Monday, Dec 15th
Last update12:38:26 AM GMT
Human Rights Glance
After being told she needed to prove the Jewishness of her maternal lineage for four generations, Hillary Rubin is questioning her decision to move to Israel.
But after filing for a wedding license and being told she needed to prove the Jewishness of her maternal lineage for four generations, she is wondering whether she made the right decision in immigrating to a Jewish state that doubts her Jewishness.
Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the main force behind a plan to build a mosque two blocks from Ground Zero in New York, thanked on Tuesday the American Jewish supporters who backed the proposed center amid a widespread contoversy.
The pro-Israeli lobby JStreet collected over 10,000 signatures in support of the center that were delivered to the Landmarks Preservation Commission ahead of its vote on the Cordoba House (the commission unanimously voted Tuesday to deny landmark designation to the site).
Civil liberties groups sued the Treasury Department on Tuesday over its refusal to permit them to challenge the federal government's claim of authority to target U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism overseas for killing.
The Center for Constitutional Rights and the American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit against the department and its Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) in U.S. District Court in Washington.
Americans for Peace Now, a sister group to the dovish Israeli group Peace Now, has announced the launching a unique campaign on Monday, meant to sway public opinion against containing settlement construction.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared the construction freeze West Bank settlements, due to expire on September 26, in last November, after months of pressure from the Obama administration, and following a Palestinian refusal to begin talks without one.
Acomprehensive study of global lesbian, bisexual and gay rights, seen by The Independent on Sunday, reveals the brutal – and, in many instances, fatal – price people pay around the globe for their sexuality.
The research, which was conducted by the charity network the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA), shows that 76 countries still prosecute people on the grounds of their sexual orientation – seven of which punish same-sex acts with death.
When the CIA sent word in 2005 to destroy scores of videos showing waterboarding and other harsh interrogation tactics, there was an unusual omission in the carefully worded memo: the names of two agency lawyers. Once a CIA lawyer has weighed in on even a routine matter, officers rarely give an order without copying the lawyer in on the decision. It's standard procedure, a way for managers to cover themselves if a decision goes bad.
But when the CIA's top clandestine officer, Jose Rodriguez, told a colleague at the agency's secret prison in Thailand to destroy interrogation videos, he left the lawyers off the note.
The captive is one of the last remaining detainees at the Guantánamo Navy Base in Cuba, where 75 percent of the suspects captured in the war on terror have gone home. Four left in the last few days.
The majority of the 176 men left behind here spent the past months watching day-old recordings of World Cup matches, playing PlayStation 3, taking life-skills courses and occasionally seeing and chatting with their families via Skype. They enjoy Agatha Christie novels, but are awaiting the Twilight series in Arabic.
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