In effort to dispel any rumors that Palestinians have rights under Israeli occupation, the Israeli Supreme Court turned down an appeal by two Palestinian hunger strikers to free them from detention without trial. Thaer Halahla and Bilal Diab are two of at least 1,550 Palestinian detainees currently on hunger strike after being held without charge under Israel’s so-called “administrative detention.” The strikes have become somewhat of a p.r. nightmare for Israel, drawing attention to its ongoing abuses and sparking international outrage from human rights groups. The Israeli group Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) condemned...

The Israeli military has officially closed its investigation into the killing of 21 members of a Palestinian family, ruling out any chance of criminal prosecution for the soldiers involved in the incident. The case goes back to Israel’s 2009 Gaza war-crimes-extravaganza which left over 1,400 Palestinians dead, roughly half of which were civilians. In this particular incident, 100 members of the extended al Samouni family were ordered into a house by Israeli soldiers… who subsequently bombed the shit out of it, killing men, women, and children. Surprise! What’s incredibly unsurprising however is that Israeli investigators...

Human rights activists are outraged over the 2010 death of Anastasio Hernandez-Rojas, a 42-year-old immigrant, after a new shocking video has been released of him begging and pleading with the border agents who tasered and beat him. “This shocking new footage of the death of Anastasio Hernandez-Rojas raises serious questions about the disturbing pattern of violence, death and, possibly, murder at the hands of the Border Patrol,” said Arturo Carmona, executive director of Presente.org. More than a dozen border agents can be seen hovering over Hernandez-Rojas as he screams, “No! No! Dejenme! [Leave me alone!] No!...

Reports of virginity testing performed on young Zimbabwean schoolgirls have been met with criticism from women’s and children’s rights groups who are decrying the practice as a violation of dignity and respect. The tests were carried out on Grade 7 girls at Tsetse primary school without parental consent; parents have claimed that “the Child Protection Committee and the teachers threatened to beat up the pupils if they did not reveal whom they have slept with.” Linda Valerie Guzha, the Zimbabwe Programme Director for Days for Girls, has termed the process of virginity testing on girls as “taking 10 steps back in...

U.S. soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division had quite the Kodak moment after orders led them to investigate and document the remains of three Afghan suicide bombers. Upon completing their mission, the paratroopers made the prudent decision to pose with body parts (heads, legs etc) and take pictures as if they were at a celebrity meet and greet. The LA Times broke the story earlier today, noting that they’d received the photos from a soldier who wanted to “draw attention to the safety risk of a breakdown in leadership and discipline” [within the U.S. Military]. The U.S. Army launched an immediate, “criminal...

The water supply of an all-girls high school in northern Afghanistan was poisoned in what educators believe to be a heinous attack aimed at deterring female education. Approximately 150 schoolgirls were affected by the poison, many experiencing symptoms including severe vomiting and headaches. Several of the girls remain in critical condition at a local hospital in the Takhar province. According to the education department spokesman, Jan Mohammad Nabizada, “We are 100 percent sure that the water they drunk inside their classes was poisoned. This is either the work of those who are against girls’ education or irresponsible armed...

Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth, Sweden’s Minister of Culture, was the subject of outrage after photos of her cutting into a cake depicting the genital mutilation of a stereotyped African woman circulated around the internet. Ummm Ya. Bad Idea. The cake was apparently an art installation for a tax payer funded event in celebration of World Art Day. According to The Local, the installation “was reportedly meant to highlight the issue of female circumcision,” and that it did! The most atrocious part of the exhibit, and yes, it does get worse, was the combination of screams coming from the head of the cake (a live performance...

Holy F*cking Sh*T! This is probably one of the most disturbing videos we’ve ever witnessed. Special needs student Andre McCollins was restrained and tortured with 31 electric shocks in one day at the Judge Rotenberg Center for the disabled. To make matters even more horrific, this video was sealed by a Massachusetts judge for EIGHT YEARS! According to their website: “The JUDGE ROTENBERG CENTER (JRC) is a special needs school in Canton, Massachusetts serving ages 3-adult. For 39 years JRC has provided very effective education and treatment to both emotionally disturbed students with conduct, behavior, emotional, and/or...

The use of fattening steroids among teenage prostitutes is becoming the norm in Bangladesh. Approximately 90% of sex workers in Bangladesh’s legal brothels use cow-fattening steroids to improve their appearance. Prostitution in the South Asian country is legal for those who over 18. However, some sex workers in brothels are as young as 12 and the girls younger than the legal age are made to take steroids in order to look older than they are. Forced to take the drugs by their madams, the drugs work to increase the young girls’ appetites, which adds curves and makes them appear healthy and older. The steroids also make them...

The European Court of Human Rights has removed the final significant obstacle to the extradition of five terrorism suspects from the UK to the U.S.. In ruling that extradition would not place the men at risk of human rights violations, the Court has effectively brought this contentious debate to an end. The suspects’ relatives have argued that the men should face trial in the UK, with the sister of one describing the decision to extradite as “a serious abuse of process.” The debate centres on the decision of British authorities to hand evidence over to the U.S., without examining it or deciding whether trial in the UK would...

The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) is the first non-LGBT civil rights group to support an executive order that would bar federal contractors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. MALDEF made the announcement recently with a letter from its president, Thomas Saenz, calling on President Obama to take administration action on the matter. Saenz points out in his letter that the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) has stalled in Congress for years. “MALDEF believes the time is now right to promote workplace fairness for LGBT individuals by taking strong executive...

Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton is attempting to revamp the city’s outdated human-rights protection laws by drafting an ordinance to outlaw discrimination against the LGBT community. The gap in the current anti-discrimination laws was brought to light in February after a lesbian couple was told they had no “grounds for a lawsuit” against the manager of District American Kitchen & Wine Bar who had them removed from the premises after customers “saw them kiss.” Currently, LGBT citizens in Phoenix are unable to file complaints with the Equal Opportunity Department for things such as housing, public accommodations,...

Women’s Rights – The Moroccan administration is coming under increasing pressure from women’s rights activists following the suicide of 16-year old Amina Filali, after she was forced to marry her alleged rapist. Her death has thrown the status of Moroccan women into the spotlight, with particular focus on Clause 475 of the criminal code that allows for a prosecution to be dropped if a minor agrees to marry her abductor. Official statistics indicate that, in 2010 alone, 41,000 female minors were married, a 25% increase on the previous year. Hanane Jazouani, a journalist at the Casablanca website Yabiladi, has suggested that...

LGBT Issues- Ohio inched closer to marriage equality on Tuesday when Mike DeWine, Ohio Attorney General, approved a petition for an amendment that would “redefine marriage in Ohio as ‘a union of two consenting adults, regardless of gender.’” The state’s 2004 constitutional amendment currently restricts marriage as being between “one man and one woman.” In order to put the amendment on the ballot, the Freedom to Marry Coalition (FTMC) must now gather “385,253 valid signatures of registered Ohio voters.” Something the coalition’s co-founder Ian James hopes to do by November 2013...

Human Rights – Protests and conflict have marked the passing of a controversial education bill in Turkey. The new law overturns provisions made by the military in 1997 by allowing for middle-school education in religious institutions. Turkey is built on secular foundations, despite being populated by a strong Muslim majority. The new bill has met with heated opposition from secularists who claim that it affords too much influence to Islamic schools and detracts from the country’s secular stance. Opponents claim that Islamic schools serve as a breeding ground for militant Islamism and remove the opportunity for middle-school...

LGBT Issues – Chile – Following the murder of Daniel Zamudio, who was beaten and tortured by a group of neo-Nazis because of his sexual orientation, the UN is urging Chile to pass stricter hate crime laws. In addition to calling for new anti-discrimination laws in the South American country, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Rupert Colville, has said that “Chilean lawmakers should make violence based on sexual orientation or gender identity ‘an aggravating factor’ in prosecutions.” Although Chile passed an anti-discrimination law in November of 2011 that included “measures against...