Monday, July 1, 2024

Six In The Morning Monday 1 July 2024

 

Israel frees hospital chief with prisons ‘full’ of Gaza captives


The detainees endured ‘almost daily torture’, claims al-Shifa Hospital Director Muhammad Abu Salmiya.

Israel has freed dozens of Palestinians detained during its war in Gaza, including the director of one of the enclave’s main hospitals.

Israel released 55 prisoners on Monday to free up space in its jails, unconfirmed reports claimed. Speaking shortly after his return to Gaza, al-Shifa Hospital Director Muhammad Abu Salmiya asserted that Palestinian prisoners in Israel’s prisons were facing daily abuse.

With thousands of Palestinians having been added to those already detained since the war began on October 7, Israel’s prisons are “full,” reported the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation.



China’s tech firms vow crackdown on online hate speech after knife attack

Clampdown follows fatal stabbing of Chinese woman who tried to stop attack on Japanese mother and child

China’s internet companies have announced a crackdown on “extreme nationalism” online, particularly anti-Japanese sentiment, after a Chinese woman was fatally stabbed while protecting a Japanese mother and child in Suzhou.

Tencent and NetEase, two of the biggest firms, said at the weekend that they would be investigating and banning users who stirred up hatred.

The notice from Tencent, which owns the messaging app WeChat, said the incident in Jiangsu province had “attracted public attention” and that “some netizens incited a confrontation between China and Japan [and] provoked extreme nationalism”.


Kenya will need to borrow more after axing tax hikes — Ruto

Kenyan President William Ruto said Nairobi will have to borrow billions to tackle Kenya's sovereign debt. He said he was not at fault for the deaths of protesters opposing the now-revoked plans to raise taxes.

Kenyan President William Ruto said that the government will have to borrow more money to plug Kenya's deficit.

It comes after Ruto walked back on a controversial tax hike that sparked widespread protests in which at least 30 people were killed, according to rights groups.

France's far-right makes gains in southeast, fails to make a breakthrough in Paris

The far-right National Rally (RN) party of Marine Le Pen won a resounding victory in the first round of the polls Sunday, with 33.15 percent of the votes cast for members of the National Assembly. The anti-immigration party made large gains in the southeastern Provence Alpes Cote d’Azur region but failed to make a breakthrough in Paris. 

The far-right National Rally (RN) made historic gains in the first round of France's two-stage parliamentary election this weekend.

The party of Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella topped the poll with 33.15 percent of the votes cast for members of the National Assembly, according to preliminary results published by the interior ministry.

The leftwing New Popular Front alliance was in second place with 28.14 percent, ahead of President Emmanuel Macron's centrists on 20.76 percent.

It’s a delusion that censorship can make repugnant ideas disappear

Curtail free speech? ‘Oh yes we can’

by Serge Halimi & Pierre Rimbert

In January 2015, just before the massive demonstrations in solidarity with murdered Charlie Hebdo journalists, cartoonist Luz wondered, ‘In a year, what will remain of this progressive impulse for freedom of expression?’ Since 7 October, we’ve had the answer: bans on demonstrations, cancelled public lectures, artists and intellectuals deprogrammed, comedians sanctioned, slogans prohibited though they have been chanted for decades, public funding to universities suspended for treating pro-Palestinian students too leniently. On top of this came judicial intimidation. In April the French police summoned several opposition figures as part of an investigation into ‘apology for terrorism’. A union leader received a one-year suspended prison sentence for the same reason. Bernard-Henri Lévy, meanwhile, flits from one media appearance to another, justifying the crushing of Gaza and even calling for Rafah to be invaded, without facing charges for being a war crimes apologist, punishable by five years in prison and a €45,000 fine.


VOX POPULI: The ‘most brutal’ crime against women rooted in society’s failings

Vox Populi, Vox Dei is a daily column that runs on Page 1 of The Asahi Shimbun.

July 1, 2024 at 13:14 JST


Stories about murders and attempted murders in the newspaper crime section point to a disturbing trend of growing gender-based violence against women.

A former romantic partner stabs a woman to death in the street.

A man murders a targeted woman after stalking her.

A man finds his ex-wife’s whereabouts and stabs her.

Learning that the number of female murder victims is on the rise globally has further disheartened me.

“Femicide” is a term that is often used when such crimes are covered by overseas media. Although the literal translation is “female killing,” it doesn’t refer to all killings of women.




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