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Democracy Now!
Amy Goodman
There has never been a more urgent time for courageous, daily, independent news. Media is essential to the functioning of a democratic society. Can you support Democracy Now! with $15 donation today? With your contribution, we can continue to go to where the silence is, to bring you the voices of the silenced majority – those calling for peace in a time of war, demanding action on the climate catastrophe and advocating for racial and economic justice. Every dollar makes a difference. Thank you so much!
Democracy Now!
Amy Goodman
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The U.S. is urging the U.N. Security Council to adopt a resolution in support of the Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal outlined by President Biden. Israel and Hamas have not yet agreed to the deal. Israel continues to pummel the Gaza Strip, where the official death toll has topped 36,500, with over 82,000 injured. Israel has killed at least 15,000 Palestinian children since October 7. In Khan Younis, relatives searched on Monday for loved ones after another Israeli airstrike.
Samar al-Breim: “I am shocked. I am looking for my mother. My wish is to see my mother. I want to find her in front of me. God is my suffice and my best disposer of my affairs. Children who are innocent were asleep. They threw an explosive barrel on them. They tore them apart. What have they done to deserve this? … This feeling is indescribable. It is like we’re in a nightmare. It is as though we are in a dream. A dream. I pray to God that I wake up and find out that it was only a dream and that it is not true.”
In other news from Khan Younis, displaced Gazans were flooded with sewage Monday as a pipeline burst in the overcrowded city, pouring waste into tents.
The Israeli military said Monday four more Israeli hostages have died. Hamas had previously said three of the men, who were all in their eighties, were killed in Israeli airstrikes.
Meanwhile, the U.N. has condemned the “unprecedented bloodshed” in the occupied West Bank, where over 500 Palestinians have been killed since October 7. Over the weekend, two teenagers were killed by Israeli forces.
Iranian media said Monday’s Israeli airstrikes in Aleppo, Syria, killed a Revolutionary Guards general.
Yemen’s Houthi movement says its fighters targeted a military site in Israel’s port city of Eilat as it vows to keep intensifying its attacks. The Israeli military says it intercepted the ballistic missile.
The Maldives says it is banning Israeli tourists over their government’s “genocidal acts” in Gaza.
Meanwhile, a group of U.N. experts said Monday all nations “must follow the example of 146 United Nations Member States and recognize the State of Palestine”.
At the University of Toronto, students and faculty held a vigil Monday for the students in Gaza who have been deprived of a graduation due to the war. Graduation caps adorned empty chairs in tribute to Palestinian students who have been killed or have had their lives upended. University of Toronto students say they will continue their encampment protest until their school divests from Israel.
Sara Rasikh: “U of T’s investments serve the interests of the Israeli state. That is not neutrality. Palestinian students and their tuition money is going into these weapons manufacturing companies that are committing the murder of their family members and their friends. This is despicable, and we must stand up against it.”
In San Francisco, police arrested 70 protesters who occupied the first floor of the Israeli Consulate and refused to leave Monday. This is one of the activists.
Margot: “We are the red line. The people are going to have to end this. People power has always been the change. Our government is not listening, and they are enabling this genocide. And so we have to be the disruptors and make it stop.”
Here in New York, as Pride Month gets underway, hundreds of queer activists took to the streets and staged a die-in, calling for a ceasefire and an end to U.S. funding for Israel. Activists are demanding mainstream LGBTQ+ groups like Outright International speak out against the war.
In Bonn, Germany, protesters interrupted a U.N. climate conference ahead of November’s COP29, holding up a banner that read, “No business as usual during a genocide.”
As votes are still being tallied in India’s election, early results show Prime Minister Narendra Modi is poised to win a third term. But his Hindu nationalist BJP party appears to have lost significant support since the last elections in 2019, and the opposition Indian National Congress looks likely to double its parliamentary seats. We’ll go to Delhi for the latest after headlines.
In Sudan, the U.N. is again warning of the spiraling humanitarian disaster.
Jens Laerke: “Time is running out for millions of people, including 3.6 million acutely malnourished children who are at risk of famine, and they are displaced from their lands, living under bombardments and cut off from humanitarian aid.”
Fighting between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces remains particularly intense in Khartoum and the Darfur city of El Fasher. At least 15,550 people have been killed and nearly 9 million displaced since the conflict broke out in April of last year.
In Nigeria, union leaders have launched another strike demanding salary increases for workers amid the skyrocketing cost of living. The strike forced major airports and Nigeria’s electricity grid to shut down Monday. Workers across Abuja and Lagos walked off the job, while others blocked the entrances to offices. This is a leader with Nigeria’s air transport union, Emmanuel Jaja.
Emmanuel Jaja: “Now we are inflicting hardship on Nigerians, which is not a normal thing. So, if it is a government that is thinking about their citizens, I think they should rethink, and we’ll go back to the table.”
President Biden is expected to sign an executive order that would temporarily shut down the U.S.-Mexico border and suspend protections for migrants seeking asylum. Under the new measure, U.S. officials would cap asylum requests at the southern border at no more than 2,500 per day. The border would be closed if asylum claims surpass that figure. The executive order is likely to face legal challenges and has been described as the most restrictive border policy issued by any recent Democratic president. Mexico’s cooperation is key in enforcing the order, as migrants barred from the U.S. would be forced to wait across the border.
ProPublica has revealed Donald Trump’s businesses and campaign committees have given significant financial benefits to at least nine witnesses in the various criminal cases against the former president, in what legal experts say could amount to witness tampering. ProPublica reports one campaign aide had his salary doubled; another received a $2 million severance package barring him from voluntarily cooperating with law enforcement.
This comes as Donald Trump has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to annul his guilty verdict in New York.
The Texas Supreme Court on Friday rejected a challenge by 20 patients and two abortion providers who sued Texas after the state’s abortion ban prevented them from receiving, or administering, urgent healthcare. The lawsuit sought to clarify and expand the medical exceptions that are supposedly permitted under the abortion ban. The Center for Reproductive Rights, which brought the case, said, “As women across the country are finding out, exceptions to abortion bans are illusory and it is dangerous to be pregnant in any state that bans abortion.”
Here in New York City, community organizers are condemning plans to build a new police training facility in Queens that will cost some $225 million. New York City Mayor Eric Adams made the announcement Friday. Construction for the training center is expected to begin in 2026, with plans for it to be operational in 2030. Critics have compared the so-called Public Safety Academy to Atlanta’s widely contested Cop City, a massive $90 million police training complex being built in the Weelaunee Forest.
In Hong Kong, some activists are marking the 35th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre despite a ban on protests and a heightened crackdown by authorities. On Monday, police arrested artist Sanmu Chen as he engaged in a protest performance. In the middle of a busy street, Chen appeared to mimic pouring himself a drink and toasting, followed by drawing the numbers “8964” in the air with his fingers — the date of the massacre. On June 4, 1989, the Chinese military attacked a student-led pro-democracy protest in Beijing, killing hundreds, if not thousands, of people.
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