If I was Syrian, Yemeni, Burmese, Uighur or Tigray I'd wonder why my life mattered so much less than that of an Israeli or Palestinian.
The Tigray War erupted in November. A study from Ghent University found 7,819 civilian casualties, but believes that this is an "extreme underrepresentation". But there's no footballers holding Tigray flags, no movie stars making Insta posts. Nothing.
Of course, any individual can choose what issue to devote campaigning energy to. But objectively, why is the mass murder and ethnic cleansing of the Tigray unworthy of rolling news, urgent Security Council meetings and huge protests?
The Finchley Road runs through the heart of London's Jewish community in Golders Green. This small convoy is chanting "Fuck their mothers" "rape their daughters" and "show your support for Palestine" out of a loudspeaker.
While I haven't been able to independently verify this video, it appears to be original. It sounded like the first word of the recording might be "Jews" as suggested in the caption, but the recording started too late for me to be sure.
slightly longer version: yeah, it starts "Fuck the Jews", just so we all know whose mothers and daughters he's talking about.
This post by Trump was shared in the big QAnon influencers Telegram group — a group with 215,000 of Trump's most hardcore supporters. How do we think it will be received there?
Yup.
"Why is he pushing vaccines? I really don’t get it. Aren’t the vaccines the things that will kill people ?"
"He wants trump haters to associate the vaccine with him and avoid it"
Or maybe it's the opposite: He wants people to take the vaccines *because* they'll be harmed and then they'll support him instead of the Democrats?
Or "Maybe he has a vaccine planned that counteracts this vaccine 🤷♀️" speculates one anon.
I'm quoted in this article about misinformation and rumour in the current conflict in Israel and Gaza. Lots of dodgy content flying around. Some is malicious, some just confused. nytimes.com/2021/05/14/tec…
Often, when I point out to someone that a photo or video isn't from this conflict, the person believes me. They genuinely didn't know. But they ALSO think it doesn't matter that it's old because it still 'represents' what's happening.
Thing is, that's not an *entirely* incorrect point. It's very common for a news story to be illustrated by an old photo, for example. Yes, it says so in the caption but those captions aren't shown on the social cards generated on FB, Twitter etc. The old photo is.
So from media reports, it looks like Netanyahu, Naftali Bennett and Ra'am's Mansour Abbas have done a deal:
1. Bennett pulls out of the new coalition because "we can't have a Government that depends on Mansour Abbas", and backs Netanyahu again.
2. Bennett and Netanyahu have reportedly convinced Mansour Abbas to back a "direct election" bill. The winner of the election would get 90 days to form a Government in this Knesset.
If the conflict hadn't erupted, Naftali Bennett would probably be replacing Netanyahu as Prime Minister today. If this report pans out, Netanyahu will survive to fight a fifth election.
I don't think Netanyahu deliberately caused this escalation. On the contrary, he overruled the police and ordered the Jerusalem Day Flag March out of the Muslim Quarter. He asked the courts to shelve the Sheikh Jarrah evictions. But he's benefiting from it anyway.
When I wrote this last week I didn't expect the situation to arise even before the new government was sworn in arieh.substack.com/p/will-a-rainb…
Unfortunately, this is exactly what happened tonight. Jewish mobs seriously beat Arabs. Arab mobs seriously beat Jews. Terrible, but also completely predictable. Police completely absent in most cases.
There were plenty of heroes tonight. Arabs who put out synagogue fires started by arson in Jaffa. Jewish workers at a petrol station in northern Israel hiding Arab colleagues from a racist mob.
But the night doesn't belong to the heroes. A Jew in Acre was hit by rocks from an Arab mob and is in critical condition. An Arab man in Bat Yam was beaten by a Jewish mob and is also seriously wounded.