Intolerance On Rise Around Developed World, Attacks on Muslims, Roma, Native Americans, & Palestinians
September 6th, 2010
The way we treat our minorities is a reflection of what we value and ultimately how we regard ourselves. This is a series of stories in the news over the past few weeks that reflect poorly on the levels of tolerance in the world and particularly among the advanced countries. These so called democracies who have believed at various times in recent history that they have a duty to spread their version of governance to others around the world, have more recently been showing their dark sides. What we are seeing is a rise in intolerance, draconian measures and a lack of generosity among the haves toward those who have not. To some degree it is a conflict of value systems, the Roma, and Native Americans are people who don't have a well defined place in the Capitalist system, they answer to a different pre-capitalist system of values. The Palestinians are the native Americans of Israel and Muslims are in America the new persecuted minority, right up there with immigrants from Latin America.
Are we going to turn 9-11 into a war of the Christian and Secular West against the Islamic East? I certainly hope we learn from history and don't repeat the mistakes of our ancestors. We have in the USA decided to walk away from the ancient grudges and petty squabbles of our mostly European past. Are we now going to return to intolerance and treat Muslims as Europeans treated the Jews, or worse?
Economic hard times have lead a lot of people to lose their cool. Although there has been a rise in intolerance over recent years the economy seems to have given new impetus to groups who want to inflame racial and religious hatred.
This is from New York Times
Across Nation, Mosque Projects Meet Opposition
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
Published: August 7, 2010
While a high-profile battle rages over a mosque near ground zero in Manhattan, heated confrontations have also broken out in communities across the country where mosques are proposed for far less hallowed locations.
In Murfreesboro, Tenn., Republican candidates have denounced plans for a large Muslim center proposed near a subdivision, and hundreds of protesters have turned out for a march and a county meeting.
In late June, in Temecula, Calif., members of a local Tea Party group took dogs and picket signs to Friday prayers at a mosque that is seeking to build a new worship center on a vacant lot nearby.
In Sheboygan, Wis., a few Christian ministers led a noisy fight against a Muslim group that sought permission to open a mosque in a former health food store bought by a Muslim doctor.
At one time, neighbors who did not want mosques in their backyards said their concerns were over traffic, parking and noise — the same reasons they might object to a church or a synagogue. But now the gloves are off.
In all of the recent conflicts, opponents have said their problem is Islam itself. They quote passages from the Koran and argue that even the most Americanized Muslim secretly wants to replace the Constitution with Islamic Shariah law.
These local skirmishes make clear that there is now widespread debate about whether the best way to uphold America's democratic values is to allow Muslims the same religious freedom enjoyed by other Americans, or to pull away the welcome mat from a faith seen as a singular threat.
"What's different is the heat, the volume, the level of hostility," said Ihsan Bagby, associate professor of Islamic studies at the University of Kentucky. "It's one thing to oppose a mosque because traffic might increase, but it's different when you say these mosques are going to be nurturing terrorist bombers, that Islam is invading, that civilization is being undermined by Muslims."
This is from `Terra Viva' IPS news service.
"MIDEAST: The Lights Are Going Out on Gaza
By Mohammed Omer
GAZA CITY, Sep 5, 2010 (IPS) - The Muslim festival Eid approaches, but not the end to power cuts that have darkened the month-long Ramadan fasting leading up to the festival. Or to the agony of Gazans, made worse by the reminder that it's approaching festive time.
The prolonged electricity cuts, lasting from 12 to 16 hours daily, is the topic of conversation on everyone's lips in the Gaza Strip. It's hot, it's Ramadan, and the people are tired, thirsty, hungry and desperate.
The electricity supply began crumbling after the 2006 election when Hamas won, leading to Israel and Egypt imposing an economic blockade. Israel launched air strikes in December 2008, knocking out all the six transformers supplying power to Gaza.
With no signs of restoration in sight, everyone is prepared for the situation to get much worse.
The supply schedule varies in different localities as well as from day to day, said Kanan Obied, an official from the Gaza Electricity Authority. And the situation worsened a few weeks ago, to coincide — ironically — with the beginning of Ramadan.
The EU, which was paying the Palestinian Authority to supply diesel for the Gaza generators, stopped the funding in August, accusing Hamas of pocketing electricity revenues. The Gaza government replied that the EU move came after they identified a corrupt official in the electricity company.
Walking through the markets and streets of Gaza one hears almost everyone appealing to the UN, EU and Arab League to find a speedy solution to the crisis. Zahran Awad from Gaza City says, "This Western attempt to make us turn against Hamas will fail."
About two-thirds of the 1.5 million residents are refugees from the 1948 or 1967 wars, according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, with 675,000 living below the poverty line.
As a Gaza-based economic expert says, "Forcing the Gazan population to pay bills is out of the question. They are suffering from a long siege, with the borders closed and no jobs available." People can be seen going from one neighbourhood to another just to charge their mobile phones and laptops. One journalist gets his laptop charged at a local hospital.
Securing fuel for the generators remains the immediate challenge. Neither the Gaza government nor the Palestinian Authority is willing to pay the steep 13 million dollars required each month.
Hamas official Dr. Yousef Rizka, adviser to Prime Minister Ismail Hanyieh, introduced an initiative. He suggested that the governments in Ramallah and Gaza deduct 45 dollars every month from each civil servant and employee. The Hamas-led government has 30,000 employees, which means that, in theory, some 1.3 million dollars a month will be available to pay the fuel bills.
But this too would be a temporary measure since the electricity company has debts amounting to 1.3 billion dollars, and no one is addressing that problem as yet.
Another effect of the power cuts has been on the sewage treatment plant. In the absence of electricity, the plant functions sporadically and every day 88,000 cubic metres of raw or partially treated sewage, oozes into the Mediterranean. The polluted waters are dangerous for fish and make a quick dip in the sea impossible to even imagine.
"Life is paralysed here," says 45-year-old Sami Abu Ouaf, an unemployed father of seven, who lives at the Buriej camp in the middle of the Gaza Strip. "And this is the price we are paying for democracy.
"I never imagined this kind of punishment — having my electricity, water and gas cut off — for casting my vote," he adds. Abu Ouaf needs to keep a sharp eye on the time to make sure he doesn't miss the rationed supply when it comes. "It's democracy by candlelight — if one is lucky enough to afford candles.""
This is from the Seattle Weekly Blog
"Man Shot and Killed by Police in Downtown Seattle
By Caleb Hannan, Tue., Aug. 31 2010 @ 4:39PM
UPDATE: We now know our victim's name. It is, not kidding here, John T. Williams, with the "T" standing for "Trouble."
According to police, yesterday at around 4:15 in the afternoon, at the corner of Boren and Howell, an officer got out of his car and approached a man whittling a piece of wood with a knife. The man allegedly got up, walked towards the officer, ignored multiple commands to drop the weapon and then lunged, at which point witnesses say they heard up to four gun shots. The suspect died at the scene.
UPDATE: Williams has a decades-long criminal history of mostly misdemeanors.
Police say he was carrying a folding knife with a three-inch blade. But as a carver and member of the Chief Seattle Club, it may not have been out of the ordinary for Williams to be carrying a knife.
Police say the officer ordered Williams to drop the knife three times before shooting him. But they can't say yet whether Williams actually lunged at the cop.
Meanwhile, a witness contacted the Times to tell them the cop's version of events doesn't match with what she saw:
Amber Maurina, 28, said she was driving home Monday afternoon from a doctor's appointment and was stopped at a red light at Boren and Howell. She said she was facing north on Boren and saw the officer stop his patrol car, which was facing south on Boren, and get out.
Maurina said a tall and scruffy-looking man was standing with his back to her. She said she never saw the man's hands but thought he might be urinating or fumbling around in a fanny pack. Maurina said she watched the officer approach the man and saw him mouthing something to the man, who did not appear to respond.
"His body stance did not look threatening at all," she said of the man. "I could only see the gentleman's back, and he didn't look aggressive at all. He didn't even look up at the officer."
The officer approached the man, but was still "at least two car-lengths" away when Maurina said she heard the officer say, "Hey, hey, hey," followed by five gunshots.
"I watched him kind of slowly, sort of gracefully and elegantly, fall to the ground," Maurina said of the man. "I immediately prayed and cried.""
This is from the local TV station's website KIROTV.com
"Native American Community Demands Justice For Man Shot By Police
Posted: 12:29 pm PDT September 3, 2010Updated: 2:07 pm PDT September 3, 2010
SEATTLE — At a news conference Friday, there were passionate pleas for justice as members of the Native American community demanded that Seattle police be held accountable for the shooting death of John T. Williams.
The conference called by the Chief Seattle Club started with a ceremonial drum blessing, then speakers took turns relating their experiences with police or talked about what they said is an ongoing problem with police and racism in Seattle.
A letter the Chief Seattle Club sent to Mayor Mike McGinn was read, expressing the native community's great concern about this week's shooting of Williams.
Many said Williams, a 50-year-old traditional wood carver, was doing nothing wrong when he was shot and killed by a Seattle police officer Monday evening in downtown Seattle.
Police said Williams refused orders to put down a knife he was using to carve, and that he lunged at the officer.
It was suggested during the meeting that Williams may have not been able to hear the officer's commands and couldn't move fast enough to attack anyone.
At a Seattle police news conference following the shooting, Assistant Police Chief Nick Metz classified Williams as a homeless man and a career criminal.
Native American leaders also called for an inquest into the shooting and an immediate discussion with Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn. They said the shooting was another example of racial injustice by the police force.
One speaker said the officer who shot Williams should be charged with murder.
The police officer who fired the fatal shots is on routine paid administrative leave during the investigation. Seattle police have not responded to the request for a public inquest."
Chief Seattle Club is a community center for Native Americans.
This from Terra Viva IPS News service
"EUROPE: New Expulsions Hit People Without a Place
By David Cronin
BRUSSELS, Sep 6, 2010 (IPS) - Roma gypsies are routinely described as Europe's largest ethnic minority. Numbering between 10 and 16 million, their combined population exceeds that of many European Union countries. Yet their numerical strength offers no compensation for the poverty, persecution and scapegoating that the Roma have to endure — or for how their welfare is accorded a low priority by the EU's institutions.
That few Brussels officials pay much attention to the situation facing Roma has been exemplified in recent weeks as Nicolas Sarkozy's government in France effectively declared a war against gypsies. When the Paris authorities announced in late July that they had authorised the systematic destruction of Roma camps and the large-scale expulsion of Roma to Bulgaria and Romania, the European Commission initially insisted that the surrounding matters concerned national EU governments only.
Following the deportation of about 1,000 Roma by France during the month of August, the Commission has finally questioned the legality of these measures. In an unpublished paper, the EU's executive arm cast doubts on assurances by Paris that all of the deportations were voluntary and therefore did not breach a 2004 law — known as the "free movement directive" — that forbids group deportations from one of the Union's states to another.
According to the paper, the granting of lump sums ranging from 100 euros (129 dollars) for child deportees to 300 euros for adults "was not sufficient" to exempt France from the EU's "free movement principles".
"The response (from Brussels) has been very slow," Sophie Kammerer from the European Network Against Racism told IPS. "Although the measures were announced by the French at the end of July, the first press statement from Viviane Reding (the EU's justice commissioner) wasn't until the end of August. So almost a month passed with no reaction. Now, at least, the Commission is looking seriously into the matter."
Kammerer noted that under EU law, deportation orders must be given in writing one month before they take effect and must allow for the possibility that they can be appealed. "Clearly, this was not respected," she added. "The camps were dismantled one day and people were asked to leave the next day."
So far, however, Reding has not given any indication of whether she would be willing to start legal proceedings against France. Her spokesman Matthew Newman took issue with suggestions that the Commission had dithered in reacting to the French announcement.
The French offensive against Roma bears some similarities to an initiative unveiled by Italy in May 2008. The Italian "security package" provided for the dismantling of Roma camps and the automatic deportation of migrants who cannot prove that they have regular employment. Since then, thousands of Roma have been pushed out of Italy.
Europe's more recent wave of attacks against Roma kicked off in July when the mayor of Copenhagen Frank Jensen urged the Danish national authorities to ensure that "criminal Roma" were arrested and expelled. More than 20 Roma were deported from Denmark soon afterwards.
Germany, Belgium, Britain and Sweden are among the other EU countries that have either taken action against the Roma or stated their intention to do so. Meanwhile, anti-Roma sentiment and the tendency to blame Roma for crime has been vigorously exploited by far-right politicians in many parts of Europe. The Hungarian extremist party Jobbik has called for Roma to be forced to live in segregated camps from the general population. In response to its call, the Hungarian Socialist Party said it hoped that Jobbik did not wish to have "concentration camps" erected.
And racism against Roma manifested itself in a particularly violent way in Slovakia in late August when a gunman killed six members of a Roma family and another woman in Bratislava. Some human rights campaigners have linked the murders to the negative stereotyping of Roma by powerful European politicians."
No comments:
Post a Comment