| Democracy Now! |
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| "Grenfell: In the Words of Survivors": Play Tells Story of 2017 London Apartment Fire That Killed 72 |
| Fri, 10 May 2024 08:45:07 -0400 |
| The play Grenfell: In the Words of Survivors, which is being staged this week in Brooklyn, tells the story of the 2017 apartment fire at Grenfell Tower in London that killed 72 people. It was the worst fire in Britain since World War II, and survivors blamed the government for mismanaging the public housing block and neglecting maintenance. The play tells the story of how the residents of Grenfell Tower, from the Caribbean, Portugal, Syria, Morocco, Ethiopia and Britain, created a thriving community even as their homes fell into disrepair in the years before the fire. Playwright Gillian Slovo says she was moved to create the play after watching “in absolute horror as that building burned,” wondering how such a tragedy could happen in one of the richest neighborhoods of London. We also hear from Grenfell survivor Ed Daffarn, who barely escaped the inferno with his life. “I’m here. It’s like a million-to-one chance,” Daffarn says. |
| Playwright Gillian Slovo: I Grew Up in Apartheid South Africa. I Saw the Same Thing in Palestine |
| Fri, 10 May 2024 08:39:26 -0400 |
| Gaza solidarity encampments, which started on U.S. college campuses, have now spread worldwide as students call on their educational institutions to divest from companies profiting from Israeli apartheid and occupation. The uprising echoes the anti-apartheid movement of the 1980s, when many in civil society called for divestment from companies that profited from South Africa’s system of racial domination. Democracy Now! explored the parallels this week with South African-born novelist and playwright Gillian Slovo, whose parents were legendary anti-apartheid activists Joe Slovo and Ruth First. “I have been to the West Bank, and I had a childhood in South Africa. I knew what apartheid looked like,” Slovo says. “When I went to the West Bank, what I saw was apartheid in action.” |
| Senate Candidate Larry Hamm on '70s Anti-Apartheid Protests at Princeton and Voting "Uncommitted" in NJ |
| Fri, 10 May 2024 08:29:07 -0400 |
| Larry Hamm is chair of the People’s Organization for Progress and a Princeton alumnus who took part in protests at the school in the 1970s to call for divestment from apartheid South Africa. He visited the Princeton student encampment earlier this week and says he is “really proud of the students” for their protest against the war in Gaza. Hamm, who is running in the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate from New Jersey, is promoting a vote for “uncommitted” in the state’s presidential primary vote. “I’m totally opposed to the Biden administration’s approach to this genocidal war in Gaza. There must be an immediate and permanent ceasefire, and the United States should cease any military aid to Israel.” |
| "We Feel Unheard": Hunger-Striking Princeton Students Vow to Fast Until Divestment Demands Are Met |
| Fri, 10 May 2024 08:22:15 -0400 |
| Over a dozen students at Princeton University have been on hunger strike for the past week as part of a Gaza solidarity encampment on campus protesting Israel’s war on Gaza and calling on the university to disclose and divest from companies with ties to Israel, among other demands. The hunger strikers are also calling for all charges to be dropped against a number of students arrested on campus in late April as part of the encampment. Areeq Hasan, a graduating senior at Princeton who has not eaten for a week, tells Democracy Now! the hunger strike was a response to the university’s stonewalling. “We feel unheard at every step of the way, so therefore we resorted to a hunger strike,” says Hasan, noting the long history of hunger strikes as a means of protest. “It is in solidarity with the history of Palestinian political prisoners since 1968. … We’re tapping into this long-standing tradition with both Palestinian political prisoners and also in the Irish and Indian liberation movements.” |
| 12 Arrested Outside NYC's New School as First Faculty-Led Gaza Solidarity Encampment Continues |
| Fri, 10 May 2024 08:12:28 -0400 |
| The first faculty-led Gaza solidarity encampment in the United States was launched Wednesday at The New School in New York City, where nearly two dozen professors and lecturers pitched tents inside the lobby of the university’s main building on Fifth Avenue. The encampment is named after the Palestinian writer, poet and professor Refaat Alareer, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza in December. The faculty protest began after the police raided a student encampment at The New School and arrested more than 40 students following a request by the university administration to clear the encampment. On Thursday, 12 more people were arrested outside The New School as the faculty encampment continued inside. Democracy Now! was on the scene and spoke with protesting faculty who denounced the school’s ties to Israel and the militarized police response against student protesters. “For the state violence that our students were subjected to and traumatized because of, we could not stand on the sidelines any longer,” part-time lecturer Suneil Sanzgiri said. “What we’re doing here is calling for all faculty across the country to step up, to risk more and to escalate, because we have to get all war profiteers out of our universities.” |
| Headlines for May 10, 2024 |
| Fri, 10 May 2024 08:00:00 -0400 |
| 100,000 Palestinians Flee Rafah as Israel Pummels Region from the Sky, Keeps Border Shut, UNRWA Closes East Jerusalem HQ After Israeli Arson Attack, Campus Uprising: Hunger Strike at Princeton, Arrests at UPenn, Victory at Sacramento State, Protests in Sweden Call Out Israel’s Participation in Eurovision, HRW: RSF Likely Committed Genocide Against Masalit and Other Communites in Sudan, Interim Chadian Leader Mahamat Déby Wins Contested Presidential Election, General Strike Brings Argentina to Standstill, Three Boeing Accidents over Past Two Days Draw More Scrutiny on Embattled Company, Police Kill 23-Year-Old Black Air Force Member Roger Fortson in His Own Home, Biden Admin to Unveil New Rules Making the Asylum Process Even Harder, Virginia School Board Votes to Restore Confederate Names to 2 Schools, USC Valedictorian Asna Tabassum Gets Standing Ovation at Pared-Down Graduation |
| Indian PM Narendra Modi Runs on "Hatred and Demonization" of Muslims in World's Largest Election |
| Thu, 09 May 2024 08:46:00 -0400 |
| Millions of voters in India are casting their ballots in the third of seven phases in the country’s mammoth general election. The election pits Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist BJP party against an alliance of more than two dozen opposition parties led by the Indian National Congress. Modi has recently come under fire from opponents for referring to Muslims in India as “infiltrators,” but our guest, the award-winning Indian author and journalist Siddhartha Deb, points out that “the Hindu right, they’ve always been extreme,” using “genocidal language” to describe those who do not fit the ethnonationalist image of their “masculine, violent, patriarchal project” and modeling the vision for a Hindu supremacist state after Israel, with its “idea that a strong, muscular, militant majority that are the only people who have the right to [the] nation.” Deb, a professor at The New School, also discusses India’s growing inequality gap, U.S. politicians’ embrace of Modi, and faculty support for pro-Palestine student protests in the U.S. |
| Pulitzer Winner Nathan Thrall on Israel's "System of Domination" and Biden Pausing Bomb Shipment |
| Thu, 09 May 2024 08:23:39 -0400 |
| Jerusalem-based journalist and author Nathan Thrall has been awarded the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction for his book, A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy. It tells the story of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank through one Palestinian father’s quest to seek answers and accountability after his 5-year-old son is involved in a deadly accident. We speak to Thrall about President Biden saying for the first time that he would not supply certain weapons to Israel to be used in an all-out invasion of Rafah. “It is too little, too late,” Thrall says. “It is a step in the right direction, but the administration has said that it has not made a final determination even about these paused weapons.” Thrall also discusses Israel’s ceasefire talks with Hamas, anti-Netanyahu protests led by families of Israeli hostages, Israel’s intensified crackdown in the West Bank, how criticism of Israel is conflated with antisemitism, and why debates over the future of a Palestinian state are an “enormous distraction from the reality on the ground” — Israel’s “system of domination that is extremely bureaucratic and elaborate, [that] has lasted for over half a century and [is] not going anywhere.” |
| Aid Worker in Gaza: "To Say There's Not an Incursion in Rafah Right Now Is Patently False" |
| Thu, 09 May 2024 08:12:37 -0400 |
| Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians are fleeing Rafah as Israeli airstrikes and shelling hammer the eastern part of the city. Fuel, food, medicine and other supplies have been cut off following Israel’s seizure and closure of the border crossing with Egypt. The main hospital in the area has also been shut down. Over 1.4 million people are seeking shelter in Rafah, the southernmost city of the Gaza Strip. Tent camps in some parts of Rafah have now vanished, springing up again as displaced families head back north. Over 60 Palestinians were killed across Gaza, many of them in Rafah, over the past 24 hours. We get a live update from Rafah from Dorotea Gucciardo of the Glia Project, who is currently on a medical mission in Gaza. “The situation on the ground is dire. Everyone here is quite afraid. To say that there’s not an incursion in Rafah right now is patently false,” Gucciardo says. “Throughout this entire day I have heard bombs, explosions, I have heard machine gun fire, and it seems to be creeping closer and closer to where we are.” |
| Headlines for May 9, 2024 |
| Thu, 09 May 2024 08:00:00 -0400 |
| Israel “Chokes Off Aid” to Gaza, Rains Down More Bombs on Rafah as Families Have Nowhere to Go, Biden Says U.S. Will Cut Off Some Weapons to Israel If It Goes Further into Rafah, Protesters Greet Biden During Chicago Campaign Stop; Hostage Families Clash with Police in Tel Aviv, Health Workers Uncover 49 More Bodies at Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital, Israel Demolishes 47 Bedouin Homes in Negev Desert, Rashida Tlaib, Cori Bush Hold Press Conference with Students Amid Police Crackdown on Gaza Protests, Professors at The New School Launch First Faculty Encampment for Gaza, Universities in Barcelona, Dublin Commit to Divestment Measures After Student Protests, April Was 11th Straight Month to Break Global Heat Record as SE and South Asia Swelter in Heat Wave, Intense Flooding Has Killed Hundreds, Displaced 100,000s Across East Africa, Vermont Lawmakers Pass Bill to Make Big Oil Pay for Climate Destruction, Body of Final Lethal Victim of Baltimore Bridge Collapse Is Recovered, Win Rozario’s Family Demands Justice After Release of NYPD Bodycam of His Fatal Shooting, House Votes Down Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Bid to Oust Mike Johnson as Speaker, Mike Johnson Joined by Stephen Miller and Trump Allies to Push “Election Integrity” Bill, RFK Jr. Once Suffered from a Parasitic Infection, Claimed a Worm Ate Part of His Brain |
| Mistrial: Abu Ghraib Survivors Detail Torture in Case Against U.S. Military Contractor |
| Wed, 08 May 2024 08:48:51 -0400 |
| A historic case against U.S. military contractor CACI brought by three Iraqi survivors of torture at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq ended in mistrial in Virginia last week after the jury failed to reach a unanimous verdict. The lawsuit against CACI — which was hired to provide interrogation services at Abu Ghraib — was first filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights in 2008. Since then, CACI repeatedly attempted to have the case dismissed. Plaintiffs Suhail Al Shimari, Asa’ad Zuba’e and Salah Al-Ejaili had accused CACI of conspiring to commit war crimes at Abu Ghraib. The three were subjected to sexual abuse and other forms of torture by interrogators. Democracy Now! speaks with Baher Azmy, attorney in the case and legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who said it was “a historic human rights case” despite the outcome. “What they could not stop is three courageous human beings who stood up against every obstacle and told their story in a U.S. court in a breathtaking, compelling manner. And while we didn’t get a judgment from a jury, we got historical testimony that makes clear, I think, CACI’s responsibility for these clients’ harms,” says Azmy, who adds that they intend to retry the case. |
| 60+ Journalism Profs Demand Investigation into Controversial NYT Article Alleging Mass Rape on Oct. 7 |
| Wed, 08 May 2024 08:31:48 -0400 |
| A group of more than 60 journalism professors has written to The New York Times calling on the paper to commission an independent review of its report that members of Hamas committed widespread sexual violence on October 7. Numerous media outlets, as well as some of the paper’s own staff, have raised questions about the December 28 article headlined “Screams Without Words,” reported in part by a freelance Israeli journalist who had liked multiple posts on social media advocating for violence against Palestinians. The Times has even published subsequent reporting undercutting some of the key elements of the article, which was used by Israeli leaders and Western allies as justification for the brutal military campaign in Gaza that had already killed tens of thousands of Palestinians up to that point. “It was very troubling to professors of journalism to see such a shoddy article be published without a retraction or an investigation,” says Rutgers media studies professor Deepa Kumar, one of the signatories, author of Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire. She also says that as an academic, she is troubled by the mainstream media’s depiction of student encampments as places of hate and violence. “For those of us who have been to these encampments, we know that the atmosphere there is peaceful until the police show up and start to create chaos. … These are fantastic spaces of learning.” |
| Meet Students at 4 Colleges Where Gaza Protests Win Concessions, Incl. Considering Israel Divestment |
| Wed, 08 May 2024 08:11:02 -0400 |
| As students around the country set up Gaza solidarity encampments on their campuses, many universities have called in police who have arrested students and dismantled the sites. But students at a number of colleges have managed to negotiate agreements where administrators have acceded to some of their demands, including considering divestment from Israel. We speak with four students who have been involved in pro-Palestine protests on campuses at Middlebury College in Vermont, Evergreen College in Washington state, Brown University in Rhode Island and Rutgers in New Jersey.
“Being an American complicit in this and being a student at an institution complicit in this genocide directly, I couldn’t imagine standing by and not acting,” says Duncan Kreps, who is graduating from Middlebury. Aseel, a Palestinian student at Rutgers who is only using her first name out of safety concerns, tells Democracy Now! that nearly 100 of her relatives have been killed in Israel’s assault on Gaza. “The Gaza that I once knew is essentially gone, but I am more than confident, along with my family, that we will return and that we will rebuild it,” she says. |
| Headlines for May 8, 2024 |
| Wed, 08 May 2024 08:00:00 -0400 |
| U.N. Warns Gaza Could Run Out of Fuel & Drinking Water After Israel Seized Rafah Crossing, Biden Withholds 3,500 Bombs from Israel, But U.S. Approves Another $827M for Israel, Families of Israeli Hostages Urge Netanyahu to End War on Gaza, Police Raid Encampments at U. of Illinois & Fashion Institute of Technology, RISD Students Occupy Campus Building, Cousin of Rabbi Meir Kahane Arrested After Driving Into Pro-Palestinian Protest in NYC, Jewish Voice for Peace Criticizes Biden’s Antisemitism Speech at U.S. Holocaust Museum, Judge Rejects Mistrial Motion After Stormy Daniels Testifies in Trump Trial, Death Toll in Brazil Tops 90 After Catastrophic Flooding, Xi Jinping Visits Belgrade on 25th Anniversary of NATO Bombing of Chinese Embassy, Florida Sues Biden Administration over Transgender Protections, Tennessee Company Fined $649,000 for Employing Children to Clean Slaughterhouses |
| "Stop Weaponizing Antisemitism": Police "Body-Slam" Jewish Dartmouth Prof. at Campus Gaza Protest |
| Tue, 07 May 2024 08:47:41 -0400 |
| Gaza solidarity protests continue at college campuses across the nation — as does the police crackdown. This comes as more than 50 chapters of the American Association of University Professors have issued a statement condemning the violent arrests by police at campus protests. At Dartmouth College last week, police body-slammed professor and former chair of Jewish studies Annelise Orleck to the ground as she tried to protect her students. She was charged with criminal trespass and temporarily banned from portions of Dartmouth’s campus. She joins us to describe her ordeal and respond to claims conflating the protests’ anti-Zionist message with antisemitism. “People have to be able to talk about Palestine without being attacked by police,” says Orleck, who commends the students leading protests around the country. “Their bravery is tremendous and is inspiring. And they really feel like this is the moral issue of their time, that there’s a genocide going on and that they can’t ignore it.” |
| Report from Rafah: Israel Seizes Border Crossing, Blocking Humanitarian Aid, as Ceasefire Talks Continue |
| Tue, 07 May 2024 08:33:44 -0400 |
| In Rafah, we speak with Gaza-based journalist Akram al-Satarri about Israel tightening restrictions on humanitarian aid, refusing a ceasefire deal and planning to invade the city where over a million Palestinians are sheltering. Israel’s military seized control of the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt, blocking humanitarian aid from entering the besieged territory, and trapping Palestinians under heavy Israeli bombardment. This comes after Israel also closed the Karem Abu Salem crossing in southern Gaza this weekend after a Hamas attack killed four Israeli soldiers. “Israel is not allowing the entry of the humanitarian aid to Gaza, which is perceived as a lifeline,” says al-Satarri, who reports Palestinians are “in despair” as Israel orders a third of Rafah’s population to move ahead of their invasion. “They understand that more destruction, more devastation, more death and deprivation is coming for them.” Al-Satarri also speaks about Israel banning Al Jazeera, one of the only international outlets with reporters in Gaza. “I think they want to silence Al Jazeera and they want to silence all the free media for the sake of preventing any further exposure of the things that are happening on the ground.” |
| Fmr. Israeli Peace Negotiator Daniel Levy: U.S. Pressure on Israel Is Key to Lasting Gaza Ceasefire |
| Tue, 07 May 2024 08:11:53 -0400 |
| Even after Hamas accepted a Gaza ceasefire proposal Monday, Israeli forces moved in with tanks to seize the Rafah crossing with Egypt. Israel says the ceasefire deal falls short of its demands, and Hamas has called for “international intervention.” Former Israeli peace negotiator Daniel Levy says the limited information and political maneuvering of all parties raises more questions than answers right now, but the core issue is whether all parties can maintain a sustained end to hostilities. “In addition to testing each other, the Hamas and Israeli parties are testing the United States of America and the Biden administration in an unprecedented way,” says Levy. “Hamas detects that the U.S. may finally be serious about offering a sustained calm.” While Levy says growing external pressure from global protests are “having an impact,” he doubts U.S. and Israeli leaders feel they must change course yet. “The pressure does not feel sufficient that Netanuahu’s politics needs him to accept a ceasefire. He still thinks he can wiggle out of this,” says Levy. “If this deal doesn’t go through, I fear we’re in for the much longer haul.” |
| Headlines for May 7, 2024 |
| Tue, 07 May 2024 08:00:00 -0400 |
| Israel Begins Ground Invasion of Rafah After Hamas Agrees to Ceasefire, Israel Used U.S. Weapons in Lebanon Attack That Killed 7 Health Workers, Students Continue Gaza Solidarity Protests, Defying Arrests, Suspensions, Harvard and MIT Students Defy Deadlines for Ending Protests, Receive Faculty Support, SUNY Purchase Agrees to Student Demands; Columbia Cancels Commencement Ceremony, Gaza Solidarity Encampments Form in Copenhagen, Barcelona; French High Schoolers Join Movement, Belgian Police Arrest 132 Climate Activists During Act of Peaceful Civil Disobedience, Bomb Attacks on IDP Camps In Democratic Republic of Congo Kill 12 People, Incl. Children, Voters in Chad Cast Presidential Ballots 3 Years After Military Takeover, Russia to Launch Drills for Possible Deployment of Tactical Nuclear Weapons , Tunisian Police Raid Refugee Encampments; Hundreds Reportedly Bused Then Abandoned in the Desert, Heavy Rains Kill at Least 17 People in Haiti, Flood Thousands of Homes, Judge Merchan Fines Trump for Violating Gag Order for the 10th Time, Threatens Jail |
| Revolt on Campus: Protests over Gaza Disrupt Graduation Ceremonies as Police Crack Down on Encampments |
| Mon, 06 May 2024 08:47:03 -0400 |
| Police have now arrested more than 2,500 students at pro-Palestine protests across the U.S., yet students continue to call for an end to the war on Gaza and universities’ investment in companies that support Israel’s occupation of Palestine. We speak to three student organizers from around the country: Salma Hamamy of the University of Michigan, president of the school’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, about the commencement ceremony protest she helped organize, and Cady de la Cruz of the University of Virginia and Rae Ferrara of the State University of New York at New Paltz about police crackdowns on their schools’ encampments. De la Cruz was arrested in the UVA raid and banned from campus without an opportunity to collect any of her belongings. She says repression has strengthened the resolve of many protesters, who are willing to risk their academic futures to push for divestment. “All of us there felt like we have more time on our hands … than the people of Gaza,” she explains, “We would hold it down for anything.” |
| "They Are Starving," Says Doctor Back from Gaza; World Food Programme Warns North in "Full-Blown Famine" |
| Mon, 06 May 2024 08:29:46 -0400 |
| The World Food Programme is warning northern Gaza has reached a “full-blown” famine that is spreading south. This comes after the Israeli military has spent months blocking the entry of vital aid into Gaza, attacking humanitarian aid convoys and opening fire on Palestinian civilians waiting to receive lifesaving aid. We get an update on conditions among the besieged and starving population of Gaza — including of children now suffering from the psychological effects of intense and prolonged trauma — from Dr. Walid Masoud, a vascular surgeon and a board member of the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund who is just back from heading a medical mission to Gaza. |
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