vandalism
Image via benketaro / Flickr
The charges come in the wake of the publication of a report by No More Deaths and La Coalición de Derechos Humanos that indicated at least 3,586 gallon jugs of water destroyed in the desert region near Arivaca, Ariz., by U.S. Border Patrol agents between 2012-2015.
“Yes. I saw water bottles stabbed," Miguel, a migrant from Sinaloa, Mexico, said in the report. "They break the bottles so you can’t even use them to fill up at the tanks. I needed water, some of the other people in the group needed water, but we found them destroyed."
Image via Minerva Studio/Shutterstock.com
The incident seems like a straightforward hate crime: Swastikas sprayed in and around the New Jersey home of an Indian-American running for Congress earlier this month.
But the vandalism is steeped in religious and ethnic irony.
The Bethlehem Chapel and Organwere defaced with green paint. Photo courtesy Washington National Cathedral.
Washington police arrested a 58-year-old woman after two chapels in the Washington National Cathedral were defaced with green paint Monday afternoon.
The arrest follows similar vandalism Friday to the Lincoln Memorial and a statue near the Smithsonian Castle on the National Mall. Police are testing paint samples to determine whether the three incidents are connected.
Police charged Tian Jiamel, who has no permanent address, with one count of defacing property.
U.S. Park Police investigators questioned her Monday night. Two police officials told The Washington Post that federal police had been seeking an Asian female who was possibly homeless.
Illustration by Sandi Villarreal / Sojourners
A few weeks ago, we asked you to sign a petition asking the Department of Justice to investigate hate crimes against the Islamic Society of Joplin’s mosque. Federal officials are offering $15,000 for information leading to the man who set the mosque on fire July 4th.
Beau Underwood wrote for Sojourners two weeks ago: “The biblical call to love our neighbors as ourselves requires Christians to speak out against these attacks. By protecting the rights of American Muslims to worship in the United States, we provide a powerful witness to those countries where Christian minorities face attack and persecution, such as Nigeria, Egypt, Somalia, and Kenya. If we expect others to take our advocacy for global religious freedom seriously, then our efforts must begin in our own backyard.”
More than 5,500 of you signed this petition, which is incredible! But we don’t have to stop there.
The news that Israel’s memorial to Holocaust victims had been grafittied in early June with bitterly anti-Semitic and anti-Israel statements was shocking.
More shocking still was the news that the three men arrested for the crime are Jewish.
How could Jews desecrate the memories of millions of fellow Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis?
The religious identities of the culprits -- however surprising to many who read of their arrests last Tuesday (June 26) -- did not surprise many Israelis, however. They know that a number of ultra-Orthodox Jews, for religious reasons, believe the State of Israel should not yet exist.
A protester from Occupy Oakland is arrested in Oakland on January 28, 2012. Photo via Getty Images.
It’s deadline day for Occupy DC:
From MSNBC - Occupy protesters in the nation's capital were preparing for a noon Monday deadline set by federal park authorities to end camping at some of the movement's last remaining large encampments, with some "surprises" in store, one of the activists said.
From The Huffington Post - U.S. Park Police say an officer used an electronic stun gun on an Occupy DC participant who was tearing down fliers warning protesters about the ban on camping in McPherson Square.
Violence escalates at Occupy Oakland – tear gas used, hundreds arrested
From The Associated Press - The demonstrations in downtown Oakland broke a lull that had seen just a smattering of people taking to Oakland's streets in recent weeks for occasional marches that bore little resemblance to the headline-grabbing Occupy demonstrations of last fall.
Occupy Wall Sreet, false idols and a moral economy. Breaking the cycle of poverty. Poorest poor in U.S. hits a new record: 1 in 15 people. As poverty deepens, giving to the poor declines. Arianna Huffington: Shakespeare, the Bible and America's shift into a punitive society. Peaceful Occupy Oakland march followed by late-night clashes.