Yesterday, 18-year-old Laith al-Khaldi, was shot to death by Israeli troops at a protest over the murder of baby Ali. His funeral was held today.

Media is trying to pull a fast one on the truth by referring repeatedly to the settlers as “Jewish extremists.” In fact, extremism is the very nature of the Israeli settlement projects & the military occupation in the West Bank. Netanyahu can cry his crocodile tears about baby Ali to repair Israel’s murderous image but his inflammatory rhetoric against Palestinians, his murderous siege of Gaza, his assaults on unarmed protesters incites violence from settlers & tells us the “extremists” are the henchmen of the Israeli regime & another flank of the occupation.

Build the hell out of the economic, cultural, & academic boycott of Israel. Don’t buy a damn thing made in Israel.

(Photo by Ilia Yefimovich/Getty Images)

Shlissel’s violence isn’t just a personal pathology; it is of a piece with the very nature of Israeli militarism. Those who live in other heavily militarized societies like the US, India, Mexico, know the problem well. Shlissel attacking gay activists derives from the mentality that agrees with carpet bombing Gaza over & over again, particularly targeting children; of the economic blockade of Gaza preventing essential medicines & foodstuffs from getting through; of soldiers attacking worshippers at Al-Aqsa Mosque; of aggressive settlers from all over Kingdom Come moving to the West Bank & expropriating Palestinian lands as though they were entitled to it; of settlers burning down Palestinian mosques in the West Bank; of torching family homes with people inside–burning to death a small child & seriously burning his family; of soldiers shooting down unarmed protesters, roughing up small children, & incarcerating thousands without due process; of uprooting entire villages like Susiya & the five villages Modi’in Illit is built on; of Israelis sitting in easy chairs watching ethnic cleansing in Gaza like it was a football game.

Israel is not & never will be the promised land of Zionism. It has no future but dystopia because it is built on carnage & lies. The only solution is a democratic secular state where Jews & Palestinians live as brothers & sisters. Those settlers who can’t deal with justice may just want to move back to where they came from.

Build the economic, cultural, & academic boycott of Israel.

(Photo by Kobi Schutz/AFP/Getty Images)

The homicide rate against the Black community in the US is finally breaking the silence barrier of media & we now know that every 28-hours a Black person is killed by a police officer. According to “Operation Ghetto Storm” by the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, that’s over 300 Black people a year.

So why in the hell are leftists going after “identity politics”? Identity politics is the civil rights movement of the 1960s, the Black Power movement of the 1970s, the women’s liberation & LGBT movements–all of which transformed politics in the US, all of which were resistance to oppression & the exercise of power. Is it perhaps the specter of Black power, female power, LGBT power that scares the hell out of people? Is it something they cannot control? What possible objections hold water when the oppressed stand up for their own best interests? None!

This small girl is a from a Madari community in Gujarat, India. It’s not posted for anthropological reasons but because humanity still has a chance to make this world work for her.

(Photo by Umesh Solanki at http://www.nirdharumesh.blogspot.in/2015/08/hair-in-air.html?m=1)

The UN refugee agency worked with the Pakistani government to induce refugees to return to Afghanistan by giving them the chump change of US $150. Of course, Afghanistan is still being bombed by the US, there is no housing for the refugees, & no work so there was little point to going home. At least in Pakistan some could find work as domestic workers–even if the pay was only about US $100 a month.

Residents are putting up a fight with the bulldozers & riot police but, as in other countries, they will be removed & just have to find another place of land where they can rebuild & live for at least a while.

Such are the glories of emancipation US-style.

US out of Afghanistan! US out of Iraq!

(Photo by Faisal Mahmood/Reuters)

I’m being badgered again about its use–as if I had anything to say about it. For me, it’s a very simple matter of freedom of religion. It doesn’t matter if you feel offended, for whatever reason, by its use. The veil is not about you. It’s about women’s right to choose what they wear without being judged stupid or being demeaned. Is such a fuss made about the bikini or the mini skirt or exposing cleavage? I don’t have anything else to say on the matter. Except that women should be respected & left the hell alone. If they feel oppressed by the veil, it’s up to them to decide what to do. If they don’t, the eyes are the window to the soul.