Protesters flood US cities to fight Trump immigration policy

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People participate in the Families Belong Together march in Chicago on Saturday, June 30, 2018. (AP)
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People rally at the Families Belong Together - Freedom for Immigrants March in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday, June 30, 2018. (AP)
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About 2,000 people protest Trump administration immigration policies outside City Hall in Portland, Maine, on Saturday, June 30, 2018. (AP)
Updated 01 July 2018
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Protesters flood US cities to fight Trump immigration policy

  • Trump's “zero tolerance policy” led officials to take more than 2,000 children from their parents as they tried to enter the country illegally, most of them fleeing violence, persecution or economic collapse in their home countries
  • In Washington, an estimated 30,000 marchers gathered in Lafayette Park across from the White House in what was expected to be the largest protest of the day

WASHINGTON: They wore white. They shook their fists in the air. They carried signs reading: “No more children in cages,” and “What’s next? Concentration Camps?“
In major cities and tiny towns, hundreds of thousands of marchers gathered Saturday across America, moved by accounts of children separated from their parents at the US-Mexico border, in the latest act of mass resistance against President Donald Trump’s immigration policies.
Protesters flooded more than 700 marches, from immigrant-friendly cities like New York and Los Angeles to conservative Appalachia and Wyoming. They gathered on the front lawn of a Border Patrol station in McAllen, Texas, near a detention center where migrant children were being held in cages, and on a street corner near Trump’s golf resort at Bedminster, New Jersey, where the president is spending the weekend.
Trump has backed away from family separations amid bipartisan and international uproar. His “zero tolerance policy” led officials to take more than 2,000 children from their parents as they tried to enter the country illegally, most of them fleeing violence, persecution or economic collapse in their home countries.
Those marching Saturday demanded the government quickly reunite the families that were already divided.
A Brazilian mother separated from her 10-year-old son more than a month ago approached the microphone at the Boston rally.
“We came to the United States seeking help, and we never imagined that this could happen. So I beg everyone, please release these children, give my son back to me,” she said through an interpreter, weeping.
“Please fight and continue fighting, because we will win,” she said.
The crowd erupted.
In Portland, Oregon, police ordered participants in a march by Patriot Prayer to disperse after officers saw assaults and projectiles being thrown. Some arrests were made.
The problems occurred as two opposing protest groups — Patriot Prayer and antifa — took to the streets. People in the crowd were lighting firecrackers and smoke bombs and police used flash bangs to disperse the clashing protesters.
In Washington, D.C., an estimated 30,000 marchers gathered in Lafayette Park across from the White House in what was expected to be the largest protest of the day, stretching for hours under a searing sun. Firefighters at one point misted the crowd to help people cool off.
Lin-Manuel Miranda, creator of the musical “Hamilton,” sang a lullaby dedicated to parents unable to sing to their children. Singer-songwriter Alicia Keys read a letter written by a woman whose child had been taken away from her at the border.
“It’s upsetting. Families being separated, children in cages,” said Emilia Ramos, a cleaner in the district, fighting tears at the rally. “Seeing everyone together for this cause, it’s emotional.”
Around her, thousands waved signs: “I care,” some read, referencing a jacket that first lady Melania Trump wore when traveling to visit child migrants. The back of her jacket said, “I really don’t care, do U?” and it became a rallying cry for protesters Saturday.
“I care!! Do you?” read Joan Culwell’s T-shirt as she joined a rally in Denver.
“We care!” marchers shouted outside Dallas City Hall. Organizer Michelle Wentz says opposition to the Trump administration’s “barbaric and inhumane” policy has seemed to transcend political lines.
“This is the issue crossing the line for a lot of people,” said Robin Jackson, 51, of Los Angeles, who protested with thousands carrying flags, signs and babies.
Singer John Legend serenaded the crowd and Democratic politicians who have clashed with Trump had strong words for the president, including US Rep. Maxine Waters who called for his impeachment.
The president took to Twitter amid the protests, first to show his support for Immigration and Customs Enforcement as some Democrats called for major changes to the agency. Tweeting Saturday from New Jersey, Trump urged ICE agents to “not worry or lose your spirit” and wrote that “the radical left Dems want you out. Next it will be all police.”
He later tweeted that he never pushed House Republicans to vote for immigration overhaul measures that failed last week, contradicting a post three days ago in which he urged GOP congressional members to pass them.
In Trump’s hometown of New York City, another massive crowd poured across the Brooklyn Bridge in sweltering 90-degree heat, some carrying their children on their shoulders, chanting, “Shame!” Drivers honked their horns in support.
“It’s important for this administration to know that these policies that rip apart families — that treat people as less than human, like they’re vermin — are not the way of God, they are not the law of love,” said the Rev. Julie Hoplamazian, an Episcopal priest marching in Brooklyn.
Though seasoned anti-Trump demonstrators packed the rallies, others were new to activism, including parents who said they felt compelled to act after heart-wrenching accounts of families who were torn apart.
Marchers took to city parks and downtown squares from Maine to Florida to Oregon; in Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico; on the international bridge between El Paso, Texas, and Juarez, Mexico; even in Antler, North Dakota, population 27. People braved the heat in Chicago and Atlanta to march.
Some of the demonstrations were boisterous, others were quiet.
Five people were arrested outside an ICE office in Dallas for blocking a road. At least one arrest was made in Columbus, Ohio, when protesters obstructed a downtown street. Light-rail service temporarily shut down in Minneapolis as thousands of demonstrators got in the way of the tracks. A rally in Portland, Maine, grew so large that police had to shut down part of a major street.
But in Dodge City, Kansas, a 100-person rally led by a Catholic church felt more like a mass than a protest.
In rural Marshalltown, Iowa, about 125 people gathered for a march organized by Steve Adelmund, a father of two who was inspired after turning on the news on Father’s Day and seeing children being separated from their families and held in cages.
“It hit me in the heart. I cried,” he said.
“If we can’t come together under the idea of ‘Kids shouldn’t be taken from their parents,’ where are we?” he asked. “We have to speak out now while we can, before we can’t.”
Drum beats and horns sounded as thousands of protesters took to the streets of San Francisco.
“We came here to let the president know that this is not acceptable,” said San Francisco resident Barry Hooper, who attended with his wife and two daughters.
His 7-year-old daughter Liliana clutched a sign she made, saying, “Stop the separation.”
Three thousand miles away in Washington, protesters ended their march at the white-columned Justice Department. They stacked their protest signs, written in English and Spanish, against its grand wooden doors.
“Fight for families,” one sign demanded.


China confronts Japanese politicians in disputed East China Sea area

Updated 13 sec ago
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China confronts Japanese politicians in disputed East China Sea area

BEIJING/TOKYO: China’s coast guard confronted Japanese lawmakers in waters claimed by both countries in the East China Sea, China’s embassy in Tokyo and Japanese media said on Sunday, the latest in a series of maritime disputes involving China and its neighbors.

Chinese vessels took unspecified law enforcement measures, the embassy said in a statement, adding that it had lodged solemn representations for what it called “infringement and provocation” by Japan near tiny, uninhabited islands that Beijing calls the Diaoyu and Tokyo calls the Senkaku.

The Japanese group, including former Defense Minister Tomomi Inada, was on an inspection mission organized by the city of Ishigaki in Okinawa prefecture, according to the Chinese Embassy and Japanese public broadcaster NHK.

Japan and China have repeatedly faced off around the Japan-administered islands. China also has escalating run-ins with the Philippine navy in disputed areas of the South China Sea, where Beijing’s expansive maritime claims conflict with those of a number of Southeast Asia nations.

Inada’s group spent three hours near the islands on Saturday, using drones to observe the area, and the Japanese coast guard vessel sought to fend off the Chinese coast guard, NHK said.

“The government and the public are aware of the severe security situation,” said Inada, a senior official of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, according to NHK. “The Senkaku are our sovereign territory and we need to go ashore for research.”

It was the first such inspection trip to the area involving a member of Japan’s parliament since 2013, NHK reported.

Officials of Japan’s foreign ministry were not immediately available for comment outside of working hours.

China strongly urged Japan to abide by what it called a consensus reached between the two countries, stop political provocations, on-site incidents and hyping up public opinion, the embassy said.

It asked Japan to “return to the right track of properly managing contradictions and differences through dialogue and consultation, so as to avoid further escalation of the situation.”


World Central Kitchen to resume Gaza aid after staff deaths in Israeli strike

Updated 13 min 8 sec ago
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World Central Kitchen to resume Gaza aid after staff deaths in Israeli strike

NICOSIA: World Central Kitchen or WCK said it would resume operations in the Gaza Strip on Monday, a month after seven workers of the US-based charity were killed in an Israeli air strike. Prior to halting operations, WCK had distributed more than 43 million meals in Gaza since October, representing by its own accounts 62 percent of all international  NGO aid.

The charity said it had 276 trucks with the equivalent of almost 8 million meals ready to enter through the Rafah Crossing and will also send trucks into Gaza from Jordan.

“The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains dire,” said the charity’s chief executive officer Erin Gore. 

“We are restarting our operation with the same energy, dignity, and focus on feeding as many people as possible.”

The April 1 deaths triggered widespread condemnation and demands from Israel’s allies, including the US, for an explanation.

Israel said its inquiries had found serious errors and breaches of procedure by its military, dismissing two senior officers and reprimanding senior commanders.

WCK is demanding an independent investigation. Israel’s six-month war against Hamas in Gaza followed an Oct. 7 attack by the militant group in southern Israel when more than 250 hostages were seized and some 1,200 people killed, according to Israeli tallies. Israel’s offensive has killed more than 34,000 people, Palestinian health authorities say, and caused a humanitarian disaster for the enclave’s more than 2 million inhabitants.

“We have been forced to make a decision: Stop feeding altogether during one of the worst hunger crises ever ... Or keep feeding knowing that aid, aid workers and civilians are being intimidated and killed,” Gore said.

“These are the hardest conversations, and we have considered all perspectives when deliberating. Ultimately, we decided we must keep feeding, continuing our mission of showing up to provide food to people during the toughest of times.” (Writing by Michele Kambas; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)


White House urges ‘peaceful’ campus protests after hundreds arrested

Updated 17 min 16 sec ago
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White House urges ‘peaceful’ campus protests after hundreds arrested

WASHINGTON: The White House insisted on Sunday that pro-Palestinian protests that have rocked US universities in recent weeks must remain peaceful, after police arrested around 275 people on four separate campuses over the weekend.

“We certainly respect the right of peaceful protests,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told ABC’s “This Week.”

But, he added: “We condemn the anti-Semitism language that we’ve heard of late and certainly condemn all the hate speech and the threats of violence out there.”

The demonstrations began at Columbia University in New York, but they have since spread rapidly across the country.

While peace has prevailed on many campuses, the number of protesters detained — at times by police in riot gear using chemical irritants and tasers — is rising fast.

They include 100 at Northeastern University in Boston, 80 at Washington University in St. Louis, 72 at Arizona State University, and 23 at Indiana University.

Among those arrested at Washington University was Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein, who faulted police for aggressive tactics she said provoked the sort of trouble they are meant to quell.

“This is about freedom of speech ... on a very critical issue,” she told CNN shortly before her arrest on Saturday. 

“And there they are, sending in the police and creating a riot.”

College administrators have struggled to find the best response, caught between the need to respect free-speech rights and the imperative of containing inflammatory and sometimes violently anti-Semitic calls by protesters.

At the University o Southern California, school officials late on Saturday closed the main campus to the public after pro-Palestinian groups again set up an encampment that had been cleared earlier, the school announced on X.

With final exams coming in the next few weeks, some campuses — including the Humboldt campus of California State Polytechnic University, have closed and instructed students to complete their classes online.

The activists behind the campus protests — not all of them students — are calling for a ceasefire in Israel’s war with Hamas and want colleges to sever ties with Israel.


Ukraine warns front ‘worsened’ as Russia claims fresh gains

Updated 57 min 43 sec ago
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Ukraine warns front ‘worsened’ as Russia claims fresh gains

  • Russia’s troops are advancing in the eastern Donetsk region
  • The US finally approved a $61 billion package of financial aid

VOZDVYZHENKA, Ukraine, April 28, 2024 Agence France Presse: Ukraine’s army leader admitted Sunday that Kyiv’s position on the battlefield has worsened after Russian forces captured another village in the east, pressing their advantage in manpower and ammunition.
Russia’s troops are advancing in the eastern Donetsk region as Kyiv awaits the arrival of much-needed US weapons that it hopes will stabilize the fragile front lines.
“The situation at the front has worsened,” Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky said in a Facebook post Sunday.
Ukrainian troops had “retreated” westwards to new defensive lines in a section of the front that runs past the city of Donetsk, controlled by pro-Russian forces since 2014.
Russia has “a significant advantage in forces and means” and had been able to notch up advances amid “heavy fighting,” Syrsky said.
“In some sectors the enemy had tactical success, and in some areas our troops managed to improve the tactical position,” he added.
Russia’s defense ministry earlier on Sunday claimed its troops had captured the village of Novobakhmutivka in the Donetsk region — around 10 kilometers (six miles) north of Avdiivka, which they seized in February.
The stark assessment of the picture facing Ukrainian troops comes at the end of week of ups and downs for Kyiv.
The United States finally approved a $61 billion package of financial aid after months of political wrangling, unlocking much-needed arms for Ukraine’s stretched troops.
But on the battlefield Russia chalked up more successes.
Its troops managed to make rapid advances in a narrow column to the northwest of Avdiivka.
In the village of Vozdvyzhenka, some eight kilometers from the fighting in Ocheretyne, AFP reporters saw civilians loading a small truck with furniture and belongings on Sunday.
“We’re going a long way from here... I don’t have time to talk because of the shelling,” one of them told AFP, before climbing into the vehicle and speeding out of the village.
Soldiers on the side of a road in the woods said they had originally been sent to build defensive lines.
“But the situation has changed. We were told not to take the shovels but to stay and wait for orders. The Russians are attacking and advancing,” one told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Syrsky confirmed on Sunday that Russia had made some “tactical” progress in that part of the front, but said Moscow had not yet achieved what he called an “operational advantage.”
He also said additional units were being deployed to replace those that had sustained heavy losses.
The recent setbacks have prompted rare criticism from Ukraine’s military bloggers.
“The (Russian) breakthrough near Ocheretyne revealed a number of problems,” the Deep State Telegram channel, with close links to the Ukrainian army, said in a post on Wednesday.
It said leaders of the 115th mechanized brigade, which is fighting in the area, were “responsible for the collapse of the defense in the entire sector, allowing significant losses.”
Kyiv’s forces are outnumbered across the battlefield, with the country struggling to recruit enough soldiers to replace those who have been killed, wounded or exhausted by the war, now in its third year.
Leaders in Kyiv have warned the military outlook could worsen in the next few weeks, while shipments of US weapons are making their way to the front lines.
“We are still waiting for the supplies promised to Ukraine,” said President Volodymyr Zelensky in his evening address Sunday.
Speaking after talks with Hakeem Jeffries, leader of the Democrats in the US House of Representatives, he said he had once again stressed the urgent need for Patriot anti-missile systems “as soon as possible.”
Ukraine’s head of intelligence at the ministry of defense Kyrylo Budanov said this month that the battlefield situation would likely be at its most difficult in mid-May to early June.


Philippines swelters in scorching heat as mercury hits record high in Manila

Updated 28 April 2024
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Philippines swelters in scorching heat as mercury hits record high in Manila

  • Children will attend remote classes on Monday, Tuesday in flashback to COVID times
  • Temperature in capital’s Metro region could surpass 40 degrees next month, forecasters say

MANILA: The Philippines is bracing for more blistering weather as temperatures in the capital region rose to a record high over the weekend.

Unusually hot temperatures have been recorded across South and Southeast Asia in recent days, forcing schools to close and authorities to issue health warnings.

In Metro Manila on Saturday, the mercury hit 38.8 degrees Celsius, surpassing the previous record set in 1915.

Elsewhere in the country, the weather has been even hotter, with Tarlac province seeing the mercury hit 40.3 degrees earlier in the year.

The hottest ever temperature recorded in the Philippines was 42.2 degrees in 1912.

Glaiza Escullar of state weather agency PAGASA told Arab News it was likely that some parts of the country would continue to see temperatures of 40 degrees and above until the second week of May.

March, April and May are typically the hottest and driest months of the year, but conditions this year have been exacerbated by the El Nino weather phenomenon.

The heat index, which also takes into account humidity, reached 45 degrees on Saturday, which the weather agency classifies as “danger.” It said it could hit 46 degrees on Monday.

“We are issuing a heat index warning just to emphasize that apart from the hot weather or high temperature, relative humidity has a factor in terms of health,” Escullar said.

“If (a person) is dehydrated or he is not in a good condition, the body tends to overheat because the sweating process is slowed down by the high relative humidity.”

In response to the searing heat and a nationwide transport strike, the Department of Education announced on Sunday that all public schools would be closed on Monday and Tuesday but that classes would be held remotely.

Jeepney drivers are staging a three-day strike in protest at the government’s plan to phase out the iconic vehicles.

Many schools in the Philippines do not have air conditioning and several were forced to close earlier this month and hold remote classes in a reminder of the COVID-19 pandemic.

High school student Ivan Garcia told Arab News the soaring heat was affecting his studies.

“The weather is annoyingly hot … I cannot focus on doing my school work,” he said.

Ninth-grader Adrian Reyes said he preferred to work from home.

“I usually leave the house around noontime and it’s really a challenge especially for me and others like me who have to commute to get to school,” he said.

“I prefer the asynchronous mode of learning because we have aircon at home.”