… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Category: human rights violations

  • Talking about Palestine “not a crime,” reminds UN Rapporteur Albanese

    Spread the love

    Original article by Ana Vračar republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

    Francesca Albanese during the event “Reclaiming the Discourse: Palestine, Justice, and Truth”. Source: screenshot

    UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese’s talks have faced intense state pressure across Europe, with Germany at the forefront

    Talks by UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese in Europe continue to face fierce pressure. Following the withdrawal of an invitation by some Dutch parliamentarians, German authorities have gone to great lengths to obstruct events where Albanese was scheduled to speak. Two German universities canceled events that had already been announced and had garnered widespread interest. However, activists secured alternative venues, ensuring Albanese could still present the results of her work.

    Yet even non-institutional venues were not spared from pressure. The publisher of Junge Welt, which stepped in to host the event “Reclaiming the Discourse: Palestine, Justice, and Truth“ after it was cast out from its original location, found itself facing nearly 100 police officers. Inside the hall, around 200 attendees gathered to hear Albanese speak. Despite protests, the police remained stationed at the venue throughout the event, serving as a clear reminder of the dire state of free expression in Germany. While the hosts are considering legal action against the police, such repression is expected to persist, as left-wing activists remain under surveillance and students organizing Palestine solidarity events at universities face persecution.

    Read more: German state continues crackdown on Palestine solidarity

    Organizations hosting Albanese, including the political platform DiEM25, have described these pressures as “a direct assault on the rule of law and the core principles of democracy.” Similarly, the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance – Reason and Justice, along with members of the left party Die Linke, condemned the suppression of academic freedom and the silencing of discussions on Palestine soon after the news of the cancellations.

    According to Albanese, Germany is the first country she has visited recently where universities have capitulated to pressure and canceled her speeches. “This gives me a sense of the state of the debate in this country,” she told attendees of Reclaiming the Discourse. Throughout the discussion, the UN Special Rapporteur emphasized the lengths to which many European governments are willing to go to suppress debates on Palestine—Germany, in particular, leading the charge. Despite the authorities’ repressive actions, she insisted that “it’s not a crime to talk about Germany’s implications and responsibilities vis-à-vis what’s happening in Palestine.”

    She also urged participants to reject fear and organize against the climate of repression surrounding discussions on Palestine in Europe, describing it as an atmosphere lacking oxygen. “It’s no longer [just] about Palestine,” she continued. “When I see police officers in Europe using the stick against people standing against injustice, when I see Jewish people in this country being lectured about what antisemitism is—I say something has gone wrong.”

    “I wouldn’t feel comfortable living in a country where you cannot talk about a people who are being genocided,” she added.

    Read more: A year of struggle for Palestine in the belly of the beast

    In their attempts to silence Albanese, Zionist groups and other right-wing organizations have attempted to smear her as antisemitic. Some have fallen for this ruse, but many more continue to stand by her and amplify her work. While audience members noted that university staff largely failed to publicly support her or defend academic freedom following the cancellations, Albanese pointed to the legal and academic experts, including in the Global South, who have spoken out, urging institutions to refuse such repression.

    “While our politicians and universities fail to show respect for a UN Special Rapporteur, we, as international lawyers, fail a colleague and a luminary in these dark times by not standing up for her against false and unfounded accusations,” wrote public and international economic law expert and professor Isabel Feichtner. “Most of all, however, we fail our students, broader society, and the very idea of human rights, which—if they are to have any meaning—must serve the powerless.”

    Original article by Ana Vračar republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

  • ‘Vulnerable Children’ at Risk as Trump Halts Legal Aid for Unaccompanied Migrant Youth

    Spread the love

    Original article by Jessica Corbett republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Unaccompanied minors are grouped apart from families waiting to be processed by U.S. Border Patrol agents near the Mexican border on April 10, 2021 in La Joya, Texas. (Photo: John Moore/Getty Images)

    The move was denounced by one immigrant rights advocate as “an affront to American values.”

    Migrant rights advocates are forcefully denouncing the Trump administration’s move this week to cut off legal services for unaccompanied immigrant children.

    Multiple organizations said Tuesday that they had received a “stop-work order” emailed from the U.S. Department of the Interior. Among them was Acacia Center for Justice. CBS News‘ Camilo Montoya-Galvez shared a partly redacted copy on social media.

    “Acacia’s Unaccompanied Children Program provides legal representation to over 26,000 children in and released from Office of Refugee Resettlement custody, protecting children from trafficking, abuse, and exploitation, helping immigration courts run smoother, and ensuring a modicum of due process, so that children navigating the immigration system alone understand their rights and legal obligations,” the group’s executive director, Shaina Aber, said in a Tuesday statement.

    “This decision flies in the face of ensuring children who have been trafficked or are at risk of trafficking have child-friendly legal representatives protecting their legal rights and interests,” Aber continued. “The administration’s decision to suspend this program undermines due process, disproportionately impacts vulnerable children, and puts children who have already experienced severe trauma at risk for further harm or exploitation.”

    Immigrant Defenders Law Center president and CEO Lindsay Toczylowski similarly said Tuesday that “the safety and welfare of children in government custody should be the primary concern of our elected leaders. Today’s decision by the Trump administration to eliminate access to counsel for 26,000 children is an affront to American values. The Trump administration is abandoning children for the sake of politics and leaving kids to fend for themselves against our complex immigration system.”

    According to Mother Jones, in addition to causing about 26,000 children to lose their legal representation—absent outside funding—the new order will lead to about 100,000 kids “missing out on programs designed to educate them about their rights.”

    President Donald Trump is known globally for forcibly separating migrant children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border during his first term and last year campaigned on various harsh immigration policies, including mass deportations and ending birthright citizenship. Since returning to office last month, the Republican has taken steps to enact his anti-immigrant agenda.

    “Trump’s decision to slash a 20-year-old program meant to safeguard the rights of the most vulnerable among us will only cause more chaos in our immigration courts and violates our commitment to children’s safety,” said Toczylowski. “We will continue to fight for their right to legal representation and to uphold our ethical and professional obligations. We urge the government to restore services immediately to protect children’s rights. Our government will be judged by how it treats children in its care. By all standards, this administration is failing them and self-inflicting a black eye as the rest of the world watches.”

    National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC) executive director Mary Meg McCarthy said Tuesday that “the Trump administration continues to choose politics over the rule of law and cruelty over humane treatment of children.” She also said that “this denial of congressionally appropriated funding violates federal law,” and mirrors Trump’s “mass firings and funding cuts of essential programs and agencies across the U.S. government.”

    As McCarthy explained:

    Decades ago, Congress passed the bipartisan Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) that recognized the unique vulnerability of children who travel alone to seek protection in the United States. The TVPRA codified the federal government’s obligation to ensure these children have legal representation so they do not face the risk of deportation without due process. Most unaccompanied children are eligible for permanent status in the United States under current laws. Attorneys help them safeguard their rights under U.S. law, connect them to essential services, and shield them from exploitation and trafficking

    […]

    Last month, NIJC and other legal service providers successfully sued the Trump administration following the unlawful stoppage of another congressionally funded legal service program. The administration’s failure yet again to uphold its legal and ethical duties does not eliminate NIJC attorneys’ ethical obligations to the hundreds of children we’ve committed to represent. We call on members of Congress to vocally oppose this egregious abuse of power by the executive branch.

    The Michigan Immigrant Rights Center wrote in a lengthy email about the order that “MIRC condemns this cruel action from the Trump administration, designed to inflict further suffering on vulnerable children and families,” including victims of labor trafficking and child abuse.

    MIRC also noted that “abruptly terminating statutorily mandated services violates the TVPRA, as well as the government’s clear obligations to children that it has otherwise agreed to during litigation, including the Flores Settlement Agreement (FSA) and the relatively recent Ms. L v. ICE settlement designed to prevent family separation, among other critical protections.”

    Original article by Jessica Corbett republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Power-mad orange gasbag Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
    Power-mad orange gasbag Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
    Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
    Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.

  • What’s So Dangerous About Trump’s Plan for Ethnically Cleansing Gaza?

    Spread the love

    Original article by Ramzy Baroud republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu participate in a joint statement in the East Room of the White House on January 28, 2020 in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images)

    Let’s be clear: The forced displacement of Palestinians is not a new idea. U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest proposal to take “long-term ownership” of Gaza, to “clean out” the “mess,” and to turn it into a “Riviera of the Middle East” is just the latest iteration of efforts aimed at ethnically cleansing Palestinians from their homeland.

    What makes Trump’s comments dangerous is not the immediate threat of U.S. military intervention in Gaza followed by the expulsion of its 2.2 million residents. The real danger lies elsewhere.

    First, Israel may interpret Trump’s words as a green light to push Palestinians out of Gaza or the West Bank. Second, the U.S. could tacitly endorse another Israeli offensive under the guise of fulfilling the president’s wishes. Third, Trump’s remarks suggest his foreign policy on Palestine will remain largely unchanged from his predecessor’s.

    Trump’s so-called “humanitarian” ethnic cleansing proposal will similarly go down in history as another failed attempt, particularly as Arab and international solidarity with the steadfast Palestinian people is stronger than it has been in years.

    Some Democrats have seized this moment to criticize Arab and Palestinian Americans who voted for Trump or abstained from supporting Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris in the last elections. However, the idea of ethnic cleansing was already being floated during the Biden administration.

    While then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated that “Palestinian civilians… must not be pressed to leave Gaza,” former President Joe Biden created the conditions for displacement through unconditional military support for Israel. This allowed one of the most devastating wars in modern Middle Eastern history to unfold.

    Just days into the war, on October 13, 2023, Jordan’s King Abdullah II warned Blinken in Amman against any Israeli attempt to “forcibly displace Palestinians from all Palestinian territories or cause their internal displacement.”

    The latter displacement became a reality as most of northern Gaza’s population was crammed into overcrowded refugee encampments in central and southern Gaza, where conditions have been and remain inhumane for over 16 months.

    At the same time, another displacement campaign is underway in the West Bank, particularly in its northern regions, accelerating in recent weeks. Thousands of Palestinian families have already been displaced in the Jenin governorate and other areas.

    Despite this, the Biden administration has done little to pressure Israel to stop.

    Arab concerns over Palestinian expulsion were real from the war’s outset. Almost every Arab leader raised the alarm, often repeatedly.

    Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi addressed the issue multiple times, warning of Israeli efforts—and possibly U.S. involvement—in a “population transfer” scheme.

    “What is happening now in Gaza is an attempt to force civilian residents to seek refuge and migrate to Egypt,” Sisi stated, insisting that such an outcome “should not be accepted.”

    Fifteen months later, under Trump, he repeated his rejection, vowing that Egypt would not participate in this “act of injustice.”

    The Saudi statement was issued almost immediately after Trump doubled down on the idea during a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on February 4. The Saudi foreign ministry went further than rejecting Trump’s “ownership” of Gaza but articulated a political discourse that summarized Riyad’s, in fact, the Arab League’s position on Palestine.

    “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs affirms that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s position on the establishment of a Palestinian state is firm and unwavering,” the statement said, adding that the Kingdom “also reaffirms its unequivocal rejection of any infringement on the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, whether through Israeli settlement policies, land annexation, or attempts to displace the Palestinian people from their land.”

    The new U.S. administration, however, seems oblivious to Palestinian history. Given the mass displacement of Palestinians in 1948, no Arab government—let alone the Palestinian leadership—would support another Israeli-U.S. effort to ethnically cleanse millions into neighboring states.

    Beyond the immorality of expelling an Indigenous population, history has shown that such actions destabilize the region for generations. The 1948 Nakba, which saw the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, ignited the Arab-Israeli conflict, whose repercussions continue today.

    History also teaches us that the Nakba was not an isolated event. Israel has repeatedly attempted ethnic cleansing, starting with its intense attacks on Palestinian refugee camps in Gaza in the early 1950s, and ever since.

    The 1967 war, known as the Nakba or “Setback,” led to the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, both internally and externally. In the years that followed, various U.S.-Israeli initiatives throughout the 1970s sought to relocate the Palestinian population to the Sinai desert. However, these efforts failed due to the steadfastness and collective resistance of the people of Gaza.

    Trump’s so-called “humanitarian” ethnic cleansing proposal will similarly go down in history as another failed attempt, particularly as Arab and international solidarity with the steadfast Palestinian people is stronger than it has been in years.

    The key question now is whether Arabs and other supporters of Palestine worldwide will go beyond merely rejecting such sinister proposals and take the initiative to push for the restoration of the Palestinian homeland. This requires a justice-based international campaign, rooted in international law and driven by the aspirations of the Palestinian people themselves.

    Original article by Ramzy Baroud republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
    Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
    Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
    Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
    Experiencing issues with this image not appearing. I suspect because it's so critical of Zionist Keir Starmer's support of and complicity in Israel's genocides.
    Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA

  • Probes Reveal Depth of Big Tech Complicity in Israel’s AI-Driven Gaza Slaughter

    Spread the love

    Original article by Brett Wilkins republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    An aerial view shows Palestinians walking through the ruins of destroyed buildings in the Jabalia refugee camp, northern Gaza Strip, on February 5, 2025.
     (Photo: Khalil Ramzi Alkahlut/Anadolu via Getty Images

    “Many nations are looking to Israel and its use of AI in Gaza with admiration and jealousy,” said one expert. “Expect to see a form of Google, Microsoft, and Amazon-backed AI in other war zones soon.”

    Several recent journalistic investigations—including one published Tuesday by The Associated Press—have deepened the understanding of how Israeli forces are using artificial intelligence and cloud computing systems sold by U.S. tech titans for the mass surveillance and killing of Palestinians in Gaza.

    The AP‘s Michael Biesecker, Sam Mednick, and Garance Burke found that Israel’s use of Microsoft and OpenAI technology “skyrocketed” following Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

    “This is the first confirmation we have gotten that commercial AI models are directly being used in warfare,” Heidy Khlaaf, chief artificial intelligence scientist at the AI Now Institute and a former senior safety engineer at OpenAI, which makes ChatGPT, told the AP. “The implications are enormous for the role of tech in enabling this type of unethical and unlawful warfare going forward.”

    As Biesecker, Mednick, and Burke noted:

    Israel’s goal after the attack that killed about 1,200 people and took over 250 hostages was to eradicate Hamas, and its military has called AI a “game changer” in yielding targets more swiftly. Since the war started, more than 50,000 people have died in Gaza and Lebanon and nearly 70% of the buildings in Gaza have been devastated, according to health ministries in Gaza and Lebanon.

    According to the AP report, Israel buys advanced AI models from OpenAI and Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform. While OpenAI said it has no partnership with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), in early 2024 the company quietly removed language from its usage policy that prohibited military use of its technology.

    The AP reporters also found that Google and Amazon provide cloud computing and AI services to the IDF via Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion contract signed in 2021. Furthermore, the IDF uses Cisco and Dell server farms or data centers. Red Hat, an independent IBM subsidiary, sells cloud computing services to the IDF. Microsoft partner Palantir Technologies also has a “strategic partnership” with Israel’s military.

    Google told the AP that the company is committed to creating AI “that protects people, promotes global growth, and supports national security.”

    However, Google recently removed from its Responsible AI principles a commitment to not use AI for the development of technology that could cause “overall harm,” including weapons and surveillance.

    The AP investigation follows a Washington Post probe published last month detailing how Google has been “directly assisting” the IDF and Israel’s Ministry of Defense “despite the company’s efforts to publicly distance itself from the country’s national security apparatus after employee protests against a cloud computing contract with Israel’s government.”

    Google fired dozens of workers following their participation in “No Tech for Apartheid” protests against the use of the company’s products and services by forces accused of genocide in Gaza.

    “A Google employee warned in one document that if the company didn’t quickly provide more access, the military would turn instead to Google’s cloud rival Amazon, which also works with Israel’s government under the Nimbus contract,” wrote Gerrit De Vynck, author of the Post report.

    “As recently as November 2024, by which time a year of Israeli airstrikes had turned much of Gaza to rubble, documents show Israel’s military was still tapping Google for its latest AI technology,” De Vynck added. “Late that month, an employee requested access to the company’s Gemini AI technology for the IDF, which wanted to develop its own AI assistant to process documents and audio, according to the documents.”

    Previous investigations have detailed how the IDF also uses Habsora, an Israeli AI system that can automatically select airstrike targets at an exponentially faster rate than ever before.

    “In the past, there were times in Gaza when we would create 50 targets per year. And here the machine produced 100 targets in one day,” former IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi told Yuval Abraham of +972 Magazine, a joint Israeli-Palestinian publication, in 2023. Another intelligence source said that Habsora has transformed the IDF into a “mass assassination factory” in which the “emphasis is on quantity and not quality” of kills.

    Compounding the crisis, in the heated hours following the October 7 attack, mid-ranking IDF officers were empowered to order attacks on not only senior Hamas commanders but any fighter in the resistance group, no matter how junior. What’s more, the officers were allowed to risk up to 20 civilian lives in each strike, and up to 500 noncombatant lives per day. Days later, that limit was lifted. Officers could order any number of strikes as they believed were legal, with no limits on civilian harm.

    Senior IDF commanders sometimes approved strikes they knew could kill more than 100 civilians if the target was deemed important enough. In one AI-aided airstrike targeting one senior Hamas commander, the IDF dropped multiple U.S.-supplied 2,000-pound bombs, which can level an entire city block, on the Jabalia refugee camp in October 2023. According to the U.K.-based airstrike monitor Airwars, the bombing killed at least 126 people, 68 of them children, and wounded 280 others. Hamas’ Qassam Brigades said four Israeli and three international hostages were also killed in the attack.

    Then there’s the mass surveillance element. Independent journalist Antony Loewenstein recently wrote for Middle East Eye that “corporate behemoths are storing massive amounts of information about every aspect of Palestinian life in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, and elsewhere.”

    “How this data will be used, in a time of war and mass surveillance, is obvious,” Loewenstein continued. “Israel is building a huge database, Chinese-state style, on every Palestinian under occupation: what they do, where they go, who they see, what they like, what they want, what they fear, and what they post online.”

    “Palestinians are guinea pigs—but this ideology and work doesn’t stay in Palestine,” he said. “Silicon Valley has taken note, and the new Trump era is heralding an ever-tighter alliance among Big Tech, Israel, and the defense sector. There’s money to be made, as AI currently operates in a regulation-free zone globally.”

    “Think about how many other states, both democratic and dictatorial, would love to have such extensive information about every citizen, making it far easier to target critics, dissidents, and opponents,” Loewenstein added. “With the far right on the march globally—from Austria to Sweden, France to Germany, and the U.S. to Britain—Israel’s ethno-nationalist model is seen as attractive and worth mimicking.

    Original article by Brett Wilkins republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

  • Human Rights Experts: Meta’s Trump-Friendly Policies Could Be ‘Conduit’ for ‘Genocide’

    Spread the love

    Original article by Olivia Rosane republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Mark Zuckerberg (C), CEO of Meta, attends the inauguration ceremony where Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th U.S. President in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda in Washington, D.C., on January 20, 2025. 
    (Photo: Shawn Thew / POOL / AFP)

    “Rather than learning from its reckless contributions to mass violence in countries including Myanmar and Ethiopia, Meta is instead stripping away important protections that were aimed at preventing any recurrence of such harms.”

    An expert on technology and human rights and a survivor of the Rohingya genocide warned Monday that new policies adopted by social-media giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, could incite genocidal violence in the future.

    On January 7, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced changes to Meta policies that were widely interpreted as a bid to gain approval from the incoming Trump administration. These included the replacement of fact-checkers with a community notes system, relocating content moderators from California to Texas, and lifting bans on the criticisms of certain groups such as immigrants, women, and transgender individuals.

    Zuckerberg touted the changes as an anti-censorship campaign, saying the company was trying to “get back to our roots around free expression” and arguing that “the recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point toward, once again, prioritizing speech.”

    “With Zuckerberg and other tech CEOs lining up (literally, in the case of the recent inauguration) behind the new administration’s wide-ranging attacks on human rights, Meta shareholders need to step up and hold the company’s leadership to account to prevent Meta from yet again becoming a conduit for mass violence, or even genocide.”

    However, Pat de Brún, head of Big Tech Accountability at Amnesty International, and Maung Sawyeddollah, the founder and executive director of the Rohingya Students’ Network who himself fled violence from the Myanmar military in 2017, said the change in policies would make it even more likely that Facebook or Instagram posts would inflame violence against marginalized communities around the world. While Zuckerberg’s announcement initially only applied to the U.S., the company has suggested it could make similar changes internationally as well.

    “Rather than learning from its reckless contributions to mass violence in countries including Myanmar and Ethiopia, Meta is instead stripping away important protections that were aimed at preventing any recurrence of such harms,” de Brún and Sawyeddollah wrote on the Amnesty International website. “In enacting these changes, Meta has effectively declared an open season for hate and harassment targeting its most vulnerable and at-risk people, including trans people, migrants, and refugees.”

    Past research has shown that Facebook’s algorithms can promote hateful, false, or racially provocative content in an attempt to increase the amount of time users spend on the site and therefore the company’s profits, sometimes with devastating consequences.

    One example is what happened to the Rohingya, as de Brún and Sawyeddollah explained:

    We have seen the horrific consequences of Meta’s recklessness before. In 2017, Myanmar security forces undertook a brutal campaign of ethnic cleansing against Rohingya Muslims. A United Nations Independent Fact-Finding Commission concluded in 2018 that Myanmar had committed genocide. In the years leading up to these attacks, Facebook had become an echo chamber of virulent anti-Rohingya hatred. The mass dissemination of dehumanizing anti-Rohingya content poured fuel on the fire of long-standing discrimination and helped to create an enabling environment for mass violence. In the absence of appropriate safeguards, Facebook’s toxic algorithms intensified a storm of hatred against the Rohingya, which contributed to these atrocities. According to a report by the United Nations, Facebook was instrumental in the radicalization of local populations and the incitement of violence against the Rohingya.

    In late January, Sawyeddollah—with the support of Amnesty International, the Open Society Justice Initiative, and Victim Advocates International—filed a whistleblower’s complaint against Meta with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) concerning Facebook’s role in the Rohingya genocide.

    The complaint argued that the company, then registered as Facebook, had known or at least “recklessly disregarded” since 2013 that its algorithm was encouraging the spread of anti-Rohingya hate speech and that its content moderation policies were not sufficient to address the issue. Despite this, it misrepresented the situation to both the SEC and investors in multiple filings.

    Now, Sawyeddollah and de Brún are concerned that history could repeat itself unless shareholders and lawmakers take action to counter the power of the tech companies.

    “With Zuckerberg and other tech CEOs lining up (literally, in the case of the recent inauguration) behind the new administration’s wide-ranging attacks on human rights, Meta shareholders need to step up and hold the company’s leadership to account to prevent Meta from yet again becoming a conduit for mass violence, or even genocide,” they wrote. “Similarly, legislators and lawmakers in the U.S. must ensure that the SEC retains its neutrality, properly investigate legitimate complaints—such as the one we recently filed, and ensure those who abuse human rights face justice.”

    The human rights experts aren’t the only ones concerned about Meta’s new direction. Even employees are sounding the alarm.

    “I really think this is a precursor for genocide,” one former employee told Platformer when the new policies were first announced. “We’ve seen it happen. Real people’s lives are actually going to be endangered. I’m just devastated.”

    Original article by Olivia Rosane republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
    Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
    Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
    Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.