes to Prabowo’s role in that history, Soares admitted he did not know much.
“The Indonesian people have made their choice. Perhaps Prabowo is the best among the contestants; that’s why they chose him,” he said.
Soares said he opted for a pragmatic approach toward the past, focusing on improving the quality of life and seeking benefits for the present and future.
“People change over time, and I believe Prabowo has changed too.”
Damien Kingsbury, a political expert specializing in Timor-Leste, said Timorese leaders were obligated to maintain a delicate diplomatic stance due to the small nation’s reliance on Indonesia for imports and its aspirations to join ASEAN, the Southeast Asian bloc. Indonesia is one of ASEAN’s founding members.
“Of course, Ramos-Horta must be diplomatic,” said Kingsbury, a professor at Deakin University in Australia, who has written extensively on Timor-Leste and Indonesia.
“He is president of a small country that has an unhappy history with Indonesia and does not want to create any possible problems,” he told BenarNews.
Kingsbury pointed out that while Ramos-Horta, a Nobel laureate and prominent diplomat, is well-versed in the language of diplomacy, there is a generational gap in awareness of the nation’s tumultuous past.
“Younger people may not be aware of events of 20, 30 and 40 years ago, but that does not mean they did not happen,” he said.
“It must leave a bitter taste in the mouths of many that Timor-Leste’s leaders need to be polite to Prabowo.”
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Theodore Herlz, father of Political Zionism: Yeah, it's colonial
Ber Borochov, father of Labour Zionism: Yeah, it's colonial
Ze'ev Jabotinsky, father of Revisionist Zionism: Yeah, it's colonial
David Ben Gurion, founding father of the Settler state: Yeah, it's colonial
Small bean fandom Zionist: Umm, lol, it's literally not colonial???
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I fucking love the True Torah Judaism Twitter page, they’re constantly posting edgy shit like this.
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If a person champions a so-called solution to the Palestinian plight, while hypocritically clinging to a standard they would abhor enduring, they are nothing short of an egregious bigot.
To impose upon a people conditions they themselves would vehemently reject is not just morally bankrupt but a testament to the insidious depths of their racial prejudice. Such individuals cloak their bigotry in the guise of concern, yet their duplicitous actions betray the rot of their moral fiber.
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Anarchism is an utterly ridiculous ideology when applied to managing an organisation or political project
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