January, 27 2021, 11:00pm EDT

Groups Call on White House to Enact Merger Moratorium in Food and Agriculture Industries
Executive action is needed after waves of consolidation have harmed farmers, workers and consumers.
WASHINGTON
A diverse set of environmental, family farm, farm policy and rural community organizations sent a letter to the White House today urging the Biden administration to issue an executive order that would enact a moratorium on mergers and acquisitions in the food and agricultural industries.
The effort, led by Food & Water Watch, is meant to highlight the crisis of consolidation across the industry. The food system in the United States is heavily concentrated across all levels of the supply chain, with negative impacts on small farmers, industry workers, and consumers alike. Corporate consolidation has been accelerating since the 1980s, but particularly since the 2008 recession. Allowing additional food and agriculture mergers to proceed will only increase this consolidation which results in decreased income for farmers and higher grocery prices for consumers.
"Corporate control over our food system has destroyed family farms and raised prices at the grocery store. A handful of profit-seeking companies exert enormous control over everything from international supply chains to the very seeds that farmers plant," said Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter. "For the sake of building a healthy food system and helping the rural communities that have been devastated by corporate greed, the White House needs to take on corporate power."
"Here in Missouri, corporate consolidation has put tens of thousands of independent hog producers out of business gutting our rural economies and Main Streets. It's because our elected representatives haven't enforced or created the laws that stop the corporate takeover of our livestock industries," said Darvin Bentalage, a 4th generation cattle and grain farmer representing the Missouri Rural Crisis Center. "In order to create fair markets and protect Missouri's 50,000 cattle producers and all American family farms, we need to put an immediate halt to corporate mergers, step back and study the negative impacts of consolidation and then do something about it."
In their letter to the White House, the groups call on President Biden to issue an executive order directing the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission to strictly scrutinize mergers and acquisitions in the industries, and to withhold approvals of any new or pending deals.
"Corporate consolidation in the food industry has reached epic proportions. Today, just four corporations control over 80 percent of beef; just two corporations distribute 75 percent of the food in this country; one corporation sells nearly one third of the groceries" said Navina Khanna, Executive Director of the HEAL Food Alliance. "This handful of corporations are abusing their unprecedented buyer power to squeeze farmers and people working across the food chain further up the supply chain, while wreaking havoc on our communities' health and the environment in the process. With this executive order the Biden administration has a real chance to take a bold first step towards curbing this egregious monopoly and creating more democratic, transparent, and accountable food systems that work for people and our planet."
The groups are also calling on the White House to establish a commission to study impacts of corporate consolidation in the food and agricultural industries, and to direct the Department of Agriculture to investigate (under the Packers and Stockyards Act) any unfair and anti-competitive practices that impact farmers.
Angela Huffman, Vice President of Family Farm Action, said, "This executive order gives President Biden the ability to live up to his promise to ensure farmers and producers have access to fair markets where they can compete. He has the power to take this action. Failing to do so will only keep farmers, ranchers, and food chain workers in harm's way."
"America's monopolistic free-for-all has unleashed agricultural and slaughterhouse giants that routinely put profits ahead of the lives of their own employees, even during a deadly pandemic," said Barry Lynn, Open Markets Institute Executive Director. "Our new administration can take strong and bold action to radically improve workplace safety and to break apart these dangerous corporations. Or it can follow status quo and fail farm and food workers, small and independent farmers and ranchers, rural communities, and eaters in every city in America, yet again. We know President Biden wants to get this right. We look forward to working with his team."
Organizations endorsing this effort include: American Federation of Government Employees Council 45, American Grassfed Association, Animal Legal Defense Fund, Buffalo River Watershed Alliance, Dakota Resource Council, Dakota Rural Action, Green State Solutions, HEAL (Health, Environment, Agriculture, Labor) Food Alliance, Family Farm Action, Farm Aid, Food Animal Concerns Trust, Food & Water Watch, Friends of the Earth, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, Idaho Organization of Resource Councils, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future, Land Stewardship Project, Missouri Rural Crisis Center, National Family Farm Coalition, Natural Resources Defense Council, Open Markets Institute, Organization for Competitive Markets, Public Justice Food Project, Rural Advancement Foundation International - USA (RAFI-USA), Socially Responsible Agriculture Project, Western Colorado Alliance, and the Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC).
Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold and uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people's health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.
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Delayed But Not Denied: 2nd Hamas-Israeli Prisoner Swap Goes Through
"After a delay, obstacles to release of prisoners were overcome through Qatari-Egyptian contacts with both sides," a Qatari spokesperson said.
Nov 25, 2023
Despite an initial delay, the second round of hostages were released by Hamas on Saturday night.
The group included 13 Israelis and four foreign nationals believed to be Thai, Middle East Eyereported. Israel also began to release 39 Palestinian prisoners in exchange as the second day of a four-day cease-fire concluded.
"After a delay, obstacles to release of prisoners were overcome through Qatari-Egyptian contacts with both sides," Majed Al Ansari, a spokesperson for Qatar's foreign ministry, tweeted, adding that the hostages were transferred to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The Israeli military confirmed to The Associated Press that the hostages reached Israel after midnight local time. The hostages included seven children and six women, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said. One of the hostages, a young girl named Emily Hand, was previously believed dead by her father.
The swap appeared to be in danger earlier in the day when Hamas said that Israel had not allowed enough aid to enter northern Gaza, which has taken the brunt of the Israeli military's force since October 7, when Hamas attacked Israel, killing 1,200 and taking around 240 hostages. Israel has since killed more than 14,800 Palestinians in Gaza in its response. The two sides have agreed to a four-day cease-fire beginning Friday that will see a total of 50 Hamas-held hostages and 150 Israeli-held Palestinians released.
In explaining the delay, Hamas also said that Israel had not released enough long-serving prisoners.
"Civilians should not be pawns in a deadly standoff between warring parties who flout basic principles of humanity."
"This is putting the deal in danger," said Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas official in Beirut, as AP reported.
Sari Bashi, the program director of Human Rights Watch, criticized both sides for the delay.
"Hamas is obligated to release hostages, whether or not aid enters Gaza," Bashi tweeted. "The Israeli government is obligated to supply Gaza with aid, whether or not hostages are released. Civilians should not be pawns in a deadly standoff between warring parties who flout basic principles of humanity."
However, Egypt, Qatar, and Hamas later said everything had been resolved and the exchange would go forward, according to AP, sparking great relief from the hostages' friends and families.
"I was very nervous when I heard about the delay. I thought something would happen," Zohar, a classmate of 18-year-old Israeli hostage Noga Weiss, told Channel 13 TV, as AP reported. "It was a great relief when I saw her."
Egypt had also said earlier in the day that it had received "positive signals" from both sides about a possible extension of the cease-fire, Reuters reported. Netanyahu had previously said the pause would extend one day for every extra 10 hostages that Hamas releases.
Hamas said it expected Israel to release six women and 33 teenage boys on the second day of exchanges, AP reported.
One of the prisoners released Saturday was Shorouq Dwayyat, the Palestinian woman who had been held in an Israeli jail the longest, Middle East Eye reported. Dwayyat was first arrested eight years ago when she was 18. Israel claimed she stabbed a settler, which her family denies.
"We send a message to our people in Gaza that we stand by your side and support you," Duwiyat said upon returning home, as AP reported.
Another woman released by Israel was Israa Jaabis, who was arrested in 2015 with burns covering half her body, according to Middle East Eye. Jaabis' family said that she was burned when a defective cylinder of cooking gas ignited near a checkpoint, while Israel accused her of attempting a bombing. Israeli forces raided Jaabis' home ahead of her release, forcing any journalists or distant relatives to leave.
Police also raided the home of Marah Bkeer before her release Friday, Reuters reported.
"There is no real joy, even this little joy we feel as we wait," her monther, Sawsan Bkeer, told reporters. "We are still afraid to feel happy."
Dwayyat told reporters that Israel had threatened to re-arrest the released prisoners if they celebrated, according to Middle East Eye.
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Scientists Relaunch Campaign to Save the Endangered Axolotl
The Adoptaxolotl 2024 campaign invites donors to adopt a threatened salamander for around 600 pesos, or $35.
Nov 25, 2023
Ecologists in Mexico relaunched a campaign Thursday to protect the axolotl, an iconic Mexican underwater salamander threatened with extinction.
The Adoptaxolotl 2024 campaign invites donors to adopt a threatened salamander for around 600 pesos, or $35, The Associated Press reported. A virtual adoption comes with regular updates on the amphibian's well-being. Axolotl lovers can also buy one of the salamanders a dinner or purchase axolotl-themed t-shirts, bandannas, and mugs.
"The axolotl is at critical risk of extinction," Luis Zambrano González, who works at the Biology Institute of Mexico's National Autonomous University (UNAM), told the UNAM Gazette. "For this reason we need to understand its conservation as something that all of society is responsible for, to care for its habitat and develop strategies to allow people to relate more to these animals."
"Thanks to these surveys we realized that the amphibian is on the edge of extinction, and if we don't do something we will soon lose it in the wild."
There are 18 different species of axolotls in Mexico, and nearly all of them are considered critically endangered, according to AP. The salamander is famous for its unique appearance, as well as its ability to grow back severed limbs. Scientists believe that studying the axolotls' ability may help them to repair tissue damage or aid in cancer recovery, but they will have to work fast to uncover their secrets.
Zambrano told the UNAM Gazette that axolotl numbers had rapidly declined in surveys: from 6,000 per square kilometer in 1998 to 36 in 2014, a decline of 99.5% in less than two decades.
"Thanks to these surveys we realized that the amphibian is on the edge of extinction, and if we don't do something we will soon lose it in the wild," Zambrano said.
The campaign, which is organized by UNAM scientists, raised more than 450,000 pesos, or $26,300, last year to launch a captive breeding program and to restore habitat in the ancient canals of the southern Mexico City district of Xochimilco, according to AP.
The scientists said that the salamanders in Xochimilco were in danger because their habitat was menaced by urbanization, pollution, and invasive species, the UNAM Gazette reported.
"There is no more time for Xochimilco," Zambrano told AP.
So far, researchers have restored 40 floating islands and 5.5 kilometers of canal, created 36 biodiversity refuges, and installed 71 filters to improve water quality, the UNAM Gazette reported.
Axolotls are also susceptible to the chrytid fungus behind mass amphibian deaths worldwide, according to AP.
Scientists say more research is needed to truly know the extent of the damage to the axolotls' habitat and the risk to the all of the species.
Alejandro Calzada, who works for the Mexican government monitoring less popular species of axolotl, told AP that his team of nine is not able to monitor all the streams in Mexico City or the country as a whole.
"What I know is that we have to work urgently," Calzada said.
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'Sign of Hope' as First Israeli Hostages and Palestinian Prisoners Freed
The exchange came on the first day of a Qatari-brokered four-day cease-fire that is slated to see at least 50 Israeli hostages exchanged for at least 150 Palestinian women and children held in Israel.
Nov 25, 2023
The first 24 Israeli hostages held by Hamas in Gaza were released Friday evening in exchange for 39 Palestinian women and children held in Israeli prisons.
The exchange came on the first day of a Qatari-brokered four-day cease-fire that is slated to see at least 50 Israeli hostages exchanged for at least 150 Palestinian women and children held in Israel. The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that the pause would be extended a day for every additional 10 hostages released.
"It's a sign of hope for Palestinians and Israelis that the cease-fire will continue and the killing will stop," Mohammed Khatib, who watched the release of the first Palestinian prisoners Friday, toldBBC News.
"I'm very happy of course, but I feel devastated by how that deal was reached… at the cost of our brothers' and sisters' lives in Gaza."
The pause in the fighting has also allowed much needed aid trucks to enter Gaza. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that 200 aid trucks were sent from Israel Friday, of which 137 were unloaded by the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East, U.N. Newsreported. It's the largest convey of aid to enter Gaza since Israel's bombardment began October 7.
"Hundreds of thousands of people were assisted with food, water, medical supplies and other essential humanitarian items," OCHA said.
Four trucks full of gas and 129,000 liters of fuel also arrived in Gaza Friday.
However, Hamas has reportedly delayed the release of more hostages Saturday because it says Israel is not allowing aid to enter northern Gaza, Al Jazeera reported. The group said Israel had also violated the terms of the cease-fire by shooting tear gas and live ammunition at people who attempted to return to their homes in northern Gaza and by flying surveillance drones high over Gaza Saturday.
Hamas took around 240 hostages—both Israelis and foreign nationals—into Gaza during its October 7 attack on Israel that also killed around 1,200 people. On Friday, the group released 13 Israelis, including an 85-year-old woman and children as young as 2, as well as 10 Thai nationals and one person from the Philippines, The Guardian reported.
"Each of them is an entire world," Netanyahu said in response to the first release. "But I emphasize… we are committed to returning all the hostages. This is one of the aims of the war and we are committed to achieving all the aims of the war."
The families of the Thai hostages celebrated their return.
"We are all very happy. Everybody is crying," Rungarun Wichangern, the brother of 33-year-old Vetoon Phoome who was released Friday, toldThe Guardian.
Phoome, who was working on a potato and pomegranate farm near Gaza when he was captured, was one of 30,000 Thai nationals working in the agricultural sector in Israel before the war, and one of around 5,000 employed at farms near Gaza. The Thai government said that 20 more Thai nationals were still being held in Gaza.
The one Philippines hostage released was 33-year-old Gelienor "Jimmy" Pacheco, who had been working as a carer in Gaza. Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos said on social media that he was "overjoyed" by Pacheco's release, and that he was safely at the Thai embassy in Israel.
"I salute the work of the Philippine Foreign Service in securing his release, and once again thank the State of Qatar for their invaluable assistance in making Jimmy's release possible," Marcos said.
Another Philippine woman, Noralyn Babadilla, remains missing.
Meanwhile, jubilant crowds turned out in the West Bank to welcome the first Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli custody, according to BBC News. The group included 24 women and 15 teenage boys. They had been arrested for offenses ranging from stone throwing to attempted murder. While some had been convicted, others were awaiting trial. Of a total of 300 Palestinian women and children marked by Israel for potential release, less than 25% have been convicted.
Israel holds around 8,000 Palestinians in its prisons, 3,000 of whom were detained since the October 7 attacks, Al Jazeera reported. Nearly every family in the West Bank has had a relative detained at one point, according to BBC News.
The NGO Palestinian Prisoners' Club said that Israel had told the families of released prisoners that they could be fined around 70,000 shekels ($18,740) for sharing sweets to celebrate their loved ones' return, speaking to reporters, or having guests over.
One of the Palestinian prisoners released was 24-year-old Marah Bakeer, who was 16 when she was arrested for allegedly attempting to stab an Israeli soldier, something she and her family deny. Israeli forces shot her in the arm and hand 12 times before her arrest.
"I'm very happy of course, but I feel devastated by how that deal was reached… at the cost of our brothers' and sisters' lives in Gaza," Bakeer said.
The Israeli attack on Gaza has killed more than 14,800 people, around 10,000 of them women and children. This means Israel has killed women and children at a rate that outstrips the deadliest conflicts of the 21st century, The New York Times reported Saturday. More than double the number of women and children have been killed in Gaza in nearly two months of fighting than have been reported killed in Ukraine in two years. Using women and children as a conservative stand-in for overall civilian deaths would mean more civilians have died during these two months than were killed by U.S. forces in the first year of the Iraq War, and nearly as many as the 12,400 estimated killed by the U.S. and its allies during nearly two decades of war in Afghanistan.
"It's beyond anything that I've seen in my career," Marc Garlasco, a former Pentagon senior intelligence analyst who now advises the Dutch organization PAX, told the Times, adding that, for a comparison, one may "have to go back to Vietnam, or the Second World War."
The bombardment has also destroyed or damaged more than 60,000 buildings, and some Gazans used the pause in the fighting to return to their homes and survey the damage.
"Our home is destroyed, nothing remains standing. And most of the ducks and chickens were eaten by hungry street dogs," one older woman toldAl Jazeera. "This is not a war; it is a genocide."
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