SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Afghanistan: Record High Civilian Casualties Make Returns Unjustifiable
The international community cannot abandon the Afghan people who have fled conflict and violence at a time when civilian casualties continue at record highs, Amnesty International said today, calling on governments to halt forced returns to Afghanistan.
According to UN figures just released, 1,692 people were killed in the first six months of 2018 - more than at any comparable period of time since records began being compiled a decade ago. Over that same period of time, 3,430 people were also injured.
WASHINGTON
The international community cannot abandon the Afghan people who have fled conflict and violence at a time when civilian casualties continue at record highs, Amnesty International said today, calling on governments to halt forced returns to Afghanistan.
According to UN figures just released, 1,692 people were killed in the first six months of 2018 - more than at any comparable period of time since records began being compiled a decade ago. Over that same period of time, 3,430 people were also injured.
"Given the numbers of people who continue to be killed and injured in Afghanistan, it is unconscionable to claim that the country is safe enough to send people back to. Callously diverting their eyes from the bloodshed, states that once pledged their support for the Afghan people are now putting their lives in immediate danger, in brazen violation of international law," said Omar Waraich, Deputy Director for South Asia at Amnesty International.
More than 10,000 people have been killed or injured each year in Afghanistan since 2014. There are fears that this year will lead to the same situation.
In recent years, forced returns have escalated in parallel, with tens of thousands forcibly returned from the EU, Turkey and other countries.
The case of Taibeh Abbasi
Despite the horrific situation on the ground in Afghanistan, the Norwegian authorities appear determined to proceed with the deportation of Taibeh Abbasi and her family.
Taibeh Abbasi is a 19-year-old woman with Afghan nationality, who has just graduated from high school in Norway. Days after she celebrated this achievement, the authorities rejected her appeal to stay. Taibeh has never been to Afghanistan, and fears for her own and her loved ones's safety. She dreams of continuing her studies and becoming a doctor.
Taibeh's family fled war-torn Afghanistan to seek sanctuary in Iran. There, they endured discrimination and eventually sought refuge in Norway.
"The Norwegian government cannot pretend that Afghanistan is safe. It strongly advises its own citizens against traveling to any part of the country, and the area around its own embassy in Kabul has been hit in attacks by armed groups. Is their desperation to look tough on migration such that they are prepared to crush a teenager's dreams and put her and her family in danger?" said Omar Waraich.
Along with Taibeh and her family, many other people in Norway are at risk of deportation to Afghanistan.
The suicide of a 23-year-old returnee
Another heart-breaking case is that of a 23-year-old Afghan who took his own life after Germany forced him to return this month.
The man, who has not been identified, was one of 69 Afghans who were forcibly returned by the German government on 4 July. Six days later, the man's body was found in a hotel arranged by the International Organization for Migration.
The news of the 69 people being forced to return was gleefully announced by the German Interior Minister, Horst Seehofer, who remarked that the occasion fell on his 69th birthday.
"The comments by the German Interior Minister are sadly typical of the callous attitude that colours European indifference to Afghan suffering. For years, Germany said it was committed to the human rights of the Afghan people. Now, they are eager to score cheap political points by playing with people's lives," said Omar Waraich.
Thousands of returns from Turkey
Over recent months, the Turkish authorities have ruthlessly deported thousands of Afghans who made a long and hazardous journey to seek refuge in the country. Many of the people seeking asylum endured beatings, abuse, and exploitation along the way.
Since January, Turkey has forcibly returned thousands of Afghans. Turkey, which is home to the world's largest population of refugees, has started building a wall along its border with Iran to resist further arrivals.
In March 2016, the Turkish government signed an agreement with the European Union to keep people seeking safety from traveling further to Europe.
"Turkey has been a generous host to refugees fleeing conflict. It's sad to see it reduced to doing the dirty work of the European Union, acting as a border guard for hire, ruthlessly turning away people who have made the most desperate journeys. These returns will only tarnish an image it had worked so hard to build," said Omar Waraich.
This statement is available at: https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/afghanistan-record-high-civilian-casualties-make-returns-unjustifiable/
Amnesty International is a global movement of millions of people demanding human rights for all people - no matter who they are or where they are. We are the world's largest grassroots human rights organization.
(212) 807-8400LATEST NEWS
'Ceasefire in Name Only': Israel Bombs Beirut With Approval From Trump Administration
"The Israeli government continues to drop US-made bombs in Lebanon," said one Democratic lawmaker. "Congress can and must put an end to the violence in the region."
May 07, 2026
The Israeli military on Wednesday bombed the suburbs of the Lebanese capital for the first time since a ceasefire agreement was announced in mid-April by US President Donald Trump, whose administration reportedly coordinated with Israel on the latest strike.
"This is a ceasefire in name only," US Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.) wrote in response to the bombing, which Israel said killed a top Hezbollah commander. "Israel needs to adhere to the ceasefire and work in good faith toward a permanent end to the larger war with Iran and Lebanon."
According to the United Nations, at least 380 people have been killed by Israeli strikes on Lebanon since the ceasefire agreement took effect. Trump announced a three-week extension of the ceasefire deal on April 23.
The target of Wednesday's strike on Beirut's southern suburbs "appeared to be a 10-story building in the Haret Hreik neighborhood next to a school," The Washington Post reported, citing satellite imagery and open-source material. "Photos of the aftermath showed half the building leveled and excavator machines digging beneath the rubble."
The Israeli military also bombed the southern Lebanese town of Zelaya on Wednesday, killing at least four people, including two women and an elderly man, Lebanon's Ministry of Health said.
Early Thursday, the Israeli military issued new displacement orders for southern Lebanon, instructing the residents of Deir al-Zahrani, Bafroa, and Habush to leave their homes.
The Wednesday attack on Beirut's suburbs, according to an unnamed Israeli official cited by the country's broadcasting authority, was "carried out in coordination with the US."
"This would be a clear violation of the War Powers Act 8(c)—further strengthening the case for Congress to urgently pass Rep. Rashida Tlaib's (D-Mich.) Lebanon War Powers Resolution," said Erik Sperling, executive director of the US-based advocacy group Just Foreign Policy.
Tlaib unveiled her legislation in late March, demanding the "removal of all US Armed Forces’ participation in unauthorized hostilities in Lebanon, including involvement in targeting assistance and intelligence sharing for the Israeli airstrikes and ground invasion."
"We must act now to stop this campaign of ethnic cleansing," Tlaib said at the time.
US Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.), who co-led the Lebanon resolution with Tlaib, said Wednesday that "the unaccountable, unlawful, inhumane campaign of death and displacement continues."
"The Israeli government continues to drop US-made bombs in Lebanon. More than 2,600 people have died, and over 8,350 people are injured," said Ramirez. "Congress can and must put an end to the violence in the region. We must Block the Bombs and pass the Lebanon War Power Resolution."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump Admin Slammed for Yet Another Move to 'Help Corporate Polluters' Exploit Alaska
One critic called the transfer of 1.4 million acres a "massive giveaway to out-of-state corporations that don't want to be burdened by the federal protections that safeguard our lands, waters, wildlife, and communities."
May 06, 2026
Defenders of the planet took aim at President Donald Trump's administration on Wednesday for transferring approximately 1.4 million acres of public lands along the Dalton Utility Corridor from the US Bureau of Land Management to the state of Alaska.
"This corridor encompasses some of Alaska’s most critical transportation and energy assets, including portions of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System corridor, the Dalton Highway, and proposed routes for the Ambler Road and Alaska Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) projects," the US Department of the Interior noted in a statement, framing the move as part of DOI's commitment to the Alaska Statehood Act, as well as orders issued by Trump and the agency's secretary, Doug Burgum.
As Burgum and Republican Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy cheered the development on Wednesday, Andrea Feniger, director of the state's Sierra Club chapter, declared that "this is less a transfer to Alaskans than a massive giveaway to out-of-state corporations that don't want to be burdened by the federal protections that safeguard our lands, waters, wildlife, and communities."
"Gov. Dunleavy has repeatedly shown he is more interested in helping the Trump administration and fossil fuel executives exploit Alaska than standing up for the people who actually live here," Feniger said. "These companies will not be satisfied until every corner of our state is opened to industrial development and short-term profit, regardless of the permanent damage done to the wild places, subsistence traditions, and communities that make Alaska unique. Alaskans deserve leaders who will protect these lands for future generations, not politicians willing to hand them over to corporate polluters."
Bloomberg reported that "Alaska's acquisition along the highway north of Fairbanks is part of 2.1 million acres" that Burgum offered earlier this year, after revoking a pair of decades-old orders. In March, a coalition of environmental groups, including Trustees for Alaska, filed a federal lawsuit over the secretary "unlawfully removing federal protections."
While Alaska filed a motion to dismiss the case on Wednesday, Bridget Psarianos, senior staff attorney at Trustees for Alaska, told Bloomberg that the land transfer is illegal. She also said that "the interior secretary broke the law when removing federal protections for over 2 million acres of public lands in February without hearings in local communities, without a public comment period, and without addressing that decision's impacts on land, water, and subsistence users."
Other groups supporting that suit include the Alaska Wilderness League, Center for Biological Diversity, National Parks Conservation Association, and Sierra Club, whose director of conservation, Dan Ritzman, condemned Wednesday's transfer.
"This action will only help corporate polluters transform Alaska into an industrial wasteland—destroying irreplaceable landscapes for the sake of expanding the portfolios of mining and oil and gas companies that will never have to live with the consequences of this destruction," Ritzman stressed. "This decision completely ignores the wishes of local communities and tribes that depend upon these untouched areas for their livelihoods, cultures, and regional identities."
"Alaska is home to some of the country's last true wild places, and projects like Alaska LNG and the Ambler Road threaten irreversible damage to these precious landscapes, the wildlife that depend on them, and the communities that have stewarded them for generations," he added. "These lands belong to all Americans, not corporate special interests looking to exploit them for short-term profit. We are fighting this in court and will continue opposing any other attempts to sacrifice Alaska's public lands for the benefit of polluters and extractive industries."
Rebecca Noblin, an Alaska senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, similarly told E&E News that "handing this incredible stretch of federal public lands over to the state puts the communities, fish, and wildlife who live there in danger."
"Alaska officials envision bulldozing the area for a private industrial mining road and the LNG pipeline boondoggle," Noblin said. "We're fighting this transfer of our federal public lands in court, and we'll keep standing up for Alaska's wild places."
Climate and conservation groups have also recently sounded the alarm about Interior's forthcoming fossil fuel lease sale for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge's Coastal Plain, and warned—in the words of Kristen Monsell, the oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity—that that Trump's "ridiculously reckless" plan to dramatically expand offshore drilling, including near Alaska, "could cause thousands of new oil spills, threatening almost every US coast."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Tennessee GOP Ripped for Rush to 'Shamelessly Capitalize' on Supreme Court Voting Rights Ruling
"You are deliberately trying to silence the voices of a community," said one Democratic Tennessee state senator. "You cannot call it anything but racism.”
May 06, 2026
Voting rights defenders in Tennessee on Wednesday condemned a racially rigged congressional map proposed by Republican state lawmakers in the wake of last week's US Supreme Court decision limiting challenges to discriminatory redistricting.
Tennessee Republicans unveiled a US House map that breaks Memphis—one of the nation's largest majority-Black cities—into three districts in a bid to make it likely for GOP candidates to flip the 9th Congressional District, which has been represented by Democrats for half a century.
"These maps have just been released that look like some coloring book from the Republican Party, without any clarity at a precinct level, of where these new districts are gonna be," state Rep. Justin Pearson (D-86) said Wednesday. Pearson—who is running to unseat incumbent Democratic Congressman Steve Cohen in the 9th District—drew national attention in 2023 when Republican legislators expelled him and Rep. Justin Jones (D-52) following their protest for tighter gun laws after the deadly Covenant School shooting in Nashville.
Tennessee Republicans just unveiled their post-VRA congressional gerrymander.It would eliminate the one majority-Black and solidly Democratic district by splitting Memphis 3 ways to install a 9-0 Republican majority.It also splits Nashville several ways to protect scandal-tarred Rep. Andy Ogles
[image or embed]
— Stephen Wolf (@stephenwolf.bsky.social) May 6, 2026 at 8:34 AM
"This whole process has been a sham," Pearson added. "It's been done in secrecy, behind closed doors, with backroom deals. This is just wrong. And everyone knows why this is happening. This is an attack on our Black majority district, this is an attack on our democracy."
US House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) weighed in Wednesday on the proposed gerrymander, writing on X, "MAGA Republicans are taking a blowtorch to Black representation in the American South."
Jeffries said that President Donald Trump "and Supreme Court extremists are responsible for this carnage," vowing to "crush them at the ballot box in November" during midterm elections.
John Bisognano, president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC), said in a statement, “This proposal takes an already egregious gerrymander to an even greater extreme by carving up Memphis into three districts, connecting it to rural areas hundreds of miles away, stretching as far as middle Tennessee—communities with needs far different from those of Memphians."
Bisognano added that the GOP proposal "robs Black voters of the ability to elect a congressional candidate of their choice—reversing a right that Black Memphians fought for with blood, sweat, and tears."
Democratic state lawmakers, civil rights leaders, and concerned citizens rallied outside the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville Tuesday to protest the proposal as a two-day special legislative session on the issue began.
HAPPENING NOW… marching on the Capitol…. #NewJimCrow @GovBillLee
[image or embed]
— The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) May 5, 2026 at 12:33 PM
Republican Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee called the special session just two days after the US Supreme Court's Louisiana v. Callais decision ordering the state to redraw its 2024 congressional map, which created a second majority-Black district to mitigate persistent barriers to equal representation.
Lee's move came a day after a phone call from Trump, who has urged him and other Republican governors to follow the lead of Texas, the first salvo fired in a redistricting war prompted by Republican fears of a midterm loss of one or both houses of Congress. Democrat-controlled California followed Texas' move, with other blue states including Virginia, Maryland, and Washington in various stages of enacting or considering redraws.
Republican Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry subsequently suspended his state’s scheduled May 16 US House primary election, a move that drew rebuke from liberal Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and legal challenges from Louisianans who already cast ballots in the contest.
The Louisiana v. Callais decision, which the court's 6-3 right-wing majority framed as limiting the role of race in redistricting, is now being used to defend maps where race still plays a decisive role, not only in Tennessee but also in other states that are moving to redraw their congressional maps to dilute Black voting power. Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis last week signed a rigged congressional map into law.
“The ink was barely dry on the Supreme Court’s disastrous decision to gut the Voting Rights Act before Tennessee Republicans rushed to be the first to shamelessly capitalize on it by proposing a gerrymander that systematically targets Black voters in Memphis... and ensures all of the state’s congressional districts are majority-white," Bisognano said.
Bold, blatant f*cking racism. They're gleeful about it.
[image or embed]
— catnan.bsky.social (@catnan.bsky.social) May 5, 2026 at 7:58 PM
Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R-25) said in a statement that “the Supreme Court has opined that redistricting, like the judicial system, should be colorblind—the decision indicated states like Tennessee can redistrict based on partisan politics."
“Tennessee’s redistricting will reduce the risk of future legal challenges while promoting sound and strategic conservatism," Sexton added.
Black Memphians weren't having it. Protesters interrupted the second day of hearings Wednesday as a House committee discussed the proposal, chanting, "Memphis is Black, there's no denying that!" and "Hands off our vote!"
“Memphis is Black! There’s no denying that!”House committee disrupted after Speaker sexton presents the racist Republican maps and claims race has nothing to do with how they carved up the city to dilute black representation with white power 🤔(From @gabbysalinas)
[image or embed]
— The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) May 6, 2026 at 3:06 PM
"Voters pick our leaders, not the other way around,” Memphis resident Amber Sherman told WREG. "Slicing up Memphis’ congressional districts across a state map will make it impossible for us to get fair representation in Congress because we know that adding a chunk of rural voters to urban cities will never give us fair representation.”
Nashville students confronted Sen. Joey Hensley (R-28) inside the Capitol on Wednesday about how the proposal will disenfranchise voters affected by the redistricting. Hensley's attempt to gaslight the students was caught on camera by The Tennessee Holler, which has provided extensive coverage of the gerrymandering effort.
HENSLEY: “Their vote will still count the same.”STUDENTS: “Then why not leave it the way it was before?”🤔🔥Sen. Joey Hensley (R-Hohenwald) tries to gaslight NASHVILLE students about the Republican push to strip representation from MEMPHIS… and gets immediately owned.
[image or embed]
— The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) May 6, 2026 at 7:09 AM
During Tuesday's session, numerous Democratic lawmakers objected to the proposal, with some invoking the deadly struggle of the Civil Rights era.
"I never thought in my lifetime as the youngest African American to ever serve in this body, in the history of this state, that I’d be standing in a body surrounded by my colleagues who are going to erase the vote of my city and Black people in Memphis,” state Sen. London Lamar (D-33) said, according to Democracy Docket.
“This will be one of the most racist actions taken in the modern history of this Legislature that you are participating in this week," she continued. "Intentionally breaking state law to take my community’s vote is downright disgusting and offensive.”
“This is an opportunity for you to have some courage, show some courage. Y’all know this is wrong,” Lamar added. “You don’t have to do it.”
State Sen. Raumesh Akbari (D-29) said: “There’s no way to sugarcoat eliminating a district that is 61% Black and breaking it up into three different districts. You are deliberately trying to silence the voices of a community. You cannot call it anything but racism.”
“History will not look back kindly on you when you had an opportunity to do what was right and you chose to do something else,” she added.
MEMPHIS SENATOR @raumeshakbari : “This is an act of hate. You cannot call it anything but racism. You cannot sugarcoat this.”Tennessee Republicans are diluting Black representation with white power, stripping their seat in Congress. #JimCrow @GovBillLee @MarshaBlackburn
[image or embed]
— The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) May 5, 2026 at 4:31 PM
As Democracy Docket reported: "The debate repeatedly returned to personal history. Black lawmakers invoked ancestors who had fought in wars, lived through segregation, and struggled for the right to vote, placing the proposed map squarely in the lineage of those battles."
The fight for civil rights in Memphis spans centuries, from the Reconstruction-era Memphis Massacre to the Ida B. Wells-led anti-lynching campaign to the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. to ongoing struggles over police violence, inequality, and economic justice.
Martin Luther King III warned in a letter to legislative leaders that the redistricting would "dismantle the only congressional district that provides Black voters in Memphis a fair opportunity to have a voice in our democracy."
“Do not take this nation back to the days of Jim Crow," he implored, adding that the “resulting disenfranchisement of Black voters would run contrary to everything that my father, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. fought for.”
Bisognano vowed to fight the GOP rigging attempt, saying that "Republicans are doing this because they think they can get away with it without consequence."
"But they are wrong," he added. "Tennesseans from across the state are already rising up against this un-American attempt to deny Black voters their voice at the ballot box, and, if enacted, this map will be challenged in court.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular