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ethnic cleansing
Trump Gives the World the Middle Finger
A float designed as part of a pre-Lenten celebration in Germany is the ultimate symbol of the second Trump era.
Mar 05, 2025
On a motorized float designed and built several weeks into the Trump administration for the Rose Monday celebration before Lent in Cologne or Koln, Germany, the likeness of U.S. President Donald Trump vividly illustrates what is becoming more of his view toward the world and toward citizens of the United States.
Trump Giving the Middle Finger to the World
On the float, Trump has the world perched on his middle finger, a derogatory symbol known worldwide.
With Trump and Vice President JD Vance’s mega-bully job on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday, February 28, 2025, Trump’s image of giving the finger to not only Zelensky, but also the leaders of the European community who met with Zelensky one day later on March 1 in London, seems to symbolize Trump’s view of European leaders.
Zelenskyy came to the White House to sign a deal for U.S. involvement in Ukraine’s mineral industry to pave the way for an end to the three-year war. The president has inspired many by refusing to flee Kyiv when Russia launched its invasion—“I need ammunition, not a ride” – delivering nightly addresses to rally his people, and visiting his troops on the frontlines.
The Guardian ironically characterized Trump as:
a profile in courage who dodged military service in Vietnam because of alleged bone spurs and who hid in the White House during the 6 January 2021 riot. Trump has reportedly described soldiers who die in combat as suckers and losers. He was impeached for trying to strong-arm Zelenskyy in 2019 and last week called him a dictator.
Statue of Liberty Knocked Flat on Her Stomach
Also on the float is a replica of the Statue of Liberty, a statue that is known from a poem by Emma Lazarus and placed as a plaque on the statue as a beacon of hope to those fleeing oppression:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost (tossed) to me.
Ironically, the inspiration for the poem came from Emily Lazarus’ “involvement in aiding Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe. After seeing the conditions in which many of these people lived, she expressed her empathy and compassion through the lines of the poem.”
On the float, the Statue of Liberty has been knocked down onto her stomach no doubt in reference to Trump’s idea of sending Palestinians away from their lands as a part of the Israeli genocide of Gaza and ethnic cleansing of the West Bank as well as a symbol of Trump’s deportation of migrants, calling them “criminals,” surely meant to inflame his blindly loyal MAGA base.
The Statue of Liberty also is no doubt offended by Trump’s proposal to sell a pathway to U.S. citizenship by offering a $5 million “Gold Card” visa to investors, replacing the 35-year-old EB-5 visa for investors who “spend about $1 million on a company that employs at least 10 people.”
Lady Justice on Her Knees
Lady Justice is depicted as kowtowing on her knees to the hundreds of Trump’s executive directives... except the courts are finally standing up to his pronouncements that are negatively affecting every aspect of our federal government’s ability to help its citizens.
While the anointed—but not confirmed—Trump alter ego, “Special Employee” Elon Musk, is supervising the destruction of many federal agencies and neuters those that do not fall in line with his mega-financial exploits with Telsa and Space X!!!
One Small Float Says It All About Trump and His Policies
It’s amazing that on one small float in Germany as a part of the celebration of the Easter season, the worldwide effects of Trump and his administration are portrayed with stunning accuracy.
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Palestinian Filmmaker Demands End to US-Backed 'Ethnic Cleansing' of Gaza, West Bank in Oscar Speech
"There is a different path, a political solution without ethnic supremacy," said Israeli filmmaker Yuval Abraham. "The foreign policy in this country is helping to block this path."
Mar 03, 2025
The winner of the 2025 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film has been unable to obtain distribution in theaters or on streaming platforms in the U.S.—despite being the highest-grossing Oscar-nominated documentary in the rest of the world—but American viewers were able to hear directly from its filmmakers on Sunday night in speeches that condemned the U.S.-backed "ethnic cleansing" of Palestinians.
The directors behind No Other Land, Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham and Palestinian activist and lawyer Basel Adra, accepted the Oscar while speaking out about the subject matter of their film, which was filmed between 2019-23, before Israel began its bombardment of Gaza in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack.
"When I look at Basel, I see my brother, but we are not equal," Abraham said. "We live under a regime where I enjoy freedom under civil law, and where he is governed by military laws."
Adra and Abraham made the film to tell the story of Masafer Yatta, a collection of towns in the occupied West Bank where Adra lives and where Israeli authorities and settlers have been attacking and evicting residents for years—claiming Israel has a right to use the land for a military training facility. The film chronicles Israeli soliders' killing of Adra's brother and their attacks on West Bank communities by demolishing homes, tearing down playgrounds, and filling water wells with cement so Palestinians cannot rebuild.
In his Oscar acceptance speech, Adra spoke as a new father of a two-month-old.
"My hope to my daughter is that she will not have to live the same life I am living now, always fearing violence, home demolitions, forced displacement that my community, Masafer Yatta, is facing every day," said Adra. "No Other Land reflects the harsh reality we have been enduring for decades and still resist as we call on the world to take serious actions to stop the injustice and to stop the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people."
Journalist Mehdi Hasan said he was "stunned" that the direct condemnation of "ethnic cleansing" targeting Palestinians was "supportively applauded" by the elite Hollywood audience.
"Times are changing," said Hasan.
Peter Beinart, editor-at-large of Jewish Currents, agreed, saying the success of No Other Land despite the refusal of U.S. distributors to bring it to U.S. audiences, and the enthusiastic applause that Abraham and Adra garnered, "must scare [the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee AIPAC] and its allies," naming the powerful pro-Israel lobby that holds sway with both Democrats and Republicans.
"They are winning politically but losing culturally," said Beinart. "Their attack ads can't stop Blue America's shift in collective consciousness on the question of Palestinian freedom. If politics really is downstream from culture, they're in trouble."
Abraham, who has reported extensively for +972 about Israel's rules of engagement in Gaza and its targeting of civilian infrastructure, called for an end to "the atrocious destruction of Gaza and its people."
"There is a different path, a political solution without ethnic supremacy, with national rights for both of our people," said Abraham. "And I have to say, as I am here, the foreign policy in this country is helping to block this path."
Israel, which is set to receive $3 billion in weapons in a package approved by President Donald Trump last week, has forcibly displaced Palestinians from the West Bank since January, when a temporary cease-fire was reached in Gaza.
Over the weekend, Israel once again began blocking all humanitarian aid to the enclave, where more than 48,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israel Defense Forces since October 2023.
Just before Abraham and Adra accepted the Oscar, the Palestinian news agency Wafareported that Israeli soldiers had detained three people in one of the villages in Masafer Yatta and settlers threw stones at residents, destroyed solar panels, and damaged water tanks.
No Other Land has received international accolades including at the Berlin International Film Festival last year, where Abraham condemned "apartheid" in his acceptance speech and subsequently received death threats.
On Democracy Now! on Monday morning, Adra repeated his call for the international community to "take measures and act seriously to end these demolitions and ethnic cleansing that is happening everywhere in Gaza and the West Bank."
"The world just keeps watching and not taking serious actions," said Adra.
Last week, advocates rebuked the BBC for canceling plans to air another documentary, Gaza: How to Survive a War Zone.
The fact that Adra and Abraham's film "can't get a distributor in the U.S.," said Hasan, "tells you everything about censorship in the U.S."
Abraham toldThe New York Times last month that the filmmakers have heard from many Americans asking how they can watch No Other Land, prompting them to release it independently with plans to show the film in about 100 theaters in the United States.
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In the Struggle for Undocumented Liberation, US Citizenship Is Not the Answer
When we reject the state’s power to define who belongs, and instead build systems of care that honor all people’s right to exist and thrive, we move toward real justice.
Feb 28, 2025
I am one of the 11 million undocumented immigrants who refuse to live in the shadows of the United States. Now that President Donald Trump’s policies are violently escalating, it’s critical to understand that none of this is new. Family separations, concentration camps, and the displacement of people are part of a long history of ethnic cleansing disguised as immigration policy. U.S. citizens are only now seeing it for what it’s always been.
I once believed anti-immigrant sentiment stemmed from a misunderstanding or a lack of empathy. But over the last decade, I’ve begun to accept what I need other undocumented people and allies to understand: U.S. citizenship is not the answer. True liberation for undocumented people will never come from assimilating into a colonial system built on our oppression. Instead, we must center the fight for Indigenous sovereignty, recognizing that dismantling these colonial ways of existing in the world—not gaining U.S. citizenship—is the key to our collective liberation.
At its core, U.S. citizenship is a legal and political status that grants individuals rights and privileges in exchange for adhering to certain laws and being loyal to its institutions. While it’s often framed as a beacon of belonging, security, and inclusion, in practice citizenship has functioned as a tool of exclusion. Programs like Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), introduced by former President Barack Obama in 2012, highlight this tension, offering relief to some while reinforcing the “good immigrant” versus “bad immigrant” narrative.
Citizenship alone won’t free us—but solidarity will.
I was sitting in my high school English class when the program was first announced. What started as hope quickly devolved into disappointment when I realized I was ineligible due to when I arrived in the United States. To qualify, applicants must have arrived before age 16, lived in the U.S. continuously since 2007, and meet education or military service requirements. They must also pass background checks. These requirements underscore that only undocumented individuals who contribute to the U.S. economy through intellectual achievements or who advance the nation’s war machine are deemed worthy of living without the constant fear of deportation.
While DACA has shifted the material realities of some young undocumented people by providing work permits, it simultaneously puts them in danger. Recipients must voluntarily disclose their undocumented status to federal authorities, submitting fingerprints, addresses, and other personal information—a process that must be renewed every two years. Despite being billed as a relief program, DACA inadvertently creates a new system of surveillance targeting undocumented youth.
The disclosure of personal information not only risks recipients’ safety but also discourages resistance. With their standing in the U.S. contingent on being “productive” and “deserving,” DACA recipients are pressured to become complacent and silent about the broader criminalization of undocumented people. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has targeted undocumented activists from across the country in retaliation for their advocacy efforts. Thus, DACA is not merely a program meant to protect; it also functions as a system to surveil and neutralize a whole generation of young people.
At the same time Obama instituted the DACA program, his administration also militarized the border and expanded deportations. The actions of the so-called “Deporter-in-Chief” demonstrate that programs like DACA are insidiously compatible with anti-immigrant sentiment. By creating a distinction between so-called “good” and “bad” immigrants, citizenship divides our community and reinforces the narrative that our worth is conditional. We are reduced to exploitable and expendable resources, mere cogs in a capitalist system.
Moving forward, we must center the material realities of undocumented people who don’t have an immediate path toward legal citizenship on the horizon. As a short-term strategy, we must continue to support harm-reducing legislation such as the New Way Forward Act, which severs ties between the immigration and carceral systems. In the longer term, we must also attend to Land Back movements, acknowledging that Indigenous people are the rightful stewards of this land.
Citizenship alone won’t free us—but solidarity will. When we reject the state’s power to define who belongs, and instead build systems of care that honor all people’s right to exist and thrive, we move toward real justice. Our futures are intertwined, and only by dismantling these violent structures together can we create the world we all deserve.
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