Tag: protests

Yes, Anti-Israel Protests Are Free Speech

Last Friday, a group of college students penned a guest essay in The New York Times arguing that the wave of anti-Israel, pro-Palestine activity on many college campuses isn’tA New legitimate free expression—and that universities have a “moral responsibility” to combat it.

“Free speech, open debate and heterodox views lie at the core of academic life,” wrote Gabriel Diamond, Talia Dror, and Jillian Lederman, students at Yale, Cornell, and Brown respectively. “They are fundamental to educating future leaders to think and act morally. The reality on some college campuses today is the opposite: open intimidation of Jewish students. Mob harassment must not be confused with free speech.”

The authors point out several examples of clearly unprotected speech that have unfolded in recent weeks, such as online posts made by a Cornell student who threatened to “shoot up” a kosher dining hall, as well as several instances of physical violence against Jewish students.

However, many of the other examples the authors single out are blatantly First Amendment–protected expression.

“Masked students have chanted slogans such as ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,’ which many view as a call for the destruction of Israel. Others have shouted, ‘There is only one solution, intifada revolution,'” they write. Additionally, Diamond, Dror, and Lederman noted several examples of professors who made offensive statements about the terrorist attack, lamenting that “to the best of our knowledge, none of these professors have received meaningful discipline, much less dismissal.”

Despite their claimed commitments, the authors make a plain-faced call for censorship by invoking university speech codes.

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Sharp Rise in Facial Recognition Use by Scottish Police, UK Protest Footage Scanned

The police in Scotland have tripled the use of retrospective facial recognition over the last five years jumping from just under 1,300 in 2018 to nearly 4,000 in 2022.

The rising trend has continued during 2023 with more than 2,000 searches carried out in the first four months of the year, according to data obtained by a freedom of information request by UK investigative journalism organizations Liberty Investigates and The Ferret.

The trend has been rising in other parts of the country. In 2014, the total number of searches using retrospective facial recognition by all police forces in the UK amounted to just 3,360. By 2022, that number jumped to 85,158, according to UK Home Office data.

The Scottish police ranks fourth in the use of the technology in the UK. The leader is the London Metropolitan Police which accounted for 30 percent or 27,677 searches last year.

The UK police have been using retrospective facial recognition to match faces captured with CCTV cameras with millions of images stored in the Police National Database. The practice has proved controversial as the database still contains many images of people who were released without charge.

Police in Scotland operate a distinct policy from other UK forces, only uploading custody images to the database once an individual has been charged with a crime and removing images of those found innocent after 6 months.

Facial recognition use by the police has been a target of criticism from some lawmakers, non-governmental organizations and policy experts.

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Leak shows ex-Trump ambassador to Israel threatening NYU over Palestine protests

A letter sent to NYU leadership claims the school is “no longer a safe space for Jewish students” while demanding policies that would shatter free speech on campus. The letter was signed by David Friedman, Trump’s rabidly pro-settlement ambassador to Israel, as well as dozens of Jewish American alumni apparently afflicted with a particularly severe version of main character syndrome.

The letter demands that NYU ramp up security for Jewish students and add mandatory coursework on the issue of “in line with universal values, fact-based critical thinking, and civil discourse.”

Read the leaked letter, “A Message from the NYU Jewish community,” here.

Additionally, the letter demands that NYU create a position “dedicated to combating anti-Semitism.” The school already maintains no fewer than 15 positions dedicated to promoting “Global Inclusion, Diversity, and Strategic Innovation.”

The letter goes on to demand that NYU disband clubs that “utilize hate speech to promote violence and endorse terrorism” and pursue the criminal prosecution of students who “deface property and/or use hate speech in the name of terrorism.” It offers no definition of hate speech, however. The assumption seems to be that strong language denouncing Israel’s violent assault on Gaza, or supporting the Palestinian armed struggle, should be treated as equivalent to verbal threats, and even physical violence, against Jews.

While providing no evidence or documentation of open support for terrorism amongst the student body, the letter alludes to Student Bar Association president Ryna Workman, who authored an op-ed in the body’s weekly newsletter blaming the Israeli state policy of apartheid for inspiring the events of October 7. Workman was promptly canceled for her speech, losing not only her position as president of the Student Bar Association, but a job offer that had previously been extended to her. 

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Neo-Nazis and the Far-Right Are Trying to Hijack Pro-Palestine Protests

Around 40 people affiliated with the National Justice Party, a white nationalist and antisemitic group, gathered in front of the White House to protest Israel last weekend. The group was led by Mike Peinovich, a long-time white nationalist personality who previously used the alias “Mike Enoch,” and was one of the architects of the deadly 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.

Israel “is a pure genocidal state, make no mistake,” Peinovich told rally attendees over a PA system. “We Americans have been snookered into supporting [Israel] by Jewish control of our banks, our media, and our politicians, but we have to say enough and rise up as a people.”

Their small demonstration was dwarfed by the hundreds-strong protest that flooded the streets of Washington D.C. But Peinovich’s rhetoric is an example of how far-right antisemites are trying to use the pro-Palestine movement, hijack some of its language criticizing the Israeli government’s actions in Gaza, and then use that as a vehicle to push anti-Jewish conspiracy theories and tropes into the mainstream. 

The presence of the National Justice Party in D.C. shouldn’t be seen as an indication that there is some ideological kinship between that group and the wider pro-Palestine movement. Fringe extremist groups are first and foremost opportunists, and will leap at any chance to insert themselves into a popular movement. In 2020, the anti-government Boogaloo movement’s gun-toting adherents—including white supremacists—unsuccessfully tried to latch onto the Black Lives Matter movement by claiming they shared similar goals. 

“They’re not pro-Palestine, they just hate Jews, and they see this moment as an opportunity to get attention, get coverage, put their banners, their images, their ideas, into reporting patterns,” said Jon Lewis, a research fellow at George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, told VICE News of the recent displays by brazen antisemites. “Nine out of ten of them would probably happily commit a hate crime against anyone [at the pro-Palestine protest].”

The pro-Palestine movement has picked up enormous support in recent weeks, with hundreds of thousands of protesters taking to the streets in cities around the world to demand a ceasefire in Gaza, where intense bombardment by the Israeli government has led to the deaths of more than 8,000 people, including thousands of children. 

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UK Police Arrest Women Who Attended Gaza Protest Wearing Paraglider-Print Shirts

London police have made the latest in a series of arrests related to the repeated Gaza and Hamas protests in recent weeks, now arresting two women on suspicion of terrorism offences for wearing prints of paragliders stuck to their clothing at a rally.

Two women, aged 29 and 44 years old surrendered themselves to police and were arrested “on suspicion of inviting support for a proscribed organisation” under the Terrorism Act after the Metropolitan Police published their images in an appeal for information. The pair are being held at a police station, the force said.

Images of four people had been published by police on the 27th relating to “Pro-Palestine” protests on October 14th and 21st, with three of those being women wearing print-outs of paragliders taped to their clothes. The fourth was a man carrying a “I fully support Hamas” placard.

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Protests In Suweida Reminiscent Of 2011 — Who Is Behind Them?

Twelve years after the initiation of the Western-backed destabilization in Syria, it appears the Western intelligence and military apparatus is once again attempting to stir up a “popular” revolution against the government of Bashar al-Assad. This time, however, not only do they continue to use their proxy fighters in the form of terrorists and Kurdish fanatics, they are also attempting to use the domestic population to further fracture Syrian society.

Having suffered through over a dozen years of horrific warfare that saw their country largely destroyed and an almost unimaginable loss of life, Syrians were then saddled with American (and thus Western) sanctions that have brought the entire Syrian economy to a halt, causing as much suffering as the war itself at least in terms of living standards for the average Syrian.

With the frontlines largely quiet except for daily shelling and occasional airstrikes, Syrians are forced to reckon with the fact that, even with the guns silent, their lives will not return to normal or to any sense of normalcy. Basic necessities like electricity, fuel, medical care, and food are are scarce and have been scarce for some time. Certainly, they have been scarce long enough for the words of their government to “hold on just a little longer” to start feeling hollow. Indeed, starving Syrians have begun to look at Syrian government officials whose lives do continue on as normal with the resentful eyes of the hungry that only someone with an empty belly can truly understand.

This resentment is what Western powers are attempting to take advantage of.

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Ban on protests supporting Palestinians is disproportionate attack on the right to protest in France

Following the request from the Minister of the Interior Gerald Darmanin asking the prefects in France to ban all pro-Palestinian demonstrations, Jean-Claude Samouiller, President of Amnesty International France said:

“The ban on all demonstrations in support of the Palestinians in France constitutes a serious and disproportionate attack on the right to demonstrate.

Faced with the atrocities committed by Hamas in southern Israel, and also the blockade and very heavy bombings in the Gaza Strip, it is important that civil society actors can mobilize peacefully and publicly, in particular those calling on those engaged in the conflict to respect the rights of civilian populations. This is why there cannot be a systematic ban on the right to peacefully demonstrate support for the rights of the Palestinian populations.

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Jewish NYC Councilwoman Inna Vernikov arrested for carrying gun at pro-Palestinian rally

Republican Brooklyn Councilwoman Inna Vernikov was arrested Thursday when she was spotted toting a firearm at a pro-Palestinian rally— resulting in calls for her to be removed from office.

The councilwoman, who is Jewish and has spoken out against pro-Palestinian supporters, was in attendance as protesters convened on the campus of CUNY’s Brooklyn College Thursday.

“[Vernikov] was observed with the but-end of a firearm (handgun) protruding from the front portion of her pants” while observing the protest between noon and 2:45 p.m. Thursday, police sources told The Post.

“The Councilwoman eventually left the location and upon notification to police, the Councilwoman was contacted and she turned herself in to the 70 Precinct, in the company of her attorney [around 2:50 a.m. Friday],” the sources continued.

The 39-year-old was arrested and charged with possession of a firearm because she was on school grounds, the sources said.

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Not The Onion: Bernie Sanders’ Staffers Have Left-Wing Antiwar Activists Arrested Outside Office

A group of 50 activists and Vermont constituents staged a sit-in inside Senator Bernie Sanders’ office on Wednesday, demanding the senator to call for peace and diplomacy in Ukraine instead of more weapons and war. The sit-in resulted in the arrest of 11 activists, including an 89-year-old CODEPINK peace activist.

The group was joined by Green Party Presidential Candidate Dr. Cornel West in the Senate lobby for a prayer vigil before the sit-in. The prayer vigil and sit-in were part of a week of action that included an antiwar rally on Tuesday night featuring Dr. West, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Chair at Union Theological Seminary; Claudia de la Cruz, Co-Executive Director of The People’s Forum; Lee Camp, American comedian, writer, podcaster, news journalist; Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK and Global Exchange; and Eugene Puryear, American journalist, activist, and host on Breakthrough News.

“We need Bernie to provide leadership to put a stop to the US funding of the Ukraine war now. Use the money for healthcare, not warfare,” said Burlington resident James Marc Leas.

Crystal Zevon, an artist and CODEPINK peace activist from Barnet, VT, expressed her disappointment in Senator Sanders, who has voted for more weapons to Ukraine and even criticized Democrats who called for peace talks. “Yes, Bernie should condemn the Russian invasion, but he should also be calling for a negotiated end to this brutal war,” said Zevon.

The group carried signs in support of peace talks and negotiations, including one quote from the Senator himself in which he previously called for a diplomatic solution.

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Man Given Secret Jan. 6 Plea Deal Finished His Prison Sentence With No Public Court Record

A Jan. 6 defendant from Pennsylvania originally charged with felonies including assaulting police at the U.S. Capitol and civil disorder was given a secret plea deal and served his entire prison term without details being recorded on a public court docket.

Samuel Lazar, 37, of Ephrata, Pa., was arrested by the FBI on July 26, 2021, and later charged in a superseding indictment (pdf) with assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers, civil disorder, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon, engaging in physical violence in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon, and an act of physical violence in the Capitol grounds or buildings.

Mr. Lazar was ordered detained until trial despite his numerous requests for reconsideration.

On March 8, 2022, Mr. Lazar accepted a deal from prosecutors and pleaded guilty to one felony: assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers and aiding and abetting. The plea deal included language that Mr. Lazar would assist federal authorities with the ongoing Jan. 6 investigation, according to a case status report (pdf) filed on Oct. 2.

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