All posts tagged: Gaza

Remembering Gaza photojournalist Fatma Hassona

Remembering Gaza photojournalist Fatma Hassona

Published by skeptic

(RNS) — “If I die, I want a loud death,” she once said. “An impact that will remain through time.” Fatma Hassona’s words, spoken not with arrogance but with purpose, were not simply a wish. They were a reflection of how she lived. A life of purpose. A life of vision. A life rooted in truth. On April 16, just days before her wedding, Fatma (whose name is also spelled Fatima Hassouna) was killed by an Israeli airstrike on her family home in the Al-Touffah neighborhood of Gaza City. Ten members of her family were killed with her, including her pregnant sister.  She died holding her camera, just as she had lived, documenting the suffering of her people with a lens that refused to blink, even when the world did. Fatma was no ordinary photojournalist. She, like so many of the murdered journalists before her, was part of the conscience of Gaza. Through her work, she gave the world access to the unbearable: Children mourning their parents. Neighborhoods reduced to rubble. Mothers baking bread in …

Israel’s A.I. Experiments in Gaza War Raise Ethical Concerns

Israel’s A.I. Experiments in Gaza War Raise Ethical Concerns

Published by skeptic

In late 2023, Israel was aiming to assassinate Ibrahim Biari, a top Hamas commander in the northern Gaza Strip who had helped plan the Oct. 7 massacres. But Israeli intelligence could not find Mr. Biari, who they believed was hidden in the network of tunnels underneath Gaza. So Israeli officers turned to a new military technology infused with artificial intelligence, three Israeli and American officials briefed on the events said. The technology was developed a decade earlier but had not been used in battle. Finding Mr. Biari provided new incentive to improve the tool, so engineers in Israel’s Unit 8200, the country’s equivalent of the National Security Agency, soon integrated A.I. into it, the people said. Shortly thereafter, Israel listened to Mr. Biari’s calls and tested the A.I. audio tool, which gave an approximate location for where he was making his calls. Using that information, Israel ordered airstrikes to target the area on Oct. 31, 2023, killing Mr. Biari. More than 125 civilians also died in the attack, according to Airwars, a London-based conflict monitor. …

Reoccupying Gaza | Joshua Leifer

Reoccupying Gaza | Joshua Leifer

Published by skeptic

In the early morning hours of March 18, Israel unilaterally broke the cease-fire it had agreed to with Hamas in Gaza two months earlier, launching a crushing aerial campaign across the territory. In less than twenty-four hours, Israeli warplanes killed more than four hundred people and wounded hundreds more.  The assault has continued unabated ever since. On March 31, during the holiday of Eid al-Fitr, Israel issued an evacuation order that covered much of southern Gaza, displacing more than a hundred thousand people, most of whom have been displaced multiple times before; nearly half a million in total have been forced to leave their homes since the end of the cease-fire. On April 3 Israeli airstrikes killed at least a hundred people across the Strip, including at least twenty-seven who had taken shelter at the Dar al-Arqam school in Gaza City. Just days later they killed at least thirty-two. Since the shattering of the cease-fire, according to health officials in Gaza, Israeli forces have killed more than 1,500 Palestinians.  After Israel blocked the entry of all goods and humanitarian aid early …

Thousands of Gaza children are malnourished under Israel’s food blockade, aid groups say

Thousands of Gaza children are malnourished under Israel’s food blockade, aid groups say

Published by skeptic

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Aid groups are raising new alarm over Israel’s blockade of the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, where it has barred entry of all food and other goods for more than six weeks. Thousands of children have become malnourished, and most people are barely eating one meal a day as stocks dwindle, the United Nations says. The warning came as Israeli strikes overnight and into Thursday killed at least 27 people, including at least six women and 15 children. The humanitarian aid system in Gaza “is facing total collapse,” the heads of 12 independent aid organizations warned in a joint statement. They said many groups have shut down operations because Israel’s resumed bombardment the past month has made it too dangerous. No food, fuel, medicine or any other supplies have entered Gaza since Israel imposed its blockade on March 2. It renewed its bombardment on March 18, breaking a ceasefire, and seized large parts of the territory, saying it aims to push Hamas to release more hostages. Hundreds have been killed, and …

Image of boy mutilated by Israeli airstrike wins World Press Photo

Image of boy mutilated by Israeli airstrike wins World Press Photo

Published by skeptic

Palestinian photojournalist Samar Abu Elouf has won 2025’s World Press Photo award for her image of a Gazan boy whose arms were mutilated by an Israeli airstrike. Abu Elouf took the photo of Mahmoud Ajjour, then aged nine, for The New York Times. At the award ceremony in Amsterdam on Wednesday, she said that the image makes her think of her own four children. “When I see Mahmoud, I think of him as if he was my own son,” she said. Like her subject, Abu Elouf is from Gaza. She was evacuated from the territory and now resides in the same Doha apartment complex in Qatar where Mahmoud lives with his family. “I used to see him looking at the children playing, and I used to feel his pain,” she said. After Ajjour agreed to have his photo taken, Abu Elouf asked his mother to contact her when the sun was shining into their apartment. The way in which the boy’s head and shoulders are illuminated by the light gives the impression of a classical …

‘Where Should the Birds Fly?’  | Adam Shatz

‘Where Should the Birds Fly?’  | Adam Shatz

Published by skeptic

In 1991 the Tunisian oud player and composer Anouar Brahem released his first album on ECM, Barzakh, a trio that also featured Béchir Selmi on violin and Lassad Hosni on percussion. “Barzakh”—“separation” or “barrier” in Arabic—is a word rich in significations. In Islamic theology it refers to the intermediate stage between death and resurrection, when the spirit is separated from the body. But within Sufism and other forms of mysticism for which Brahem feels an affinity, barzakh is a bridge between the material world and the spiritual world, a jumping-off point that initiates a process of becoming, transformation, and transcendence.  Brahem has worked in this zone of metamorphosis throughout his career. Steeped in the musical traditions of the Arab world, he is in no way confined to them. His is an art of the in-between, an art of liminality rather than “fusion,” performed by musicians who practice a range of genres yet share a sense of adventure, of attraction to the unknown.  After the Last Sky, his twelfth album on ECM, has many of the signature …

Renewed conflict in Gaza

Renewed conflict in Gaza

Published by skeptic

Humanists UK expresses its deep concern over the resumption of hostilities in Gaza and Israel following the breakdown of ceasefire negotiations and calls on the UK government  to use every channel available to press for civilian protection, humanitarian access, and resumed ceasefire negotiations. The renewed violence in the region brings with it an increase in the devastating human toll that has characterised this conflict. Already weakened infrastructure faces further destruction, civilian casualties continue to mount, and humanitarian conditions — particularly in Gaza — deteriorate to crisis levels. The World Health Organisation has previously reported critical shortages of medical supplies, while the UN has warned of widespread hunger and displacement affecting hundreds of thousands of people. The humanist perspective is one grounded in a commitment to reason, evidence, and the inherent dignity of every person. As such we believe that our shared humanity and capacity for empathy provide common ground for addressing this conflict. While respecting diverse perspectives on historical and cultural claims, we maintain that protecting human life, alleviating suffering, and securing basic rights must …

‘Mahmoud Is Not Safe’

‘Mahmoud Is Not Safe’

Published by skeptic

Mahmoud Khalil has been a public face of the pro-Palestine student movement at Columbia University and Barnard College since last spring. I have known him for over a year. During the encampment on campus he served as the lead negotiator with the Columbia administration: a mature, gentle human being and a sophisticated political thinker, he […] Source link

Trump ‘slurred’ Schumer as a Palestinian. In most parts of the world, it’s a compliment.

Trump ‘slurred’ Schumer as a Palestinian. In most parts of the world, it’s a compliment.

Published by skeptic

(RNS) — Last year, as I arrived in Ireland, the airport customs officer asked me where I was originally from. I told her, “Palestine.” She looked at me, smiled, and said, “Every true Irish person is Palestinian at heart as well.” And with that, she stamped my passport and let me in. On Wednesday (March 12) in Washington, President Donald Trump, sitting beside Irish Prime Minister Michael Martin in the Oval Office, used the word “Palestinian” as a slur to talk down Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. “Schumer is a Palestinian as far as I’m concerned. He’s become a Palestinian. He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore. He’s a Palestinian,” Trump said, responding to a reporter’s question about Schumer’s views on corporate taxes. The contrast is striking. The Irish, a people who understand colonialism and occupation in their bones, see Palestinians as their kin. The American political class treats “Palestinian” as something shameful. The Irish aren’t the only ones who talk about Palestinians with respect. This week, meeting with a displaced Gazan family, Mohammad Tahir, the …