The Israeli government passed at least 21 bills aimed at discriminating against the country's Arab citizens making the current Knesset as being the most racist Israeli parliament since the country's founding, according to a report released Sunday by civil rights groups.
The Coalition Against Racism and the Mossawa Center, which works to promote equality, claimed that the proposed legislation seeks to de-legitimize Israel's Arab citizens by decreasing their civil rights. The report's data show that in 2008 there were 11 bills defined as racist presented to the Knesset while in 2009 there were 12 such bills.
In 2010, the report's authors claim, there were no less than 21 bills proposed that included discriminatory elements against the country's Arab citizens. According to the report released to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the number of laws that discriminate against Arab citizens proposed in the current Knesset bypassed all previous years, increasing by 75 percent.
Effectively canceling a planned speaking tour, the U.S. consulate in the Netherlands has put an extended hold on the visa application of award-winning Palestinian journalist and photographer Mohammed Omer, scheduled to speak on conditions in Palestine, on April 5th in Chicago.
The American occupation forces, and the occupation-assigned Iraqi government, grossly failed to fulfill their most basic duties towards the children of Iraq in accordance with the UN/CRC Convention on the Rights of the Child, Resolution 25/ Session 44, November 1989. The convention was ratified by 194 United Nations countries, except the USA and Somalia.
The cover-up of child sexual abuse by the Catholic church is not about sex and it is not about Catholicism. It is not, as Pope Benedict rightly argued in yesterday's distressingly bland pastoral letter, about priestly celibacy. It is about power.
A 10-year-old boy has undergone pioneering surgery in which his own body worked as a "bioreactor" to help a donated windpipe, seeded with his own stem cells, grow into a fully functioning organ.
In the years since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, 967 American service members have lost at least one limb, as of March 1. Of them, 229 have lost more than one. The number of amputees mounted steadily as the U.S. military stormed into Afghanistan in late 2001, then focused on Iraq -- with an invasion in 2003 and a "surge" in 2007. More recently, the number has edged up again as the Obama administration has pumped more troops into Afghanistan.
Pope Benedict XVI has apologised to victims of child sex abuse by Catholic priests in Ireland. In a pastoral letter to Irish Catholics, he acknowledged the sense of betrayal in the Church felt by victims and their families.
