Retired professor of planetary science, mostly plasma physics of outer planet magnetospheres, widower, three children, six grandchildren, human rights and peace activist(not sources of popularity in Israel)
Indigenous tribes do not simply die out. They are killed by the actions of so-called civilized nations. Survival International provides a long list of cases in which a letter from you can and will make a difference. Please open this link and write at least one letter. This link will be a permanent feature on our blog and we would be grateful if you gave it a bit of attention each week. We suggest going down the list in the order given. The letters are pre-written for you. All you need to do is send them. It would be nice also if a donation to Survival International could be forthcoming. They are the best conservationists--help that fact go viral.
We have added this section to the blog in order to join the struggle against slavery worldwide. This week we refer you to the the ILO’s Protocol on Forced Labor which is all about modern slavery. We call your attention to the anti slavery campaign. There you can sign up for action updates.The importance of checking your sellers’ supply chains cannot be overemphasized.
*We have great news for you! Thai authorities have finally dropped extradition charges against refugee footballer Hakeem al-Araibi. He will now be able to return to his family and friends in Australia. This is a triumph for human rights activism. Thank you for all your support throughout the campaign! For the history of the case, click here.
On his way home!
CÔTE D’IVOIRE
Urgent Action: Detained Online Activist Alleges Torture in Prison
Soro Tangboho, alias Carton noir, an outspoken online activist, was arbitrarily arrested on 8 November 2018 in the town of Korhogo (the north of the country). He was detained and subjected to torture and other ill-treatment while live streaming a video on Facebook showing police officers who were, according to him, extorting money from motorists. He has been accused of disrupting public order. Soro Tangboho is currently hospitalized at the MACA prison clinic.
Urgent Action: Bill Could Grant Amnesty for Grave Crimes
Guatemala’s Congress could imminently pass a law that would grant an amnesty to those suspected or found guilty of crimes such as genocide, torture, and enforced disappearances during the internal armed conflict (1960-1996). The bill could lead to the release of those found guilty within 24 hours of its approval. It would also lead to the suspension of ongoing investigations into these crimes. Guatemala’s Congress must refrain from passing this bill to respect the rights of victims to justice, truth and reparation.
Urgent Action Update: Detained Journalist Denied Family Visits
Journalist Amade Abubacar was transferred from the Macomia district prison to Mieze prison in Pemba district, the capital of Cabo Delgado province on 24 January. Since then prison authorities have denied him family visits. He was allowed one supervised visit with members of a Commission of the Mozambican Bar Association and his lawyer on 25 January where he alleged that he had been subjected to ill-treatment while in military detention.
Our featured image shows Miriam, (1947-2012), a great human rights defender
HE WHO PERMITS OPPRESSION PERMITS CRIMES.-Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)
Desiderius Erasmus in 1523 as depicted by Hans Holbein the Younger. The Greek and Latin words on the book translate to “The Herculean Labors of Erasmus of Rotterdam”.
CHARITY CORNER
This week we turn our attention to the issue of keeping girls in school in Third World countries. The project is supported via global giving by the American Foundation for Children with AIDS. Their mission statement:
Mission
The American Foundation for Children with AIDS (AFCA) is a
non-profit organization providing critical comprehensive services to
infected and affected HIV+ children and their caregivers. Our programs
are efficient, promoting self-reliance and sustainability. Since 2005,
in collaboration with our in-country partners, we have served tens of
thousands of families in some of the most underserved and marginalized
communities in Africa. Our areas of impact include: medical support,
livelihoods, educational support and emergency relief.
We urge you to donate to this worthy cause.
INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
Indigenous tribes do not simply die out. They are killed by the actions of so-called civilized nations. Survival International provides a long list of cases in which a letter from you can and will make a difference. Please open this link and write at least one letter. This link will be a permanent feature on our blog and we would be grateful if you gave it a bit of attention each week. We suggest going down the list in the order given. The letters are pre-written for you. All you need to do is send them. It would be nice also if a donation to Survival International could be forthcoming. They are the best conservationists--help that fact go viral.
We have added this section to the blog in order to join the struggle against slavery worldwide. This week we refer you to the the ILO’s Protocol on Forced Labor which is all about modern slavery. We call your attention to the anti slavery campaign. There you can sign up for action updates.The importance of checking your sellers’ supply chains cannot be overemphasized.
Urgent Action Victory! Mauritanian Anti-Slavery Activists Released
Two anti-slavery activists Biram Dah Abeid and Abdellahi el Housein Mesoud were released from Nouakchott civil Prison on 31 December 2018. The Tribunal of Arafat in Nouakchott sentenced them to six months, two months of which would be a suspended sentence. Having already spent more than four months in prison, Biram and Abdellahi were released the same day.
Biram Dah Abeid
NO FURTHER ACTION IS REQUESTED. MANY THANKS TO ALL WHO SENT APPEALS.
MEXICO
Urgent Action: Two Activists Killed Among Escalating Violence
On 17 January, unidentified armed men attacked demonstrators in Amatán, Chiapas state, southern Mexico. Noé Jiménez Pablo and José Santiago Gómez Álvarez, two economic, social and cultural rights activists and members of the Independent Regional Campesino Movement (MOCRI – Movimiento Campesino Regional Independiente), were taken and deprived of their liberty by the armed men. The following day, their wounded dead bodies appeared in a local dumpster. In reaction to this attack, the government took measures like sending a few law enforcement officials, but members of the community fear further attacks and that these measures are insufficient to protect them.
Urgent Action: Canadian Sentenced to Death in a One-Day Retrial
Robert Schellenberg, a Canadian national, was sentenced to death after he was convicted of drug trafficking at his re-trial. First arrested in 2014, he was convicted and sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment by the Dalian Municipal Intermediate People’s Court on 20 November 2018. Schellenberg subsequently appealed the verdict and on 14 January 2019 at his retrial, he was found guilty of a more serious drug-related offense and sentenced to death. Announcing a death sentence at the same time of the conviction was unprecedented, according to Mo Shaoping, a partner of the law firm representing Schellenberg.
Urgent Action: Peaceful Protesters Attacked and One Murdered
Protest at Christmas time in Manila
Hundreds of workers from southern Philippines have been camping out in Manila since 27 November 2018 to protest the labor conditions on Japanese-owned Sumitomo Fruit Corporation (Sumifru) plantations. Since declaring a strike on 1 October 2018, the workers have faced multiple attacks, including the killing of a prominent union member and the burning down of the union’s office and the houses of some members. A prompt, thorough and impartial investigation by the Philippine authorities into the threats and attacks should be conducted immediately, and the authorities must also guarantee the safety of the protesting workers.
Stop the Outsourcing of Danger – Justice for Kim Yong-gyun!
Kim Yong-gyun, a 24-year-old subcontracted worker was killed after getting stuck in a coal conveyer belt at the Taean Power Plant. Kim was working alone in the dark, doing extremely dangerous work. According to the occupational health and safety rules in the manual, Kim should have been working in a team of two.
Union leaders imprisoned for having negotiated a collective agreement
Guatemala has been going through an institutional crisis in recent months that has now become more acute. The Jimmy Morales government has systematically increased the persecution of community leaders, activists, journalists and trade unionists.
Luis Alpirez Guzmán, General Secretary of the National Union of Health Workers of Guatemala (SNTSG), and Dora Regina Ruano, from the same organization, were detained for nearly ten days (17-28 January) for negotiating and signing a collective agreement between the union and the Ministry of Health authorities back in 2013.
Our featured image shows our beloved Miriam (1947-2012), a great human rights defender
HE WHO PERMITS OPPRESSION PERMITS CRIMES.-Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)
Desiderius Erasmus in 1523 as depicted by Hans Holbein the Younger. The Greek and Latin words on the book translate to “The Herculean Labors of Erasmus of Rotterdam”.
CHARITY CORNER
This week we turn our attention to the Center of Reproductive Rights. They are now marking 46 years since Roe vs Wade. Please donate to support access to abortion and other rights.
INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
Indigenous tribes do not simply die out. They are killed by the actions of so-called civilized nations. Survival International provides a long list of cases in which a letter from you can and will make a difference. Please open this link and write at least one letter. This link will be a permanent feature on our blog and we would be grateful if you gave it a bit of attention each week. We suggest going down the list in the order given. The letters are pre-written for you. All you need to do is send them. It would be nice also if a donation to Survival International could be forthcoming. They are the best conservationists--help that fact go viral.
We have added this section to the blog in order to join the struggle against slavery worldwide. This week we refer you to the the ILO’s Protocol on Forced Labor which is all about modern slavery. We call your attention to the anti slavery campaign. There you can sign up for action updates.The importance of checking your sellers’ supply chains cannot be overemphasized.
Urgent Action Update: Lawyer Detained In Undisclosed Location
On 15 January 2019, Hoda Abdelmoniem appeared before the prosecution for investigation, and her pre-trial detention was renewed for 15 days. Hoda told her daughter that she is being detained in an undisclosed location. Hoda’s last appearance before the public prosecution was on 21 November 2018, after her 20 days of enforced disappearance. From 2 December 2018 until 14 January 2019, Hoda’s lawyer and family could not find her in any prison and did not know about her fate and whereabouts.
Urgent Action: Administrative Detention for Facebook Posts
Kishorchandra Wangkhem, a journalist based in Manipur, India, was arrested in August, and again in November 2018, because of Facebook posts where he criticized the government. While he was released on bail in both cases, on 27 November, he was arrested under the National Security Act (NSA). This draconian administrative detention law allows for him to be imprisoned for 12 months without charge or trial, in violation of regular criminal justice safeguards. The High Court of Manipur will hear his challenge to his detention under the NSA on 1 February 2019.
Urgent Action Update: New Charges Against Prisoner of Conscience
A photo of Mehman Huseynov, photojournalist, blogger and youth activist on Azerbaijan, potentially facing 5 years in jail on charges of \”hooliganism\”.
On 26 December 2018, the Azerbaijani authorities brought new criminal charges against prisoner of conscience Mehman Huseynov, just as his current jail term nears to an end. The prominent journalist has been charged with assault for allegedly attacking an inspector at the detention center. Mehman Huseynov denies the accusation. On 26 December 2018, he went on a hunger strike in protest of the new criminal charges and there are now grave concerns for his health which has been reported by his lawyer as ‘critical’. If convicted, Mehman Huseynov could face up to seven more years in jail. He must be immediately and unconditionally released.
The Education International (EI) invites the global union community to write to President Rodrigo Duterte to express its outrage at the death threats received by the General Secretary of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT), Mr. Raymond Basilio, and at the unlawful profiling of union members by the Philippine authorities.
Our featured image shows our beloved Miriam (1947-2012) a great human rights defender
HE WHO PERMITS OPPRESSION PERMITS CRIMES.-Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)
Desiderius Erasmus in 1523 as depicted by Hans Holbein the Younger. The Greek and Latin words on the book translate to “The Herculean Labors of Erasmus of Rotterdam”.
At the Center for Biological Diversity, we believe
that the welfare of human beings is deeply linked to nature — to the
existence in our world of a vast diversity of wild animals and
plants. Because diversity has intrinsic value, and because its loss
impoverishes society, we work to secure a future for all species,
great and small, hovering on the brink of extinction. We do so through
science, law and creative media, with a focus on protecting the lands,
waters and climate that species need to survive.
We want those who come after us to inherit a world where the wild is still alive.
These bears are victims of oil drilling and climate change
Join us. They are highly rated by all the charity monitors.
INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
Indigenous tribes do not simply die out. They are killed by the actions of so-called civilized nations. Survival International provides a long list of cases in which a letter from you can and will make a difference. Please open this link and write at least one letter. This link will be a permanent feature on our blog and we would be grateful if you gave it a bit of attention each week. We suggest going down the list in the order given. The letters are pre-written for you. All you need to do is send them. It would be nice also if a donation to Survival International could be forthcoming. They are the best conservationists--help that fact go viral.
We have added this section to the blog in order to join the struggle against slavery worldwide. This week we refer you to the the ILO’s Protocol on Forced Labor which is all about modern slavery. We call your attention to the anti slavery campaign. There you can sign up for action updates.The importance of checking your sellers’ supply chains cannot be overemphasized.
Urgent Action: Homophobic Crackdown In Chechnya Resumes
The Chechen authorities have unleashed a new wave of attacks on people believed to be gay or lesbian. At least 40 individuals have been arbitrarily detained and tortured in Chechnya, a republic in the south of Russia. At least two people are reported to have been tortured to death.
Amade Abubacar, a journalist at Nacedje community radio, was arrested on 5 January 2019, by the police in Macomia district, Cabo Delgado province, northern Mozambique. The police confiscated his cell phone, handcuffed him and took him to Macomia’s Police Station. Amade Abubacar was arrested when he was interviewing internally displaced civilians who fled their homes due to the intensification of violent attacks in the northern Cabo Delgado. Amade Abubacar is being held in incommunicado detention, he has not been officially charged with any crime and has not been granted access to his lawyer.
Urgent Action Update: Woman Attacked for Seeking Justice for Son
Endangered human rights defender
On 11 January, two unidentified men in a motorbike shot three times at the car in which Alfamir Castillo was in a rural area of the municipality of Pradera, Valle del Cauca Department, southern Colombia. Alfamir Castillo was with her husband and two bodyguards granted by the National Protection Unit and were not injured. Alfamir Castillo has faced several threats and attacks for years as she is seeking justice for the unlawful killing of her son by members of the Colombian armed forces.
Our featured image shows our beloved Miriam, a great human rights defender
HE WHO PERMITS OPPRESSION PERMITS CRIMES.-Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)
Desiderius Erasmus in 1523 as depicted by Hans Holbein the Younger. The Greek and Latin words on the book translate to “The Herculean Labors of Erasmus of Rotterdam”.
CHARITY CORNER
This week we turn our attention to the Union of Concerned Scientists. UCS was founded in 1969 by scientists and students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. That year, the Vietnam War was at its height and Cleveland’s heavily polluted Cuyahoga River had caught fire. Appalled at how the U.S. government was misusing science, the UCS founders drafted a statement calling for scientific research to be directed away from military technologies and toward solving pressing environmental and social problems. Please support this worthy cause, highly rated by charity monitors.
INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
Indigenous tribes do not simply die out. They are killed by the actions of so-called civilized nations. Survival International provides a long list of cases in which a letter from you can and will make a difference. Please open this link and write at least one letter. This link will be a permanent feature on our blog and we would be grateful if you gave it a bit of attention each week. We suggest going down the list in the order given. The letters are pre-written for you. All you need to do is send them. It would be nice also if a donation to Survival International could be forthcoming. They are the best conservationists--help that fact go viral.
We have added this section to the blog in order to join the struggle against slavery worldwide. This week we refer you to the the ILO’s Protocol on Forced Labor which is all about modern slavery. We call your attention to the anti slavery campaign. There you can sign up for action updates.The importance of checking your sellers’ supply chains cannot be overemphasized.
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is a British mum serving a five-year prison sentence in Iran – but she hasn’t committed any crime. She was recently released on a three day leave from prison to visit family – but has now, crushingly, been returned to prison. She has done nothing wrong. Help secure her freedom by signing our petition now.
CHINA
Google is planning to re-launch its search engine in China – and in doing so, cooperate with the Chinese government’s repressive online censorship and surveillance rules.
Urgent Action: Deported Bahraini at Risk of Ill-Treatment
On 20 October 2018, Ali Mohamed al-Showaikh was deported from the Netherlands and arrested upon arrival at Bahrain International Airport. For more than ten weeks since, he has been held without access to an attorney while the Public Prosecution’s terrorism unit proceeds with charges against him. There are strong reasons to fear he has been subjected to ill-treatment.
Thailand: Union leaders sacked, fined for demanding rail safety
The State Railway Workers’ Union of Thailand (SRUT) organized a nationwide rail safety campaign following the fatal train derailment on 5
October 2009 at Khao Tao Station in Thailand, which killed seven and left several others injured. The government is punished the leaders of the union for highlighting the unsafe condition of th e railroad. Please join the protest.
Our featured image shows our beloved Miriam (1947-2012), a great friend and human rights defender.
HE WHO PERMITS OPPRESSION PERMITS CRIMES.-Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)
Desiderius Erasmus in 1523 as depicted by Hans Holbein the Younger. The Greek and Latin words on the book translate to “The Herculean Labors of Erasmus of Rotterdam”.
Nobel Peace Prize Awarded To Fistula Surgeon – Dr. Denis Mukwege
. Fistula is a childbirth injury largely eradicated in the developed world, but still devastating women in the poorest countries. It’s treatable with life-transforming surgery.
INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
Indigenous tribes do not simply die out. They are killed by the actions of so-called civilized nations. Survival International provides a long list of cases in which a letter from you can and will make a difference. Please open this link and write at least one letter. This link will be a permanent feature on our blog and we would be grateful if you gave it a bit of attention each week. We suggest going down the list in the order given. The letters are pre-written for you. All you need to do is send them. It would be nice also if a donation to Survival International could be forthcoming. They are the best conservationists--help that fact go viral.
A major calamity for indigenous people is forced “development.” Forcing “development” or “progress” on tribal people does not make them happier or healthier. In fact, the effects are disastrous. The most important factor by far for tribal peoples’ well-being is whether their land rights are respected.
One of the results of forced contact
THE STRUGGLE AGAINST SLAVERY
We have added this section to the blog in order to join the struggle against slavery worldwide. This week we refer you to the the ILO’s Protocol on Forced Labor which is all about modern slavery. We call your attention to the anti slavery campaign. There you can sign up for action updates.The importance of checking your sellers’ supply chains cannot be overemphasized.
Urgent Action Victory! 200 Families No Longer at Risk of Forced Eviction
Families from the Guahory Community, Eastern Paraguay, are no longer at imminent threat of forced eviction. The implementation of the Joint Action Plan for Punishable Actions for Trespassing on Property has been suspended in their community.
On 13 July, 200 families from the Guahory Campesino Community in Eastern Paraguay were at imminent risk of a forced eviction due to the decision to implement the Joint Action Plan for Punishable Actions for Trespassing on Property in their community. This led to the deployment of about 400 police officers in the area. Following the release of the Urgent Action, the implementation of the Joint Action Plan was suspended, and the police officers left the community.
The Joint Action Plan for Punishable Actions for Trespassing on Property (Plan de Acción Conjunta para Hechos Punibles de Invasión de Inmueble Ajeno) is an agreement between the Attorney General’s Office, the Ministry of the Interior and the National Police which sets out the actions these three bodies would take to stop the potential trespass on property. Amnesty International has identified that this procedure leads to veiled forced evictions, carried out without due safeguards to respect and protect the right to decent housing.
Furthermore, after meetings between the Director of Human Rights of the Public Ministry, the Deputy Minister of Security of the Ministry of the Interior, the Director of Human Rights of the Ministry of the Interior and Amnesty International, an interinstitutional working group was created to review the Joint Action Plan. On 31 October, this working group held its first meeting, and it is expected to hold at least two more meetings in which Amnesty International, the Paraguayan Coordination of Human Rights (CODEHUPY – Coordinadora de Derechos Humanos del Paraguay) and the United Nations will be invited to present their positions on the plan.
We will continue to monitor the status of these discussions to determine whether further action is required.
Thank you to all those who sent appeals. No further action is requested from the UA network.
VENEZUELA
Urgent Action: Indigenous Communities Attacked and at Risk
The Pemón Indigenous communities in the Canaima National Park (western Venezuela) were the target of a violent attack during a two-day military operation, for which there was no justification. The communities fear for their safety in the context of these operations and the militarization of their ancestral territory ordered by the national government.
Urgent Action: Bill to Give Armed Forces Control of Security
Mexican legislators could pass a bill for a constitutional reform that would broaden the powers of the armed forces providing them wider policing authority and permission to remain on the streets of Mexico permanently. The bill is tabled for voting in the chamber of deputies.
Urgent Action Update: Hunger-Striking Academic In Critical Condition
Dr Nasser bin Ghaith’s health has severely deteriorated. The prominent Emirati economist and academic has been on hunger strike for over 70 days in al-Razeen prison in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to protest the detention conditions and the denial of access to medical care. He is a prisoner of conscience.
In our featured image Murphy wishes all a Happy New Year in the name of Prometheus, Pandora and the amanuenses YandA.
As we all know, Prometheus and Pandora orbit Saturn and keep the f-ring in place. Their old friend Titan orbits much farther out, but they may visit him in the Google blogger if this Gutenburg editor foisted upon us by WordPress continues to drive us nuts.
The Charity Corner has found a home on the Miriam Shlesinger Human Rights Action site. Promethus and Pandora hope that you will visit there, take the actions and make the donations.
IN MEMORIAM LYUDMILA ALEXEYEVA 1927-2018
Lyudmila M. Alexeyeva, a leader of the Russian human rights movement in the Soviet Union and in the era of President Vladimir V. Putin, died on on December 8in a Moscow hospital. She was 91.
Ms. Alexeyeva arriving at a New Year’s Eve anti-Kremlin protest in downtown Moscow in 2009.CreditIvan Sekretarev/Associated Press
Ms. Alexeyeva had been Russia’s most prominent surviving Soviet-era dissident, harking from the same generation as the physicist Andrei Sakharov and the novelist Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Though frail, she took part in street protests until about eight years ago.
She spent about 50 years in the Russian opposition, starting as a typist for a samizdat journal in the 1960s and continuing as an observer of politicized court hearings against street protesters under Mr. Putin. She was considered the grandmother of the Russian human rights movement Even President Putin came to visit her on her 90th birthday. Detailed obituaries can be found in the Economist and the NYTimes.
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia visiting Ms. Alexeyeva on her 90th birthday at her Moscow home last year.CreditPool photo by Alexei Nikolsky
We have been ranting a great deal about the erosion of liberal democracy around the world, especially in the US and Israel. Now we would like to look a bit at the theory around it. The late Professor J.L. Talmon of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, devoted much effort to clarifying the difference between liberal democracy and totalitarian democracy.
Jacob Talmon (1916-1980)
Talmon was a leader of the Cold War liberals and at the same time a Zionist., i.e. a Jewish nationalist. The apparent contradiction between liberalism and nationalism created a tension in his philosophy. As pointed out by M.H. Hacohen in a detailed essay in the History of European Ideas, Talmon lived in two worlds. Hacohen argues that that Talmon’s nationalism (Zionism included)—historicist, romantic, visionary—lived in permanent tension with his liberalism—empiricist, pluralist, pragmatic.
Talmon himself regarded his mission as “an attempt to show that concurrently with the liberal type of democracy there emerged from the same premises in the eighteenth century a trend toward what we propose to call the totalitarian type of democracy”
Professor Talmon finds the ground for the antagonism between the two types of democracy in a radical difference of attitude toward politics, which grows out of a radical difference of philosophy. Liberal democracy assumes that politics is largely a matter of trial and error, and it regards political systems as mainly “pragmatic contrivances of human ingenuity and spontaneity.” Totalitarian democracy on the other hand is “based upon the assumption of a sole and exclusive truth in politics” and it “postulates a preordained, harmonious and perfect scheme of things” toward which history inevitably tends and toward which recalcitrant human nature must, if necessary, be driven.
This theoretical framework is very relevant to what is happening in the world today. A recent issue of The Atlantic (October 2018) devotes a large section to articles about the demise of democracy. The examples are mostly from the US scene such as the article about losing the habits of democracy by Yoni Applebaum, but a description of the loss of democracy in Poland by Anne Applebaum provides an enlightening view of the process. The stages are:
Polarization.
Conspiracy theories.
Attacks on the free press
An obsession with loyalty
Recent events in the United States follow a pattern Europeans know all too well. We see it happening in Israel as well. The concepts of Professor Talmon are alas an accurate description. Anne Applebaum, in the article cited above, refers to the Romanian writer Mihail Sebastian who chronicled an even more extreme shift in his own country in the 1930’s. He described how, one by one, his friends were drawn to fascist ideology, like a flock of moths to an inescapable flame. He recounted the arrogance and confidence they acquired as they moved away from identifying themselves as Europeans—admirers of Proust, travelers to Paris—and instead began to call themselves blood-and-soil Romanians. In the light of the above, it is easy to understand the obsession of the far right with George Soros. This Hungarian born American billionaire has donated huge sums to support liberal democracy in the former Soviet bloc countries. As a result he is the bogyman target that these regimes need to deflect the dissatisfaction of their people. Soros-bashing has already spread to the US and is a harbinger of what lies ahead for the Western world of Trump and Brexit.
Whereas in Israel the defining “truth” to which we are supposed to subscribe is the idea of establishing a state for the Jews of the world (vid. Talmon’s tension above), in other countries it is nativism, for example, Trump’s white Christians or Marine La Pen’s “France for the French” nationalism. For young American Jews who grew up with the defining values of American Jewish political culture: a belief in open debate, a skepticism about military force, a commitment to human rights inter alia it does not make sense to push these values aside when considering Israel. It puts them off to see the PM of Israel consorting with the autocrats of Europe such as Orban of Hungary and other proponents of “illiberal Christian democracy” which will put an end to the era of multiculturalism. The violence of Israel’s rule over the Palestinians is indeed driving American Jews to protest.
Demonstrators march towards Trump Hotel in Washington to protest against the relocation of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
In Israel we have an additional component, the Messianic drive, that guides the politics of the settlers block, Gush Emunim. Prof. Talmon summed up this irrational mind set well “Claims such as those of Gush Emunim sound to the international community much like that biblical passage Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou, Moon, in the Valley of Ayalon “would sound in an astronomers’ debate.”Of course a lack of connection to reality is not unique to Israel…
FILM REVIEW: ROMA
Roma is a 2018 drama film written and directed by Alfonso Cuarón. Cuarón also produced, co-edited and photographed the film. It stars Yalitza Aparicio, Marina de Tavira, Marco Graf, Daniela Demesa, Enoc Leaño and Daniel Valtierra. Set in the early 1970s, the film is a semi-autobiographical take on Cuarón’s upbringing in Mexico City, and follows the life of a live-in housekeeper to a middle-class family. The title refers to the Colonia Roma, a neighborhood in Mexico City.
The film has won universal critical acclaim, as well as many awards, starting with the Golden Lion when it had its world premiere at the 75th Venice International Film Festival. The review in Rolling Stone by Peter Travers begins “If a thing of beauty is a joy forever, as John Keats famously said, then the surpassing loveliness and bracing brilliance of Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma will never pass into nothingness. …” Other reviews are in the same style, such as the Guardian (Peter Bradshaw): “Alfonso Cuarón’s new film Roma is thrilling, engrossing, moving – and just entirely amazing, an adjectival pileup of wonder. He has reached back into his own childhood to create an intensely personal story, and this is the second time I have seen it since the premiere at this year’s Venice film festival, hoping to get a clearer view of those later images that on first viewing were made wobbly by tears. Same problem, though. Those coming to see this film had better prepare themselves to be emotionally wrung out.”
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft is set to fly by a distant “worldlet” 4 billion miles (6.4 billion kilometers) from the Sun in just a few days, on New Year’s Day 2019. The target, officially designated 2014 MU69, was nicknamed “Ultima Thule,” (pronounced “ultima toolee”) a Latin phrase meaning “a place beyond the known world,” after a public call for name recommendations. No spacecraft has ever explored such a distant world.
This is the first detection of Ultima Thule using the highest resolution mode of the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) aboard the New Horizons spacecraft. Three separate images, each with an exposure time of 0.5 seconds, were combined to produce the image. All three images were taken on Dec. 24, when Ultima was 4 billion miles (6.5 billion kilometers) from the Sun and 6.3 million miles (10 million kilometers) from the New Horizons spacecraft. Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI
Ultima, as the flyby target is affectionately called by the New Horizons team, is orbiting in the heart of our solar system’s Kuiper Belt, far beyond Neptune. The Kuiper Belt is a collection of icy bodies ranging in size from dwarf planets like Pluto to smaller planetesimals like Ultima Thule and even smaller bodies like comets — which are believed to be the building blocks of planets.
This is indeed exciting news in geekdom and you are all invited to share the fun on New Year’s Day.
