People in a New York prison’s mental health unit are kept in their cells 24 hours a day, with the exception of an occasional “callout,” and denied therapeutic services, according to a lawsuit filed this week by Disability Rights New York and Prisoners’ Legal Services of New York against New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS), among others.
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
New Green Party leader Zack Polanski spoke to the Canary this week. And he addressed a question some critics have raised about the challenge of bringing together members with different social views, saying:
I just won with 85% of the vote. I don’t think it’s gonna be tricky.
The big societal issue in Britain is inequality, and that’s where Polanski believes the focus should be. As he insisted:
no matter where you live, inequality hurts you everywhere.
He added that:
relentlessly focusing on inequality, lowering bills, nationalising our water companies, protecting nature, and tackling the climate crisis are unifying issues of the 99%.
He knows there’ll be moments where bigots will disagree with him. But he stressed:
I’m never gonna change my solidarity to minority communities. Left-wing politics, progressive politics, at its heart, if nothing else, is about solidarity.
Regarding trans rights in particular, Polanski asserted that:
transphobia will absolutely not be tolerated under my leadership, and it will never be acceptable in the Green Party.
He made it clear that he doesn’t expect people to have exactly the same opinions on every issue. Instead, what he wants to remind people consistently is that “we have common cause”.
Explaining how inequality is a massive issue for people both in urban and rural areas, Zack Polanski said:
I’m an assembly member [in London]. I wanna see rent controls for the broken housing market. And that’s because of a power dynamic between young renters in particular – but actually not just young renters, anyone who doesn’t own their own home – and an unscrupulous landlord. But the same thing is for farmers. 80% of farming subsidies go to the wealthiest 20% of farmers. Meanwhile, most farmers who are vital for our food security are being screwed over by the supermarkets and agricultural capital. Same power dynamic.
We’ll be releasing the rest of our interview with Zack Polanski over the coming days.
Featured image via the Canary
By Ed Sykes
This post was originally published on Canary.
For over half a century, Palestinian families have suffered a cruel double blow. Not only do they face the devastating loss of loved ones killed amid Israel’s ongoing occupation, but many also endure the prolonged agony of being denied the right to bury their dead with dignity.
This is due to the Israeli occupation’s systematic policy of withholding the corpses and remains of hundreds of Palestinians killed by its forces – whether resistance fighters, detainees, or civilians – which forms part of what academics call necropolitics: the politics of death, and the power of authorities to decide who lives and who dies.
In the case of Palestine, the Israeli regime’s policy of withholding bodies, and even setting strict rules for funerals and mourning, is part of a broader system of colonial domination which seeks to control Palestinian life, death, and memory.
Mourning is weaponised, to enforce occupation and erode collective identity, stripping Palestinians of dignity and closure, and inflicting suffering far beyond death. Families feel completely desperate, not only because they have lost their child or loved one, but because they are unable to carry out a burial, and so have had their final act of saying goodbye stolen from them.
Adalah – The Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, actively intervenes in cases where Palestinian families are denied the bodies of their deceased relatives by the Israeli occupation, offering legal representation by petitioning the Israeli Supreme Court to demand the release of the bodies for burial.
Nareman Shehadeh-Zoabi, an attorney at Adalah’s civil and political rights department who has led many of the recent cases on this policy, explained:
Withholding bodies inflicts unbearable pain on families. Burial is the final act of love, the closure that allows them to accept the reality of death. Without it, some cannot believe their sons are gone, clinging to the hope they are still alive. Parents feel they have failed, even unable to do this last duty for their child. As a lawyer, it is heartbreaking to face mothers who cannot understand the logic behind this policy. No explanation eases their suffering. Denying families the right to bury their loved ones is a cruelty that deepens grief and prevents healing.
This practice has become a key instrument of occupation, gradually becoming institutionalised and embedded into Israeli law, with the remains and corpses of hundreds of Palestinians now being withheld by the occupation.
Rather than returning them for a dignified burial, some are frozen in morgues, while others are buried in unmarked graves in military-controlled cemeteries. These ‘cemeteries of numbers’, located in closed military zones which are inaccessible to the public, have become emblematic of dehumanisation. Bodies are stripped of names and identities, marked only by numbered metal plaques, with each number corresponding to individual files kept by Israeli security authorities.
The Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Centre (JLAC) documents cases and coordinates campaigns for the return of bodies, through the ‘National Campaign for the Retrieval of Martyrs’ Bodies‘, which it launched in 2008:
According to its documentation, 726 Palestinian bodies are currently being withheld by the occupation and, of these, 256 are buried in the ‘cemeteries of numbers’. The bodies include 85 prisoners, at least 10 women, and 67 children. All other bodies are men over 18 years old, who were killed in a variety of situations, including extra judicial killings or forcibly disappeared in unclear situations:
The campaign’s data does not include bodies withheld from the Gaza Strip, although up to 1,500 Gazan corpses, many unidentifiable and decomposed, are now held in refrigerated containers in the Sde Timan military detention centre in Israel, notorious for its human rights abuses.
Many Palestinian bodies in Gaza have also been wrapped in plastic bags, dumped on top of each other in mass graves, with families left completely unaware of what has happened to their loved ones, or whereabouts they are buried. The occupation has dug up and confiscated bodies from these mass graves and various hospitals in Gaza, and withheld them from the families:
According to Euro-Med Monitor, some of the bodies which have been returned have shown evidence of organ theft, including missing vital organs such as livers, hearts, and kidneys, as well as cochleae and corneas. Accusations of organ trafficking by the occupation have been going on for decades, and the human rights organisation is calling for an independent international committee to be created to investigate organ theft suspicions.
Abdallah Alzighari is president of the Palestinian Prisoner’s Club, which advocates for the rights of thousands of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons by providing legal support, documenting conditions, and offering assistance to detainees’ families. He said:
The Israeli occupation system is considered the only state in the world that practices this humanitarian and moral crime, whereby not only is the body of the martyr punished by being detained in the refrigerators or cemeteries of numbers, but it is also a collective punitive policy against the families of the martyrs in general. This contravenes all international laws and agreements. It is the right of these martyrs, whose bodies are being held by the occupation, to be buried in accordance with religious, moral and national teachings, so they may be honoured by having a place where their families can visit them at any time they wish, so they may feel reassured and at peace when they practice the traditions related to burying their son, who has been absent from them for many long years, inside the occupation’s prisons.
Israeli authorities acknowledge again and again that the main purpose of withholding these bodies, and causing this unimaginable harm and desperation to the families, is for use as political tools – bargaining chips in negotiations with armed groups.
The policy has its roots in the days of British colonial rule in Palestine, with Regulation 133(3), imposed in 1945, allowing military authorities to withhold bodies as long as they deemed necessary, for ‘security reasons’. Following the 1967 occupation, Regulation 133(3) was embedded in Israeli military orders, and has now become systemic, with the Knesset and the occupation’s judicial system playing a pivotal role in legitimising this policy.
September 2024 saw the court allow, for the first time, the body of a Palestinian citizen of Israel to be held for purposes of leverage in future negotiations. The body was that of Walid Daqqa, who died of cancer in prison, at the age of 62, in April 2024.
Daqqa, who came from a Palestinian town in central Israel was in prison for decades, for the alleged kidnap and murder of an Israeli soldier – a crime he repeatedly denied. His body has still not been returned to his family.
Miriam Azem, Adalah’s international advocacy coordinator said:
The withholding of Palestinian bodies was already a widespread policy before October 2023, due to the Security Cabinet adopting two cabinet decisions that formally introduced this as an Israeli policy, and effectively allowed the policy of withholding bodies without any kind of time limit for purposes of negotiations. But over the last two years it has been vastly extended, both in terms of scope and who it’s being applied towards. For the first time, Israel is also using this policy against its own citizens. Palestinians holding an Israeli citizenship are now being withheld in their death by Israeli authorities for negotiations, to release Israeli hostages from Hamas.
According to Adalah, there are at least nine bodies of Palestinian citizens of Israel currently being withheld by the Israeli occupation authorities, as bargaining chips for future negotiations with groups such as Hamas. This policy has been confirmed in several rulings, including in January 2025, when the Israeli Supreme Court rejected petitions from Adalah against the state’s withholding of the bodies of six Palestinian citizens of Israel, classifying them as security prisoners and allowing the continued retention of their remains, without requiring individual case assessments:
This even applies in cases involving minors, such as the recent ruling in July 2025 allowing the continued withholding of the body of 14-year-old Wadia Shadi Sa’d Elyan, from East Jerusalem, who was shot and killed by Israeli occupation forces near the West Bank settlement of Ma’ale Adumim, in February 2024.
Israeli authorities allege he was involved in a stabbing attack on an Israeli police officer, but video footage shows him being shot from behind while fleeing the scene, and then again while laying motionless on the road.
Despite this evidence, the court accepted the state’s position that the body may continue to be held for leverage in prisoner exchange negotiations. Adalah, who represented Elyan’s family in court, argued that the prolonged withholding of Elyan’s body violates not only Israeli and international law, but also the rights and dignity of the deceased and his family.
If the return of a loved ones body is agreed by the occupation, this usually only occurs if family members agree to certain conditions – often severe restrictions on the funeral, such as limited attendance, a nighttime funeral, and monetary guarantees. Families are often also forced to provide guarantees they will not hold autopsies and they will bury the bodies within a certain number of hours, so as to prevent any investigation into the circumstances of the killings taking place.
Many never receive remains, or receive bodies so decomposed and mutilated that they can barely be recognised, not only making identification extremely difficult, but also causing lasting pain and anger. For Muslims, a prompt burial is very important, and is not only seen as a way of honouring the deceased, but also of allowing the soul to move into the afterlife.
Issam Aruri, director of JLAC, says that as in all cultures, religions, and beliefs, the funerals, burial and the practices that follow are also part of the healing process for families and friends to start a new chapter in their lives:
According to Aruri, there can be a long-lasting psychological toll on families of those whose bodies are being withheld, especially if they have no gravesite to visit, or if they are forced into restricted conditions for a funeral. He said that:
When you have a body that you didn’t see or touch or having a last look at, you feel stuck somewhere – you feel guilty if you go to a party, you remember them during a family dinner or other occasions. Many families believe that their beloved ones didn’t die, and they keep waiting that some day or night they will be released and knock the door.
Once, when we succeeded in the release of a few bodies, one of them after 7 years, we went to show our condolences to the family, and the father told us: ‘I cant thank you enough, because for the first time in 7 years my wife slept a whole night. For 7 years she kept having a nightmare, waking up at night because she imagined that our son was screaming somewhere, under torture’.
There is no healing without a burial and all the accompanying processes.
In addition to acting as a tool for political bargaining, this policy is a means of collective punishment, as each body represents a family torn apart by doubled grief, a community deprived of closure, a culture denied the rites vital to religious and social healing, and by withholding the bodies of Palestinian children, the occupation knows it can significantly increase the trauma it inflicts on the relevant families.
Khaled Quzmar, director of Defense for Children International – Palestine (DCIP) told the Canary:
Israeli media have announced many times that it’s a kind of punishment for the family. It is also meant to be a deterrent, a message to all the other children, who are thinking of doing any action against Israel, that he is going to pay the price by subjecting the family to collective punishment like house demolition, attacks, prison, and also by keeping the body of their child.
He explained that children are always considered children, and never criminals, in international law. Even if they have committed the crime of killing someone, in court they will be considered a victim of certain circumstances, a victim in need of protection, rehabilitation, and reintegration into society, rather than a criminal deserving of punishment. But things are different for Palestinian children.
Quzmar said that:
The ICJ concluded that the occupation is illegal. To those who are attacked and killed by Israel, it is not only a war crime, but a crime against humanity and, in the case of children, it violates the Israeli obligation under the Child Rights Convention, which it signed and adopted. This behaviour is not happening to Israeli children, only against the Palestinian children, and by attacking them, detaining them, and withholding their bodies, I can say it is double or triple crimes that are committed against the child and against his family. Not one of those children are being treated as a human being, as a child, according to the law, but are all subject to the mentality of the Israeli army.
International law proscribes collective punishment of civilians, cruel treatment of the dead, and enforced disappearance, which are all applicable here. International law, with the Geneva Conventions, demands prompt return, identification, and dignified burial of the dead. The UN Human Rights Council and international commission have condemned the Israeli occupation’s policy of withholding the bodies of Palestinian martyrs, viewing it as a violation of humanitarian principles, and explicitly recognising the practice as a form of psychological torture.
Despite legal setbacks, Palestinian civil society continues to resist through organisations such as JLAC, and seeks dignity beyond death by launching vigils, protests, and legal petitions. Each recovered body is not only a personal closure, but a collective act of resistance against the erasure of memory.
To learn more, read JLAC’s excellent publication titled The Warmth of our Sons.
Featured image via JLAC and additional images and video supplied, or via JLAC
By Charlie Jaay
This post was originally published on Canary.
The cofounders of Ben & Jerry’s published an open letter this week demanding that their parent company allow Ben & Jerry’s to operate independently, saying that the ice cream brand’s founding commitments to social justice are being undermined. In 2000, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield sold their company to Unilever, which is now spinning off the ice cream brand, along with other businesses…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Many of 1 million residents say they will not leave as they do not believe al-Mawasi humanitarian zone is safe
The Israeli military has killed at least 41 people in Gaza, including 12 aid seekers, over the last 24 hours as it continued to order the population of Gaza City to evacuate before its planned offensive.
The evacuation orders were accompanied by intensified Israeli bombing of the city, the Israeli military interspersing orders with announcements of high-rise towers they had bombed.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says filming and posting videos of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents constitutes “violence,” and has threatened to potentially charge people who take videos and photos of agents conducting immigration raids in their communities, despite First Amendment protections. DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin told the…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
September 1, 2025: I (Roger) asked Chat GPT.com, an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot created by OpenAI, this question:
“Chat GPT, will you analyze all the different proposals for a Third Constitution of the United States and reveal to us your best recommendation for creating a Third Constitution of the United States that creates peace and happiness in our nation and throughout the entire world?”
Here is the response from Chat gpt . com. It mentioned my constitution first, but it did not narrow its critique to my latest version.
I then asked Chat GPT this question: How Come We Don’t Have Peace on Earth? An excellent answer was given.
I asked Chat GPT to analyze this latest September 4, 2025 version of the Third Constitution specifically. I share Chat GPT’s response at the end of the Third Constitution below, but please read the constitution first.
*****
Preamble to the Third Constitution of the United States
We the People of the United States of North America establish this Third Constitution to promote freedom, democracy, human rights, social justice, ecological wisdom, peace, and happiness for our nation and the world.
The United States government should never be subservient to something like the Earth Constitution unless the majority of its citizens approve it through a national referendum (which is a direct vote by the electorate), and the majority of other nations also approve it through their own national referendums. Moreover, any international constitution, as a basis for a democratic world government, must state that the citizens of each nation shall vote once a year to decide whether to continue the democratic world government or abolish it and return back to the status of nation-states once again.
It is truly foolish and tragic that in this modern age that many nations are spending half of their federal budgets for military defense, which is the primary reason there is no peace on the planet.
As a nation, let us ask the individuals and nations we have harmed or exploited in the past for forgiveness. As a nation, let us vow to promote world peace and happiness for every nation and for every person and sentient being on the earth. Let us understand that we are one world, one earth, one humanity–we are like all the cells and organs of a human body that must cooperate and work together.
The first United States government with a constitution was under the Articles of Confederation, implemented in 1781. The second constitution was implemented with the presidency of George Washington in 1789, and now this Third Constitution will be the basis for the third constitutional government.
An Overview of the Third Constitution
One of the aims of this Third Constitution is to preserve the best of the former constitution and government. It differs from the second constitution in the many ways that it empowers average Americans by making our democracy more inclusive and participatory.
Under this Third Constitution of the United States, there will be 435 Federal Legislators (the same number that was in the House of Representatives under the previous government), based on districts (including Washington D.C.) of equal population. The election of lawmakers to the new Federal Congress or House of Federal Legislators, under the Third Constitution, will be based on the system of Proportional Representation among the 7 largest national political parties. United States citizens can choose Federal Legislators from the 7 largest national political parties–each party will be empowered with the same privileges, ballot access, rights and responsibilities.
The United States Senate, which existed under the former constitution has been eliminated in the new Third Constitution, which means that the new federal legislature will be unicameral not bicameral, and it will have 100 fewer federal legislators since the former US Senate has been abolished. All federal laws in this one-chambered Congress must be passed with at least a 51% majority.
Under the second constitution, California, whose population was about 70 times the population of Wyoming, unfairly had the same number of senators as Wyoming. The former undemocratic U.S. Senate has been abolished since it is not based on geographical districts that have an equal number of people.
The Third Constitution reduces the Supreme Court from 9 members to 7 members, and each member may serve an unlimited number of 4-year terms. Each of the 7 largest national political parties–not the President–will appoint a Supreme Court Justice.
The 7 Supreme Court Justices will be appointed on the first Tuesday of November, in the same year that the president is elected, and the new Justices will take office on January 20 of the following year. Supreme Court Justices can serve for an unlimited number of 4-year terms if they are appointed again by the political party they represent and if the political party they represent is still one of the 7 largest national political parties.
The election of Federal Legislators will occur on the first Tuesday of November in the same year that the new President is elected, and the Federal Legislators will take office as the new President and Supreme Court Justices likewise do on January 20 of the following year. Federal Legislators can serve an unlimited number of 4-year terms, if they are the choice of the people.
The election of the President will occur during the first Tuesday of November, and he or she will take office on January 20. The president can serve a maximum of two 4-year terms.
The Third Constitution eliminates the Federal Reserve, and has the Treasury Department oversee a National Public Banking System. The Treasury Department will be audited by the U.S. Congress or their chosen representatives every 4 years.
This Third Constitution also eliminates the previous Electoral College System for electing a President of the United States, choosing instead to elect the presidential candidate who gets at least 51 percent of the popular vote using a system of Ranked Choice Voting.
This Third Constitution is much shorter and easier to understand. The Constitution is not just for lawyers. It is written in a clear way that even elementary school children will be able to understand it and become empowered by it.
The Third Constitution promotes honesty, fairness, and transparency at all levels of government. Average Americans will now feel more empowered to participate in political decision-making. As we create a truly democratic society, civics and citizenship should become supremely valued as never before.
Our Founding Fathers of the second, current Constitution of the United States never told how to properly abolish it, apparently thinking they knew what was best for all future generations.
Previous articles by Roger Copple explained a Twenty-Eight Amendment proposal to revise Article V of the current second constitution to show how the second constitution can be amended and abolished in an easier, quicker, orderly, and very fair way.
If that revised Article V of our current second constitution is ever officially ratified as a new amendment to our current constitution, then the American people could have a systematic way to abolish the second constitution in order to have a Constitutional Convention to establish the Third Constitution. And the same Constitutional Convention process to establish the Third Constitution can also be used to create the Fourth Constitution of the United States when the people are ready to abolish the Third Constitution.
Revising Article V of our current second constitution through the ratification of a new Twenty-Eight Amendment may seem like a long time coming. However, the 26th Amendment to lower the voting age to 18 was accomplished in about 3 months.
The Founding Fathers did not foresee the establishment of political parties, which began to emerge almost immediately after our current constitution was ratified. In fact, they actually feared and warned against political parties, referring to them as “factions”–a threat to the unity and stability of the new republic.
Equally empowering the 7 largest national political parties is the most important component of the Third Constitution. And the good news is that even under the current second constitution, our current bicameral US Congress could, without a new amendment or constitution, equally empower 7 national parties. But there would have to be a very large demand for it. A mass movement of people would have to demand it because the Republicans and Democrats have agreed to make it very difficult for third parties to have a greater voice.
World Peace Is Coming Sooner Than You Might Think
It could be the nightmare of a permanent technocratic, authoritarian police-state peace, or it could be the paradise of a fully democratic peace on earth in a world without empire.
We cannot create the ideal learning environment until we create the ideal world, a world working together as one body.
Chat GPT (AI) and others coming down the pike can provide individualized instruction if we ask what we truly want to know, but as artificial intelligence analyzes the world and us, we the people must always have the last word.
How Proportional Representation Works
Voters in federal legislative districts will study and evaluate the platforms of the 7 largest national political parties. Each voter will choose just one political party that he or she identifies with the most.
In the United States, there are 7 political archetypes which could be the 1. Republican 2. Democratic 3. Libertarian 4. Green 5. Socialist 6. Constitution Party, and 7. the Anarchists, who usually don’t form political parties. But the 7 political archetypes may not coincide exactly with the actual 7 largest national political parties. Here is what Chatgot (AI) said are the 7 largest national political parties: 1. Democratic Party 2. Republican Party 3. Libertarian Party 4. Green Party of the United States 5. Constitution Party 6. Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) and 7. Socialist Party USA (SPUSA).
The 7 largest political parties in the United States could contain the following percentages: 30% Republican, 30% Democratic, 10% Libertarian, 10% Constitution Party, 10% Green Party, 5% Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), and 5% Socialist Party USA.
The State of Indiana, for example, currently has 10 federal legislative districts out of a total of 435 US federal districts.
The National Elections Committee
Under the Third Constitution, there will be a National Elections Committee whose 7 executive directors will come from the 7 largest national political parties at that time.
The National Elections Committee will guarantee that in every precinct of every county of every state that there will be impartial and professional election officials. The election officials at every poll will ensure that uniform or standardized procedures of voting are established. The National Elections Committee will also verify and ensure that the national political parties provide an accurate count of their actual numbers.
Equal Media Time for Political Parties
The 7 largest national political parties will have all the rights, ballot access, and free television exposure that the Republicans and Democrats exclusively had under the Second Constitution, (End of Third Constitution Overview)
Summary of Historical Events that Led to the Establishment of the Second US Constitution
The Parliament of Great Britain passed the punitive Intolerable Acts which caused the Boston Tea Party to occur. Then the British Navy implemented a blockade of Boston Harbor.
Twelve delegates from the 13 colonies then decided to form a meeting, which became known as the First Continental Congress. The First Continental Congress met for about 7 weeks in the fall of 1774 in Philadelphia.
After the Battles of Lexington and Concord, the delegates met again at the Second Continental Congress which began meeting on May 10, 1775 and disbanded on May 1, 1781 (6 years). During this period, on July 4, 1776, the 56 delegates to the Second Continental Congress adopted the United States Declaration of Independence.
The Declaration of Independence is the founding document of the United States. The Declaration explains to the world why the Thirteen Colonies regarded themselves as independent sovereign states no longer subject to British colonial rule.
The 56 delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence came to be known as the nation’s Founding Fathers, and the Declaration has become one of the most circulated, reprinted, and influential documents in world history.
After the Declaration of Independence was signed and adopted in 1776, the fighting of the American Revolution continued another 5 years until the Revolutionary War ended in 1781.
The Second Continental Congress (1775-1781) established the bond of Perpetual Union, managed the war effort, and adopted the Articles of Confederation, which was the first US Constitution.
The final draft of the Articles of Confederation was completed on November 15, 1777. It was ratified on February 2, 1781 and it became effective (or was implemented) on March 1, 1781. The Articles of Confederation was superseded on March 4, 1789 when the first president George Washington, under the new second US Constitution, took office.
The government under the Articles of Confederation was considered to be weak, and the desire to make it stronger was realized when the second constitution was created, adopted, and implemented on March 4, 1789.
The current Constitution of the United States is our second constitution. The process of drafting or framing the US Constitution occurred during the Constitutional Convention that met at Independence Hall in Philadelphia from May 25 to September 17, 1787.
The final draft of the US Constitution was completed on September 17, 1787, the last day of the Constitutional Convention, and it was ratified on June 21, 1788 by 9 of the 13 states. It became effective on March 4, 1789 when the new stronger federal government, based on the new US Constitution, began with George Washington as the first president.
Third Constitution of the United States
The Human Rights of United States Citizens
ARTICLE I: The Legislative Branch of the Federal Government
Section I
All federal legislative powers shall be granted to the Federal Congress of the United States, which shall be a unicameral body consisting of Federal Legislators. There will be 435 separate congressional districts in the 50 states of the United States, including the District of Columbia, based on equal population. Federal Legislators will be elected based on the system of Proportional Representation. All new federal laws must pass with at least a 51% majority vote of the federal legislature. Proposed amendments to the Third Constitution must also be approved by a 51% majority national referendum vote of the people.
Section 2
All Federal Legislators of the United States Congress will be chosen for four-year terms that coincide with presidential terms of office. Federal Legislators may serve for an unlimited number of 4-year terms. The election of Federal Legislators will occur on the first Tuesday of November. They will take office on January 20 of the following year.
Section 3
Each state will have at least one Federal Representative under the system of Proportional Representation, and the District of Columbia will also have at least one Federal Representative.
Section 4
When vacancies in the Federal Legislature occur because of sickness, death, or resignation, the state of the removed legislator will vote for a replacement, chosen from the 7 largest national political parties.
Section 5
The Federal Legislators will vote among themselves to elect a Federal Legislator to be the Speaker of the House at the start of every new 4-year term. The elected Speaker of the House will choose the chairpersons for the established committees. The chairpersons, in turn, shall select committee members.
Section 6
The Federal Legislators will be allowed to try, impeach, and remove any high-leveled federal officer in the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the federal government. Any officer impeached is also liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment, and punishment, according to the law.
Section 7
All proposed bills must deal with one issue only. Lawmakers have the responsibility to clarify the pros and cons of every proposed law or amendment to their constituents in their home state. The best arguments for and against a bill must be expressed in writing for the lawmakers’ constituents.
Citizens of a voting precinct in a state can electronically register their vote on a particular proposed federal bill before the Federal Legislators make their final voting decision.
Section 8
The salaries of Federal Legislators will be three times the federal minimum wage, based on a 40-hour work week. Legislators cannot accept from corporate lobbyists any money, gifts, or fringe benefits at any time before, during, or after their tenure in office.
Section 9
After the passing of a particular federal law or constitutional amendment, the President cannot veto it, if he or she disapproves of it.
Section 10
Congress must strive to balance every budget and not engage in deficit spending, unless there is a national emergency.
Section 11
In all elections of Federal Legislators, the 7 largest national political parties (based on officially registered memberships) will have the same requirements, privileges, media access, and public financing as Republicans and Democrats had under the former government and constitution.
If Indiana has 10 of the 435 federal legislative districts based on the latest national census, its 10 Federal Legislators could hypothetically consist of the following: 6 Republicans, 2 Democrats, 1 Libertarian, and 1 Legislator from the Constitution Party.
Section 12
Federal Legislators may be elected for more than one term to provide continuity and experience in government.
Section 13
Federal Legislators must have permanent residency in the districts of the states they represent.
ARTICLE II: The Executive Branch of the Federal Government
Section 1
Executive power shall be invested in the President of the United States. His or her term of office will be four years, the same 4-year period in which Federal Legislators and Supreme Court Justices will be elected. The president will choose a Vice President who will serve in the President’s absence. Presidents will be elected on the first Tuesday of November, and they will take office on January 20 of the following year.
Section 2
A president cannot become president unless he or she wins at least a 51-percent majority of the popular vote.
The Electoral College System for electing a president has been abolished in this Third Constitution.
Section 3
If a president resigns, dies, is impeached, or is unable to hold the office, then the vice president will replace him or her. If the vice president is unable to serve at that time, the order of succession will be the Speaker of the House of Federal Legislators, followed by the Secretary of State.
Section 4
The president’s salary shall be 3 times the federal minimum wage. The president cannot accept money, expensive gifts, or fringe benefits from citizens or corporate lobbyists before, during, or after his or her term of office. Such money or gifts could bias his or her decisions.
Section 5
The president shall be Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the United States. The President is not required to wait for the approval of Congress to deploy troops on a moment’s notice during a national emergency that requires it. A state governor will be the Commander-in-Chief of the National Guard of his or her state.
Section 6
The president cannot make a declaration of war, unless 51 percent of US citizens approve it, as expressed through a national referendum.
Section 7
All executive orders or presidential directives made by the current and former presidents that are in effect must be fully disclosed, explained, and clarified to the people.
ARTICLE III: The Judicial Branch of the Federal Government
Section 1
The Supreme Court, under the Third Constitution, will have Judicial Review regarding federal and state legislation that possibly conflicts with the federal constitution.
Section 2
Under the Third Constitution, the Supreme Court will consist of 7 Justices—no longer 9. Before the new government under the Third Constitution begins, the 7 largest national political parties will each appoint one Justice to serve on the first Supreme Court.
The 7 Supreme Court Justices will be appointed by the 7 largest national political parties on the first Tuesday of November, and the 7 Justices will take office on January 20, at the same time that the new president and 435 federal legislators take office.
The appointed Justices will each begin a 4-year term of office. Supreme Court Justices may serve for an unlimited number of 4-year terms. If a Supreme Court Justice dies or resigns, the political party he or she came from will provide a new Justice. If the political party that the Supreme Court Justice came from is no longer one of the 7 largest national political parties, then a new political party will make the Supreme Court appointment.
Section 3
Currently there are over 850 federal judgeships in the United States. A term of office for a federal judge will be four years. Through a referendum vote, citizens of the district that a federal judgeship represents will elect a new federal judge on the first Tuesday of November during the same year that presidents are elected. Federal judges may serve an unlimited number of 4 year terms.
Federal judges not assigned to a particular state will be selected by the Federal Congress or Federal Legislators.
There will continue to be two distinct federal and state judicial systems under the Third Constitution as there were under the second constitution.
Section 4
In addition to the 12 Federal Circuit Courts of Appeal based on geographical areas, there will also be, as previously established under the second Constitution, the Court of Appeals for the Thirteenth Circuit, which will have national appellate jurisdiction over certain types of cases, such as those involving patent law and those in which the United States is a defendant. The Court of International Trade, The Court of Federal Claims, and similar courts may appeal to this Thirteenth Circuit Court as they did under the previous federal government.
Section 5
The federal Supreme Court can also review and cancel State Supreme Court decisions and state laws if the federal Constitution is violated.
Section 6
States cannot be sued in federal courts of a foreign country.
Section 7
The Federal Congress with a 51 percent majority can make modifications in the structure of the Supreme Court and the federal court system. Congress will determine how much of the federal budget is needed to finance the Supreme Court and the federal court system.
Section 8
The job of the Supreme Court is to make judgments based on the Constitution and existing federal statutes, not to change or make new laws. Federal statutes under the second constitution will continue unless they are modified or abolished by the unicameral federal legislature of the Third Constitution.
Section 9
Every individual must do what he or she promises to do by contract. An important role of the judiciary is to determine that legal contracts are honored.
Section 10
Government officials in any of the three branches of government will not have immunity from prosecution while they are in office.
Section 11
Every individual shall have equal justice under the law.
ARTICLE IV: States Desiring to Withdraw from the Country
A state cannot withdraw, or secede, from the rulings and protections of the United States government based on the stipulations of this Third Constitution, unless the Federal Congress votes for it with a 51 percent majority, and it is approved and ratified through a referendum of US citizens with a 51 percent majority.
ARTICLE V: Nations Desiring to be United with the United States
Only if approved by the Federal Congress and also approved through a referendum of the people can new nations that desire to be united with the United States be admitted.
If ever one of the United States’ protectorates desires sovereignty from the United States, Congress will grant it sovereignty because the days of colonialism and empire are over.
ARTICLE VI: The National Debt Problem
The Federal Legislators should strive to pay off the enormous national debt within 20 years through large reductions in military spending. The Federal Legislators can propose laws for the people to vote on regarding whether to have a graduated income tax. When a nation repeatedly has annual deficits, it causes the national debt to skyrocket, which then puts an enormous burden on taxpayers of future generations.
ARTICLE VII: The National Census
The US Census will continue to be taken every ten years. Accurate statistics enable the government, private companies, and individuals to have a better understanding of the nation’s demographics, which then promotes better planning for the future.
ARTICLE VIII: Approving Corporate Charters
County or municipal governments have the right to approve or revoke corporate charters and to impose taxes on corporations operating within their boundaries. They may revoke the charter of any private corporation in their district if they determine that a particular corporation does not serve the community or benefit the environment.
A corporation is not a natural person and should not have the same rights as a natural person. A corporation cannot make any financial contributions to any local, state, or federal government election campaign.
The federal congress or a state legislature can also revoke a corporate charter in a particular county if it considers the company is detrimental to surrounding counties within the state.
ARTICLE IX: An Alternative to the Federal Reserve
The former Federal Reserve System will be eliminated when the Third Constitution is implemented. Public Banking in the United States shall be organized and supervised by the US Treasury Department and audited periodically by the US Congress.
ARTICLE X: The Primary Role of Government
The primary role of government is the protection of its citizens. Actions such as, murder, rape, robbery, pollution, theft, embezzlement, fraud, arson, kidnapping, battery, trespassing, harassment, and nuisance–violate the right of others. The government should investigate, prevent, and have consequences for individuals who engage in these types of illicit or illegal actions.
ARTICLE XI: The Need for Habeas Corpus
Habeas Corpus is a concept of law in which a person may not be detained by the government unless the government has a valid reason for putting that person in jail or prison. Even in a national emergency, an individual’s right to Habeas Corpus should not be violated. Prisoners of war or alleged terrorists, foreign and domestic, must also be given a fair trial.
ARTICLE XII: The Need for Social Security
The national Social Security System must not be abolished. Some American citizens (because their employers did not offer pensions, or because of misfortune or unwise financial planning) will need monthly Social Security payments (money that they themselves paid into throughout their entire life-working history) in order to survive financially in their old age. The federal government does not have the right to take money from the Social Security fund for any other purpose than what the fund was designed for.
Article XIII: Keeping the Best of the Former Government
Under this Third Constitution, the Federal Congress must not attempt to eradicate the good policies that existed under the previous constitution. However, previous policies, statutes, regulations, and protocols can be changed as needed under the Third Constitution to reflect the ever-changing new attitudes, beliefs, and values of the current age.
ARTICLE XIV: A New Era of Honesty and Transparency
Wealthy individuals and large corporations must not be able to influence the political decision-making of voters. A new era of openness, honesty, and transparency in government, private business, the media, and foreign affairs is vital to our well-being. Moreover, it is also important that individuals are open, honest, transparent, and vulnerable in their interpersonal relationships.
ARTICLE XV: Income Tax Laws
Federal income tax laws should be simplified in ways that do not allow clever people to cheat the government. The Federal Legislators will determine the federal tax for private corporations and possibly religious organizations as well. The Federal Congress can also choose to eliminate the federal income tax.
ARTICLE XVI: Bottom-up Reorganization of the 50 State Governments: Only A Recommendation State governments are encouraged to rewrite their state constitutions so that they are organized from the bottom-up, not the top-down: from the elementary public school district (which could also be a voting precinct district) to the township level, up to the municipal or county level, and up to the state level.
Each level of state legislative government can make, not just legislative decisions but also executive and judicial branch appointments for that level. Elected legislators at each level may vote among themselves to send a legislator to the next level above it. This method is better than the previous system in which state and local citizens have often voted a straight ticket for many officers from two parties for candidates whom they know nothing about. States are also encouraged to consider direct democracy at precinct, township, city, and county levels of government. Here is an expanded explanation for reorganizing state governments.
State governments are also encouraged to allow the residents of any public elementary, middle, or high school district to abolish its public school with a 51 percent majority so that money can be given to parents directly for private schooling, public charter schools, or for home schooling with additional private tutors.
ARTICLE XVII: How this Third Constitution Can Be Amended and How It Can Be Abolished When a Fourth Constitution Is Desired.
The United States government under the Third Constitution can be changed when new Federal Laws are passed with a 51% majority. But the United States government can also be changed by adding Amendments to the Third Constitution. But to change the federal government completely and abolish this Third Constitution, there has to be a Constitutional Convention to create the Fourth Constitution of the United States.
How to Add Amendments to the Third Constitution
Under the previous second constitution, new amendments were added only if passed by Congress with a ⅔ majority and ratified by ¾ of the 50 state legislatures. That was an extremely difficult task to accomplish, and it only happened 27 times.
Under the Third Constitution, amendments can be added if the Federal Legislators approve it with a 51 percent majority, and the American people approve it with a 51 percent majority vote referendum. Then the new amendment to the Third Constitution will be ratified.
In a modern, rapidly changing world, new laws, new amendments, and new constitutions should be easier to ratify to adapt to the changing times and changing preferences of each new generation.
How to Abolish the Current Third Constitution to Create the Fourth Constitution
The Constitution is the supreme civil law of the land. A radically new constitution and government can be created by having a Constitutional Convention. If done properly in the way prescribed here, it will be achieved in a fair, orderly, and democratic way.
The American people have a right to choose whether they want a new Constitution on a regular basis. Through their chosen representatives, an entirely new constitution can be written and adopted. Here is the procedure for having a Constitutional Convention to create a new constitution, the Fourth Constitution.
The American people will vote to determine if they want a Constitutional Convention to create a new constitution every 3rd year after a presidential election. If approved by a 51-percent majority of the American people, then the following 8-month timeline will be used to make it happen.
The 8-Month Timeline for Creating the Fourth Constitution
Three years after every presidential election on the first Tuesday of November, the American people with a 51 percent majority can decide if they want a constitutional convention to create the Fourth Constitution.
If American voters decide they want a Constitutional Convention, they will have about 7 weeks from the second Tuesday in November till January 14 of the following year to officially register with a national political party that truly expresses their values and worldview. Various websites describe all the major national political parties that voters can choose from.
Then from January 15 till the end of January, no switching of parties can be made as the official count of all national political parties is determined by the National Elections Committee, which will be appointed by the current 7 largest national political parties. Each of the 7 largest national political parties will appoint one person to serve on the Executive Council of the National Elections Committee.
The National Elections Committee will know by the end of January which national political parties received the most votes. The National Elections Committee will determine what are the current 7 largest national political parties.
The National Elections Committee will be responsible for counting and verifying the membership of national political parties, and the National Elections Committee will guarantee that local election officials are impartial and professionalized. The National Elections Committee may use voting machines that are standardized, or it may decide on other fair methods of voting that prevent dishonesty and corruption.
Starting in the month of February and going to the end of March (a 2-month period), the 7 largest national political parties will get official, equal, free, national public television exposure.
The 7 largest national political parties will be able to make public speaking presentations and will be allowed to participate in town hall meetings and debates on national television stations. The 7 largest national political parties will also be required to give their written responses to standardized questions determined by the National Elections Committee, not exceeding the maximum number of words that the question allows. Each of the political parties will be allowed to share their party platforms, any proposed national constitutions, and various articles from their websites.
Then during the first two weeks of April, there will be a second counting of registered voters in each of the 7 largest national political parties. Party identifications cannot be changed during this time period. As a result of this second counting, some voters will stay with the party they picked in January, while others will pick a new political party that better expresses their values and worldview.
So after the second counting of party memberships, it will be announced on April 14 the percentage of votes each of the 7 largest national political parties received. So here is how the results could be, hypothetically speaking:
If the Constitution Party gets 5 percent of the votes, then there will be 5 Constitution Party delegates sent to the Constitutional Convention. If the Green Party gets 9 percent of the votes, then there will be 9 Green Party delegates sent to the Constitutional Convention. If the Republican Party gets 14 percent of the votes, then there will be 14 delegates from the Republican Party sent to the Constitutional Convention, and so forth.
On May 1, the Constitutional Convention delegates will meet at the Capitol Building in Washington D.C. for the month of May and June. The 100 delegates will work during May and June to create the best constitution that 51 percent or more of the attending delegates approve.
When the Constitutional Convention begins in May, each of the 7 largest national political parties will nominate one of their attending party delegates to be the potential chairperson of the Constitutional Convention. The 100 delegates will vote to elect one Constitutional Convention Chairperson from the slate of 7 potential candidates.
If delegates reach a 51 percent majority before the 2-month period elapses, they must use the remaining days of the 2-month time frame to hear dissenting delegate voices in the constant effort to keep improving their document in order to get an even higher percentage of approval than 51 percent. If at any point 60 percent of the constitutional convention delegates approve the new document, the delegates may choose to adjourn and go home before the maximum 2-month time limit has elapsed.
If only 50 percent or less of the delegates approve any new proposed constitution after working on it for 2 months, then any document becomes void, and the current Third Constitution will continue to be official and valid. However, if the new constitution is approved with a 51 percent majority by the end of June, then the American people must also approve the new document on the second Tuesday of July with at least a 51 percent majority in a referendum vote.
This Constitutional Convention process that started the first Tuesday in November (3 years after a presidential election) until the second Tuesday of July, is roughly about 8 months.
If the American voters approve or ratify the new document on the second Tuesday of July, the new Fourth Constitution will not be implemented immediately. There has to be an election of new government officers, as there normally would be in a presidential election year on the first Tuesday of November.
Then in the following year on January 20, the new constitution will be implemented, and the new legislative, judicial, and executive officers (who were elected during the previous first Tuesday of November) will begin their terms of office.
When the Constitutional Convention delegates meet during May and June, the delegates should make their day-to-day proceedings public. As mentioned above, whatever document the delegates approve with a 51 percent majority will not be ratified until 51 percent of the American voters approve it in a referendum vote.
End of the 8-Month Timeline for Creating the Fourth Constitution
End of Article XVII of the Third Constitution
End of the Third Constitution of the United States
*****
The post Third Constitution of the United States first appeared on Dissident Voice.This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.
The imminent arrival of the Israeli president in the UK is a critical moment for the police and judiciary of the UK. He is the head of state of Israel, which has been accused of genocide at the International Criminal Court (ICC). The president of Israel stands accused of aiding and abetting war crimes committed by the IDF in Gaza and the West Bank.
The relevant precedent for the UK is the arrest of General Pinochet in London in 1998. The House of Lords Judicial Committee ruled that immunity is not absolute. On 25 November 1998, it ruled on the immunity of a former head of state.
Herzog is the current head of state of a state that is committing the first live-streamed genocide in history. It also commits torture and Apartheid. These are crimes that are prosecutable on a ‘universal jurisdiction’ basis. As the head of state of a state that commits these kinds of crimes, Herzog is arguably an enemy of all of mankind.
He must be arrested under the 1984 UN Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. The Israeli courts do not punish Israeli officials for any of these crimes against Palestinians. Herzog is the head of this state of mendacity.
Israeli human rights group B’tselem, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch all accuse Israel of committing genocide. Herzog is the head of the government that is carrying out genocide. Under customary international law, universal jurisdiction exists for crimes against humanity. The UK has unequivocal jurisdiction to arrest him.
The current Labour Party government aims to repeat the poor decisions of the 1998 Labour government regarding the interaction between public international law and domestic law. There is no doubt that the UK has the authority to arrest Herzog. It has the right. So if he comes to the UK, he should be arrested. If he wishes to avoid arrest, then he should stay at home.
We are witnessing the impunity that the Labour government allows to Israeli politicians, diplomatic staff, and IDF personnel. The Tories and Reform share the same views.
Diplomatic, economic, military, and cultural support by the USA, the EU, UK, Australia, Canada, and NATO have destroyed the credibility of the rules that govern the international order since WWII. Arresting Herzog like Pinochet in 1998 would begin retrieving the remains of universality under the law from the graveyard that Israel has created. After the Nazi Holocaust, it cannot be that the life of a Palestinian matters less than that of a Jewish Israeli. It cannot be that the lives of tens of thousands of Palestinian children are less valuable than those of Jewish Israeli children in Tel Aviv.
We have observed how the Labour government, led by a human rights lawyer, refuses to recognise that Israel is committing gross violations of international law, human rights law, and humanitarian law. The UK government does not have a factual problem. The facts are being live-streamed. It has an attitudinal problem. A Palestinian is less of a human being than a Jewish Israeli: that is the logic. President Herzog leads the state that is the grave-digger of the rules-based international system established after World War II. He must be arrested when he arrives in the UK.
A democracy cannot endure with only two elements: isegoria (the equal right of citizens to participate in public debate in democracy) and parrhesia (the license to say what one pleased, how and when one pleased, and to whom). The former demands informed citizens who participate in all matters of public concern. It should not be the case that major issues are controlled by corrupt politicians within the government and powerful corporations, and that the public is misled by a manufactured consensus. The media is as culpable as our government and corporations, which act as shields for the Israeli genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and the settler colonial project of Apartheid.
This piece is part of our effort to engage in parrhesia, regardless of the costs of speaking truth to power. We see hundreds of activists offering themselves for arrest in defence of the non-violent direct action of a Palestinian activist group. We see hundreds of thousands turning out for monthly demonstrations in defence of the international rules-based order.
President Herzog must be arrested when he comes to London. He must suffer the same fate as General Pinochet. However, unlike Pinochet, Herzog must be sent to the Hague to stand trial. Jack Straw, home secretary at the time, sent Pinochet to Chile instead of Spain, which was waiting to put him on trial. Shabana Mahmood, another lawyer, should get ready. How many more Palestinians have to die at the hands of this rapacious, racist state before its head of state is arrested?
We have seen that indifference to the crimes of Israel is a bipartisan consensus position. Labour and the Tories are shields for Israeli crimes against humanity. The opposition to those crimes is outside of parliament, on the streets, and in our small demonstrations across the country.
William James, the American philosopher, said that indifference is the one human trait that makes even the angels weep.
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said that indifference is worse than evil itself.
Herzog should be detained and put on trial for war crimes and assisting and facilitating a genocide. We must not allow the government to use the same kind of ruse with him as Blair’s government used when Jack Straw allowed Pinochet to get away on medical grounds.
Like Nuremburg, the voices of the victims of the Nazi Holocaust had to be heard. We honour the Palestinian dead by arresting Herzog and putting him on trial. There must be integrity and universality if we claim to have a rules-based international order. Integrity means moral and legal consistency. We cannot just arrest leaders from the Global South and put them on trial. When there are white people from the Global North, then we want to ‘um and ah’. Arrest Isaac Herzog and put him on trial for war crimes and for aiding and abetting genocide so that we might believe that the law applies to everyone equally.
The Israeli political, business, media, academic, sports, and other cultural elites must live in fear of being arrested. If we do not arrest them, then our own humanity is at stake. Do not be as complicit as Germany and hypocritical as France when it comes to the dignity of Palestinians. Herzog’s arrest in London, September 2025, would be as significant as the referral of Israel to the ICJ by South Africa.
It will force the Israeli public to accept their complicity in the genocide in Gaza. They are most likely as guilty as the German public that supported the Nazi Holocaust. The arrest will also force the Israeli judiciary to stop acting as a rubber stamp for Apartheid and genocide by Israeli governments since 1947.
It will also cause the IDF to think twice about committing genocide and implementing an Apartheid project in the Palestinian-occupied territories and the IDF and Israeli police to review and reconsider their complicity with the racist, bigoted armed settlers in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The pro-Israel lobby in the UK will also have to shut up shop or they too will be arrested for aiding and abetting crimes against humanity, genocide and war crimes. They have had a free ride for too long.
Herzog must be put on notice. Come to London and you will be arrested. If you do not want to be arrested, stay at home. His world, and the world of those like him, must become very small.
Featured image via the Canary
By Skwawkbox
This post was originally published on Canary.
EU Commission president urged to ‘show leadership’ and preserve bloc’s credibility amid catastrophe in Gaza
The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, is under growing pressure from MEPs to “show leadership” and preserve the EU’s political credibility by taking a tougher approach to Israel’s government over the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
Von der Leyen is expected to refer to the EU’s role on the world stage in her annual “state of the union” speech to the European parliament on Wednesday, where she will set out her agenda for the year ahead.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
The Israeli crimes perpetrated AFTER October 7th 2023 represent the reason why the October 7th events unfolded.
You read that correctly, but I’ll say it again: the Israeli crimes perpetrated AFTER October 7th are why the heroic Palestinian resistance (i.e. Hamas) attacked the Nazi Zionist apartheid terrorist entity to begin with.
But what happened on October 7th?
This is something that’s been discussed extensively; discussed honestly only in rare cases, but distorted, misinterpreted and lied about the vast majority of the time.
This is because the doctrine/policy of (pro-)Israeli propagandists and their allies – the prostitutes of propaganda- such as CNN, the BBC, Fox News, Talk TV and countless others, conforms to the Nazi practices of Hitler and his minister Joseph Goebbels.
The post Propaganda 101: The Illusion Of Truth appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.
This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
The Israeli crimes perpetrated AFTER October 7th 2023 represent the reason why the October 7th events unfolded.
You read that correctly, but I’ll say it again: the Israeli crimes perpetrated AFTER October 7th are why the heroic Palestinian resistance (i.e. Hamas) attacked the Nazi Zionist apartheid terrorist entity to begin with.
But what happened on October 7th?
This is something that’s been discussed extensively; discussed honestly only in rare cases, but distorted, misinterpreted and lied about the vast majority of the time.
This is because the doctrine/policy of (pro-)Israeli propagandists and their allies – the prostitutes of propaganda- such as CNN, the BBC, Fox News, Talk TV and countless others, conforms to the Nazi practices of Hitler and his minister Joseph Goebbels.
The post Propaganda 101: The Illusion Of Truth appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.
This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
Campaign group accuses Isaac Herzog, arriving in UK next week, of aiding and abetting indiscriminate killing in Gaza
Pro-Palestine activists have requested that an arrest warrant be issued against Israeli President Isaac Herzog for alleged war crimes ahead of his arrival in the UK this week.
Herzog is accused of aiding and abetting the indiscriminate killing of civilians in Gaza in the request to the director of public prosecutions filed by the Friends of Al-Aqsa campaign group.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Government position set out in letter to select committee as No 10 prepares for visit by Israeli president
The UK has not concluded that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, nor that any of the British-made parts for F-35 jets sold to Israel have directly led to breaches of international humanitarian law, ministers have told parliament.
Ministers have also rejected calls for an independent audit of UK arms sales, but admitted they were not in a position to say if Israel’s assault in Gaza had led to any breaches of humanitarian law owing to the complexity of the fighting terrain.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
September marks the first month since June 2024 that supporters of Just Stop Oil haven’t been held in UK prisons for taking action. Going back to to 2022, the state has jailed supporters for 36 out of the last 38 months. However, while in the UK, activists have time to regroup, offer support, and take stock, the fight continues for Students Against EACOP Uganda. Right now, Ugandan authorities are wielding repressive carceral arms of the state to intimidate activists into silence.
EACOP is a 930-mile long pipeline that will transport oil from Uganda to a port in Tanzania. French fossil fuel firm TotalEnergies, China National Offshore Oil Corporation Ltd (CNOOC), and Uganda’s state oil company are partnering on the pipeline.
The project poses a climate and environmental disaster. It will facilitate the extraction of enough oil to produce over 34 million tonnes of extra carbon dioxide emissions each year. Moreover, it threatens thousands of kilometres of vital wildlife habitats. EACOP risks displacing over 100,000 people along the route – and is already harming many of these communities.
On 1 August, twelve supporters of Students Against EACOP Uganda took to the streets with banners and placards. They staged a nonviolent protest on their way to Stanbic Bank – one of the major financiers of the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP).
Authorities arrested and imprisoned them, and have just denied them bail for the third time. They will now spend at least two months in Luzira Maximum Security Prison before trial.
Prison in Uganda is notoriously difficult. They are full far beyond capacity and illness and disease is common as a result. Prison guards have subjected those in jail to beatings and torture. They often make them carry out heavy labour work while on remand.
As in the UK, the state is using remand as a tool to punish before trial. It has transferred action takers to Death Row (known in Uganda as the Committal Ward) alongside those it has convicted of capital offences in order to intimidate them in to silence.
Prison food is poor – so Just Stop Oil is urging the public to donate in solidarity with the brave Ugandan student activists in prison, in order to provide them supplementary meals. Support is available from family and friends, but with twelve activists on remand for a matter of months, finances are tight.
To make matters worse, when denying them bail, the judge made clear all twelve will be imprisoned during their trial. This will make it near impossible for them to organise an effective defence.
Just Stop Oil said to its supporters:
In this unprecedented moment we need to chip in once again. For those that have yet to donate, please make a contribution, however small – those of us in a rich nation like the UK have a huge debt to pay to people like Ugandans. It is from courts based on British structures that those taking action today face repression.
You can donate to support Students Against EACOP Uganda here.
Featured image supplied
By The Canary
This post was originally published on Canary.
On the 10 and 11 September, president of Israel Isaac Herzog is expected to visit the UK to meet with UK ministers. The International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP) has now written to Scotland Yard demanding that it investigate the Israeli president upon his arrival in the UK. ICJP urges it to do so on suspicion of Herzog bearing criminal liability for alleged war crimes.
ICJP sent the correspondence to SO15, Scotland Yard’s War Crimes Unit. Isaac Herzog is suspected of bearing criminal liability for alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity, torture, and actions that constitute plausible genocide contrary to the Criminal Justice Act, the Geneva Conventions Act 1957, and the International Criminal Court (ICC) Act 2001.
As a result, ICJP is calling for his investigation and interview. The group notes that diplomatic immunity would not preclude SO15 from interviewing him and otherwise investigating him. This would be in compliance with the UK’s international and domestic obligations.
The ICC has already issued arrest warrants for two senior members of the Israeli government, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and ex-Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has heard evidence of dehumanising statements made by senior Israeli officials. Crucially, this included a statement by Herzog on the 12 October 2023, asserting:
It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. It is not true this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved…
ICJP has previously provided the Metropolitan Police with two criminal complaints. These rely on extensive evidence which demonstrates Israel’s commission of international crimes. They include the crime of starvation as a method of warfare and indiscriminate targeting of civilians and civilian objects, specifically protected medical staff. All of these are crimes that fall within the remit of UK legislation and jurisdiction.
This is therefore an opportunity for the UK government to pivot from arresting those who speak out against genocide to holding accountable those responsible for genocide, as required under UK and international law. From weapons exports to spy plane flights to trade, and diplomatic support, the UK government has failed at every step to live up to its legal obligations under international and domestic law to act to prevent the horrifying atrocities in Gaza.
ICJP’s senior public affairs and communications officer Jonathan Purcell said of Isaac Herzog:
This action represents a significant escalation in the global legal effort to hold senior Israeli officials accountable for war crimes and grave breaches of international law.
The rule of law applies to all, regardless of office or nationality. If political leaders refuse to subject themselves to the legal process, it is their own soldiers who will be left exposed facing justice alone, without immunity or protection. There will be no safe haven for suspected war criminals. International law demands accountability, and we are determined to deliver it.
Featured image via the Canary
By The Canary
This post was originally published on Canary.
A growing number of Kenyans, Ugandans and Ethiopians are being trafficked to Myanmar, where missing online scam targets leads to beatings and torture
• Revealed: the huge growth of Myanmar scam centres that may hold 100,000 trafficked people
Within hours of landing in Bangkok from Nairobi last December to start a job as a customer service agent, Duncan Okindo knew something was wrong. The 26-year-old had sold his cattle, borrowed money from friends and used his savings to pay a recruitment agency 200,000 Kenyan shillings (£1,150).
“I felt it would be good to go outside [the country] and look for money to take care of my family,” says Okindo. “I’d tried hard to get a job in Kenya, but life here had pushed me to the wall.”
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Petition, drafted by human rights lawyers, says war crimes were committed during British occupation of Palestine
A group of Palestinians will serve a legal petition asking the UK to take responsibility for what they call “serial international law violations”, including war crimes committed during the British occupation of Palestine from 1917 to 1948, the consequences of which it says still reverberate today.
The 400-plus page document, drafted by human rights KCs, details “incontrovertible evidence” of the UK’s unlawful legacy.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Jail terms of up to five years for ‘promoting homosexuality’ in Burkina Faso is latest in push for ‘family values’ sweeping the continent
“For my own safety I’ve become much more distrustful, I’ve shut myself off and try not to talk to certain people,” says Paul*, a young Burkinabé. “How will we go to health centres? Will doctors and nurses protect us? Or will they report us?”
On 1 September, Burkina Faso’s minister of justice and human rights, Edasso Rodrigue Bayala, announced an amendment to the Code of Persons and Family (CPF) which came into force in 1990, establishing for the first time a prison sentence of between two and five years and a fine for those who “promote homosexuality”.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is incarcerating immigrants at Louisiana State Penitentiary, better known as Angola, Gov. Jeff Landry (R) and Trump administration officials announced Wednesday. Fifty-one immigrants are currently incarcerated at Angola, in a solitary confinement unit once dubbed the “Dungeon.” Officials closed the unit in 2018, but over the summer…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
There is only one treaty in the world that, despite its limitations, binds nations together: the United Nations Charter. Representatives of fifty nations wrote and ratified the UN Charter in 1945, with others joining in the years that followed. The charter itself only sets the terms for the behaviour of nations. It does not and cannot create a new world. It depends on individual nations to either live by the charter or die without it.
The charter remains incomplete. It needed a Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, and even that was contested as political and civil rights had to eventually be separated from the social and economic rights. Deep rifts in political visions created fissures in the UN system that have kept it from effectively addressing problems in the world.
The post United Nations Turns Eighty appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.
This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
Political prisoner T. Hoxha is dying.
She is on her 18th day of hunger strike in HMP Peterborough in protest of the prison’s politically-targeted abuses. One of the Filton 24 detained indefinitely under the UK’s “Terrorism Act” while awaiting trial next spring, Hoxha is alleged to have participated in the heroic dismantling of an Elbit Systems weapons factory, causing €1 million in damages.
Over two weeks into her strike, Hoxha’s loved ones report that her physical and mental health is deteriorating fast, her hair is falling out, her jaw is in pain, and her brain fog is worsening, while the prison neglects her medical care. Supporters on the outside are organizing a call-in campaign to demand the prison administration give her electrolyte sachets and meet her demands.
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This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is planning to recruit and train special agents who will be able to make arrests, carry firearms, and execute warrants against people who have allegedly violated immigration laws. A final rule published today in the federal register authorizes the director of USCIS to conduct “law enforcement activities to enforce civil and criminal…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Rights groups in Gaza and Ramallah had asked international criminal court to investigate Israel over genocide claims
The US has imposed sanctions against three Palestinian human rights groups that asked the international criminal court (ICC) to investigate Israel over allegations of genocide in Gaza, according to a notice posted to the US treasury department’s website.
The three groups – the Gaza-based Palestinian Centre for Human Rights and Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, and the Ramallah-based Al-Haq – were listed under what the treasury department said were ICC-related designations.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Peace deal cannot be ‘negotiated away’ by British political figures who want to quit ECHR, says Irish deputy PM
Northern Ireland’s peace deal cannot be “negotiated away” by British political figures who want to see the UK quit the European Convention of Human Rights if elected, the Irish tánaiste has warned.
The ECHR is an integral part of the 1998 Belfast Good Friday agreement and withdrawal would remove those foundations of peace, according to Simon Harris, Ireland’s deputy prime minister.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
By Margot Staunton, RNZ Pacific senior journalist
Bougainvilleans went to the polls today, keen to elect a leader who will continue their fight for independence.
“There’s a mood of excitement among the people here,” said Electoral Commissioner Desmond Tsianai.
“It is important that this election is successful and credible, because we want legitimate leaders in the government, who will continue discussions with Papua New Guinea over independence,” he said.
Tsianai said there were more than 239,000 registered voters in the autonomous PNG region and he expects a better turnout than the 67 percent during the 2020 election.
“We anticipate voter turnout will increase due to the importance of this election in the political aspirations of Bougainville.”
Tsianai said his office had been proactive, encouraging voters to enrol and reaching out through schools to first-time voters aged 18 and over.
He is adamant Bougainville could achieve a one-day poll, despite the election being rescheduled at the last minute.
Polling pushed back
Polling was scheduled to begin on Thursday but was pushed back a day to allow time to dispatch ballot papers.
In addition, he said, there were some quality control issues concerning serial numbers.
“These are an important safeguard against fraud. We, therefore, took measures to ensure that these issues were rectified, so that electoral integrity was assured.”
The final shipment of ballot papers, which was scheduled for delivery on August 23, finally arrived on September 2, he said.
This did not allow enough time for packing and distribution to enable polling to take place on Thursday.
“The printing of the ballot papers and the delay afterwards was out of our hands, however we’ve taken the necessary steps to ensure the integrity of the process.
The polling period for the elections was from September 2-8, and the office had discretion to select any date within that period based on election planning, he said.
“Rescheduling allowed sufficient time to resolve ballot delivery delays and to ensure that polling teams are ready to serve voters.”
Preventing risk
He said that the rescheduling was done in the interest of voters, candidates and stakeholders, to prevent any risk of disenfranchisement.
“We remain fully committed to delivering a credible election and will continue to provide regular updates to maintain transparency and confidence in the electoral process,” he said.
“We have taken the necessary steps and anticipated that some wards within constituencies have a larger voting population so extra teams had been allocated to those wards so polling can be conducted in a day.”
The dominant issue going into the election remained the quest for independence.
In 2020, there were strong expectations that the autonomous region would soon achieve that, given the result of an historic referendum.
A 97.7 percent majority voted for independence in a referendum which began in November 2019.
However, that has not happened yet, and Port Moresby has yet to concede much ground.
Toroama not pressured
Bougainville’s 544 polling stations will open from 8am to 4pm local time (9am-5pm NZT) in what is the first time the Autonomous Bougainville Government has planned a single day poll.
Some 404 candidates are contesting for 46 seats in the Bougainville Parliament, including a record 34 women.
Six men are challenging Ishmael Toroama for his job.
Toroama recently told RNZ Pacific that he was not feeling any pressure as he sought a second five-year term in office.
“I’m the kind of man that has process. They voted me for the last five years. And if the people wish to put me, the decision, the power to put people, it is democracy. They will vote for me.” he said.
Counting will take place on September 9-21, and writs will be returned to the Speaker of the House the following day.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.
Israel only identifies roughly a quarter of the thousands of Palestinians from Gaza it’s imprisoning under its combatant law as combatants, a new report of internal military documentation reveals. According to an investigation released Thursday, Israel only identified 1,450 of 6,000 Palestinians in detention under its combatant law as combatants. This means that, even under Israel’s…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
ANALYSIS: By Simon Levett, University of Technology Sydney
Journalist Mariam Dagga was just 33 when she was brutally killed by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on August 25.
As a freelance photographer and videographer, she had captured the suffering in Gaza through indelible images of malnourished children and grief-stricken families. In her will, she told her colleagues not to cry and her 13-year-old son to make her proud.
Dagga was killed alongside four other journalists — and 16 others — in an attack on a hospital that has drawn widespread condemnation and outrage.
This attack followed the killings of six Al Jazeera journalists by the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) in a tent housing journalists in Gaza City earlier on August 10. The dead included Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Anas al-Sharif.
Israel’s nearly two-year war in Gaza is among the deadliest in modern times. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which has tracked journalist deaths globally since 1992, has counted a staggering 189 Palestinian journalists killed in Gaza since the war began. Two other counts more widely cited have ranged between 248 and 272
Many of the journalists worked as freelancers for major news organisations since Israel has banned foreign correspondents from entering Gaza.
In addition, the organisation has confirmed the killings of two Israeli journalists, along with six journalists killed in Israel’s strikes on Lebanon.
‘It was very traumatising for me’
I went to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem in Israel and Ramallah in the West Bank in 2019 to conduct part of my PhD research on the available protections for journalists in conflict zones.
During that time, I interviewed journalists from major international outlets such as The New York Times, The Guardian, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, CNN, BBC and others, in addition to local Palestinian freelance journalists and fixers. I also interviewed a Palestinian journalist working for Al Jazeera English, with whom I remained in contact until recently.
Israel murdered journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, a US citizen, in 2022. The Biden admin helped cover it up. Now Israel is targeting even more journalists — with U.S. weapons.@RaniaKhalek speaks to @DionNissenbaum & @LinaAbuAkleh about the new @zeteo_news doc “Who Killed Shireen?”… pic.twitter.com/qxJ5TzFolH
— BreakThrough News (@BTnewsroom) September 3, 2025
I did not visit Gaza due to safety concerns. However, many of the journalists had reported from there and were familiar with the conditions, which were dangerous even before the war.
Osama Hassan, a local journalist, told me about working in the West Bank:
“There are no rules, there’s no safety. Sometimes, when settlers attack a village, for example, we go to cover, but Israeli soldiers don’t respect you, they don’t respect anything called Palestinian […] even if you are a journalist.”
Nuha Musleh, a fixer in Jerusalem, described an incident that occurred after a stone was thrown towards IDF soldiers:
“[…] they started shooting right and left – sound bombs, rubber bullets, one of which landed in my leg. I was taken to hospital. The correspondent also got injured. The Israeli cameraman also got injured. So all of us got injured, four of us.
“It was very traumatising for me. I never thought that a sound bomb could be that harmful. I was in hospital for a good week. Lots of stitches.”
Better protections for local journalists and fixers
My research found there is very little support for local journalists and fixers in the Occupied Palestinian Territories in terms of physical protection, and no support in terms of their mental health.
International law mandates that journalists are protected as civilians in conflict zones under the Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols. However, these laws have not historically extended protections specific to the needs of journalists.
Media organisations, media rights groups and governments have been unequivocal in their demands that Israel take greater precautions to protect journalists in Gaza and investigate strikes like the one that killed Mariam Dagga.
Sadly, there is seemingly little media organisations can do to help their freelance contributors in Gaza beyond issuing statements noting concern for their safety, lobbying Israel to allow evacuations, and demanding access for foreign reporters to enter the strip.
International correspondents typically have training on reporting from war zones, in addition to safety equipment, insurance and risk assessment procedures. However, local journalists and fixers in Gaza do not generally have access to the same protections, despite bearing the brunt of the effects of war, which includes mass starvation.
Despite the enormous difficulties, I believe media organisations must strive to meet their employment law obligations, to the best of their ability, when it comes to local journalists and fixers. This is part of their duty of care.
For example, research shows fixers have long been the “most exploited and persecuted people” contributing to the production of international news. They are often thrust into precarious situations without hazardous environment training or medical insurance. And many times, they are paid very little for their work.
Local journalists and fixers in Gaza must be paid properly by the media organisations hiring them. This should take into consideration not just the woeful conditions they are forced to work and live in, but the immense impact of their jobs on their mental health.
As the global news director for Agence France-Presse said recently, paying local contributors is very difficult — they often bear huge transaction costs to access their money.
“We try to compensate by paying more to cover that,” he said.
But he did not address whether the agency would change its security protocols and training for conflict zones, given journalists themselves are being targeted in Gaza in their work.
These local journalists are literally putting their lives on the line to show the world what’s happening in Gaza. They need greater protections.
As Ammar Awad, a local photographer in the West Bank, told me:
“The photographer does not care about himself. He cares about the pictures, how he can shoot good pictures, to film something good.
“But he needs to be in a good place that is safe for him.”
Simon Levett is a PhD candidate in public international law, University of Technology Sydney. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.
A government can’t half care about human rights. And Australia’s ‘disagree where we must’ approach with China enables abuse and undermines our national interest
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A photo of former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews alongside the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, during a military parade in Beijing raised troubling questions. Earlier, former New South Wales premier Bob Carr sought to pre-emptively justify his possible attendance at the event (although he didn’t in the end) in an opinion piece.
While it is difficult for the Australian government to control the actions of former officials, the photo still raises the question how the two former premiers found themselves in a situation where they were either in a photo or contemplated attending an event with all these known grave violators of human rights. Perhaps it is because the Australian government sends mixed messages about responding to human rights abuses when committed by some governments.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
President Donald Trump claimed Tuesday that US troops deployed to the Caribbean attacked and destroyed a “drug ship” that had left Venezuela.
“Just a few minutes ago, literally, we shot down a vessel that was carrying drugs, a large amount of drugs. You’ll see it and read about it. It just happened moments ago,” the US president said at a press conference in the Oval Office.
He said he had just been briefed on the matter by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Daniel “Razin” Caine. “We have a lot of drugs coming into our country, coming in for a long time, and they just came out of Venezuela… A lot of things are coming out of Venezuela, so we got rid of them,” Trump said.
The post US Forces Destroy Small ‘Venezuelan’ Boat Allegedly Carrying Drugs appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.
This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
