Man on the Spot #49: Gaza, Baghdad, Mental Health Care

Posted by bob on August 24, 2014 in Blog | 0 comments

Arab Leaders, Viewing Hamas as Worse Than Israel, Stay …

By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK JULY 30, 2014

Egyptian officials have directly or implicitly blamed Hamas instead of Israel for Palestinian deaths in the fighting, even when, for example, United Nations schools have been hit by Israeli shells, something that occurred again on Wednesday.

Hospitals in Gaza Overwhelmed as Attacks Continue – The …

By BEN HUBBARD and FARES AKRAMAUG. 2, 2014

RAFAH, Gaza Strip — It was clear from the bodies laid out in the parking lot of the maternity hospital here that it had assumed new duties: No longer a place that welcomed new life, it was now a makeshift morgue.

Other bodies lay in hallways and on the floor of the kitchen at Hilal Emirati Maternity Hospital. In the walk-in cooler, they were stacked three high, waiting for relatives to claim them for burial.

In Fatal Flash, Gaza Psychologist Switches Roles, Turning Into

By ANNE BARNARD AUG. 4, 2014

Dr. Zeyada, 50, works to destigmatize mental health care for a Palestinian population exposed repeatedly to war and displacement, practicing at the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, which was led by the pioneering Palestinian psychiatrist and human-rights advocate Dr. Eyad El-Sarraj until his death from leukemia in December.

Gaza War Strains Relations Between US and Israel – The …

By MARK LANDLER AUG. 4, 2014

Even as the White House harshly criticized the Israeli strike on the school, the Pentagon confirmed that last Friday it had resupplied the Israeli military with ammunition under a longstanding military aid agreement. Mr. Obama swiftly signed a bill Monday giving Israel $225 million in emergency aid for its Iron Dome antimissile system.

Covering New War, in Shadow of Old One – NYTimes.com

JUNE 28, 2014 MARGARET SULLIVAN

THE lead-up to the war in Iraq in 2003 was not The Times’s finest hour. Some of the news reporting was flawed, driven by outside agendas and lacking in needed skepticism. Many Op-Ed columns promoted the idea of a war that turned out to be both unfounded and disastrous.

Tears, and Anger, as Militants Destroy Iraq City’s Relics …

By TIM ARANGO JULY 30, 2014

BAGHDAD — When the Sunni extremists ruling Mosul destroyed the shrine of a prophet whose story features in the traditions of Islam, Christianity and Judaism — the most important of nearly two dozen marked for destruction by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria in the first seven weeks of its reign — small groups of residents gathered to mourn.

Noam Chomsky | Nightmare in Gaza – Truthout

In an interview, human rights lawyer Raji Sourani, who has remained in Gaza through years of Israeli brutality and terror, said, “The most common sentence I heard when people began to talk about cease-fire: Everybody says it’s better for all of us to die and not go back to the situation we used to have before this war. We don’t want that again. We have no dignity, no pride; we are just soft targets, and we are very cheap.

In Sweden, Dinners Melt Cultural Barriers – NYTimes.com

By SUZANNE DALEYJULY 30, 2014

STOCKHOLM — Last year, when Ebba Akerman, 31, was teaching Swedish to immigrants in the suburbs of this city, she ran into one of her students on the train and asked him whether he enjoyed living in her country.

She found the answer deeply disturbing. The man shrugged, saying his life here was not much different from the one he had left behind in Afghanistan.

Looking at Link Between Violent Video Games and … – Bits

By NICK BILTOn  JUNE 15, 2014 11:00 AM

Studies on the impact of video game violence by research institutes, universities and psychologists have been inconclusive. For seemingly every report that says video games lead to real-world shootings, there have been others rebutting those claims.

But new psychological studies are finding that as violent games become more realistic, constantly playing them can lead to a desensitization toward real violence.

Safer Era Tests Wisdom of ‘Broken Windows’ Focus on …

By JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN JULY 24, 2014

A controversy over chokeholds expands to an increase in pretty-offense arrests. Some officers have said they were under pressure from commanders to raise their arrest numbers, which supervisors use to gauge productivity. But as the city grew safer, the police also pursued ever lower violations, such as having a foot on a subway seat. Years after cracking down on turnstile jumpers, the police started a push to arrest people who stood outside the turnstile, asking others for a swipe of their MetroCard.

A Unanimous Supreme Court: Abortion Rights Lose a Buffer 

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD JUNE 26, 2014

Yet on Thursday the Supreme Court, in McCullen v. Coakley, struck down that law for violating the First Amendment. Massachusetts’s buffer zone, it held, burdened “substantially more speech than necessary” to protect public safety. If individual protesters try to block a clinic entrance or harass a prospective client, the court said, Massachusetts already has laws on the books to deal with them.

The Outrageous Shackling of Pregnant Inmates – NYTimes …

By AUDREY QUINNJULY 26, 2014

EARLY one morning in November 2011, Tina Tinen, a pregnant prisoner at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in Westchester County, N.Y., woke with painful contractions. Guards called an ambulance to take her to the hospital and, according to her account, shackled her wrist to the bar of a gurney — despite a 2009 state law against shackling pregnant inmates during and after labor.

Rape Evidence Backlog – NYTimes.com

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD JUNE 28, 2014

The failure of police departments around the country to test and analyze evidence connected to sexual assaults shows contempt for victims, public safety and justice. Medical personnel collect saliva, semen, blood, hair and other DNA evidence from victims after an attack in so-called rape kits. These kits, however, often sit unopened for years in police evidence rooms or public crime labs.

New York’s Abortion Protest Law Is Praised by Justices, but …

To the unfamiliar observer, the scene, repeated almost every Saturday morning at Choices and other clinics that perform abortions in New York City, would appear to be nothing so much as unbridled chaos. But it is also seen as one model for how abortion protests in the United States should be managed.

What’s Lost as Handwriting Fades – NYTimes.com

By MARIA KONNIKOVA JUNE 2, 2014

But psychologists and neuroscientists say it is far too soon to declare handwriting a relic of the past. New evidence suggests that the links between handwriting and broader educational development run deep.

Children not only learn to read more quickly when they first learn to write by hand, but they also remain better able to generate ideas and retain information. In other words, it’s not just what we write that matters — but how.

Chester Nez, 93, Dies; Navajo Words Washed From Mouth …

By MARGALIT FOX JUNE 5, 2014

Chester Nez was born on Jan. 23, 1921, in Chichiltah, N.M., known in English as Two Wells, and reared on the Navajo reservation nearby. His mother died when he was very young.

“When joining the Marine Corps, I thought about how my people were mistreated,” Mr. Nez said in a 2005 interview. “But then I thought this would be my chance to do something for my country.”

Taking a Bullet, Gaining a Cause: James S. Brady Dies at 73

By JAMES BARRON AUG. 4, 2014

When he was pressing for the Brady bill, Mr. Brady dismissed as “lamebrain nonsense” the National Rifle Association’s contention that a waiting period would inconvenience law-abiding people who had reason to buy a gun. The idea behind the waiting period was to give the seller time to check on whether the prospective purchaser had a criminal record or had lied in supplying information on the required documents.

Coroner Is Said to Rule James Brady’s Death a Homicide, 33 Years After a Shooting

By NICK CORASANITI AUG. 8, 2014

WASHINGTON — The death this week of James S. Brady, the former White House press secretary, has been ruled a homicide 33 years after he was wounded in an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan, police department officials here said Friday.