Texas friends: I met a woman today who is the sole caretaker for a cognitively disabled brother. He is incapable of self-care so she has to shave, bath, change his diapers. He is also unable to talk or walk. She may not know how to navigate the disability benefits programs in Texas so he receives $700 a month with no other benefits, including a wheel chair or a home care worker. She supports them by selling used goods out of a storage locker so she’s unable to afford a disability rights lawyer & doesn’t know where to turn. Do any of you know who she needs to talk to for some action on his disability rights? I told her I’d reach out for some advice & think some of you may know the system.

There’s a report originated from Associated Press (AP) that a damaged boat with 56 Rohingya refugees, believed to have set sail from Arakan/Rakhine State within the past three weeks, stopped at an island in southern Thailand on Saturday evening to get out of a storm at sea. The AP report said those 56 people “claiming to be Muslim Rohingya refugees” from Burma were helped back to sea by Thai fishermen & navy craft.” The Thai police claim they restocked essential supplies before putting them back out to sea.

Everything about this story stinks like horse manure, including the suggestion that refugees would claim to be Rohingya when they could have been aliens from outer space. Why the hell would they lie? Couldn’t Thai officials tell who they were from their language? There are reports that the storm had not abated before the boat was put back out to sea. There are no reports that the boat damage was repaired before it was forced back out to sea. We’d like to see an inventory of what the Thai police considered “essential supplies.” Were food & water included? We’d like to know if the Rohingya refugees wanted to move on in a rickety, damaged boat during a storm with at least 20 kids aboard? Or were they forced back to sea, as is the practice of the Thai Navy?

Take a look at this photo which the Thai Navy released claiming it was the Rohingya boat being escorted out to sea with a Thai naval officer seen standing in dark outfit on the bow. There are only about twenty, not 56, people in that boat in a calm sea. The Thai Navy has no idea what happened to that boat & in violation of maritime law almost certainly forced that boat to set sail in treacherous conditions against their wills. There will come a time of justice for the Rohingya people & part of it will include bringing down the Thai military regime that commands such barbarity against refugees from genocide.

(Photo is Thai Army handout via AFP-JIJI)

This is a wonderful album showing the faces of 100 Rohingya refugees, from little kids to seniors. If you love to look at faces, like I do, you will love this album. Always, the eyes are the window to the soul.

https://interactive.aljazeera.com/aje/2018/100-faces-of-rohingya-refugees/index.html

Such is the depravity of war, occupation, genocide that children are denied childhood to fight for their humanity & survival. This little boy is Kashmiri. He could be Palestinian, Rohingya, Afghan, Iraqi, Syrian, Yemeni, Libyan, Somali. Children & youth with rocks & fury against pellet guns, rockets, assault weapons, & bombers.

Long live Intifada.

(Photo from Kashmir News Trust)

About 250 Israelis marched in Tel Aviv yesterday to protest the slaughter of unarmed Palestinians last Friday in Gaza. They of course had to face counter-protesters celebrating the slaughter. Those Israelis who defy the rightwing & the regime to oppose the occupation & apartheid are the advance guards of social transformation. Zionism can be defeated. Justice will win in Palestine. There can be a democratic, secular state where Palestinians & Jews will live as brothers & sisters.

This woman is one of thousands mourning & protesting in Kashmir over the murders of 20 people yesterday in three hunt to kill operations by the Indian army. It isn’t certain how many were injured but Srinagar hospital reports that 33 of the 34 unarmed civilians admitted for treatment suffered pellet gun injuries, mostly to the eyes. The other sustained a bullet injury.

In the several months of the 2016 uprising against the occupation, the Srinagar hospital treated 9,000 pellet gun victims, which is about 50 pellet gun injuries a day. We may live in barbarous & surreal times, but civilized humanity still considers that savagery & under international law it is deemed human rights criminality.

Stand with Kashmiris against this violence. Spread the word. No to occupation. Yes to self-determination.

(Photo from Rising Kashmir)

The photo is young people running from sniper fire at the Great Return March in Gaza on Friday. Eighteen unarmed Palestinian protesters were killed, over 1,400 were injured, 757 by live ammo, & the others by rubber bullets & tear gas inhalation.

Haaretz published an opinion piece by Odeh Bisharat titled “Flourishing Israel Is Drenched in Palestinian Blood” where he wrote: “Millions are celebrating Passover on the Israeli side while masses of others are burying their dead on the other side. And those Israelis who feel wonderment over how their country is flourishing while their neighbors bleed from sniper fire coming from the Israeli side should seek to find out where they lost their humanity. It may be the height of economic prosperity, but it is happening alongside the depths of moral deterioration.”

Stand with Palestinians in their struggle against occupation, apartheid, & for self-determination. Honor the economic & cultural boycott. Be prepared to hit the streets to rally in solidarity against this violence.

Haaretz piece: https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-israel-s-spring-bloom-faded-in-palestinian-blood-1.5964360

(Photo from Great Return March on Twitter)

Stand with Kashmiris against the brutal occupation. Let the world know what India is doing to those fighting for freedom. If we stand with them, they can win against military might & all of suffering humanity will be strengthened in struggles against war, persecution, occupation, genocide.

Album of the funerals/protests after Indian army hunt to kill operation in Shopian district:

https://www.facebook.com/basit.zargar.92/posts/893350230869922

(Album by Basit Zargar)

Photos of the Shopian hunt to kill operation:

(Album by Basit Zargar)